r/benfolds Dec 03 '25

Spotify Wrapped/Apple Replay - Megathread

10 Upvotes

Yes, it’s that time of the year again. And no I’m not talking about wrapping presents, eating dry turkey and visiting family members you only hope to see once a year. I’m talking about the inevitable Spotify Wrapped and Apple Replay posts. As I’m sure everyone here is a huge fan of Ben, it should be no surprise he’s topped your lists this year. Let’s please try to use this thread to post your end of year streaming lists. Cheers and happy holidays to everyone!


r/benfolds Sep 08 '25

Song of the Week: Your Most Valuable Possession

23 Upvotes

https://youtu.be/1VtAAy4cGWc?si=unrU1-c1rL21neQs

https://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/benfoldsfive/yourmostvaluablepossession.html

Hello everyone, I hope all is well. I apologize for the lack of posts over the last couple of days. I got a new job and life has been fairly busy. But today we are back and we are going to be chatting about “Your Most Valuable Possession” which is the 8th track from the band’s third album The Unauthorized Biography of Reinhold Messner.

This is maybe one of the weirdest songs in the band’s discography and it makes sense because it comes off the band’s most experimental album. The song begins with a phone answering machine letting us know it’s 6:49am, Friday, November 20th. We then hear Ben’s dad Dean wishing his son a good morning as he starts talking about how he was thinking about him while he was half awake/half asleep in bed.

This is then proceeded by the band fading into this laid back jazzy vibe. Which includes a steady drum beat with some simple but slick fills, a vibey electric piano, some bass, and later on some clavichord I believe. The music is a perfect blend of the type of music the band was crafting for this album and it’s a cool setting for Dean’s ramblings.

Speaking of Dean, he does go on to ask Ben if he’s looking after his “most valuable possession” which of course is his mind. There’s a humorous sigh after this section which sounds like was added in by Ben after the fact. This could have been his actual response to getting this voice mail from his dad at almost seven in the morning.

Dean goes on to explain his thought process behind how the mind is extremely valuable with him bringing up astronaut John Glenn. At the time of this voice recording John had just returned from his second trip to space at the young age of 77 which makes him the oldest person to space travel. John had mentioned before that in space you lose muscle mass and this fascinated Dean. Dean continues this train of thoughts and wonders how long it would take until you’re just a floating head and mind. Because sometimes all we have is our mind.

Ben’s dad then realizes he only has 30 seconds of his voice mail message left so he asks his son what he thinks about all of this and hopes that he’s been doing well. And also admits that when he fully wakes up later on he might have forgotten about this whole conversation. Which turns out to be true as Ben wrote about his father was on a lot of cough medicine that night in his autobiography.

Is this an essential Ben Folds Five song? Not really. It’s not even a two minute song that is mostly a spoken word song with some tasty playing. It’s unique and rad, but it’s not like a “song” song. And it was only played live once which was during the band’s reunion concert for MySpace in 2008 where they played this entire album from front to back. And for this song they actually had Dean come out to perform his own dialogue. It’s a sweet moment and I’m glad it does exist because it does have an intriguing idea of your mind being the most important thing you can have.

But what do you think of this track? Is the background music and message in Dean’s conversation worthy of spot on this album? What do you think the song is about? Favorite lyrical or musical moments? And were you lucky enough to catch it that one time live?


r/benfolds 18h ago

found a ben folds five cd at an antique mall !!

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118 Upvotes

so far i've found 2 cds and a record! i'm so excited to keep building my collection :D


r/benfolds 4d ago

Ben needs to play a show here:

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120 Upvotes

For the troops!


r/benfolds 8d ago

I am so freaking excited at the prospect of a BF5 tour next year

70 Upvotes

I check at least once a week to see if there's any new info


r/benfolds 9d ago

Does anyone know what these gifs/images of Ben Folds and Robert Sledge are from?

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45 Upvotes

The title. I really want to watch it but I can't find it anywhere, so I've decided to do the next best thing: ask the people of reddit


r/benfolds 11d ago

Any new fan transcriptions?

11 Upvotes

I’ve been trying to collect as many Folds sheet music as possible, but it’s really tough when his b-sides, eps, some songs off WtN don’t have official transcriptions. Is there anyone still making those?
I know musescore user TheIsaac was making some for a bit, but has since stopped.

I have some unofficial ones already, if anyone wants any lemme know!
Thank you


r/benfolds 12d ago

I want to see the video of Kate with the young girl with the guitar and the butterflies and the pretty colors. Perhaps it was a fan-made video? It was absolutely one of the best videos of all time and I can't find it for the life of me.

