Great songs, according to me (Part 36)

Hey, it's another installment of the never-ending list of songs I think are great! By the time I'm finished with my original list, I'll have to make a new list just as long to reflect the music I've gotten since then! So it will, indeed, never end!

In case you're interested, I have written other installments, as you might guess. Here is the archive for Parts 1-15, here is the archive for Parts 16-30, and here is Part 31, Part 32, Part 33, Part 34, and Part 35. But let's look to the future!

351. Mean Street (by Van Halen on the album Fair Warning, 1981): The opening song on Van Halen's fourth (and wildly underrated) album signals that this album is different and slightly darker than the first three, which featured bright, shiny, party metal. This time, Eddie's groove is much rougher and fuzzier, and Dave's growl is definitely far more menacing than usual. The lyrics reflect this: "At night I walk this stinkin' street past the crazies on my block and I see the same old faces and I hear the same old talk." It gets darker from there, until Roth snarls "See, a gun is real easy in this desperate part of town, turns you from hunted into hunter, gonna hunt somebody down" as Eddie's guitar starts to fade into the distance. It's a short blast of anger from a band that had rarely shown it, even in their darker songs, and would not show very often in the future.

352. Meaningless (by Magnetic Fields on the album 69 Love Songs (vol. 3), 1999): Like most of the songs on this excellent album, this is a quick one, but also as usual, the strength of it lies in Stephen Merritt's fun lyrics, which propel the song along. Many of the lyrics on the album are much darker than the tone of the song implies, as in this one, when Merritt sings, "And if some dim bulb should say we were in love in some way, kick all his teeth in for me and if you feel like keeping on kicking, feel free" and it sounds absolutely delightful.

353. Memories Can't Wait (by Living Colour on the album Vivid, 1988): This is a strange song, but that doesn't make it any less great. It starts off with a strong grungy vibe, angry lyrics, pounding through the song, and then suddenly switches to a quiet, even reflective sound, with Cory Glover musing about his memories. It's an odd shift, but it works in the song, and then the band slowly builds again to a powerful finish. It's an excellent song on an excellent album.

354. MidLife Crisis (by Faith No More on the album Angel Dust, 1992): Man, I love this album and this song. Faith No More's follow-up to their breakout album The Real Thing didn't continue their rise, but it's a better collection. On this song, Mike Patton growls "Go on and wring my neck like when a rag gets wet" to start, and it only gets better. The chorus is fantastic: "You're perfect, yes, it's true, but without me you're only you. Your menstruating heart isn't bleeding enough for two." The music is less heavy than many of FNM's songs, but it's somewhat haunting, grinding away and propping up Patton's anger. It's too bad Faith No More never made it bigger.

355. Milk & Honey (by Beck on the album Midnite Vultures, 1999): I've said before how much I love Beck's disco album, and this is one reason. It begins with a kind of heavy rock groove, but switches quickly to a space-age disco beat, with corny keyboards that nevertheless fit beautifully in the framework of what Beck is doing. As is fairly typical with Beck, especially on this album, the lyrics are almost incomprehensible (at least to a layperson like me), but they have a twisted sense of fun about them, and at the end, when the music becomes more driving, they even have a bit of poignancy to them. It's a wild song, and a perfect example of Beck's versatility.

356. Mind Over Matter (by Ice-T on the album O. G. Original Gangster, 1991): Whenever I listen to this album, I rap along with every single lyric, which makes it the only time I ever use the "n" word (I hope Roger forgives me for it). I love this album, but only a few songs are really great, and this is one of them. It's simply a song about T telling us how great he is, but he does it with such flair and lyrical fun, plus he gets slow and funky on the song, that we can't help but forgive his arrogance. He does, however, talk about improving his mind (hence the title) and how he's making himself smarter than anyone else on the streets. "My brain's a hand grenade - catch" he raps, then follows with "I'm a hit you with an overload of bottomless thought, reversin' all the shit you're taught." Considering Ice-T's subsequent career, maybe he did know something we all didn't.

357. Miss America (by Styx on the album The Grand Illusion, 1977): I'm not sure if you're a true American if you don't like Styx, but we'll discuss that another day. "Miss America" is a lesser-known great song from this, their triumphant masterpiece, but Dennis DeYoung really sells it with his nasty lyrics about a woman who believes looks are everything, but realizes they aren't. I love the line "In your cage at the human zoo, they all stop to look at you." It starts the second side of the vinyl album (you all own it, right?) very strongly.

