Top 5/Bottom 5: The Beatles

If you’re anything like me, you love to listen to, talk about, and even argue about music. In that spirit I’ve decided to embark on a little project. In this series I’ll be listing and writing about my top 5 and bottom 5 songs from an artist or band that I love, or at least like. Disagree? Let me know, that’s half the fun.

The Beatles are the greatest band in the history of recorded popular music.

Top 5:

·      “Eight Days a Week”: I really wanted to put one of the early, pre-psychedelic Beatles songs on this list because I think this period is easy to overlook for modern fans. The critical consensus is that the Beatles’ music got more and more interesting as time went on and as they evolved as people, musicians, and songwriters; I agree, but it is absolutely astonishing how gifted they were from the very start of their recording career. Every time I hear this particular song I’m blown away again at how perfectly all the elements fit together. It’s got a fantastic intro (something very few songwriters including myself do anymore); it’s got great vocal harmonies and a great vocal breakdown; and it’s just a super-fun song. Listen to that bouncy rhythm, those chiming guitars, and that catchy yet sophisticated melody and see if they don’t instantly lighten your mood. If the lyrics are slightly dopey, well that’s pop music for you. Who cares as long as it feels good?

·      “Tomorrow Never Knows”: Regarded by many as the finest Beatles album, Revolver closes with the first song recorded for the album, “Tomorrow Never Knows.” Though the Beatles had already been pushing the art of recorded music in many ways by introducing new (to rock) instruments like the sitar and playing with recording speeds to get effects like the pseudo-harpsichord solo on “In My Life,” “Tomorrow Never Knows” was their boldest sonic leap yet. Inspired by acid, contemporary avant-garde music, Timothy Leary, and the Tibetan Book of the Dead, this song is also one of the more compelling arguments for the use of drugs as creative stimulant.

Written by John Lennon as a sort of drone chant song, the song’s recording was one of the more inspired collaborations between the members of the group, producer George Martin, and engineer Geoff Emerick. Ringo contributed a fantastic drum groove, which Emerick made sound massive through the use of tape speed manipulation and a Fairchild limiter; Harrison contributed the droning sitar; Paul contributed tape loops that Emerick and the band manipulated in the studio, using faders to bring multiple loops in and out in a manner Emerick described as being like an early sampling synth; and John’s vocal was put through a Leslie rotating speaker to help achieve a trippy sound akin to “the Dalai Lama chanting from a mountain-top,” as Lennon famously described the effect he was looking for. “Ahead of its time” and “mind-blowing” are just a couple of the clichés that apply in spades to this song. DJ Shadow, the Chemical Brothers, and many other artists owe an obvious debt to this song in particular, and to state another true cliché, it sounds as amazing now as it did when it was released.

·      “A Day in the Life”: What can I say about this song that hasn’t already been said? Probably not much. The greatest Beatles song? The greatest pop song of the twentieth century? Quite possibly. It’s a song that still sets the standard for what an epic pop song can be, encompassing dream-like musings, the tedium of the day-to-day, and reflection on the alienation and strangeness of modern life. And that’s just the lyrics. Musically it pushed the boundaries of what was possible in the recording studio at the time, and paved the way for the sophisticated studio pop of the seventies and beyond.

Let’s talk about the arrangement: From the moment it fades in from the “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” reprise with strummed acoustic guitar and piano, every element is perfectly placed and performed. Ringo’s drums first offer fills that answer John’s vocal, giving the song just a little push and excitement as it builds on the initial piano and guitar foundation. Paul’s bass playing is masterful as always, and the easy but forward-moving groove he and Ringo establish along with the piano drives gently but firmly to the alarm clock bridge that takes us to Paul’s domestic scene interlude. That second part of the song grounds the listener in the day-to-day before allowing us to float away again on a bed of strings and hazy singing until we land back in John’s dream vision of modern England. John’s vocal is one of the greatest vocals ever recorded, one that almost never fails to send a shiver down my back each time I hear it. And of course, “A Day in the Life” also features the greatest closing chord ever recorded. This song is beyond a masterpiece.

·      “Don’t Let Me Down”: Recorded during the Get Back/Let it Be sessions and issued as the B-side of “Get Back,” “Don’t Let Me Down” is a classic example of a composition that was primarily Lennon’s being released as the B-side of a seemingly more commercial McCartney composition, and arguably overshadowing the A-side. Its simple arrangement is in my opinion the most successful of the stripped down Let it Be sessions, allowing Lennon’s soulful belting to shine along with Billy Preston’s supremely tasteful electric piano playing. The straight-forward message of emotional need and newly discovered love is all the more powerful for not being couched in metaphor or flowery language, and Lennon sells the song through pure vocal expression.

·      “Here Comes the Sun”: One of the great later Beatles songs from my favorite Beatle, the Quiet One. As overplayed as any Beatles song at this point, it still somehow makes me feel good pretty much every time I hear it. The arrangement is an absolute masterclass in how to tastefully layer an acoustic-based song with interesting elements without overshadowing the melody and feel. There are strings, multiple guitars, perfect bass and drums, and (then very new) synthesizers, and yet the purity of the song isn’t compromised in any way. Listen to the recent remix/remaster on good headphones, I guarantee it will blow your mind.

Bottom 5:

·      “Something”: Considered by many to be one of the Beatles’ greatest love songs, and by Frank Sinatra to be one of the greatest ever, this song just doesn’t do it for me. In my opinion it’s not even the greatest song written about George Harrison’s then-wife Pattie, which is of course “Layla,” Eric Clapton’s wailing declaration of love for his friend’s lady. For whatever reason, though I’ve heard it far too many times, “Layla” doesn’t make me reach for the skip button as quickly as “Something.” There’s also the question of whether the Beatles’ version is even the best version of the song, with Joe Cocker’s version arguably besting it just as his “With a Little Help From My Friends” is arguably the definitive version of that song. Speaking of covers, Sinatra’s version of “Something” does offer us the classic comedy of a completely gratuitous “Jack” inserted into the line, “Stick around [Jack], it might show.” The Chairman also allegedly credited Lennon and McCartney as the song’s writers initially, though he did give Harrison proper credit in later performances.

