THE COUNTDOWN CONTINUES....
Every one of these songs means something to me. Whether it's a lyric, a harmony, a chord change or a memory attached to it, these 15 songs all deserve to be in my Top 100 for one reason or another. Yet as wonderful as I think they are, there are still others I love more.
This
list is flawed. The songs are just about perfect. But as expected, and
as predicted by some of you, this task is daunting and will no doubt
haunt me. What have I missed? Can I really include (insert song title)
and not (insert song title)? Nevertheless, after considerable thought, and relentless editing, these songs make the cut.
That said, here is the continuation of the bottom 150, sequenced in optimum playing order, not by rank.
Green Onions- Booker T. & The MGs
The mother of all badass grooves, and a quintessential example of how a great drummer needn't flex his muscles or show-off. Just driving the ship like Al Jackson Jr. does here is showing off enough.
The Golden State- John Doe & Kathleen Edwards
This is a perfect pop song. I love the sexy lyrics--"You are the lick of my lips, I am on the tip of your tongue"--the great chord changes and the two emotional vocal performances. That chord change and melody when they sing the title on the chorus gets me every time.
Stupidly Happy- XTC
I devoted an entire post to this song in October of 2010. You can read that here, if you like. I feel like there are two XTC camps, pre-"Skylarking" and post-"Skylarking." I am definitely a post-"Skylarking" guy and it's because of songs like this. The structure of this song is genius, as are the lyrics and the arrangement, which is layered to perfection. An Andy Partridge masterwork.
Bus Stop- The Hollies
Graham Gouldman strikes again. One of the first 45s I owned. Almost 60 years later and the harmonies on this track still knock me out.
Mandocello- Cheap Trick
Where the hell did this come from? There is nothing on this record or on any Cheap Trick record that followed that sounds like this! A stunning piece of pop with ridiculous harmonies on the bridge. My favorite Cheap Trick song.
Tell It Like It Is- Aaron Neville
Written by Naomi Neville, aka Allen Toussaint, this should be on everyone's favorites list.
You're A Big Girl Now- Bob Dylan
Dylan at his most heartbreaking. When anyone says Bob can't sing, play them this song.
"Love is so simple, to quote a phrase
You've known it all the time, I'm learnin' it these days
Oh, I know where I can find you, oh
In somebody's room
It's a price I have to pay
You're a big girl all the way"
Do Right Woman- Do Right Man- Aretha Franklin
Songs like this don't really need to be discussed. Thank you, Dan Penn & Chips Moman.
Moody's Mood For Love- King Pleasure
It took years, but I finally learned all the words and phrasing and can just about keep up singing along with King Pleasure. If you didn't know, the melody of this song is a James Moody sax solo from his version of "I'm In The Mood For Love" with lyrics penned by Mr. Pleasure. A classic.
21st Century Gypsy Singing Loving Man- Taj Mahal
This is a Jon Cleary tune that he himself didn't get to recording until many years later. I prefer this version. I think this is Taj Mahal's greatest vocal. You can feel it. Another arrangement to die for.
Take Me For A Little While- Vanilla Fudge
Another perfect 45 and another song I devoted an entire post and mix to. There are no bad versions of this song, but this is the one that I think takes the cake.
Pancho & Lefty- Willie Nelson & Merle Haggard
I want to love Townes Van Zandt the way others love Townes Van Zandt, but I find his records difficult to get through. His songs, on the other hand, are brilliant and almost always sound better covered by others. This is my very favorite.
Sea & Sand- The Who
This is the second track by The Who to appear and I bet it isn't one you'd expect to see at all. But this is my favorite track off "Quadrophenia" and one of my favorite Roger vocals. The way he sings the following verse, especially the line "I'm wet and I'm cold" is all the evidence you need.
"Come sleep on the beach
Keep within my reach
I just want to die with you near
I'm feeling so high with you here
I'm wet and I'm cold
But thank God I ain't old
Nothing is planned, by the sea and the sand"
What Am I Doing Hangin' Round- The Monkees
Written by Michael "Wildfire" Murphy, but recorded first by The Monkees, this song, quite simply, makes me happy. What a chorus, I mean how can you not sing along? Could be my favorite Monkees track. Murphy recorded it a few years later, but it pales in comparison.
