I Need You To Listen To…

300.Song:The East Wind

Artist:Gord Downie And The Country Of Miracles

Album:The Grand Bounce 

When Gord Downie worked with The Tragically Hip, there was always a sense of a buried power waiting to unleash itself. With his solo work, he could let that power take flight, with the appropriate folksy atmospherics to help it along. The jangly guitars don’t overpower the treble, the drums hover in the background like a light breeze, and Gord Downie’s vocals soar through lines like “It doesn’t go around you/ It goes through you”. This serene atmosphere, where you can practically see the vast distances of the  prairies rushing by in your head, continues on, the rest of the band joining in on the fun. The electric guitars drip like honey off of the soundscape as the drums collide into you like an old friend. “Hello again my friends/ I’ve come to see you again” Downie sings to emphasize the point. But like any friendship, there will always be a certain distance to maintain “No I do not love you/ Hate the word”, but for now, enjoy the time spent together.

299.Song:Bust A Move

Artist:Young MC

Album:Stone Cold Rhymin’ 

Hip-hop’s resilience as a genre relies on its chameleonic capabilities. For its aural wallpaper to shift from genre to genre, from whatever was needed to what is necessary now. Hence, “Bust A Move”’s continued relevance, a dance party anthem is always welcome, but one this deliriously funky, catchy, rhythmic, etc. retains its cachet even when the rest of the genre finds itself mired in the complications of social commentary and materialism.  “Bust it” Young MC declares, as if the only thing that matters now is what you are here for. Forget the rest of the world. That signature “Ballin’ Jack’s” sample is so deliriously funky and jubilant that it hard carries the entire song almost on its own. Crystal Blake’s emphatic vocals in the chorus provide just the tonic for morose existence “you want it/ You got it”. Yes, his flows can come across as basic, even obsolete at the time of release, but Young MC’s undeniable charisma keeps the party going forever. 

298.Song:Bette Davis Eyes

Artist:Kim Carnes

Album:Mistaken Identity 

If you can believe it, this was originally written as a country tune by Jackie DeShannon. Listening to that version is where you realize that covering a song well is a major talent, to do so in a way that makes the original entirely redundant is miraculous. Enter Kim Carnes. It was keyboardist Bill Cuomo that came up with the distinctive synth riff that carries us along through the song with its unstoppable momentum and warm presence, but this is mainly Kim Carne’s show. Her rough vocals turn this song into a true banger, finding a rhythmic line that the original couldn’t hope to compare against. Everything about this song is perfect, from Carne’s throaty performance, to the delectable way that the electronic snare hits introduce themselves, like thunderclaps. It seduces us with the force of personality that the lyrical subject exudes. We’ve all known firecracker personalities, what attracts us to them, “Bette Davis Eyes” precociously lights up our fascinations.

297.Song:Louie Louie

Artist:The Kingsmen

Album:The Kingsmen In Person 

Usually for songs on this playlist I have the Genius lyrics sheets on hand in a secondary tab, but for “Louie, Louie”, I find that there is no need for it. This is the record that, more than any other, gave full flight to the concept of “The Sound” mattering more than what was said. How else can we explain its success on the charts, when the lyrics are not intelligible at all, more so when listening to it on the radio instead of headphones. It has lyrics, even defined ones when reading off the sheets, it doesn’t matter. We are here for the vibes and nothing else. Now that I think about it, this absolutely could be read as a presager for multitudes of genres that were still to come, from electronica to shoe-gaze, from punk to noise-rock. There are explanations for its otherwise grubby sound, mostly related to budget, but the audible “Fuck” at 54 seconds in by drummer Lynn Easton gives off all the impulse power needed when considering its impact.

296.Song:I Still Feel

Artist:Martina Topley-Bird

Album:Quixotic 

Martina Topley-Bird is an artist in danger of being lost to the uncaring ravages of time. While trip-hop enthusiasts might scoff at that notion, after all she does have some legacy cachet due to being featured on Maxinquaye, I submit that her solo work, despite being just as beguiling, is rarely referenced.To compensate, I will satiate with this: “I Still Feel” hits all of the highest notes that trip-hop as a genre strives for; subtlety fighting for space against the voluminous soundscape, seductive impulses versus the drugged out implications of the club-beats. Starting with low droning bass guitars and distorted drums, transitioning into a sampled plucked harp string riff, Martina’s vocals slide in upon a bed of record noise and subtle reverberation “Wish that I could close my eyes/ and stop this room from moving”. Stunning stuff, all the more so when the harmonies flit in and out of the stereo field, like a persistent itch that you can’t scratch.