·      “What Goes On”: Generally speaking, the Ringo Starr features are not the highlight of a Beatles album. Nevertheless, some of them are all-time classics (“Octopus’s Garden” included, I don’t care what anybody says). This is not one of the classics. It’s a throwaway country song on one of the Beatles’ most important albums, not helped by its sequence position as the opener of side two ahead of “Girl.” I’ll admit I have my own axe to grind with this song, stemming from the time I played it on a friend’s fancy surround sound stereo system to thoroughly underwhelmed response. This was before the Beatles catalog had finally been digitally remastered for CD and streaming, and I had recently obtained high quality audio files of some of the best mono masters then available. I had never listened to the Beatles in mono to that point, and I realized listening to them that this was in fact the way the music had been made to sound. Raving about this to my friends, I wanted to play them some of the songs so they could hear the Beatles as they were meant to be. I started with “What Goes On” because it was one of the few songs I felt we all wouldn’t have heard a million times, a decision that backfired spectacularly as I had to admit it sounded underwhelming on that very modern sound system in a loft studio. That was the end of that particular listening session.

·      “Dig a Pony”: Let it Be is a flawed album by Beatles standards that is nevertheless still great because it features several incredible songs and it’s still the Beatles. Much of the album feels a little half-baked, though songs like “Get Back” and “For You Blue” are fun and well-enough written that they are carried by the musicianship and energy of the world’s greatest band playing together. By contrast, “Dig a Pony” just doesn’t have enough going for it. It does feature a very cool guitar arpeggio intro, but from there it just drags, with the pseudo-nonsense wordplay of the verses not doing it any favors. Not every lyric has to be deeply meaningful of course, but lyrics like, “I-a-hi-hi, a-hi-hi do a roadhog/Well you can penetrate anywhere you go” don’t really suit the dramatic style of their delivery here. What’s more, the song just isn’t very interesting sonically past that intro–the rhythm guitar is barely in tune and dull in tone, the vocals are dry and lifeless, and it’s all just a little flat. John Lennon reportedly called the song “a piece of garbage.” He was famously dismissive of a lot of his and the Beatles’ work, but in this case he’s pretty much right.

·      “Revolution 9”: This one’s pretty obvious, I admit. As much as I admire artistic experimentation, sometimes a little goes a long ways. At nearly twice the length of any other song on the White Album, this track just goes a bit too far. Besides, the Beatles had already incorporated tape loops and found sounds to much greater effect in songs like “Tomorrow Never Knows” and “Being For the Benefit of Mr. Kite.” It’s a rare occasion I don’t reach for the skip button about halfway through this one. I will say that if you can make it through the whole thing it does serve as a nice setup for the album-closing lullaby of “Goodnight.”

·      “Magical Mystery Tour”: It feels kind of unfair to compare this song to other Beatles’ songs seeing as it was composed as more of a TV special theme song than a standalone piece. Nevertheless, it is the title song of an album that also contains “The Fool on the Hill” and “I Am the Walrus,” next to which it obviously doesn’t stand out. It’s a fun enough piece, but you’ve pretty much gotten the whole idea by the time it’s about halfway through. I don’t mind it at all and actually like it well enough, but this is the Beatles we’re talking about; if you haven’t noticed, they didn’t put out a whole lot of clunkers, and something has to go in this spot.

Top 5/Bottom 5: Neil Young

If you’re anything like me, you love to listen to, talk about, and even argue about music. In that spirit I’ve decided to embark on a little project. Each week I’ll be listing my top 5 and bottom 5 songs from an artist or band that I love, or at least like. Disagree? Let me know, that’s half the fun.

Neil Young is one of the great singer/songwriters to emerge from the ‘60s LA scene, and an artist whose music I constantly return to as a source of comfort and inspiration. His prolific output has included gorgeous country rock, solo folk songs, raging electric guitar rock, and genre experiments of all kinds. His 50 year plus catalog includes plenty of high points and low points, which were a lot of fun to explore here.

Top 5:

·      “Crime in the City (Sixty to Zero Part 1)”: This song and two others from the Freedom album were put on a cassette for me by my uncle when I was 9 or 10 years old, and provided my introduction to Neil Young. I remember being slightly baffled by Neil’s vaguely Uncle Sam appearance on the cover of the album–at least that’s how it appeared to me at the time, I now realize the single star on his hat could have been taken a lot of other ways given the Cold War context of those days. “Crime in the City” is a long narrative song that deals in a loose way with various forms of urban crime and unrest, as did several other songs on the album. Many of Neil’s topical songs over the years have been fairly blunt, occasionally unsubtle to the point of being hard to take seriously, but I find that many of the songs on this album achieve the balance of anger, sorrow, and compassion that can make topical songs really successful. “Crime in the City” is essentially a series of vignettes, each vivid enough to paint a picture, but leaving enough space for the listener’s imagination to fill in the details. It almost feels like one of those dark ‘80s urban action movies, in the best way possible. The music uses some classic Neil Young elements, particularly the “All Along the Watchtower”-inspired chord progression (given a subtle nod in the line, “They couldn’t get no relief’), with pedal steel, saxophones and a couple of nice rhythmic changes that really keep the song moving. There are a couple of earlier live versions that have come out recently in archival releases; they’re interesting in that they feature some different lyrics and a more classic Neil Young rock arrangement, but in this case the subtler and more carefully arranged studio version is where it’s at.