358. Mofo (by U2 on the album Pop, 1997): Many people, apparently, don't like this album, but it's a very good disc, highlighted by this song, which has a cool techno groove and deeper lyrics than you would expect. Bono gives the lyrics some emotion, too, and we feel his pain when he sings, "Mother, am I still your son?" Meanwhile, the boys give us an ethereal vibe when the song slows down before ratcheting up again. I wish U2 had kept pushing the musical envelope, but on the next album, they went "back to their roots," meaning they tried to recapture the cash cow music that had made them global superstars. Oh well. This album isn't great, but it's far more interesting than their last two releases.

359. Moment of Forgiveness (by Indigo Girls on the album Become You, 2002): Like most Indigo Girls songs, the strength of this tune lies in its lyrics (not to bash the music, which is always pleasant, but it's not like it's revolutionary or anything). Amy's powerful voice takes over as she sings about trying to reconnect with a lover in a moment of weakness. There's no hope to rekindle the romance, but that doesn't stop Amy from trying. It's a common theme in popular music, of course, but as usual, the way it's sung and the lyrics used make it much sadder than you would think. It's why we cling to hope when it's all gone.

360. Monday A.M. First Thing (by Think Tree on the album Like the Idea, 1992): The first song on Think Tree's masterpiece (and final record) is a blast of odd techno-rockabilly-punk backing some of the most innovative and twisted lyrics you could ever hope to find. Think Tree, as I've mentioned here before when they've shown up, was a bit too avant-garde for the early, pre-Nirvana 1990s, and that's a shame, because this album is brilliant, and this song sets the tone. Here's just one excellent verse, to give you an idea of Peter Moore's lyrical genius: "Monday A.M. First Thing/And in walked an old crow named Poe/Who smelled like a library book I'd checked out/Some twenty-odd years ago/His dark gray parka sat on him/Like the shell of a crustacean/He had flowers to bring to his wife, Lenore/Back home at the bus station/Then his eyes lit up, he screamed, "My God!"/And dropped the bottle he was nursing,/And said, I was fired from that chair/You're sitting in, four years ago on a/Monday A.M. First Thing!" And that's one of six wild verses in the song. This is a wonderful song to begin this wacky album, and it's a shame that Think Tree disappeared not long afterward. If anyone is interested in this album, let me know and I'll burn you a copy, as it's long out of print. That's how much I dig it!

That's another ten songs in the bank. Will I ever finish my list? Only the blogging gods know for sure!

Great (and very good) albums by short-lived bands

I was listening to Apple by Mother Love Bone the other day, and was reminded once again what a great album it was and what a shame it is that Andrew Wood couldn't stay off the smack. Such is life, as the great philosopher once said.

It put me in mind of really good albums by bands that didn't last long, and the fact that this either deprives us of more musical genius or fixes the band in time as something that never degraded, whichever way you want to put it. Then I thought, "Hey, I have a blog - why don't I ramble on about this and ask for opinions?" So here are ten albums by bands that didn't last very long that I consider great or even just very good. My criteria is strict: these bands must have released one or two albums. Three albums simply implies a longer career. In the case of Boston, it took ten years for those three albums to come out. And remember, these are only albums I actually own. So with that in mind, here they are, in no particular order:

1. Mother Love Bone, Apple, 1990. This is truly a great album, released not long after Wood died. It really captures the early grunge sound, even though it's influenced by classic rock a great deal. Wood gives us surreal yet beautiful lyrics, and Stone Gossard's guitars are fantastic throughout. The band easily moves from powerful rockers like "This is Shangrila" and "Holy Roller" to power ballads like "Stardog Champion" and "Man of Golden Words" to bittersweet love songs like "Stargazer" and "Crown of Thorns." It's a brilliant album with only a few missteps (I could lose "Captain Hi-Top"). It's out of print, but you can find the compilation that includes their EP, Shine, which also is pretty danged good. Pearl Jam, to which Gossard and Jeff Ament went, wishes they were as good as Mother Love Bone.