Silver Springs (Live)- Fleetwood Mac
Loved it as a b-side. But the now legendary live version with Stevie glaring at Lindsey and singing these words AT him, deserves a Best Picture Oscar. And again, I need to mention the harmonies. Gorgeous.
If We Never Meet Again- Reckless Sleepers
Few can write heartbreak like Jules Shear. This song is a beauty. It's somehow sad and uplifiting at the same time. It's anthemic! It's an all time fave.
Layla- Derek & The Dominoes
Two-two-two songs in one. Do I need to say anything more about this song?
TRACKLIST
Green Onions- Booker T. & The MGs
The Golden Stare- John Doe & Kathleen Edwards
Stupidly Happy- XTC
Bus Stop- The Hollies
Mandocello- Cheap Trick
Tell It Like It Is- Aaron Neville
You're A Big Girl Now- Bob Dylan
Do Right Woman- Do Right Man- Aretha Franklin
Moody's Mood For Love- King Pleasure
21st Century Gypsy Singing Loving Man- Taj Mahal
Take Me For A Little While- Vanilla Fudge
Pancho & Lefty- Willie Nelson & Merle Haggard
Sea & Sand- The Who
What Am I Doing Hangin' Round- The Monkees
Silver Springs (Live)- Fleetwood Mac
If We Never Meet Again- Reckless Sleepers
Layla- Derek & The Dominoes
COMING SOON:
THE TOP 100
18 comments:
Great mix. I love these selections but not familiar with King Pleasure--but I do like James Moody. Looking forward to listening. Thanks-Ron
Re: "The strings of a big guitar (cue: power chord)"
Could be my favorite XTC moment ever.
Another great list, thanks!
Randy
To hijack the comments with multiple postings: Sal said I could post my 150 along with his when he does future postings (like this one!), so to catch up, here’s my list of 101-150 with a few brief notes for things that might make you scratch your head. I found this to be an interesting (and frustrating) exercise, but ultimately, satisfying. A few overall notes (if anybody cares) about how I went about this. Some songs — are just obviously great songs. Some songs appealed to me as a bass and guitar player. Some songs have emotional memories as they were on mix tapes I made and they still resonate. Some songs definitely will have you go WTF?
I beg your indulgence while I break this into a couple of replies for length limits here. The next one will be (basically) 126-150 and then 101-125. I won’t go into (much) detail like Sal did — except where I think context might help explain things. From what Sal has posted so far — only about 5 (so far?) are in my list of 150.
If I figured out the breakdown of dates properly, the songs on my list are from these decades. This isn’t surprising as I discovered am radio about 1974, was in college in the early-mid 80s and then discovered John Borack’s first Power Pop 200 book in the late 2000s — all three events opened my ears and shaped what I like. But I love harmonies, unexpected chord changes, a lyric that moves me and big, big choruses. My list reflects that. A few artists/bands have more than one song — and a band you might not even guess has the most on my list with 4 songs — and it’s *not* The Knack!
60s - 37
70s - 69
80s - 18
90s - 10
00s - 15
10s - 1 (really!)
Oh man, so many great songs here. I count myself in the post-Skylarking XTC camp--although I'd throw Mummer in there as a transition album (while skipping over the Big Express).
There's a live version of Pancho and Lefty with a violin that starts off Rear View Mirror that I think is my favorite version, although I can see why you opted for the Willie and Merle version.
Thanks for sharing these, Sal!
Bill
126-150 (in alphabetical order by artist. This was the hardest final 25 to nail down):
The Things We Do For Love — 10cc
You And Me — Alice Cooper (this was my “walking down the aisle” song…)
Lonely Boy — Andrew Gold (that bass line that comes out of the solo — fabulous!)
One Way Or Another — Blondie
Gut Feeling-Slap Your Mammy — Devo
Walk On By — Dionne Warwick (not my favorite Burt Bacharach write/co-write on the list — but the second most!)