·      “Hey Hey, My My”: Is there a more fabulously menacing guitar sound ever recorded than this song’s fuzzed out opening riff and the crashing chords that answer it on the electric version of this song? I challenge you to find it. That main riff is one of the greatest Neil ever composed, maybe the single greatest, working equally well on acoustic or electric guitar. For years when I was younger I didn’t know if I had imagined hearing this song in both electric and acoustic versions, or if they really existed. Eventually I discovered that both versions had been released on the same album (albeit under slightly different titles) as opening and closing tracks. That’s a move that takes some confidence, something that Neil has never seemed to lack, whatever else we might say about him. Of course it’s impossible to consider this song without noting its place in rock history, both as a commentary on changing musical times with the rise of Johnny Rotten and the Sex Pistols and the death of Elvis in the ‘70s, and as the song quoted by another great rock frontman in his suicide note in the ‘90s. For me this is one of the greatest rock songs on rock, much truer in its dangerous sound and ambivalent lyrics to the spirit of rock and roll than Don McLean’s saccharine paean to the good old days down by the levy.

·      “Campaigner”: “Even Richard Nixon has got soul” might have been a surprising sentiment coming from the author of “Ohio” and countless other songs of political unrest, but Neil Young has always been full of surprises. A great solo acoustic recording that I first heard on Decade, this song has always stuck with me. Its lyrics touch on the vastness and variety of American experience, from “test tube genes and slot machines” to “roads stretch[ing] out like healthy veins.” This is the folkie Neil at his best, not so much telling a direct story or offering political opinions but musing on what politics is and offering an empathetic look at a strange country.

·      “After the Gold Rush”: Is this the best ever dystopian ecological piano ballad? Probably. Neil’s voice is at its best on this song, with evocative lyrics that sit perfectly on the edge of fantasy and reality. What was it his friend had said that he hoped was a lie? I don’t know, but I can imagine. And here’s Mother Nature, still on the run in the 2020s.

·      “Love and Only Love”: When I saw Neil Young and Crazy Horse at Barclays Center in Brooklyn several years ago, they opened with this song, a classic Crazy Horse blast of hippie sentiment rolled up in raging rock. Truthfully, I could put any number of Crazy Horse jams in this slot, but this one has been a favorite ever since that show. It struck me as an audacious but inspired choice to open with, a mid-tempo rocker that was never a hit but perfectly encompasses the jam side of the Horse. The studio version is over ten minutes long, with lyrics that maybe don’t matter that much but express an aging hippie’s core belief in love above all, a groove that hardly varies, and a whole lot of glorious guitar noise. It may not be for every fan of “Heart of Gold,” but it’s fantastic. This side of Neil and Crazy Horse reminds me of the Ramones in that everything kind of sounds the same and it’s almost stupidly repetitive, and you wouldn’t want it any other way. Where Neil and the Horse achieve sonic nirvana through endless jams and guitar solos, the Ramones get there via blitzed-up pop rock, but it’s all rock and roll, baby.

Bottom 5:

·      “The Needle and the Damage Done”: As everyone who has followed his career with even a little interest knows, Neil Young has seen his share of friends go through addiction and even death at the hands of drugs; Neil himself has had his ups and downs with substances, including the famous Last Waltz incident when cocaine had to be airbrushed from his nostrils in the final film. “The Needle and the Damage Done” is one of his most direct songs, addressing a junkie who just can’t get enough. Here’s my problem with the song: It is on seemingly every Neil Young live recording ever released, and every version is exactly the same. Versions appear on: Harvest, Live at Massey Hall 1971, Live Rust, MTV Unplugged, Songs For Judy, and probably some others I’m forgetting. My introduction to it was the Unplugged album, and yes, at the time I liked it and eventually learned how to play the classic intro on acoustic guitar. But something about this song just fatigues me now. I get the message and musically the song is a little more interesting than a lot of solo singer-songwriter chord strummy songs, but it’s just not enough to keep me from skipping it most times.

·      “Last Trip to Tulsa”: Neil Young’s first, self-titled album is the sound of a newly solo artist trying to figure out what he can do on his own. It has a few great moments, but it also suffers from a lack of definite direction at times. This song is a plodding piece of pseudo-Dylan solo acoustic guitar and surrealistic rambling. Neil was hardly alone in taking inspiration from Dylan, and he can’t be faulted for trying to stretch the boundaries of popular song in both lyrical content and length; he occasionally did so successfully, and lord knows many lesser artists than Neil Young attempted the same. But this song is just awful. The lyrics are a jumble of pseudo-profound psychedelic folk nonsense (“So I unlocked your mind you know/to see what I could see/If you guarantee the postage/I’ll mail you back the key.”) and the acoustic guitar plays a rudimentary chord progression with no rhythmic drive or melodic interest. It’s possible this song would at least be passable if the tempo were upped significantly–at least its nonsense lyrics wouldn’t stand out so painfully. But as it is, the song feels even longer than its nine and a half minutes. “Sad Eyed Lady of the Lowlands” this is not.

·      “Don’t Be Denied”: This autobiographical song first appeared on Time Fades Away in a live version that felt a bit half-baked. Last year’s archival live album Tuscaloosa includes an even longer, equally half-baked version, marring an otherwise very good live release from Neil’s golden period. The song mostly consists of Neil and backing vocalists singing, “Don’t be denied/don’t be denied/don’t be denied/don’t be denied” over and over, alternating with some boring recollections of moving as a child, fantasizing about stardom, and playing “songs for the highest bid” on the Sunset Strip, all over an incredibly dull slow groove that never goes anywhere. This song is the worst side of Neil Young, a piece of work that feels unfinished and isn’t very interesting that was put out anyway because Neil just has to keep moving forward and doing the next thing, blah blah blah. Listening to this song for eight minutes is a minor form of torture.