2. Horse Flies, Gravity Dance, 1991. I'm counting the Horse Flies, because they've only released two studio albums, but they have done two movie soundtracks, so if you want to say I'm cheating, oh well. I have spoken often of my love for this album, and whenever I listen to it, it almost demands that I stop driving (which is where I usually listen to music) and pull over and just sit there. It begins with the strangely tragic "Life is a Rubber Rope" and moves on to the horribly funny "Roadkill" (which is indeed about eating things you find on the side of the road) and the weird "Needles on the Beach" (again, self-explanatory). The two highlights are "Two Candles," which is a beautifully haunting paean to lost love, and "Your Eyes are Elevators," which ends the album on a wonderfully bizarre bluegrass note. The Horse Flies are a weird band with a strange melange of styles, but for the most part, they make it work.

3. Think Tree, Like the Idea, 1992. This weird Boston-based band released a couple of albums in the early Nineties, but they were far too weird to ever have any kind of mainstream success. They combined a kind of mystical Zen thing with raunchy and irreverent lyrics and twangy electronic music that, they were proud to mention, was done without the help of a computer. With songs like the wonderfully corny "Monday A.M. First Thing" and "Porcupine Coat" to the serious but still weird "Everything is Equal" and "Eye for Eye," they covered a lot of ground on this album. It's still one of my favorites, and I'm very glad I happened across it in a record store in Auckland, New Zealand, of all places.

4. Temple of the Dog, Temple of the Dog, 1990. This is the only "supergroup" on this list, as this was a band that was never meant to release more than one album. It was put together after the death of Andrew Wood (see above) and takes its name from a lyric in a Mother Love Bone song ("Mr. Golden Words," if you're interested). They released one album, but man, it's a good one. The two tributes to Wood, "Say Hello 2 Heaven" and "Reach Down," are actually the two weakest tracks on the album (although they're still good), and the album really gets going with "Hunger Strike," which features Eddie Vedder before Pearl Jam took off. This is a superb album that happened to come together at a perfect time, and I'm certainly glad Chris Cornell and the members of Pearl Jam never tried to recapture it.

5. Liquid Jesus, Pour in the Sky, 1991. I'm trying to figure out if Liquid Jesus ever released a third album, as this would disqualify them. But I can't, so I'm going to count this, their second album, as their last one. The only people I've ever known who have heard of Liquid Jesus (two of them) hated them, so maybe I would be in the minority, but I think they were excellent, and this, their only studio album (like Jane's Addiction, after whom they were clearly modeling their career, their first album is live), is very good. "Finding My Way" kicks off the album, but it really gets good with "W.H.Y.B.," a song from their first album. They also give us a powerful upbeat love song in "Better or Worse" (featuring Bruce Hornsby on piano, which is slightly odd) and some very good rock tunes like "No Secret" and "The Colorful Ones." They mixed a lot of different sounds and styles, using a mellotron on at least one song ("Feelings Flower"), which gave them a neat sound but probably hurt their chances of being commercially successful. Maybe you heard them on the Pump Up the Volume soundtrack!

6. Amanda Ghost, Ghost Stories, 2000. I wouldn't call this a great album, but it is very good. Ghost has an odd, bluesy voice, and she sings some great songs on this, her only album (so far; apparently she's working on one). She could easily sing in a dark bar, leading pathetic patrons onward to something beyond their sad lives. The album starts off very well, with "Filthy Mind," "Idol," and "Glory Girl" the three best songs on it, but the quality doesn't dip too far for the rest of the disc. There's a great deal of sadness in her voice, but a great deal of hope as well. It's a wonderful combination.

7. Scissor Sisters, Scissor Sisters, 2004. This is cheating, as the Sisters are just beginning their career and probably have plenty of albums left in them (even if they don't, they surely have a third album in them!), but technically, right now they have only released two. Both are good, but their debut album is a bit better. "Laura" kicks off the album with foot-stomping goodness, and their cover of "Comfortably Numb" is excellent. Other excellent songs abound: "Lovers in the Backseat," "Tits on the Radio," and "Filthy/Gorgeous" are all interesting with great beats. The album loses a bit of steam at the end, but that's okay. The best song on the album is "Take Your Mama," and that alone would make this a worthwhile disc. Luckily, there's plenty of other great tunes on it.