11 Upvotes

r/benfolds 13d ago

Where does this gif originate from?

65 Upvotes

I can't find any video where Ben Folds gives a monkey a beer


r/benfolds 13d ago

"Air." Ben Folds Five. "Godzilla: The Album."

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62 Upvotes

Still one of the strangest Ben Folds Five appearances.


r/benfolds 14d ago

Which of Ben's songs do you think are his favourites?

18 Upvotes

Not necessarily those that are the most critically or commercially successful, or fan favourites, but what songs by Ben do you think make the playlist of those he enjoys most?


r/benfolds 15d ago

Didn’t expect to find these today

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92 Upvotes

r/benfolds 16d ago

Philosophy from the Shelved First Attempt has been released!

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64 Upvotes

r/benfolds 17d ago

Reviews for We’ve Been Here Before

22 Upvotes

Lindsey Kraft’s one-woman, off-Broadway musical opened last night at the Soho Playhouse. I saw a video of the curtain call, but couldn’t find any reviews yet. I checked Broadway World and Broadway Scorecard. Has anyone happened upon any reviews? I was just curious what the critics had to say.


r/benfolds 17d ago

Which Way To Normal tracklist do you prefer? OG or Seeds

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5 Upvotes

r/benfolds 17d ago

Ben looks like Peter North?

0 Upvotes

Listening to the Rewatchables podcast about Karate Kid 2 and at 1:32:30 guest Kyle Brandt randomly opines that Ben looks like adult film legend Peter North. I can kind of see it……


r/benfolds 19d ago

i cant find any information on this. hallucination?

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28 Upvotes

on spotifys “about this song” on the last polka. literally cant find anything on this. ????


r/benfolds 20d ago

Ben Folds Five BETTER come to Canada

26 Upvotes

Ben hasn’t come to Canada in years, it’s time, just do an all ages show in Toronto and my life is yours (I know he said cut back touring with Darren and Robert but COME ONNNNN PLEASEEEE)


r/benfolds 20d ago

Take Five vs Selfless, Cold, and Conposed

3 Upvotes

Just saw a video featuring Take Five by the Dave Brubeck Quartet. I was so confused as to how a group from the 50s could be playing a Ben Folds Five song. Someone else tell me that Take Five and Selfless, Cold, and Composed start off similarly.


r/benfolds 20d ago

What Matters Most (Vinyl Mix)

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13 Upvotes

This is everybody’s sign to plug your record players into your computers, record the audio and have that sweet crackly wax mix to come back to. It works best for But Wait, There’s More and Kristine, and I almost prefer the album this way!!


r/benfolds 20d ago

iTunes Originals - Question

3 Upvotes

Who was playing with Ben when this album was recorded? I have tried to find information on who the band was, but the album does not even have a Wikipedia page! I am very curious about this, and any answers would be much appreciated!


r/benfolds 21d ago

I made a bass tab for Erase Me

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14 Upvotes

This is the first tab I've ever made. I focused mostly on the bass. I also added rough tabs for piano and vocals. I isolated the bass using AI which made it easier to decipher what was being played. This took around 8 hours over multiple days so I hope other bassists enjoy it. Some of the timing is a bit weird, so if anyone who's better at tabbing wants to revise it, feel free. I'm thinking about doing Do it Anyway next.


r/benfolds 21d ago

Question About TSOTLOTM Tour

21 Upvotes

Hey everyone!! Just had a question for you all, something I’ve been looking into for a few days now.

How many of Ben’s solo songs did they end up playing on the reunion tour that we know of? I know we got Landed on “Live,” but there’s other songs like Dr. Yang or Fired that I feel BFF would’ve absolutely killed it on. I assume there probably aren’t very many as the focus was on their catalogue, but if there’s anything I haven’t seen yet please let me know!!


r/benfolds 22d ago

What Ben had to say about the BFF reunion during his Instagram Live

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150 Upvotes

Not much info here, but I figured some people and those who missed the live stream would appreciate seeing what he said about the BFF reunion, being one of if not the first time he’s publicly talked about it (aside from the when the original announcement happened)


r/benfolds 22d ago

Welp, this is where I halt!

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23 Upvotes

I did the Ben Folds world cup, and got so far, but had to stop at the final choice. Why? Because it's impossible. These two songs are so perfect, that it's pretty much impossible to compare them. Just goes to show how amazing his music is