·      “Such a Woman”: This song is a low point on what is otherwise one of my favorite later Neil Young albums, “Harvest Moon.” It is a piano ballad with strings that finds Neil crooning, “You are such a woman to me/And I love you.” Oh, Neil also informs us that “love is a healer.” That’s about all there is to it. There is a lot of romantic sentiment in the songs on “Harvest Moon,” but this one lacks any of the specific elements that bring the other songs to life and make them feel real. It could have been written by any middling middle-aged singer/songwriter who loves his wife, and I don’t mean that in a good way.

·      That Song He Played at That Show I Saw: About midway through a raucous electric set of music with Crazy Horse at Barclays Center, it was time for the acoustic set. The band took a brief break as Neil played a couple songs by himself on acoustic guitar and piano. Well, not quite by himself–as he played one of the corniest songs I have ever heard, some vapid rags-to-riches stuff about a star-struck girl moving west to seek her dreams or something, an actress wandered onto the stage carrying a guitar case. She looked up to the left, she looked up to the right, presumably dazzled by the lights of the big city. She was like a bizarre version of The Sound of Music’s Maria, dropped inexplicably into the middle of a rock and roll show. It was stupefying, and made as big a lasting impression on me as the bold, full-throttle rock opening of “Love and Only Love.” I still don’t know what song it was, but it was a perfect example of what many people find so frustrating about Neil Young, the very high highs followed by the extreme lows. But hey, I guess that’s what comes of following the muse. And refusing to edit. Long may he run.

Top 5/Bottom 5: Prince

If you’re anything like me, you love to listen to, talk about, and even argue about music. In that spirit I’ve decided to embark on a little project. Each week I’ll be listing my top 5 and bottom 5 songs from an artist or band that I love, or at least like. Disagree? Let me know, that’s half the fun.

 Prince Rogers Nelson rose out of Minneapolis, Minnesota in the late’70s to become one of the biggest stars of the ‘80s and beyond. His prolific output was unrivalled by any star on his level, and included seemingly endless hits, not only of his own but written for other artists.  

I am not the world’s greatest Prince authority; however, this is a project about my own experiences and opinions of music, and I’ve loved and listened to plenty of Prince’s music over the years, so here we go!

Top 5:

·      “I Wanna Be Your Lover”: This is the best Prince song, I don’t care what anybody says. It’s got everything you could want: a killer groove that feels like it could go on forever, a classic R&B falsetto vocal, and the oddly androgynous and ambiguous lyrics that would become a Prince trademark (“I want to be your mother and your sister too.”). Prince played all the instruments himself, as he would on many releases before recruiting backing groups like The Revolution and New Power Generation. There are times I feel like Prince’s music suffered from his control freak tendencies, but this song is a great example of an artist doing everything the way he wants and getting it just right. If you want me to dance at your wedding, this will do it every time.

·      “Kiss”: Another one that succeeds by being the completely unique product of Prince’s vision. Though it was started with production partner David Z as a demo for the group Mazarati, Prince turned it into the song we all know and love after it was rejected by the group. Nothing about this song should be that special–it’s basically just a funky blues song with some classic R&B guitar and a drum machine, and there’s no bass. NO BASS! Who makes a song this funky and doesn’t put bass on it? It’s one of those genius/idiot moves that only great artists like Prince can pull off, and the result is spectacular. It helps that Prince was one of the greatest vocalists ever, and the layered vocals on this song are what really make it special. Clearly one of the primary inspirations for D’Angleo’s neo-soul vocal workouts years later, among many others.

·      “Purple Rain”: The greatest power ballad in Prince’s oeuvre, and one of the greatest ever for that matter, “Purple Rain” also features one of the greatest opening guitar chords in recorded music history, up there with “A Hard Day’s Night” and “Rumble.”  I have no idea what it would mean to see someone doing anything “in the purple rain,” or why Prince wants to see it so much, but sometimes a song is so great that you can’t question the lyrics. The song is so dramatic and so full of feeling. I love the way it builds into a climactic guitar solo, and ultimately dies down into a sort of end-of-the-night, the romance-is-over, time-to-go-home-alone atmospheric twinkle. You don’t want it to end but you know it has to. Not many 8-plus minute songs feel this short.

·      “Seven”: I don’t know exactly what it is I like about this song, but I like it a lot. Maybe it’s the groove, based on a sample of Lowell Fulson’s version of “Tramp.” Maybe it’s the vocal melody, brilliantly layered and harmonized throughout. Maybe it’s the pseudo-mystical, Biblical lyrics. Ok, it’s probably not that. It certainly isn’t the video, which I just watched for the first time–let me tell you, it is a bizarre thing, featuring children in belly dance and vaguely bondage-inspired outfits, as well as some grownup belly dancing and weird pseudo-Disney castle vibes. Whatever it is, I love this song.

·      “Musicology”: It’s always hard to pick the last of five songs for an artist who has so many great ones, and I’m not sure I’d say this is a better song than “When Doves Cry” or any number of other Prince classics. But this is a list of my favorites, and this song just tickles me. It’s a great piece of classic funk, a sound that Prince could pull off better than almost anyone, but often eschewed in favor of quirkier, synth-driven studio creations, at least in his early heyday. This song just grooves in an organic way that perfectly suits the music it pays tribute to. And what true music lover hasn’t occasionally wanted to shout, “Don’t you ever touch my stereo!” to some fool trying to skip a classic joint on the playlist?

Bottom 5:

·      “Sexy M.F.”: Musically this song is another great piece of James Brown-style classic funk, but have you ever listened to the lyrics? I’m all for sexy jams and finding clever ways to express erotic feeling, but this one is ridiculous. Here is an actual line from this song: “Guard your folks and get your daughter/This sexy motherfucker’s so fine I could drink her bathwater.” I know the idea of bathwater drinking didn’t originate with Prince, but has anyone ever actually been turned on by the suggestion that a lover would drink their bathwater, or by the thought of doing so? I mean, different strokes and all that, but come on. Here is another choice line: “We’re all alone in a villa on the Riviera/That’s in France on the south side, in case you cared.” Geography and romance lessons all in one! What a time!