295.Song:God Is Alive Magic Is Afoot

Artist:Buffy Sainte-Marie 

Album:Illuminations 

Leonard Cohen had a lot of complicated emotions to wring out when it came to God. Even on his deathbed, he was wrestling with the contradictions of faith. He collected a lot of his stop-start, whirling thoughts into a collection of poetry called Beautiful Losers, which is where Buffy Sainte-Marie found “God Is Alive, Magic Is Afoot”. This baffling slab of mystic lyricism, that seems to span a Biblical epoch with its scope, was perfect for a woman with ever shifting identities. Recording her main performance in one take, producer Maynard Solomon laced the proceedings with eerie synthetic vocals, delayed and reversed to wrap around the song and define its purpose. You are not supposed to get a solid feel of where Leonard’s lyrics will take you, Buffy constantly builds towards non-existent revelations, her voice throatily drilling through mythic sounding verses. Magic is definitely afoot here, but God, apparently, takes some serious will to find.

294.Song:Eleanor Rigby

Artist:The Beatles

Album:Revolver  

“All the lonely people/ Where do they all come from?” Paul McCartney’s voice pans to the centre on this line, like he’s letting you in on a secret. This whole song, off of one of the most revolutionary albums ever recorded, gives off that air. Consider the characterization of Father Mackenzie, as a man who composes a sermon “that no one will hear”, who darns his socks in the night for a performance that none will appreciate. All of this for a woman, one “Eleanor Rigby”, for whom nobody would come to her funeral. She may or may not have lived a fabulously rich life, all that mattered, in the end was what it all amounted to. The big tragedy of this song, whose funeral march of strings sounds provides the backdrop, is how this isn’t an isolated incident, that people die every day with no one to care or notice “Ah, look at all the lonely people”, with even the structures of religion failing to provide comfort for those ends. A tragedy in miniature.

293.Song:Work It

Artist:Missy Elliott

Album:Under Construction

It mystifies me how long it was a mystery to the music public what the reversed lyrics were in the chorus[1], they were literally the reverse of the immediately preceding words. It does speak to this song’s long term viability in the great songs sweepstakes, we are still combing through it for meaning. It is refreshing how blunt this song is “Go downtown and eat it like a vulture”. What separates it is the zaniness of the sonics, this is prime Timbaland magic, throwing everything and the kitchen sink into the backing for Missy Elliott’s unhinged stylings. Her personality threatens to overpower the proceedings, the sexual energy pouring through every syllable is palpable, but Timbaland barely lets the listener breathe as he samples everything from Blondie’s “Heart Of Glass” to Run DMC’s “Peter Piper”.  That all of this works so well is an incredible feat, for Missy Elliott, it’s a mere Tuesday.

292.Song:The Man Who Lives Forever

Artist:Lord Huron

Album:Lonesome Dreams

Originally, this song’s spot on the playlist was taken up by a Coldplay song, “Every Teardrop Is A Waterfall”, itself a massively loud outburst of romantic energies. Lord Huron’s take on the worldly magnificence of love just happened to edge them out. Heck, if you took Coldplay’s Viva La Vida and compressed it down to one song, this would be the result. The intro, with its metal drums and bird sounds captures an innate exploratory appeal, as if Lord Huron would travel the entire span of the globe to reach the object of his affections. “There ain’t enough time in the life that they gave me” as a lyric pairs with “I wanna be the man whole lives forever” in the chorus, as Ben Schneider’s vocals seem to drift in from some ethereal plane, hazy, indistinct when compared to the crystal clear arrangements. Let the “Ooh, Ooh-Ooh”’s that populate the structures carry you along on its momentous tides.

291.Song:Money

Artist:Pink Floyd

Album:The Dark Side Of The Moon 

I’m sure it’s common knowledge that this song is in 7/4 time, but describing the appeal of that halting rhythmic structure can be a blessing and a curse when it comes to Prog-rock bands. With “Money”, one of the more famous songs off of that most famous of albums, you get perhaps the best rejoinder to anyone who complains of the genre’s inaccessibility. Here you get big blunt basslines and slashing guitars, matter-of-fact synths and David Gilmour spelling it all out for you “Money, it’s a crime”. That halting 7/4 structure always has the listener coming up short, banging up against the structures of society “But if you ask for a rise/ It’s no surprise that they’re giving none away”. Alan Parsons’ production gives Pink Floyd everything they need to rage against the machine, from literal cash register sound effects, to the space they need for those rollicking solos. “Money, so they say/ Is the root of all evil today”. It’s all there for your appreciation.