Galveston — Glen Campbell
The Letter — Joe Cocker (one of the best reinventions of a song ever)
Walk Away — Joe Walsh and The James Gang
Ruby — Kaiser Chiefs (another KC song is coming, but this is the lead track to their second album and it hits everything.)
Fuck and Run — Liz Phair
Classical Gas — Mason Williams (at one point, I used to play this to warm up my fingers — never quite nailed the whole thing)
Cruel To Be Kind — Nick Lowe
I Go To Pieces — Peter & Gordon (the harmonies!)
Stay With Me — Rod Stewart (one of the top 10 openings of a song — ever!)
Deacon Blues — Steely Dan
John Wayne Gacy, Jr. — Sufjan Stevens (first time I heard this — I actually choked up.)
Every Time I Think Of You — The Babys (ah, high school dances…)
It Makes No Difference — The Band (to me — the best and most emotional song they ever did.)
Ramblin' Gamblin' Man — The Bob Seger System (I’m from the greater Detroit area — this song still fires me up)
Nothing But a Heartache — The Flirtations (a surprise song from the “One Kiss Can Lead To Another” girl group box set that became one of those immediate “why have I not heard this song before?” favorite moments.)
Love Or Let Me Be Lonely — The Friends of Distinction (out of all those 70s soul singles, this one just hits all my buttons.)
Mighty Love — The Spinners (there should have been room for more Spinners, but there wasn’t…)
Love Is Like Oxygen — The Sweet
Hello It's Me — Todd Rundgren (the only Todd on my list — sorry Sal — and it beat out “I Saw The Light” and a few others))
101-125 (here it started to get slightly easier):
Knowing Me, Knowing You — ABBA
SOS — ABBA (these two songs could easily have slid higher — but they didn’t — they are both brilliant)
How Am I Different — Aimee Mann (from Bachelor #2 — her best album. “Calling It Quits” didn’t make the cut and it could have…)
The Ballad Of El Goodo — Big Star (I was late to this album — a big regret missing out on many years of loving it.)
A Whole Lot Better — Brendan Benson (this song has *multiple hooks* — phenomenal!)
The Knife Feels Like Justice — Brian Setzer (nothing like the Stray Cats and the heart-felt vocal has always stuck with me)
Ever Fallen In Love? — The Buzzcocks (another “why didn’t I hear this song earlier?” pick)
Sara Smile — Daryl Hall & John Oates
Denise — Fountains Of Wayne (my first FOW song and the only one on the list)
Lust For Life — Iggy Pop (the drums, man! What a production!)
Theme From Shaft — Isaac Hayes
That Lady (Parts 1 & 2) — The Isley Brothers (the extended version with longer solo please!)
I Want You Back — The Jackson 5 (love that bass line)
Kids In America — Kim Wilde (I’m a huge Kim fan, but her debut single is still etched in stone)
Chilly Winds — The Kingston Trio (I grew up listening to my dad’s KT records — this is probably their most moving song)
You Didn't Have To Be So Nice — The Lovin' Spoonful
Shape Of Things To Come — Max Frost & The Troopers (a WTF? choice maybe? But it hits everything for me!)
Sometime In The Morning — The Monkees (again, a surprise that there’s only one other Monkees song on my list — but it’s a top 10 song for me)
Down By The River — Neil Young & Crazy Horse
Here Comes The Flood — Peter Gabriel
Round And Round — Ratt
The Frug — Rilo Kiley
Egyptian Cream — Robyn Hitchcock & The Egyptians (Oddly, for as big an RH fan I am, this was the only song that made the cut. Seeing it live with Deni Bonet playing the riff was trancendent)
Can't You Hear Me Knocking — The Rolling Stones (one of the other songs with a holy-shit-this-is-amazing opening!)
America — Simon & Garfunkel
Man, that 1997 cut of Silver Springs gives me shivers every time. I always show it to my students when I teach 1970s rock music.
paulinca
Yay and yippee. Can't wait until these come out. Have been enjoying them immensely. These have been put into their own special playlists so I can keep going back. Some of my favorites (XTC, H&O,S&G,Stones....). Already looking forward to the next set.