·      “Annie Christian”: Topical songs are tricky, and it may be a little unfair to judge a song like this almost 40 years later. But some age better than others, and this one is pretty forgettable. The title character is of course a stand-in for the anti-Christ, who apparently “was a whore always looking for some fun” who then “bought a gun” and killed John Lennon and attempted to kill Ronald Reagan. You would think that an artist as vocally sexual as Prince might have known better than to equate being a whore with murder, even in a vague metaphorical sense, but this song is a jumbled list of things that are “bad” or “evil” that doesn’t really take a coherent stand on any issues. Like so many other bad topical songs, it just strings together bad happenings in an attempt to appear “conscious” without offering any specifics or really telling a particular story.

·      “When You Were Mine”: This is actually a good song–my issue is with the recording itself. While the parts all work together and everything is played very competently by Prince, the end result is flat, uninspired, and boring. To me this is the flipside of “I Wanna Be Your Lover”–a carefully constructed recording that ends up feeling safe and dull instead of perfectly crafted. The guitar sound is clean, twangy, and lacking punch, a sound that doesn’t serve such a driving rock song; the synth sounds verge into ‘80s cheesiness; and the drums are dry and lifeless. To top it off, there’s a bridge keyboard solo that feels completely tacked on. Truth be told there are many Prince songs from this era that I think suffer from dated production sounds; in many cases the material and performances are so strong that it doesn’t matter much. This is an exception, a song that’s pretty much ruined by the recording. (As I suspected, there are live versions on youtube that destroy the original studio version.)

·      “Eye Hate U”: I’ve never been much for the slow R&B ballad with spoken interlude, so this song already had a strike against it in my book. Add to that some corny “courtroom of love” lyrics and a title that reads like a bad Korn song, and this is not one of my favorites. How even Prince can get away with singing, “I hate you/because I love you/but I can’t love you/because I hate you” is beyond me. The beginning of the guitar solo sounds like somebody plugging in at Guitar Center.

·      “Planet Earth”: Throughout his career, Prince made a point of delivering killer album title tracks. A partial list would include “Dirty Mind,” “Controversy,” “1999,” “Purple Rain,” “Sign O’ the Times,” and “Musicology.” By the standards he set for himself, “Planet Earth” is pretty weak. I will admit, I haven’t spent a ton of time with the Planet Earth album, but it does contain at least a couple fun songs like “Guitar,” and it came at a time when Prince’s star was riding high again after his incredible Super Bowl performance and a couple good albums and successful tours. Unfortunately, this particular title track is a melodramatic ballad with some sappy lyrics about seeking “balance with the one” and sending children off to war that are as vague as the music is boring. It’s a pretty discouraging album opener that’s best skipped in my humble opinion.

Top 5/Bottom 5: Radiohead

If you’re anything like me, you love to listen to, talk about, and even argue about music. In that spirit I’ve decided to embark on a little project. Each week I’ll be listing my top 5 and bottom 5 songs from an artist or band that I love, or at least like. Disagree? Let me know, that’s half the fun.

Radiohead are one of the most influential and greatest bands of all time, having bridged the ‘90s alternative rock era to the 21st century’s computer-driven sounds. They are also one of my favorite bands and were a huge influence on my music and songwriting.

Top 5:

·      “Everything in its Right Place”: When Kid A was released in 2000, the critical response was mixed, to say the least. But in my circle of friends in Sonoma County, opinion was unanimous: Kid A was a masterpiece. We listened to the album at every opportunity: at every party, in spite of its not being what one would consider “party music”; standing around a friend’s car before a show our bands were playing together; at home on headphones, etc. I do vaguely recall that it took me a couple listens to really get into, but then so had OK Computer a few years before. However long it took, I loved it, and “Everything” quickly became one of my favorite album openers of all time. To this day I find few musical phrases so instantly transporting as the opening electric piano arpeggio. The sound is so warm it’s like an aural cocoon, something you want to crawl inside and live in, a feeling reinforced by the gentle heartbeat kick drum that enters shortly after the piano. The lyrics, seemingly a series of barely connected feeling-thoughts, come out almost as a series of confused mantras, the thoughts of someone desperately seeking calm in a world whose chaos is suggested by the reversed, effected vocal garbles that surface periodically. There are no guitars. Never has there been a more perfect mission statement for a band following up a huge commercial and creative success with a change of direction.

·      “How to Disappear Completely”: As wide a sonic net as Radiohead have cast since The Bends and OK Computer established them as one of the best and most influential modern rock bands, I think it’s fair to say that the band’s ballads have always been at the heart of their appeal to most serious fans. Thom Yorke’s singular voice is undoubtedly one of the most beautiful and distinctive in modern music, and this song showcases it to an unparalleled degree. Written at a time that Yorke was struggling with mental health and the difficulties of fame and the road, the song was inspired by a book on creating new identity, as well as a sort of mantra that REM’s Michael Stipe recommended to Yorke: “I’m not here, this isn’t happening.” The song’s premise can certainly sound a bit nihilistic, however sympathetic a famous person’s desire to disappear from the public eye might be, but it is an undeniably gorgeous piece of music. “How to Disappear…” was also one of the first songs to highlight what would become a key element of the band’s sound in the coming years, namely Jonny Greenwood’s string arrangements. From the start, each element of the song’s arrangement is carefully considered, from the walking bassline to the strings that are sometimes lurking, sometimes swooping in only to recede a moment later, to Yorke’s acoustic guitar and vocal, the constant centerpiece. A masterpiece, and one that certainly puts the lie to the Melody Maker review that at the time claimed, “60 songs were started that no one had a bloody clue how to finish.” (That review is hilariously wrong and great reading, by the way.)

