Earlier this month I posted a list of my top 5 songs of 2013, and one of my followers responded that he compiled his own list, but of songs he discovered this year, not necessarily songs that were released this year. It got me to thinking that there are quite a few songs I discovered … Continue reading Top 30 Songs of 2013
If you know anything about me at all you probably know that I love music more than almost everything else. When I was 10 years old I heard U2’s “Bad” on the radio and I became fascinated with the nuance of the song. That translated into listening to the radio anytime I could get my hands on it, and when my mother wasn’t railing against secular music. I used to put a tape in the player, turn the sound all the way down, and let it record whichever radio station happened to be on for 45 minutes. Then I would turn it over and record for the next 45 minutes. That’s how I found songs like “Shout,” by Tears for Fears, and “Love is a Battlefield,” by Pat Benatar, and a host of other dynamic songs I would have never heard otherwise.
At the end of every year since then I’ve made my own list of my own top songs from that year. And I don’t care if absolutely no one else heard the songs or cared for them. It’s all about my own tastes. I have two rules, though, for a song to count. It had to be released in that calendar year, and it couldn’t be from my top 2 artists, even if they had released music in that calendar year. That second one was because usually they would take all the top spots, and I wanted to compile a list that was varied. So, without further ado, here are my top 5 songs of 2013*:
5. Say Something – A Great Big World (feat. Christina Aguilera)
“Say something. I’m giving up on you. I’m sorry that I couldn’t get to you. Anywhere, I would have followed you. Say something. I’m giving up on you.” I never would have heard this song if not for singing shows like The Voice and The X Factor, where the original artists came on to sing (on The Voice), and the song was covered brilliantly (on The X Factor, by Alex and Sierra). But I have loved its haunting melody from the start. It also features one of the most subtle vocal performances by Christina Aguilera in a supporting role. Simply brilliant.
4. Holy Grail – Jay-Z (feat. Justin Timberlake)
“One day you’re here. One day you’re there. One day you care. You’re so unfair. Sippin’ from your cup til it runneth over. Holy grail.” This song would probably be number 1 if it had just been Justin Timberlake’s portion of it, but just like Suit & Tie from The 20/20 Experience, the song suffers when Jay-Z enters it. As much as I love Jigga, for some reason he doesn’t seem to hold his end of the bargain when he collaborates with JT. The song is still amazing enough, though, despite that, for me to place it high on my list for the year. Continue reading “Friday Top 5: Songs of 2013”
I had an interesting conversation earlier today with a coworker. When I asked her what type of music she liked, she said she just really didn’t listen to much music at all. After I picked my jaw up off the ground, I realized that not everyone is as caught up in and with music as I am, that it could honestly become an afterthought to others. While I love having music in the background as much as the next person (and I’m listening to Katy Perry’s new album in the background as I write this), I also use it as a focal point for just about everything I do. It helps me focus and concentrate, and it brings me such joy, from a simple pop song to a complex anthem for a generation. It’s been a while since I put this thing on shuffle and let you in on some of the music on my iPod, so here goes…
1. Good Girls Go Bad (Crash Crash Remix) – Cobra Starship
While I prefer the original to this remix, the best thing about the song is its repetition which is everywhere in both versions. Plus it has a guest appearance by my girl, Leighton Meester (Blair from Gossip Girl), so that makes it cool also. “I make them good girls go bad.”
2. Spring – Tracy Chapman
Tracy Chapman is the soundtrack to my adolescence. Well, her and Nirvana, sort of like a yin and yang. This song reminds me of fall, even though it’s named Spring.
3. Brenda’s Got a Baby – 2Pac
My mother’s name is Brenda, so I imagine 2Pac is rapping about me in this song. I’m not sure my mother would be thrilled to know I think this so please don’t tell her.
4. Never Named – Soundgarden
Out of all the Soundgarden songs I have on my iPod (every one they ever released), this one is probably the one I’ve listened to least. Not because I don’t like it, but because there are just so many good Soundgarden songs out there. “I’ll put my hand in flames.”
5. Rolling in the Deep – Haley Reinhart
Okay, I’ll admit it. I’m a huge American Idol fan, and I have been since season 6. Ms. Reinhart was featured in season 10, and I voted for her many times. This was one of my favorite songs she performed on the show. And no, she doesn’t sound like Adele. Continue reading “Tuesday Shuffle”
Have you ever seen someone read while walking? Those people fascinate me. And I suppose I could do it too if I really focused, but it just seems like too much work with the possibility of disaster at the other end. It’s like listening to a book on CD while driving. Either I expend too much energy trying to concentrate on listening to the book that I can’t focus enough on the road, or I focus everything I have on the road and completely miss out on whatever was happening in that section of the book. So you would think reading while listening to music or reading with a lot of noise in the background would be a dealbreaker for me, huh? Not at all.
In fact, I can’t imagine reading without having some kind of music or noise going on behind it all. Most other readers I’ve talked to either can’t do the same thing, or they say if there’s music on in the background it has to be quiet in terms of both volume and content. For me it doesn’t really matter on the volume or content front. I can listen to classical music or Metallica, at low volume or at high, but what I can’t do is have complete silence when I read. Continue reading “In the Background”
The first time I heard Sammy Hagar I was in the stacks of the Temple University library in 1996. I had my old-style, drug store, $6 dollar headphones plugged into my imitation Walkman, and his voice took me by surprise when it bore itself into my brain that fall. You see, back then I listened to the radio a lot, but I did it in unconventional ways. There were no podcasts, no digital radio like Pandora, and no satellite radio. There was just good old AM, good old FM, and an antenna to listen to either.
I wouldn’t often get the chance to listen at home, so I would get out blank audio cassettes, put them into the stereo, and press record. Then I would go back later and listen to them, trying to figure out who the singers and bands were that sang the songs I liked. There was no Shazam back then to figure it out, and the DJ didn’t always give the information, so it was a fact-finding expedition that often led to dead ends since I had no contacts to explain it all to me. But it didn’t stop me from loving the songs I loved from those tapes, from those radio days, some of which I still have no idea who sang to this day.
In those days I would also get caught up with those radio concerts, you know the kind that were edited so they could be on the radio, so they cut out all the good parts and a lot of the crowd noise too, plus even some of the show so it would fit in the alotted time the radio had planned for it. But back then it was the only way I got to listen to shows so I would copy them too. One time I found out there was an STP concert coming on, so I set the tape to copy it. I found out later, though, that it was one of those back-to-back show nights where they played two concerts in a row. The first show was STP, and the encore was a Sammy Hagar concert from 1983. Continue reading “Hearing Sammy”
Nineteen ninety-eight was the year I was supposed to have graduated from college, but that feat didn’t actually happen until 2003. Instead, I was moving to Tennessee that year. That was back before my self-imposed exile from radio, so I was still grooving to N*Sync and Mariah Carey back-to-back every fifteen minutes on EVERY RADIO … Continue reading Friday Top 5: Songs of 1998
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