1,001 songs to listen to before you die...

[Liam]

316.      

‘Oh Lonesome Me’, Neil Young (1970)

It speaks to my proclivity for buying albums that I rarely listened to when I was younger that I may, or may not, have the album this song comes from in a box in my attic, yet I’m pretty certain I don’t remember this song. I mean, if I didn’t own the album, then that makes a lot more sense. Still, this was a cover of a song written by Don Gibson, which apparently was a more ‘to hell with it’ take on a song about being lonely. Young took a more literal tack with it, slowing things down and really selling the lyric. The spare backing from the band Crazy Horse supports Young’s mournful tones in a song that is really good…whether I should have heard it before or not.

317.      

’56-64 Was My Number’, Toots and the Maytals (1970)

This is the second song that saw Toots and his Maytals make this list, and as first one came off the back of an eighteen month jail sentence, it is perhaps fitting that the second song was all about his time in prison and his innocence. Popular in Jamaica and overseas, it was both a protest and a prison song, a song that had Toots claiming he was only sent down for trying to protect a friend. The ska/reggae songs are ones I find hard to talk about, as it just isn’t really part of my cultural capital and I find myself just defaulting to words like ‘groovy’ and ‘catchy’. That is exactly what this song is, but perhaps undersells it.

318.      

‘Working Class Hero’, John Lennon (1970)

The third solo Beatles song to make the list, this feels like the one that moves furthest from what the Fab Four were doing. Not that it is Lennon going off and doing Icelandic throat chanting or anything, but the singing and guitar work is very reminiscent of Bob Dylan. According to the book, Lennon had undergone therapy before recording the album, yet what he represented and what he wanted to be clashed, an idea explored on this song. It also involves some casual use of the word ‘fucking’, another move that felt like a deliberate move away from his style when writing alongside Paul McCartney. The relative simplicity of this helps to make it feel timeless – this doesn’t feel five decades old.

[METALMAN]

Oh Lonesome Me is a good tune from a really great album.

Toots is nice.

i don’t like Working Class Hero. Lennon was never very good when he did politics. But regardless of the message, music is the medium and that’s what is most important, but this dirge is barely a song.

[Liam]

319.      

‘Box of Rain’, The Grateful Dead (1970)

Written and sung by Phil Lesh – the vocals being a rarity according to the book – this was a song that was a tribute to Lesh’s father. I was about to start this by saying that I’d never really listened to any Grateful Dead and was interested in hearing what they offered, but this is apparently a departure from the style of music they were famous for. I appreciate the sentiment with which it was written and it is by no means a bad song, yet it did very little for me. I mainly come away from the listen knowing that the writer of this section thought that Lesh wasn’t a very good singer – I’ll leave that up for debate.

320.      

‘Life on Mars?’, David Bowie (1971)

Influenced by: My Death • Scott Walker (1967)   

Influence on: Boy • Ian Hunter (1975)

Covered by: Barbra Streisand (1974) • The Flaming Lips (1996) • Geoff Keezer (2000) • Seu Jorge (2004) • Tony Christie (2006) • The Dresden Dolls (2006) • The Thing (2008) • Enrico Ruggeri (2009)

What surprised me about this song was the story behind it – a swipe at Frank Sinatra’s ‘My Way’ as Bowie had also written a song that used the music of the French song it was based on, ‘Comme d’habitude’, but it went unreleased. It naturally isn’t as straightforward as that, but it definitely makes an intriguing narrative. The song is a great slice of what Bowie was all about at this time – visually arresting in the music video; catchy as anything in the studio. Is this my favourite Bowie song? Quite probably. Something about it just works for me and nothing surpasses it of the songs that I’ve heard.

321.      

