The U2 Top 17

Top 17 Songs

I thought it would be much easier than this to keep up a vain music blog. I must just set aside time every day or two to just write stuff.
I'm going to be posting new posts about my favorite songs from my favorite artists. A "Top 17". Why 17 you ask? Well, seven is my favorite number, and most lists are top 10, so I just added them together. Plus, 17 reversed is 71, which is the year of the 70's in which I was born. I'm old.
I'm going to eventually do this for my Top 34 artists (17+17=34; 3+4=7), but will start with these 5: one from each decade from the 60's through the ought's. I regard an artist in a certain decade of where their best work was created. My top 34 artists are not the greatest artists in musical history (totally different discussion) just my personal faves...like if I had to chose only 34 artists to listen to for the rest of my life.Henceforth, to start:
60's-The Beatles
70's-Joy Division
80's-The Smiths
90's-Jeff Buckley
00's-The National

If you have a suggestions for artists for me to consider...let me know. I'd love to talk music with y'all. Unless your favorite artist is Kenny G. Then no, we cannot discuss music.

The Greatest MUSEic

Rose & are going to see Muse saturday night. I would put them somewhere in the top 10 bands of the last decade and somewhere in my top 25 of all time. So...
Here my top 20 Muse songs, 4 from each album. I have liked them the instant I heard "Sunburn" sometime the end of 1999. It sounded like the Y2K fears rolled into personal turmoil. They certainly have evolved from their Radiohead-esque beginnings to attain their own sound. Mix Cure paranoia/Radiohead political panic with the bombast of Queen and melodic sense of Rachmaninoff..and top with space-rock genius arrangements = Muse. They have riffs straight out of Sabbaths songbook, piano chops worthy of Chopin and Matt Bellamy's voice, though sure highly influenced by Jeff Buckley, has evolved into his own minor-key angst.
You can simply watch my entire playlist and hear them evolve. I put my favorite song at the beginning of each album/era. Hence: "Showbiz" from their first album; "Map of Your Head" from their 2nd (though it is a b-side from that era); "Time Is Running Out", when they went global!; "Starlight" (which I know I'll get flak from because it's their poppiest moment ever...but I love it!); "The Resistance" from it's title album...what a freakin' chorus!. I also enjoy "Bliss"'s sequenced keyboard motif. That killer last riffage from the end of "Knights of Cydonia" makes me want to go 100 m.p.h. on the freeway when I hear it. Enough already let's listen:

honor of Rose & I seeing Phoenix live tomorrow @ the Hollywood Bowl (with Grizzly Bear opening!), I have made my Top 7 Phoenix songs. Phoenix to me are a pop band with a twist. Not quite rock (but with great grooves & guitars), and not quite electronic (though with defining keyboard parts and motorik beats). The singer isn't a singer in the classic sense; he's a bit like an ordinary guy singing (about God knows what sometime) in conversational tones. Pleasing, but not sleep-inducing. I liken them to a French version of Beck maybe, with a low key New Oder thrown in.
I start with "FunkySquaredance" from their first album. I distinctly remember KCRW playing this in the summer of 2000 and thinking: What the f*** is this? Starts out like a country song, then at near the 3 minute mark switches gears into a a crazy party groove with a Latin beat under current. Not settling for this...just after 5 minutes in...a metallic prog-rock middle, complete with vocoder-ed vocals. Oh, and a screaming guitar workout worthy of Steve Vai in full-flight. But even in the midst of this extended coda...a mini New Order-esque breakdown. Whew! But it all works. =)
"Rome", from their latest, has a catchy guitar staccato line and a melancholy melody that sticks in your mind like peanut butter to the roof of your mouth. It's y fave from this album. "Long Distance Call", from their previous release, is I guess them working up to the sound they achieved with greatness with the "Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart" album last year. It's still the best track of this somewhat spotty album. They were definitely in transition. I like the little keyboard flourishes, though. "If I Ever Feel Better", starting out with other-worldly organ sounds, kicks into a fantastic soul groove, complete with multi-layered guitars that stab, shimmer, and chime. The video for "Everything is Everything"is cool...and, again lyrically ambivalent enough to put your own meanings to. Maybe that's part of their appeal. You don't seem to focus on a song as a story, but as a collection of phrases that resonate. There's other bands that excel at this to me even more (Interpol, The National for example), but they are far less pop. They go 'rock' a bit more with "Armistice" from 'W.A.M.'. there's some tasty organ bits and hi-hat work in there, too. I finish with "Victim of the Crime" from the decidedly downbeat 'Alphabetical" album. Certain pop elements, but a lingering feeling it's a modern folk song.
Subversive, yes. Enjoyable, even more so.

Sorry some of the videos have ads. Damn YouTube! Enjoy:

Unsung Band, Episode One: Ivy

Ivy were a great pop band that started in the mid 90's, but have a new album due nest year. The best way I can describe them is unhurried. I mean that in a good way. Every band I like, I enjoy for different reasons and for different moods. Ivy hold a special place...just great pop songs for chilling out to. Not pop as in radio-friendly crap shoved down your ear canals by commercial radio, but reminiscent of 60's pop, although with a 70's vibe. With the main songwriter from Fountains of Wayne (themselves writers of fine pop songs with a more urgent pace) and the fluid vocals of French singer Dominique Durand...you are destined to be spellbound. Enjoy, my top five Ivy tunes:

Salutations

I have finally taken steps to publish a blog. My aim is to post music reviews and rant about things in general. Please subscribe to this blog if you like what I have to say...or even if you don't.

Tomorrow (9/8) will be my very first entry.