·      “Airbag”: Another great album opener, which includes one of Radiohead’s better guitar riffs. While still using most of the basic elements of a rock guitar band, this song nevertheless made clear that Radiohead were expanding their sound and venturing into territory that was truly their own. The slightly distorted drums seem to constantly stop and start, inspired by DJ Shadow’s beat mixing; the syncopated bassline echoes “I Shot the Sheriff” even as it ultimately becomes more and more frantic; and the guitars are constantly on the edge of disintegrating into sonic fragments. While “Paranoid Android” was the more epic composition and tops many lists, this is my favorite rocker on OK Computer.

·      “Bones”: My favorite of Radiohead’s earlier angst-driven rockers, “Bones” is driven by a great bassline and stuttering tremolo guitar. I love the way the guitar answers the bassline like an alt-rock “Rumble,” the speed of the tremolo gradually drawing down after the chord is hit. The lyrical portrayal of fear of aging is somewhat unique among rock’n’roll songs in that the fear is not necessarily of growing old and out of touch mentally or emotionally, but about growing old physically. This puts the song in contrast to “My Generation” and other rebellious rockers in that it acknowledges and attempts to reckon with the universal truth that everyone experiences the aches and pains of age sooner or later. Thom Yorke’s vocal is a great combination of his soaring range with the snarl of Johnny Rotten, fitting for a song that rages against forces that he knows are beyond his control. Songs like this are part of the reason so many fans missed Radiohead’s guitar-driven rock sound when they turned to electronics in the early 2000s.

·      “Creep”: As much as Radiohead have evolved since, and as overplayed as this song is, I still have to put it in my top 5. Much like Beck’s “Loser,” “Creep” was a great first hit that introduced the world to a band that turned out to be better than even the song’s biggest admirers could have predicted. I remember hearing it on the radio and seeing the video on MTV, and even at a time when Radiohead were using similar elements to a lot of other bands–a mix of clean and distorted guitars, quiet/loud dynamics, and angst-ridden lyrics–something about the song stood out. A big part of that something was definitely Thom Yorke’s voice, at the time rivaled only by that of Jeff Buckley. The lyrics certainly spoke to a confused adolescent as well as any of the time’s angsty grunge bands, and there were just enough curveballs in the arrangement to suggest that the band had more to offer than most.

Bottom 5:

·      “Hunting Bears”: A short instrumental from Amnesiac, the more “guitar-oriented” follow-up/accompaniment to Kid A. Some have speculated or opined that it was originally meant as a sort of intro or reprise to “I Might Be Wrong,” with which it shares a key and a basic guitar sound. Whatever the case, it might have worked better as an intro, or at least should have been more fully developed as a standalone piece. I recall seeing a review of the album around the time of its release saying this track’s guitar playing gave Richard Thompson “a run for his money,” or something along those lines. Uh, not quite.

·      “Karma Police”: I have to admit, I kind of just don’t get this song. It’s tuneful enough, and I have no problem with its slight cribbing of “Sexy Sadie” (sometimes that’s just how music happens, Gaye family). Nevertheless, while I don’t skip it when I listen to OK Computer, neither do I find it to be one of the album’s highlights. The description of a man who “buzzes like a fridge…like a detuned radio” is fantastic, but besides that the lyrics seem almost mean; there’s something to be said for putting a little meanness into a song now and then–music is of course an outlet for a great many emotions that you might not want expressed another way–but for whatever reason, the angle just doesn’t connect with me personally in this case. Musically the song is fine, but not one of the more interesting pieces of this era’s Radiohead. One of the few Radiohead songs that I wouldn’t be excited to hear on the radio if it happened to come on. I probably still wouldn’t change the station though.

·      “Videotape”: I love In Rainbows, but for me this album closer is a bit of a dud. What the heck does “When I’m at the pearly gates/this will be on my videotape” mean? Is it a suicide message? “This is one for the good days,” Yorke sings. Maybe it’s a reminder that there have been better days, even if the present seems bleak? Then why the obvious reference to death? For me, the lyrics aren’t quite specific enough to really conjure anything, and their abstraction doesn’t come off in a way that gives me a chance to assign my own meaning. In general, this would be my criticism of a lot of later Radiohead song lyrics: there are a lot of fragments and vaguely ominous phrases that just don’t stand on their own as insightful or unique. Musically, not a lot happens in this song either: The drums gradually skitter away in an interesting fashion, but the piano playing is elementary and not quite interesting enough to be the centerpiece of the whole song. “Pyramid Song” uses similar elements to much greater effect, with the notable addition of a great Jonny Greenwood string arrangement.

·      “Feral”: Not many people would rank The King of Limbs the best Radiohead album, but I think it’s a pretty good album that does have its moments. “Feral” is not one of them. I’m not one to poo-poo experimentation and abstraction in general, especially not in the case of a great band like Radiohead; but a piece of music like this still needs something to hold it together and take it somewhere in order to not feel like a throwaway. To my ear, “Feral” fails where tracks like “Treefingers” and “Pulk/Pull Revolving Doors” succeed. It just doesn’t have much beyond the groove going on, and it’s basically the same groove as “Bloom,” an actual complete song. The vocals are incomprehensible and not especially melodic. Basically 3 minutes of filler on an album that only features 8 songs.

·      “Last Flowers”: One of the difficulties of a list like this is always determining the scope of the inquiry: Are B-sides included? EPs? And so on. This song comes from the accompanying bonus EP to In Rainbows; I’ve decided it qualifies for this purpose since the EP features as many tracks as one Radiohead album, even if 2 of them are very short sound collages. A lot of Radiohead fans would have heard the songs on this EP around the same time as In Rainbows, which was famously released online as a pay-what-you-want download in 2007. The EP has its moments, but most of the material doesn’t compare to the quality of In Rainbows, and this is one of the weakest songs in my opinion. It crosses the line from dramatic mid-tempo number into plodding piano piece, and it has even fewer interesting elements than “Videotape.” The lyrics do nothing for me and the vocal is so anguished that it just serves to highlight the weakness of the whole piece. This is one of very few Radiohead songs I would say I actively dislike.

