Rolling Stone Top 500 Rethought
After being reminded how outraged I was at seeing Freebird at 191, I take back my favorable tone of this list. I think there was a bit too much deference to stature and less to the actual sound of the song. In the end, to me, what makes a song great is what it says to you, how it makes you feel when you listen to it. Freebird is an anthem of freedom that makes my heart sing, when those three guitars crank it up. Listen to the longing in Layla or Tears in Heaven as Clapton lays it all on the line. Check out the hot simpatico of Rob Thomas and Carlos on Smooth. Stairway to Heaven, Dark Side of the Moon (or are we only considering 3 min. songs?)....come on! These are all better songs than Like a Rolling Stone, their #1. How many times in a row could you listen to that, or Teen Spirit? When it comes to music, and song evaluation, social relevance comes in second to sound. Any song is all the more important for affecting music, culture, society. All of that needs to be considered.
What is the best song ever written? My pick would be Johnny B. Goode. It set the tone for rock & roll. It all gets back to Chuck Berry in the end. You cannot get around Berry riffs in rock & roll, ask any musician. That simple little song is so well crafted, it is perfection. It's a great dance song and that should count for a lot...remember the evaluator all the kids used on Bandstand..."the beat". It doesn't have the complexity of a Layla or Stairway to Heaven but it does deserve the #1 spot and What's Going On, deserves to be #2. While the Berry anthem expresses the optimism, Gaye shows the let-down. What the hell happened to the rock & roll revolution folks? Same thing that happened with the dot com bust. People realized there was no magic bullet, you gotta go keep on fighting, till you just decide to hand the baton off for a while & rest. We got our music from Africa, so don't be puttin 3 white boys up there first, ok? Respect should be #3. BTW, Dylan himself was embarassed, John would have been and Mick probably is too. It bothers all those early British blues/skiffle/rock artists that their own idols got such short shrift.
Anyway, I'm listing some of the songs they put too high, some they put too low, and some they actually left off the list completely. I mean, someone tell me I'm wrong but did they actually leave off songs like Smooth, which is not only an incredible song but spent 50 weeks on the charts, 12 of them at #1, won 8 Grammy's & sold 15 million copies. How can you even give credibility to a list like this? There were so many obscure songs on there, some I've never even heard, so I'm gonna go actually listen to them and then tell you how awful they are...(I did, they were). There were all sorts of little factions overrepresented (Joni Mitchell, one of the judges, got 3 songs in) while a lot of mainstream, great songs, that were number #1, for weeks, got overlooked. Girls, Latins and singer/songwriters all got shafted.
Too Highly Rated:
Smells Like Teen Spirit - 9
What'd I Say - 10
A Change is Gonna Come - 12
Maybelline - 18
One - 36
Help - 29
Waterloo Sunset - 42
Heroes - 46
Bo Diddley - 62
Tangled Up in Blue - 68
Walk on By - 70
Mystery Train - 77
Hot Stuff - 103
Rock n Roll Music - 128
Cathy's Clown - 149
I could go on endlessly, there were hundreds of them, but since these were actually all rated above 150, they needed outing the most.
Underrated Songs:
Layla - 27
Stairway to Heaven - 31
Won't Get Fooled Again - 133
Bohemian Rhapsody - 163
Freebird - 191
Pretty Woman - 222
Moondance - 226
Fire & Rain - 227
Sexual Healing - 231
Gimme Some Lovin - 244
Chain of Fools - 249
Somebody to Love - 274
Ain't No Sunshine - 280
Whipping Post - 383
Baby I Need Your Lovin - 390
Ooh Ooh Child - 391
Summer in the City - 393
Roxanne - 388
Just My Imagination - 389
Sweet Emotion - 408
Smoke on the Water - 426
Lola - 422
Piano Man - 421
Mustang Sally - 434
Penny Lane - 449
Runaway - 466
Suite:Judy Blue eyes - 418
My Sweet Lord - 454
White Rabbit - 478
I Love Rock n Roll - 484
Under the Boardwalk - 487
Brown Sugar - 490
Left Out!