8. Ruby, Salt Peter, 1995. This is an odd album, but for the most part, it works. Ruby has a gruff and angry voice, and the music, which is that mid-1990s electronica stuff, has a hypnotic power. Ruby's vicious lyrics come through nicely on such songs as "Flippin' Tha Bird," "Paraffin," and "Swallow Baby," and she also slides into ethereal-ness (ethereality?) on the album's final track, the seven-minute "Carondelet." This isn't a great album, but it's quite good. Ruby did release another album, but that's it. I wonder what she does with herself.

9. Stress, Stress, 1991. I have mentioned this band occasionally, but I can't find anything about them on-line. I believe this is the only album they ever released, but I can't be sure. Anyway, this is a pretty darned good album, with a weird psychedelic Beatles thing going on, with a blend of Eastern mysticism with flower-power hope and just enough rocking to give it an edge. "Indian Summers Dream" is an excellent song, as is "Lordy Lord," which is sweetly nostalgic. I imagine this is long out of print, but it would be a nice purchase from a dark used record store.

10. King Swamp, King Swamp, 1989. Does anyone remember King Swamp? I saw their video for "Is This Love" and really enjoyed it, so I bought this. It turns out to be a good album full of strong rock songs with a good bluesy edge, and even some hard dance beats (like in "Year Zero," a song about working the fields). There's not really a clunker in the group, although some are better than others. "Original Man," "Widders Dump," and "Motherlode" are highlights, and the album ends wonderfully with "Sacrament," a powerful ballad with a haunting chorus. It's too bad they weren't more popular, and after a second album, they broke up and disappeared.

Those are just ten albums I own that I think are pretty darned good by bands that didn't last too long. I have some others, but they aren't as good. I always enjoy owning albums by bands that didn't last, especially if I like them, because I feel like I'm pulling a fast one on all the losers who didn't get in on them. Of course, it's probably that I'm the loser for not liking better bands, but I can live in my delusions, can't I?

Anyone have any good albums by short-lived bands they'd like to champion? That's why we have blogs, after all!

Great songs, according to me (Part 18)

Let's check out another fun ten songs that I, personally, think are great. This is turning out to be quite the project, ain't it?

As usual, you can always check out the rest of the songs. The archive of the first 150 is here, while Part 16 is here and Part 17 is here. And away we go!