Top 5/Bottom 5: Led Zeppelin

If you’re anything like me, you love to listen to, talk about, and even argue about music. In that spirit I’ve decided to embark on a little project. Each week I’ll be listing my top 5 and bottom 5 songs from an artist or band that I love, or at least like. Disagree? Let me know, that’s half the fun.

If the many popular shows and movies based in ‘70s and ‘80s adolescence are to be believed, no teenager’s bedroom of the time was complete without a Led Zeppelin poster. As the residents of those bedrooms knew and would no doubt have argued, Led Zeppelin were one of the greatest, most popular and influential rock bands of all time. Learning and jamming Zeppelin riffs was a rite of passage for myself and countless other aspiring guitar players. With a deep and varied catalogue that covered a ton of stylistic ground, Zeppelin are an ideal candidate for this week’s Top5/Bottom 5.

Top 5:

·      “Whole Lotta Love”: This is about as Led Zeppelin a song as there is. It’s got all the elements: hot-rodded blues riffing and lyrics, innovative and trippy production, horny moaning and barely disguised innuendos, thunderous drumming, and a virtuoso ensemble sound with no weak links. If you love Zeppelin, you love this song. Led Zeppelin II was the first Zeppelin album I owned, and it still may be my favorite. Where the first album showed a band that could do almost anything musically and weren’t shy about showing off their range, this one was something else entirely. “Whole Lotta Love,” “The Lemon Song,” and “Bring It on Home” take blues to a whole other place, one much more interesting and original than the two straight blues covers on the first Zeppelin album. This song and this album would still be my recommendations to anyone who wonders what Zeppelin are all about.

·      “Good Times/Bad Times”: This makes the list pretty much for the opening chords and drum fills alone. Jun-jun! As I’ve already hinted, I think the first album tries to do a little too much in terms of showing off the band’s range, and I certainly don’t agree with Rolling Stone that it should be the highest-ranked Zeppelin album on the list of greatest albums of all time; but this is a perfect album opener and a perfect first song. Zeppelin famously didn’t release many singles, but this was an early exception, and for most fans at the time this was the first thing they would have heard from this new band. Holy shit. The guitar playing, the bass playing, the vocals, and the drums all get their moment to shine. I can only imagine how many people were inspired to pick up a bass by John Paul Jones’s fills on this song, or to play drums by Bonham’s blend of perfect support and over-the-top bashing here, not to mention Jimmy Page’s obvious impact on legions of guitar players. Not many bands before or since can match this as a first song.

·      “Ramble On”: It’s a tough call, but for me this is the ultimate Zeppelin ballad, edging out “That’s the Way” and “Going to California.” It may be unfair to compare it to those songs, since “Ramble” does contain some heavier Zeppelin elements, including some fairly heavy electric guitar and drumming on the choruses, but to me it remains a ballad at its heart. This song is also in my opinion the best of the Tolkein-referencing Zeppelin songs, of which there are several. The electric guitar leads in between verses are sublime, and again the vocals, bass, and drums all show extraordinary range and virtuosity.

·      “Over the Hills and Far Away”: Another ballad/heavy rocker combined in one. I’m not aware of any band that combined acoustic sounds and heavy rock elements in quite this way before Zeppelin. No doubt this was partly owing to improving recording technology and the ability to cleanly layer acoustic and electric instruments in the studio. Whatever the case, Zeppelin certainly pioneered the loud/quiet/loud dynamic of much modern rock with songs like this, and no one has ever done it better. Epic.

·      “Stairway to Heaven”: Sure, this song has been played to death and it’s now almost impossible to hear it without thinking of jokes like the Wayne’s World “No Stairway” bit. And maybe the intro is just a little too close to that of Spirit’s “Taurus” for comfort. Nevertheless, Stairway has it all: an all-time classic acoustic guitar intro, the brilliant studio layering that was such a hallmark of their recordings, some mystical lyrics vague enough to mean nothing and everything all at once, a killer guitar solo, and a heavy outro. Though I don’t often listen to it deliberately these days, every once in a while I hear this song afresh and it strikes me again how great it is.

Bottom 5:

·      “The Crunge”: Famously composed as Zeppelin’s answer to James Brown, this song does groove in a unique way, and I’ve always enjoyed that nonsensical “Where’s that confounded bridge?” bit at the end. Nevertheless, it’s a bit of a letdown on Houses of the Holy, following the first three magnificent songs, and for me it contributes to Houses being the first not-quite-great Led Zeppelin album. It just feels a bit like heavy filler that doesn’t quite go anywhere.

·      “Since I’ve Been Loving You”: I love a good slow blues and there was a time when I loved Page’s guitar playing on this song. But having now heard the song many times since I was young, it sounds to me like a plodding, bombastic piece of not super-original, overbaked noodling, full of unnecessary drum fills and vocal and guitar histrionics. In short, it’s everything that people who don’t like Led Zeppelin don’t like about Led Zeppelin. I like Led Zeppelin, but sometimes the critics are partly right.

·      “Candy Store Rock”: Did I select this randomly by looking at one of Zeppelin’s weakest albums and picking a very straight-forward rock and roll number? I’m not telling. I will tell you that I listened to it again, and it is not better than I remembered. Every line begins with “Oh baby, baby,” and it doesn’t really get better or more interesting from there. It’s not terrible exactly, just not great, and that’s the measuring stick for Led Zeppelin.