Smooth
American Pie
Song For You
Danny's Song
Riders on the Storm
Roundabout
Low Spark of High Heeled Boys
Takin Care of Business
Long Cool Woman
I Try
Superman
Inna Gadda da Vida
Truly Madly Deeply
You've Got a Friend
Love Child
Hello, I Love You
Karma Chameleon
Centerfold
Come On Eileen
Drops of Jupiter
If You're Gone
Air That I Breathe
Young Girl
Town Without Pity
Summertime
So Happy Together
Play that Funky Music White Boy
Whip It
Susie Q
Wild Nights
Spooky
Rock This Town
Come Away with Me
My Sharona
Let's Go
American Woman
Dig In
Feelin Alright
All Right Now
Use Me
Mony Mony
Devil Inside
She Drives Me Crazy
Smooth Operator
This Love
Falling
Family Affairs
Simply Irresistable
Fire
Ain't No Mountain High Enough
Everybody Hurts
At Last
Crazy in Love
Crazy Little Thing Called Love
Circle of Life
Angie
Time is on my Side
Get Off My Cloud
Stand By Me
Money
Feel Like Making Love
Ain't Too Proud to Beg
Locomotive Breath
Black Magic Woman
Wish You Were Here
Get This Party Started
Where is the Love?
Blackwater
Truckin
Waterfalls
I Can Feel it Coming
Wicked Games
After Midnight
Boys Are Back in Town
Smokin in the Boys Room
Sweet Melissa
Complicated
Girls Just Wanna Have Fun
I Can't Hold Out
No Such Thing
Some Kind of Wonderful
Rout 66
Pride & Joy
Crazy Love
Just a Girl
Hit Me With Your Best Shot
Beautiful
Game of Love
Man, I Feel Like a Woman
You Make Me Feel (Like a Natural Woman)
Foolish Games
Breathe
Allstar
I Will Always Love You
Livin La Vida Loca
It's Raining Men
Addicted to Love
Twisting the Night Away
Emotional Rescue
Kiss Me
Dessert Needs Rain
Like a Virgin
Tuesday Afternoon
Here Comes the Rain Again
Turn Turn Turn
These Boots Are Made For Walkin
Hanky Panky
Crimson & Clover
I Want to Know What Love Is
Careless Whisper
Don't You (Forget About Me)
Aquarius
Venus
I'll Be There
Homeward Bound
Hero
Maneater
Mind Games
Reelin in the Years
Joy to the World
Give a Little Bit
Fly Like an Eagle
Again, I could go on, but these should replace the hundreds of lame songs on that list. It's too much of a pain to keep going back to the list, which is not cross-referenced alphabetically, just to make sure I'm not crazy (ok, I just found an index inside a pull-out ad). Let's just say they left off tons of great songs. They also missed all the current stuff that WILL be viewed as seminal like all the great indie sounding females making it on their own names. They ignored all the earlier women too, from Carole King to Jewel. It's pretty outrageous, now that I think of it. Looking down their list of voters, I see some 90% are men. OK, now I'm really getting mad because I have always loved Rolling Stone and Jann Wenner, but women have had it tough enough in this world, not to mention rock and roll and believe, me, you don't even want to me to go THERE, cause I have been there personally, front row center. Given that some 99% of my own audience is male, I won't go off on y'all too bad but, I will say this. Take a look around - more and more sales for the women, bigger names, staying around longer & gaining clout, like Madonna. The Grammy's & other awards are giving them props. So, shame on you RS, they should have taken a look at it and gone out again to a bigger group. No one cares what VH1 thinks but, when you've been around over 30 years and have the stature you do, do a better job.