290.Song:Flesh Without Blood

Artist:Grimes

Album:Art Angels

“A diss track about a false friend” Grimes said about” Flesh Without Blood” [1]. Why do a lot of artists find their most bountiful fruits picked from failed relationships, friendships or otherwise? When listening to this song, you get the feeling that Grimes could wring pure gold out of a soiled dishrag. It most emphatically does NOT mean to go on as it starts. Those melodic oooh’s and aaah’s that kick things off are mere accouterments to the surging electronica. Grimes sounds barely self-contained as her vocals careen from line to line, the occasional operatic flourish given an extremely long tail of reverb/delays, only to grace us with some ethereal chorus delivery “Baby, believe me/ and you had every chance/ you destroy everything that you know”. This song is the dream that floated through every prog-rock artists’ head before the technology was available for them, it certainly plays out like one. A lucid, ever shifting, dreamscape.

289.Song:Supersonic

Artist:Oasis

Album:Definitely Maybe 

Written and recorded in the space of one day, this is Oasis embodied. Egotism, beauty and clumsy perfection. One of the music videos for “Supersonic” shows the band surrounded by the grit and grind of the city, trash bags drifting in the wind behind the drummer and the trains speeding by. Even the grainy, as the crow flies, photography harkens back to Let It Be era Beatles, who the Gallhager brothers so desperately wish to be compared against. All of this contrasts with the song itself, which is a muscular beauty, a perfect, capital R, Rock song. “You need to be yourself/ You can’t be no one else” This lyric captures the essence, from a band that tried to replicate all that came before and overshadow whatever would come after. They carved out a spot for themselves in the canon by aiming for greatness, however sincerely or not they managed. “I need to be myself/ I can’t be no one else”.

288.Song:Concrete Jungle

Artist:Bob Marley & The Wailers

Album:Catch A Fire

Imagine how utterly despondent someone would have to be, when catching a glimpse of mid-twentieth century America’s urban centres, to write a song about how soul stifling the city life can be. The benefits of modern urban planning have largely freed us from those concrete hellscapes, but for those unlucky souls still trapped in places like, say, Gary, Indiana, this is the song for you. “No chains around my feet but I’m not free”. The stark electric guitar that plays throughout performs like the ashes of accumulated dreams of escaping from rural destitution. Bob Marley’s vocals sound like they are wavering on the knife edge of hope, dynamically fluctuating against the synth lead and accusatory bass lines. Reggae’s constant insistence on the 1-2 1-2 gives “Concrete Jungle” a punk-rock edge as Marley sings “No sun will shine in my day today”. As he asks “Where is the love to be found?” you get the feeling that nothing could console him.

287.Song:The Motor City Is Burning

Artist:John Lee Hooker/ MC5

Album:Urban Blues/ Kick Out The Jams 

The best of the blues could often be just as incendiary as the most raucous of punk, this is probably why MC5 chose to cover this song on their seminal live album Kick Out The Jams. As titanic a guitar assembly as they managed there, they still can’t quite match the gliding ferocity of John Lee Hooker’s original recording. Written and produced by Al Smith, Hooker is given all the room he needs to run riot over the traditional blues structures. The drums crackle with a restrained fury, like they are about to pop off at any moment, the rolling bass lines match that energy beat for beat. Hooker’s guitars flicker like the flames of a riot, as was the case in the summer of ‘67, when society was starting to tear itself apart over  the Vietnam War and the Civil Rights Movement. His vocals have all the assured presence of a man who has seen these times before and is content to watch the flames. “The Motor City’s burnin’/ Ain’t a thing that I can do”.

286.Song:1901

Artist:Phoenix

Album:Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix 

Sometimes a song comes along that vents all the pent up aspirations of youth, that carries us along a beat so intensely propulsive that we surrender to its magic. “1901” has that energy, a through-line of fantastical vivacity that speaks to the ages. Written as an homage to 1901 France, just before the calamities of the World Wars, an age where the future was as bright as it was seemingly limitless with potential, this song refuses to let go of its naivety. If anything it wants to drag you along with its hopeful vigor. Great big synth slabs pair with a guitar line ringing out in the distance, like a call to action, as the drums come crashing in along the rhythm guitar parts, suggesting notes hanging just out of reach. As the chorus worms its way into your skull, you get the feeling that you would rather be nowhere else but here, dancing along to its exuberant highs “It’s not a miracle we needed/ And no, I wouldn’t let you think so/ Fold it, fold it, fold it, fold it”.