·      “Hats Off to (Roy) Harper”: This song isn’t really terrible either, but it’s pretty half-baked, and another example of Zeppelin needlessly trying to show off that they can play blues, in this case without adding anything of note to it but some vocal effects and weird production. It should probably be titled “Hats off to Fred McDowell,” since he’s the most obvious progenitor of this style of country blues–for that matter, he probably should have received a songwriting credit. The guitar playing is fine, but doesn’t come close to matching McDowell’s rhythmic drive, and doesn’t add any other elements to the style. It’s also hard not to blame tracks like this for every amateur guitarist who sticks a slide on his finger, tunes to an open chord and thinks he’s a “blues man”. The lyric is standard blues cliché stuff, which is fine as far as it goes, but not very interesting. Overall, pretty forgettable. I mean, did you even remember what song this was by the title? I didn’t.

·      “Stairway to Heaven”: I hope I never hear this song again. What a bunch of nonsense.

Top 5/Bottom 5: The Rolling Stones

If you’re anything like me, you love to listen to, talk about, and even argue about music. In that spirit I’ve decided to embark on a little project. Each week I’ll be listing my top 5 and bottom 5 songs from an artist or band that I love, or at least like. Disagree? Let me know, that’s half the fun.

Considered by many to be the world’s greatest rock and roll band, the Rolling Stones have now been making music for over 50 years. That makes their vast catalogue an ideal one to pick through and select highlights and lowlights.

Top 5:

●      “Satisfaction”: Yes, I know we’ve all heard it too many times, and yes, I know there are many (including Keith Richards) who argue that Otis Redding’s version is actually superior, and they may be right. But this is just about a perfect pop/rock song, with its propulsive groove, that classic stupid simple riff, and its great petulant, bratty rock and roll lyrics dissing and dismissing everything from “some girl” to “the man… on the radio” hawking the latest products for instant happiness and fulfillment. Maybe the most important song in establishing the Stones as a group with its own attitude and sound–what we might now call its own “brand.” Classic for a reason.

●      “Wild Horses”: For me it’s just about a tossup between this and “Can’t Always Get What You Want” for greatest Stones ballad, but I give the edge to “Horses” because it feels a little more specific and a little more real to me. Though I always liked it, this was a song that truly meant something to me once I had actually experienced heartbreak a couple times, and no matter how many times I hear it, it still works. It’s also a great arrangement–I love the way the drums just disappear for entire verses and come back in on the choruses, and the lead guitar and the 12 string rhythm are so beautiful and restrained, perfect illustrations of the Stones’ just-enough musicianship approach.

●      “Beast of Burden”: The greatest soul tune in the Stones’ oeuvre in my opinion. A great guitar intro, a great mid-tempo groove, and lyrics that walk the line between self-doubt and seduction. From what myself and many others consider the last truly great Stones album, 1978’s Some Girls.

●      “Tumbling Dice”: It’s all about the groove. No song better exemplifies what I’d call the middle-period Stones, the time when in my opinion they went from being a very good rock and roll band to being a band that had its own complete signature sound. This kind of mid-tempo rock groove, with the classic Keith Richards/Charlie Watts push/pull interplay is what really sets the Stones of Let It Bleed through It’s Only Rock and Roll apart, and it’s the most easily identified sound in bands obviously inspired by the Stones. No matter how many bands attempt it (the Black Crowes come to mind), it just can’t quite be matched. One of the greatest songs on what many, including that similarly named publication Rolling Stone, consider the greatest Rolling Stones album, Exile on Main Street.

●      “Gimme Shelter”: Another one of the greatest mid-period Stones songs, this one for me is all about the production. I’ve heard plenty of live versions of this, along with plenty of covers, and for me none come close to matching the Let it Bleed studio version’s grandeur and menace. The lyric demands big music, and the studio version delivers it. Where most live versions are too fast, the tempo of the album version is perfect to convey the gathering storms, both actual and psychological, depicted in the lyrics. The sometimes swampy. sometimes stinging guitar sounds; the almost operatic backing vocals; the howling harmonica; the thundering piano, all add to a glorious rock and roll mass.

Bottom 5:

●      “Angie”: “Angie/Aaaaann-jay”–I consider this the other side of the “Wild Horses” coin. Is it about David Bowie’s then-wife Angela? Is it about Anita Pallenberg? Is it about Keith Richards’s daughter? Who cares? What it is is a saccharine ballad with some drippy strings and piano, and Mick Jagger overly enunciating every syllable for effect. It’s also possible that my negative opinion of the song was reinforced by the junkie who used to come in to the Guitar Center near Union Square in New York where I worked, who would sit on a stool, play the beginning of the song, start singing to himself and almost invariably nod off. You and me both, buddy.

●      “Start Me Up”: Ok, I’ll admit this one seems a little too easy to hate. Maybe I don’t actually hate it, but it’s so ubiquitous as to be borderline annoying almost every time I hear it. It’s a good guitar riff that in my opinion doesn’t quite measure up to Keith’s greatest. Something about the song just gives me ‘80s rock beer commercial vibes, even if its most famous commercial use was actually for Microsoft.

●      “Anybody Seen My Baby”: This song just sucks. A weak attempt to use some of the mid-‘90s electronic dance production techniques that were so in vogue, and were much better utilized by artists like David Bowie. (Bowie of course produced some blatant Stones pastiches in the ‘70s.) And sure, you could list any number of the Stones songs from the mid-‘80s on as among their weaker songs, but some of them are actually pretty fun if you don’t listen too closely. Not this one. Amusingly, Keith Richards recounts in his autobiography that Mick Jagger accidentally stole part of the melody from a KD Lang song, and the band subsequently had to give her partial songwriting credit. A dubious honor in this case, but no doubt financially rewarding.

●      “Have You Seen Your Mother Baby?”: What the hell is this song? Glad you asked. It is a psychedelic relic of anti-authority nonsense. On the other hand if this were a Pretty Things song it would be one of the best things they ever did. What an overrated music dork band they were.

●      “It’s All Over Now”: Just kidding, this song rules.