The little blurbs they had for each song gave a little insider rip but usually no real justification for its placement. A song that predates or inspires subsequent good music does not, in and of itself, make a song "great" in my book, just influential. The song needs to be good on its own and reach the kind of stature good songs are supposed to, i.e., lots of people are listening to it. Some of their picks didn't even chart at all. These insiders love to show off their knowledge of the obscure to each other, very clubby. They should have shown more respect for RS readers & the icon's populist roots.
And, one more thing, I see from the amount, size and placement of the ads that they made a forune off this list, undeservedly so.
What is the best song ever written? My pick would be Johnny B. Goode. It set the tone for rock & roll. It all gets back to Chuck Berry in the end. You cannot get around Berry riffs in rock & roll, ask any musician. That simple little song is so well crafted, it is perfection. It's a great dance song and that should count for a lot...remember the evaluator all the kids used on Bandstand..."the beat". It doesn't have the complexity of a Layla or Stairway to Heaven but it does deserve the #1 spot and What's Going On, deserves to be #2. While the Berry anthem expresses the optimism, Gaye shows the let-down. What the hell happened to the rock & roll revolution folks? Same thing that happened with the dot com bust. People realized there was no magic bullet, you gotta go keep on fighting, till you just decide to hand the baton off for a while & rest. We got our music from Africa, so don't be puttin 3 white boys up there first, ok? Respect should be #3. BTW, Dylan himself was embarassed, John would have been and Mick probably is too. It bothers all those early British blues/skiffle/rock artists that their own idols got such short shrift.
Anyway, I'm listing some of the songs they put too high, some they put too low, and some they actually left off the list completely. I mean, someone tell me I'm wrong but did they actually leave off songs like Smooth, which is not only an incredible song but spent 50 weeks on the charts, 12 of them at #1, won 8 Grammy's & sold 15 million copies. How can you even give credibility to a list like this? There were so many obscure songs on there, some I've never even heard, so I'm gonna go actually listen to them and then tell you how awful they are...(I did, they were). There were all sorts of little factions overrepresented (Joni Mitchell, one of the judges, got 3 songs in) while a lot of mainstream, great songs, that were number #1, for weeks, got overlooked. Girls, Latins and singer/songwriters all got shafted.
Too Highly Rated:
Smells Like Teen Spirit - 9
What'd I Say - 10
A Change is Gonna Come - 12
Maybelline - 18
One - 36
Help - 29
Waterloo Sunset - 42
Heroes - 46
Bo Diddley - 62
Tangled Up in Blue - 68
Walk on By - 70
Mystery Train - 77
Hot Stuff - 103
Rock n Roll Music - 128
Cathy's Clown - 149
I could go on endlessly, there were hundreds of them, but since these were actually all rated above 150, they needed outing the most.
Underrated Songs:
Layla - 27
Stairway to Heaven - 31
Won't Get Fooled Again - 133
Bohemian Rhapsody - 163
Freebird - 191
Pretty Woman - 222
Moondance - 226
Fire & Rain - 227
Sexual Healing - 231
Gimme Some Lovin - 244
Chain of Fools - 249
Somebody to Love - 274
Ain't No Sunshine - 280
Whipping Post - 383
Baby I Need Your Lovin - 390
Ooh Ooh Child - 391
Summer in the City - 393
Roxanne - 388
Just My Imagination - 389
Sweet Emotion - 408
Smoke on the Water - 426
Lola - 422
Piano Man - 421
Mustang Sally - 434
Penny Lane - 449
Runaway - 466
Suite:Judy Blue eyes - 418
My Sweet Lord - 454
White Rabbit - 478
I Love Rock n Roll - 484
Under the Boardwalk - 487
Brown Sugar - 490
Left Out!