‘Bang a Gong (Get It On)’, T-Rex (1971)

Influenced by: Little Queenie • Chuck Berry (1959)   Influence on: Cigarettes and Alcohol • Oasis

Covered by: Power Station (1985) • Blondie (1993) • The Glitter Band (1996) • Boy George & Edwyn Collins (1996) • Neanderthal Spongecake (2002) • Ministry (2008)

Very much the definition of a song that I have been aware of for years, but couldn’t necessarily have told you that it was by T-Rex. One of the only hits for the band in the United States, it was a tribute to ‘Little Queenie’ by Chuck Berry. The most interesting thing here was the potential for excess that the song afforded the band – Bolan apparently bragged about the ability for them to go for twenty minutes by just throwing more and more solos at the song when it was played live. It is a good song, if one that I care less about in the pantheon of rock and roll tunes that I like.

[Bobfoc]

Did Space Oddity not make it in? That's surprising.

[Malenko]

I admit this is an odd reason to say this but I thought the Moody Blues Nights in White Satin was going to be in this.

My dad filmed me when I was 3 riding a trycicle in our old home. The background song was that one. Whenever I hear it I get sad and nostalgic. It would be in my 1001 songs list but I guess the writer never saw that video. I'll let it pass this time.

Edited May 12, 2020 by Malenko

[METALMAN]

I really like Box of Rain, and American Beauty is a good album. It's certainly atypical of the Grateful Dead, mainly because it doesn't have very many really long guitar solos. And yeah, he's not a great singer but I think it works for this song.

I've mentioned before that I don't really like David Bowie before Young Americans. This song is one of the exceptions. It's something special. Great piano by Rick Wakeman too.

IS IT MY IMAGINAAAAAAAAYSHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEUN. I've always found T-Rex a bit boring; all of their songs sound the same. Cigarettes and Alcohol is genuinely better than the song it ripped off.

[Skummy]

I love T-Rex, but prefer them when they still had a bit of their weird hippy airs about them, rather than trying to be swaggering rock stars. "20th Century Boy" is a much better rock track, though.

"Life On Mars" is, obviously, gorgeous. It's really the first time, on a grand scale, that Bowie showed that there was more going on in his head than rock and folk, as it brings in some of the odd music hall influences as well, with none of it feeling like pastiche. For someone who always gets celebrated as being an innovator and musical chameleon, I'd argue that this is really the first time that he started to feel like a significant artist in his own right.

[METALMAN]

Yeah 20th Century Boy and Metal Guru are the T-Rex rock songs that I like.

[VerbalPuke]

T. Rex is great, Bang a Gong isn't a surprise here but I like Jeepster best off of Electric Warrior. Telegram Sam is a great later tune of theirs as well. 

Hard to argue Bowie, this is some of my favorite stuff. 

Always found the Dead boring.

[Liam]

I write these a day in advance more often than not, yet forgot to save yesterday's listening/writing. Therefore, I've tried to recreate them roughly.

322.      

‘Blackwater Side’, Anne Briggs (1971)

When someone is described as being ‘punk’ when it comes to folk music, you do begin to wonder what you might hear. To be fair, this seems to be more a point about her lifestyle as she busked her way around, enjoying a drink or two and disappeared as soon as she arrived, almost. This song was taught to Bert Jansch who has already been on the list and repurposed by Led Zeppelin before Briggs even committed it to record. She has a beautifully haunting voice that is allowed to shine against her simple guitar instrumentation. Shame there isn’t more of her work out there.

323.      

‘I Don’t Want to Talk About It’, Crazy Horse (1971)

Written by Danny Whitten, this was one of five songs he wrote for the band before his heroin addiction led to him being kicked out of the band. It was also his heroin addiction that led the band to be kicked off of the ‘After The Gold Rush’ recordings with Neil Young, so it was nothing if not destructive – Whitten died in 1972. This is a mournful song that may be about his willingness, or lack thereof, to face his own addiction. The real highlights are Whitten’s weary voice and the melancholy tinge furthered by the slide guitar. I’ve heard covers of this, but nothing beats the original.

324.      