171. Eye for Eye (by Think Tree on the album Like The Idea, 1992): I enjoy doing these alphabetically, because I could go long stretches without mentioning a band I like, and then get a few songs in a row. Such is the case with Think Tree, whom we first came across in Part 17. "Eye For Eye" is another nifty little song by the group, as they twist their weird techno/lo-fi vibe and add a bit of honky-tonk to come up with a truly bizarre, and great song. Peter adds nasty lyrics like "Glances at the telly and it latches up her belly to believe the shot/of a perfumed Pocahantas with her swinging young Adonis lovin' what she's got/she's mad just to be ponderin' how the catch is simply wonderin' when her time will come/when she's forced to crave the honor of his pounding flesh upon her and she's numb with cum." The song is about yearning for celebrity, fame, good looks, carved bodies, meaningful relationships, but when Moore sings "You were promised a taste of honey and wine, all you got was a waste of money and time" we know that those things can't fill that empty hole in your soul. In your soul!!!!
172. Eyes of a Stranger (by Queensryche on the album Operation: Mindcrime, 1988): This song ends a truly great album, and it's nice that they put such a strong song to finish up. "Eyes Of A Stranger" works in the context of Queensryche's concept that has been running through the whole album, but it also works on its own, as a devastating critique of love and the American Dream. The guitars drive us through the song, but Geoff Tate's howling lyrics stay with us - when he sings "Is this all that's left of my life before me, strait jacket memories, sedative highs," the snarl in his voice chills you and reminds you that for many, life is horror-filled and bearable only with drugs. Tate's "character" wants nothing more than to be cured, but he can't find any way out of the prison he's constructed in his mind. The mirror never lies, indeed.
173. Face the Change (by INXS on the album The Swing, 1984): This is a kicky tune from one of the band's best albums, and it shows once again that Hutchence and the boys were a lot more than just new-wave-ish dance pop. Hutchence is telling us that things change, and that's nothing to be afraid of - we just have to accept it and make it a positive change. Of course, because it's INXS, you can dance to it, but it's a strong statement by the band and, consequently, a great song.
174. Factory Girls (by Flogging Molly (with Lucinda Williams) on the album Within A Mile Of Home, 2004): There's nothing fancy about this tune - it's just a straight-forward twangy pseudo-country song with the Mollies' Irish twist. It's a sad song about lost innocence, with that Irish nostalgia that makes dying in the potato fields sound wonderful, but Williams' raspy cigarette-and-whiskey voice grounds it, and the final verse, with the wistful longing for lost days, puts the whole song in context and pushes it to greatness.
175. Fade to Black (by Metallica on the album Ride The Lightning, 1984): I've never been a huge Metallica fan, but this album, and in particular this song, are simply brilliant. This is pretty much an ode to suicide, but it's still a haunting tune, made even more chilling by Hetfield's subtle growl, as if he wants to kill himself but first he's going to rip out your throat with his teeth. As with many Metallica songs, it starts off soft and builds slowly to an instrumental storm, but because it stays quiet for so long, the internal tension keeps you on the edge of your seat. As love letters for offing yourself go, it's brilliant.
176. Fading Lights (by Genesis on the album We Can't Dance, 1991): Genesis took a horrific wrong turn with Invisible Touch, and it seems as if they knew it, because they waited five years to release another album (their "last," even if Rutherford and Banks put one out in the mid-1990s), and it was a nice return to form for the band. Sure, it had its goofy tries for pop relevance, but Genesis was never about that and shouldn't have been about that. "Fading Lights" is a beautiful coda to this album and their career in general, as Phil sings about memories and how everything ends and it's okay. Halfway through the song, in true Genesis fashion, the boys launch into an extended instrumental jam that just reminds you how good they really are, and the song ends with Phil singing quietly, "And you know that these are the days of our lives ... remember ..." as the music floats off into the ether. A nice way to finish a nice career.
177. Fairytale Of New York (by The Pogues (with Kirsty MacColl) on the album If I Should Fall From Grace With God, 1988): This is one of those songs that has taken on a life of its own outside of just Pogues fans, probably because MacColl died young and it's a Christmas song. Those two factors make this a famous song, but it's a heart-breaking and ultimately wonderfully uplifting song about love and living together and making things better. MacGowan can really belt out a tune, and MacColl's humanizing touch to such lyrics as "You scumbag, you maggot, you cheap lousy faggot" make it a celebration as well as a tiny bit of a dirge. It's a beautiful Christmas song and a beautiful love song. And if you don't like The Pogues, then I weep for your lonely soul.
178. Faithfull (by Pearl Jam on the album Yield, 1998): In the early-to-mid-1990s, when Pearl Jam was the biggest band in the world, someone must have said something rude about their musical abilities, because they went out and made No Code, which was an interesting failure. Eddie and the gang got their heads back on straight and released Yield, which was a good old-fashioned rock-n-roll album. There's a lot to like on the album, but "Faithfull" [sic] is the highlight, even though Eddie's lyrics are somewhat oblique. Essentially it's a song about what we believe in and what this turns us into. Eddie decides he's going to be faithful to love, which is awfully sweet of him, and suggests we do the same. The music transcends the rather vague lyrics, and Eddie, as usual, howls with conviction, which is what we like to hear from our rock gods.
179. Falling to Pieces (by Faith No More on the album The Real Thing, 1989): When I first heard "Epic," I didn't like it, and this kept me from buying this album for a while. Silly me. This was the second single off the album, and it convinced me to check it out, and I'm glad I did. This is a fantastic song, from its thudding bass introduction to its weird light-hearted keyboard riff to Mike snarling the excellent lyrics: "Because I'm somewhere in between my love and my agony, you see, I'm somewhere in between - my life is falling to pieces ... somebody put me together." The rap part of the song doesn't overwhelm it, like it does a bit on "Epic," and it's much more comprehensible than that song. I absolutely love this song.
180. Famous Last Words (by Billy Joel on the album River Of Dreams, 1993): Another song that ends another "last" album, in this case Mr. Joel's (he's released a few since then, but none of original, "rock" songs). This is another one that really encapsulates a career nicely, from the rollicking yet slightly melancholy piano to the theme of everyone leaving the beach at the end of the summer and winter setting in. Joel has always had that element of lounge singer for the tourists in him, and here he acknowledges it. He gives us a moving tribute to better days and good times, while recognizing that it's time to move on. It's a great song, made nicer by the context in which it's presented.

So there's another batch of songs in the book. Be as cruel as you want in your criticism! We all know I am impervious!