@ cmealha
When you say "some of your favorites," do you mean artists that would be on your lists, because looking at what I have posted so far, I don't see S&G, H&O or the Stones.
(maybe cmealha is referring to what I posted?)
One last comment about my list:
I love “Get The Knack” (no suprise right? hah!). I think it’s a perfect Power Pop album — nay, a near-perfect overall record. I think their entire discography is full of catchy, well-crafted (and, yes, occasionally questionable lyrics). Doug Fieger is sadly missed by me.
But there's only *one* Knack song on my list of 150 (and it comes up in the next set when Sal posts his next round -- “Ooh Baby Ooh” almost made the cut, but didn’t… )
I found doing this exercise that some of my favorite bands/artists don’t actually make up some of of my favorite songs over-and-above other one-shot favorite songs. My list has zero XTC songs on it (!!!) — and they are probably my overall favorite band. My overall list has no Juliana Hatfield, only one song from the Beatles (as a group) and Fountains of Wayne (!!). No KISS. No Sloan, no Zappa, no Jefferson Airplane/Starship and not nearly as many Motown artists when it came down to it! No Elton John! All of those bands had songs in what were my top 350 I started with, but when it came time to cut -- they didn't make it.
This is why I found it to be such an interesting exercise as it ended up in a place I wouldn't have guessed when I started and I'm looking forward to the rest of your list for the same reasons.
Love these lists (and seeing so many songs I love on your lists!)
I think I get a tiny dopamine hit every time I read the title of a pop song I love.
It makes me disproportionately happy. Stupidly happy, one might say.
Thanks for sharing.
Excellent new installment! I'm a "post-Skylarking" XTC fan too - almost nothing before it interests me, and all after it does.
Love Green Onions. Booker T just released 3 new takes on that song. Of course they're not as good! But they're fun, and interesting - dig it:
https://music.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_l81t9-FInrvwbbs7rDCZpcHoD28x52_ZQ
And also, thanks to Shriner for your lists kicking off here.
Great stuff, as always.
To further the XTC discussion.... while I am absolutely in the post-Skylarking camp, I don't understand those that dismiss everything that came before it. English Settlement in particular is exceptional, but even if one doesn't care for entire albums (or the angular suff in general) I think there are numerous songs like:
Love On a Farmboy's Wages
Burning With Optimism's Flame
This World Over
Complicated Game
Respectable Street
Wake Up
Senses Working Overtime (!)
Melt the Guns
Runaways
Jason and the Argonauts
All of a Sudden (It's Too Late)
Wonderland
Great Fire
that are fantastic and to miss them out of general disregard for the first half of the band's output is a sad thing. YMMV
@Guy
To clarify, I love all XTC...except most of "Go 2." I just prefer "Skylarking" on. "Drums & Wires," "English Settlement" and "Mummer" are especially fantastic. I just know many who swear by "Black Sea" but completely dismiss "Nonsuch," "Apple" and "Wasp," which I don't get at all.
This great list keeps growing! I know what you mean about Townes Van Zandt. I appreciate his songwriting but there's something about his delivery that just doesn't grab me. Bus Stop, one of my very favorite songs. Thank you for including that gem. Looking forward to the next installment.
That is a great playlist. Omni-popper's dream. Keep 'em rolling Sal.
Green Onions is a really hard song to recreate because playing with that kind of feel and reserve is super-hard. I've heard so many bar bands murder it - including bands I was in.
I remember that XTC post, I immediately put it in my mix (along with much of the album).
As for Layla, it bewitched me as a teenager. That weird chord change into the verses, the anguished chorus, and then this big, romantic, atonal ending. It's never the same after you've heard it a million times, but once in a while if it comes on and I really listen, I can still feel that wonder.
Thanks for sharing Sal (and chiming in Shiner). Loads of fun to read your take and people's take on your take....
That's a great list that I'd never be able to compile, there are just too many songs I could never eliminate. There are more than a few there that I need to check out. I'm pretty sure "What Am I Doing Hangin' Round" is my favorite Monkees song too. Thanks for the DL.
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