‘A Case of You’, Joni Mitchell (1971)

Mitchell is another artist that I feel I must have heard some work from just by merely existing, but have never sought out her work. This may have been written about James Taylor, whom Mitchell was having an affair with, though she had also been romantically involved with Crosby, Stills and Nash so her entanglements were slightly more complex. Whilst this is not my sort of music, it isn’t hard to see why people like Mitchell – her shifts in pitch and tone showcase a very capable voice.

[METALMAN]

The Anne Briggs song is really nice. There was loads of great British and Irish folk music around this period.

I love Crazy Horse but I know them entirely as Neil Young's backing band. I can't believe I've never heard this before! I liked it.

I'm not a huge fan of this earlier period of Joni Mitchell - I prefer stuff like Hejira from a few years later when she went a bit more jazzy and started working with Jaco Pastorius. But A Case of You is probably my favourite of hers from this time.

[Liam]

325.      

‘Crayon Angels’, Judee Sill (1971)

Reform school, drugs, prostitution and jail are all things you’d be surprised to link with Judee Sill if you just heard her voice alone. A singer and songwriter who died tragically young (35), Sill never really was able to make a breakthrough after becoming the first release on David Geffen’s new label, Asylum Records. Her voice is very melodious and belies what sounds like a very rough life all round. Eye opening if not earth shattering.

326.      

‘Famous Blue Raincost’, Leonard Cohen (1971)

With some of these names, it does interest me as to how many songs might end up on the list. Cohen is famous, yet I wouldn’t be expecting Beatles or Elvis numbers from him. However, this is his second song of a storied career. With a narrative that sees a letter to a male acquaintance exploring a love triangle, Cohen’s talky-style of singing works very effectively with the minimalist strings in accompaniment. Apparently, he spent years perfecting this song as he knew when it was released, it would be a popular addition to his catalogue. Whether that is right, I don’t know, but I enjoy the feeling of contemplation that the whole song creates.

327.      

‘Chalte Chalte’, Lata Mangeshkar (1971)

Once in the Guinness Book of Records as the most recorded song in history, this version is from the 1971 film Pakeezah. Lip-synched by the director’s wife in the movie, it is Mangeshkar who provided the actual voice. There is an element of Indian music that I always enjoy – the rhythm, the instrumentation, the liveliness of a lot of it – but I generally can always give or take it over time. This is here because it is clearly very historic and Mangeshkar has a pleasant singing voice, but that is about all I can offer.

[GoGo Yubari]

Judee Sill was like the big find for me from the point in this book I got up to. Never heard of her before and after "Crayon Angels" I basically tracked down all her stuff on YouTube, I adore her voice and the earnestness of the songs she wrote. The fact that all of it is juxtaposed with an all-too-short career (two studio albums and some live recordings) and tragic life really stings.

Some other songs of hers I think are worth a listen: "The Kiss," "There's a Rugged Road" (this is a version recorded for the BBC that I think is better than the studio version), "Lady-O," "The Lamb Ran Away With the Crown," and her biggest hit "Jesus Was a Cross Maker," which is great '70s AM radio folk.

[Skummy]

Jesus Was A Cross Maker and The Lamb Ran Away With The Crown are the too that I know and love, the former especially. I didn't really know anything about her life until just now, though.

 

Famous Blue Raincoat is one of my favourite Leonard Cohen songs. I think he lyrically became more interesting, and more mature (if you can say that about a writer who didn't start releasing records until his mid-30s anyway) as he musically moved into cheap synths and weird production choices that make some of his later music a more acquired taste, but this is right at the point where he's moved beyond the likes of Suzanne/So Long, Marianne, which, while great, always have the feel of a bit of a dirge about them, while simultaneously reminding me of middle class hippies. He feels much more unique as an artist here - when Nina Simone sang Suzanne, it didn't feel like a Leonard Cohen song, whereas anyone who sings Famous Blue Raincoat sounds like they're working in his wheelhouse. 