285.Song:Bitter Sweet Symphony

Artist:The Verve

Album:Urban Hymns

Sometimes life just throws stuff at you that synchronizes perfectly with your artistic aspirations; As what happened with “Bitter Sweet Symphony”, where The Verve got screwed out of songwriting royalties for their usage of a small part of an orchestral rendition of  The Rolling Stones’ “The Last Time”. Allen Klein proved to be one of the most cutthroat managers in music when he strong-armed them for 22 years [1].  When life and art come together like this, you can’t help but be impressed by the cosmic roulette that we all play with our lives and those of our surrounding significants. “‘Cause it’s a bitter sweet symphony this life”. The voluminous strings that appear throughout are simply perfect manifestations of melodramatic grandeur, of the pettiness of life writ large. The rest of the band serves as mere accouterments, striking through the dense string mixture with resigned indifference. As if life couldn’t be more perfectly atonal.

284.Song:Don’t Hurt Yourself

Artist:Beyonce Feat. Jack White

Album:Lemonade 

Listening to this song is an exercise in timidity. Girl, you know you can just leave him right? When Beyonce finds herself singing lines like “You ain’t trying hard enough/ You ain’t lovin’ hard enough”, is she actually following the logic through to the end in her head? Whatever, humans are complicated, love even more so. Music can help us parse through these things, but finding easy answers through it? Forget it. Beyonce found a well of uncontested artistic brilliance from it at least. Teaming up with Jack White, the two produce a neo-soul rocker that hits on every possible cylinder. From the way that the organ riff at the beginning flares up and down, to the way that the drums seem to fill a void that only they could fill. There is something here for any audiophile to drool over. But back to Beyonce’s lyrics, after an entire song filled with invective, she growls menacingly at the end “If you try this shit again/ You gon’ lose your wife”. We shall see.

283.Song:Cherry Coloured Funk

Artist:Cocteau Twins

Album:Heaven Or Las Vegas 

No lyrics sheet exists for this song. The closest that we have are educated guesses [1]filled with nonsense sentences and disjointed imagery. Kooky stuff like “You steam a lens stable eyes and glass” or “You’ll hang the hearts black and dull as the night”. These are lyrics that mean nothing, to be sung as if they are known unknowns. Elizabeth Fraser’s vocals have always been a guessing game, the kind of late-night party-game where you could lose your mind trying to decipher the vaguest of syllables for the vaguest of ends. Still, you can’t escape the sheer spacious beauty that the Cocteau Twins surround her vocals with. The guitars that are always shifting on these unstable foundations, as if they themselves also can’t find the answers that we are seeking. The drums that are the only constant that we can hang our hat on, keeping an insistent push as if nudging us towards some kind of  understanding. Whatever it all means, it’s a lovely uncertainty.

282.Song:Red Rain

Artist:Peter Gabriel

Album:So

On So, Peter Gabriel’s emotions were outsized. In a year where music was exceedingly global with its intentions, where the Cold War threatened every advance with the specter of our darkest potential, he released this moody epic. Borne out of a nightmare, only “Red Rain” could sound like this, at this moment, for this purpose. The intro soars in like a thunderstorm, the synths and drums impacting like lightning over the savannah. Then Gabriel’s voice, lamenting, rough, and worn down by trauma, unleashes itself in torrents. “I am standing at the water’s edge in my dream/ I cannot make a single sound as you scream” That his performances eeks a semblance of hope out of the bleak soundscapes is utterly remarkable, but the end result is still a plea for…something, it’s not quite clear from the lyrics, which I guess is the point. Letting nightmares define your way forward can only end in misery, but “Red Rain” at least allows for that reflection.

281.Song:My Heart Will Go On (Love Theme From “Titanic”)

Artist:James Horner & Celine Dion

Album:Titanic 

Yeah, for a year or two this was the most played song on the planet, get over it. It deserved to be played then, now and forever. Recorded in one take by Celine Dion, this is by far the best showcase of her talents as a performer. To lilt from line to line, first softly, then bombastically, to power through lyrics like “Love was when I loved you” without breaking into laughter, in fact to make us not care about that writing snafu, that’s magic. James Horner was smart enough to craft the production around her, not overpowering but adding in crucial touches, such as the signature delayed claps dotted throughout, or carefully threading the line of cheesiness with the angelic synths. This song has a momentum that approaches unstoppable, the kind of inevitability that one has while watching the Titanic sail right into the iceberg. One take! No cover, no studio touch ups. Celine Dione alone, against the world. The world clearly loved it and so should you.