Smooth
American Pie
Song For You
Danny's Song
Riders on the Storm
Roundabout
Low Spark of High Heeled Boys
Takin Care of Business
Long Cool Woman
I Try
Superman
Inna Gadda da Vida
Truly Madly Deeply
You've Got a Friend
Love Child
Hello, I Love You
Karma Chameleon
Centerfold
Come On Eileen
Drops of Jupiter
If You're Gone
Air That I Breathe
Young Girl
Town Without Pity
Summertime
So Happy Together
Play that Funky Music White Boy
Whip It
Susie Q
Wild Nights
Spooky
Rock This Town
Come Away with Me
My Sharona
Let's Go
American Woman
Dig In
Feelin Alright
All Right Now
Use Me
Mony Mony
Devil Inside
She Drives Me Crazy
Smooth Operator
This Love
Falling
Family Affairs
Simply Irresistable
Fire
Ain't No Mountain High Enough
Everybody Hurts
At Last
Crazy in Love
Crazy Little Thing Called Love
Circle of Life
Angie
Time is on my Side
Get Off My Cloud
Stand By Me
Money
Feel Like Making Love
Ain't Too Proud to Beg
Locomotive Breath
Black Magic Woman
Wish You Were Here
Get This Party Started
Where is the Love?
Blackwater
Truckin
Waterfalls
I Can Feel it Coming
Wicked Games
After Midnight
Boys Are Back in Town
Smokin in the Boys Room
Sweet Melissa
Complicated
Girls Just Wanna Have Fun
I Can't Hold Out
No Such Thing
Some Kind of Wonderful
Rout 66
Pride & Joy
Crazy Love
Just a Girl
Hit Me With Your Best Shot
Beautiful
Game of Love
Man, I Feel Like a Woman
You Make Me Feel (Like a Natural Woman)
Foolish Games
Breathe
Allstar
I Will Always Love You
Livin La Vida Loca
It's Raining Men
Addicted to Love
Twisting the Night Away
Emotional Rescue
Kiss Me
Dessert Needs Rain
Like a Virgin
Tuesday Afternoon
Here Comes the Rain Again
Turn Turn Turn
These Boots Are Made For Walkin
Hanky Panky
Crimson & Clover
I Want to Know What Love Is
Careless Whisper
Don't You (Forget About Me)
Aquarius
Venus
I'll Be There
Homeward Bound
Hero
Maneater
Mind Games
Reelin in the Years
Joy to the World
Give a Little Bit
Fly Like an Eagle
Again, I could go on, but these should replace the hundreds of lame songs on that list. It's too much of a pain to keep going back to the list, which is not cross-referenced alphabetically, just to make sure I'm not crazy (ok, I just found an index inside a pull-out ad). Let's just say they left off tons of great songs. They also missed all the current stuff that WILL be viewed as seminal like all the great indie sounding females making it on their own names. They ignored all the earlier women too, from Carole King to Jewel. It's pretty outrageous, now that I think of it. Looking down their list of voters, I see some 90% are men. OK, now I'm really getting mad because I have always loved Rolling Stone and Jann Wenner, but women have had it tough enough in this world, not to mention rock and roll and believe, me, you don't even want to me to go THERE, cause I have been there personally, front row center. Given that some 99% of my own audience is male, I won't go off on y'all too bad but, I will say this. Take a look around - more and more sales for the women, bigger names, staying around longer & gaining clout, like Madonna. The Grammy's & other awards are giving them props. So, shame on you RS, they should have taken a look at it and gone out again to a bigger group. No one cares what VH1 thinks but, when you've been around over 30 years and have the stature you do, do a better job.
The little blurbs they had for each song gave a little insider rip but usually no real justification for its placement. A song that predates or inspires subsequent good music does not, in and of itself, make a song "great" in my book, just influential. The song needs to be good on its own and reach the kind of stature good songs are supposed to, i.e., lots of people are listening to it. Some of their picks didn't even chart at all. These insiders love to show off their knowledge of the obscure to each other, very clubby. They should have shown more respect for RS readers & the icon's populist roots.
And, one more thing, I see from the amount, size and placement of the ads that they made a forune off this list, undeservedly so.
posted by Intervision at 3:30 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home