[METALMAN]

Never really got into Judee Sill. The way she sings reminds too much of Tom Delonge.

I love the cheap synth Leonard Cohen! I'm not actually so big on his acoustic period, they certainly do have a dirge -like quality about them. Famous Blue Raincoat is good, but I'm not often in the mood to listen to that or the rest of Songs of Love and Hate.

Chalte Chalte is a good one. I like that style of Indian pop music in limited doses. Very evocative.

[Liam]

328.      

‘Maggie May’, Rod Stewart (1971)

Influenced by: Maggie May • Traditional English folk song (c.1800)   

Influence on: Painkiller • Turin Brakes (2003)   

Covered by: The Pogues (1989) • Blur (1992) • Mathilde Santing (2008) • Massacre (2008) • Matthew Sweet & Susanna Hoffs (2009)

This is another one of those songs that I feel like I’ve heard the chorus of a million times, but never sat down and listened to the whole song in one go. A narrative about a young boy that finds himself in the clutches of an older woman, the song feels lively in a manner that is almost at odds with the limited amount of instruments creating the sound. I agree with the book when it states that there is a timeless feel to the song – it surprised me how ‘current’ it sounded when it kicked into gear. Underneath the rock and roll element, there is just a really well-crafted pop song.

329.      

‘Imagine’, John Lennon (1971)

Influenced by: Let It Be • The Beatles (1970)   

Influence on: Don’t Look Back in Anger • Oasis (1995)

Covered by: Andy Williams (1972) • Diana Ross (1973) • Susan Cadogan (1975) • Elton John (1980) • Gerry & The Pacemakers (1981) • Liza Minnelli (1992) • David Bowie (1997) • Ray Charles (2001)

I fucking hate this song.

330.      

‘Laughing’, David Crosby (1971)

Pushed back to 1971 following the success of Crosby, Stills and Nash, this was an all-star group accompanying Crosby’s solo effort. Joni Mitchell, members of the Grateful Dead and Jefferson Airplane were involved in some capacity in bringing the song to record. I’d enjoyed when Simon and Garfunkel had their vocals tracked many times over for one of their songs and a similar thing happens here as Crosby’s voice is multi-layered in places. Alongside the rippling and metallic sound of the percussion, there is a hippy serenity and spirituality to the song that was really fun.

[Malenko]

Care to elaborate? 

[METALMAN]

Maggie May is a great song. Possibly the first song on this list that I've seen performed live by the original artist. 😕

Imagine is tiresome, but I don't know if that's John Lennon's fault. I'm trying to assess it as if wasn't sung by self-aggrandising Hollywood actors to comfort us while we're in lockdown and all that other nonsense. And I don't think it's a bad song. Just not a very interesting one. 

I like David Crosby, but poor guy, his solo music is nowhere near the level of that of Neil Young, Stephen Stills or Graham Nash. I guess the compilers of the book felt like they had to give him something though, and this is a good enough song to be fair.

Edited May 14, 2020 by metalman

[GoGo Yubari]

Even at the height of younger me loving nearly all of John Lennon's solo stuff I didn't like "Imagine" and thought it was grossly overrated. I hate the piano and I think the lyrics are a bit tiresome. Though like metalman said, it's kind if impossible to separate this song from its legacy and the fact that everyone trots it out as this meaningful, heartfelt thing on singing competitions and commercials. That being said, "Hallelujah" is the same way and there are still versions of that song I'll happily listen to while rolling my eyes at the overuse.

It does need to be in this book, though, like if it's trying to be a survey of the history of music you certainly can't omit "Imagine."

(Also Rod Stewart has never done anything for me either, if I'm being honest. I don't think I can muster more than "I get why other people might like this" with him.)

[Liam]

3 hours ago, Malenko said:

Care to elaborate? 

To be fair, I thought it was just funny to leave it at that. I just think it is overrated. I'm sure I've struggled to separate the song from the legacy.