280.Song:The Passenger

Artist:Siouxsie & The Banshees/ Iggy Pop

Album:Through The Looking Glass/ Lust For Life 

While Iggy Pop’s original version of this song is much more beloved, it does have a more punk-rock energy to it, I believe that, given time, Siouxsie & The Banshees’ tighter recording will prove definitive. The main weakness of the original, to me, was the lack of a rhythmic center to its more tone poem production, the ad-hoc nature of its recording. It turns out, adding a brass section completely chained to the rhythm allows the rest of the song to bounce off of it more effectively. Thus, Siouxsie. Every musical element just functions far better when the listener isn’t desperately holding on for dear life. While that lackadaisicalness may be the point, may even be artistically far more potent, it is far easier to ride those musical waves when we are assured of where we and the band stand. That Siouxsie is a better singer is an added bonus, she can simply reach those peaks that Iggy, bless his soul, simply can’t reach.

279.Song:Ghost Rider

Artist:Suicide

Album:Suicide 

This song came out in 1977, at a time when disco was at its peak and Giorgio Moroder had already made several of his iconic synth sets. So it’s not as if there hadn’t already been precedents for what Suicide would give the world, a sixties band named Silver Apples explored much of the same terrain as well. But what makes “Ghost Rider” so iconic is its blase attitude towards rebellious youth. Like it could care less that American boys were so recently led to slaughter in the Vietnam War, it pummels forward over the notions of good sense. How else can you explain its comic book inspiration taking up so much space in the lyrics sheet? “Ghost rider motorcycle hero” Alan Vega just sort of angsts out, his vocals on the verge of insanity as Martin Rev’s synth organ and stark drum machine sounds play on and on and on. This mood of coiled up anxieties, never allowed to really cut loose, would go on to inform entire genres of resigned dissatisfaction. 

278.Song:Higher Ground

Artist:Stevie Wonder

Album:Innervisions 

Stevie Wonder had such a knack for soulful, enervating, songwriting that it almost doesn’t matter if you can call “Higher Ground” out for being instantly dated due to its distinctive synths. The joy overpowers the cynicism, as a matter of course. The fact that every sound is crystal clear in the mix allows the sonics room to breathe, to percolate their way into your senses. The warmth of the basslines and groove of the drums form a steady base for introspection. Given the context of a post civil-rights decade still grappling with the particulars, the sharp blips and bloops of the keyboards function as a neat metaphor for the continued need for awareness and agitation to “reach the highest ground”. “Teachers keep on teaching/ Preachers keep on preaching…/Cause it won’t be too long”. Barack Obama once said that the moral arc of the universe bends towards justice, songs like “Higher Ground” will be here to remind us to “keep on learning”.

277.Song:If I Die 2Nite

Artist:2Pac

Album:Me Against The World 

Against a sonic backdrop hard enough to create the effect of a man rapping with his back to the wall, 2pac lives up to his considerable legend. We have those sparse synth hits, swirling horns in the chorus and outro, Dr.Dre popping in with his bassy emphasis and 2pac double tracking his vocals through each verse, an onslaught unto himself. The drums and bass deserve special credit here: that bass is a powerfully punchy thing, coming in alongside 2pac’s plosives like a concealed sidearm. The dry snare has the effect of shining a spotlight onto the proceedings with its slashing frequencies, the kicks mixed low enough to become abyssal. A perfect production style to allow 2pac’s snarling rhymes their space to ram through the speakers “I hope they bury me and send me to my rest/ Headlines reading ‘murdered to death’ my last breath”. “ If I Die 2Nite” is the sound of 2pac having the last word, no matter what should happen.

276.Song:No Church In The Wild

Artist:Jay-Z & Kanye West (Feat. Frank Ocean & The Dream)

Album:Watch The Throne  

“We formed a new religion/ No sins as long as there’s permission”. In the light of Kanye West’s fascinating descent into his god-delusion, “No Church In The Wild” hits even harder as a spiritually debauched, seductive, showcase of his talents. Yes, producer 88 Keys introduced him and Jay-Z to the main beats, but he had the insight to fill the soundscape out with Frank Ocean’s sharp voice and demand certain changes throughout. It gets to the point that, even though this ostensibly a collaboration between West and Jay-Z, it really could have just been another track on a mainline West album. That’s not to sell Jay-Z’s philosophically dense contributions short ,“Socrates asked whose bias do y’all seek/ All for Plato, screech”, it’s just hard not to place it as a result of a man battling his own internal spiritual demons, especially with that liquid, deep toned prog riff circling around the proceedings like a flock of vultures.