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stuonsongs · 3 years

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My Top 10 Favorite Songs of All Time - 2006 Edition

2021 Editor’s Note: I was looking through some old files and found this thing that I wrote sometime in the summer of 2006 at age 22. For all I know, it could’ve been 15 years to the day! Looking back, I’m not sure how many of these songs would still make my top 10. Don’t get me wrong, I still love all of these tunes, but I’m sure you know how it goes - You get older, you get exposed to more things, and your idea of good music expands. Anyway, I thought it might be nice to share with anyone who still uses this site. I present it in its original format without edits to my writing. I ended up writing full posts in this blog about some of these songs if you go through the archive.

Stu’s Top 10 Favorite Songs…Ever

Let’s start with some honorable mentions. These were so close, and I thought about it for so long, but they had to be left off.

Honorable Mentions

All Summer Long – The Beach Boys

All Summer Long. 1964. Capitol

This song has been described so many times as being “the perfect summer song.” When you listen to it, you can’t help but smile from the opening marimba intro, all the way through. It just screams “summer” and it hurt me to leave The Beach Boys off my top 10.

Bleed American – Jimmy Eat World

Bleed American. 2001. Grand Royal

So full of energy, so rocking, and so what would’ve been the most recent song on my list. I wanted to keep it in the top 10 just so I could have a song from the ‘00s, but it wasn’t meant to be. When the chorus kicks in, I can’t help but headbang.

Marie – Randy Newman

Good Old Boys. 1974. Reprise

Randy has said that a lot of young composers pick “Marie” as their favorite Newman song, and I can see why. The idea of a guy having to be drunk to tell his wife that he loves her is pretty funny, and throughout the whole song it’s just the beautiful melody with tons of strings, all to a tune about a guy ripping on himself as he comes home drunk to his wife.

Does He Love You? – Rilo Kiley

More Adventurous. 2004. Brute/Beaute

I guess this is newer than Bleed American, so it would’ve worked too. This is another more recent song that it killed me to leave off the list. The outro is an arrangement of the main tune with a different chord progression performed by a string quartet. Very beautiful. Also when Jenny Lewis screams “Your husband will never leave you, he will never leave you for me,” I get chills every time.

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So here it is. After a long day’s work, I’m finally finished. It actually turned out much different than I was thinking when I first started. The number one wasn’t really even in my top five when I started, but I slowly realized I loved it so much. I also left Ben Folds (Five) off this list completely, and I don’t know, I just feel the whole catalogue of Ben is so solid, none of the songs stick out to me that much. But anyways, here it is! After the break of course…

Stu’s Top 10

10.

(Love Is Like A) Heat Wave – Martha and the Vandellas

Heat Wave. 1963. Motown.

This one beat out “Bleed American” just barely. The reason being that somehow, despite being nearly 40 years older than Bleed American, it still has so much energy that it kills. Dan Bukvich once told our Jazz Arranging class that you can boil all the oldies you hear on the radio down to three categories: 1) Great Song. 2) Great Performance. 3) Great Arrangement. This song is one of the great performances. The handclaps throughout, combined with the driving baritone sax behind everything and constant snare drum action will keep anybody with blood running through their veins dancing all night long.

Bodhisattva – Steely Dan

Countdown to Ecstasy. 1973. MCA

This song is my Freebird. It’s just a basic blues progression song at its core with some minor changes at the end of the form. The real kicker that drives this song home is the three minute guitar solo in the middle that isn’t nearly as rocking as Freebird, but it is highly proficient and takes me to places that just make me want to play the song over and over again. I have no idea what this song is about, probably Buddhism, but hey, this once again proves that lyrics rarely matter and the music itself is the core.

Zanzibar – Billy Joel

52nd Street. 1978. Columbia

This song reminds me of long car rides on vacations down the west coast with my parents growing up. They used to play a tape of 52nd Street, or at least their favorite selections, constantly on these trips. I didn’t hear this song again until early in my senior year in college and remembered why I loved it so much. The song has a heavy jazz influence, displayed in the breakdown where Jazz trumpeter Freddie Hubbard does a solo. The best part of this song though is at the end of the 4th line of each verse, Billy does this “Woah oh oh!” thing that just makes me want to sing every time. It was between this and “Miami 2017 (Lights Go Out On Broadway)” which is also a great song, but the “Woah oh oh!” is too much for ol’ Stu boy.

Rosalita (Come Out Tonight) – Bruce Springsteen

The Wild, the Innocent, and the E Street Shuffle. 1973. Columbia

Early Bruce Springsteen records have something that very few other artists can ever pull off without sounding cheesy or forced. It has this undeniable sense of urgency, like the world will fall apart and life will crumble through your fingers if this one moment in time doesn’t work out the way Bruce describes it. There are so many early Springsteen songs that just set a scene of “We have to get out of this town right now girl before it kills us, no matter what any of our parents, friends, anybody has to say.” There’s a line that kinda sums it up: “Well hold on tight, stay up all night ‘cause Rosie I’m comin’ on strong. By the time we meet the morning light, I will hold you in my arms. I know a pretty little place in southern California down San Diego way. There’s a little café where they play guitars all night and all day. You can hear ‘em in the back room strummin’, so hold tight baby ‘cause don’t you know daddy’s comin’.”

I’ve Got You Under My Skin – Frank Sinatra

Songs For Swingin’ Lovers! 1956. Capitol

This song falls into the category of great arrangement. This Cole Porter classic tune was arranged for Sinatra by Nelson Riddle. The story goes that he was still copying down parts for the players while riding in the cab to the recording studio on the day of recording. After the players ran through it once with Frank, they stood up and applauded. The Baritone sax takes control here, outlining a Db6/9 chord throughout the intro. Of course, Frank’s vocal delivery is spot on and goes up and down in all the right places for the biggest emotion impact. It’s amazing how a song with no real chorus can be so good.

A Change Is Gonna Come – Sam Cooke

Ain’t That Good News. 1964. RCA Victor

This song was not even going to be on this list, but then I ran across it while scouring my collection of music and remembered how good it was. Then I listened to it and was blown away by the level of detail that went into this arrangement. Sam’s vocals soar above the mind blowingly beautiful arrangement. The lyrics to this one actually add to the tune itself, speaking of wrongdoings in the world around him, and how social change is on its way in the form of the civil rights movement. The song flows with such ease out of Cooke that one might forget the weightiness of the content, but the song’s content is just so heavy that it’s impossible to deny it.

Whatever – Oasis

Whatever EP. 1994. Creation

This song was released as a Christmas present to the U.K. from the Gallagher brothers and company. It never appeared on any full album, only being released as a single, and amazingly, it blows away anything else they’ve ever done. Think “All You Need Is Love,” but with tons of rocking energy and a snide, nonchalant attitude. The chorus speaks, “I’m free to be whatever I, whatever I choose and I’ll sing the blues if I want. I’m free to be whatever I, whatever I like, if it’s wrong or right, it’s alright.” Not exactly poetry, and the song isn’t exactly breaking any new ground either, but the song is absolutely perfect in every way, and it was going to be my #1, but perhaps the only reason it’s not at number one is because I’ve played this song so many times that at the moment, these next three are beating it, but who knows how I’ll feel in a few months. This song also pulls the same “outro performed by a string quartet” thing as “Does He Love You?” but even better. It’s so simple, but I can’t get enough of it.

Mr. Blue Sky – Electric Light Orchestra

Out of the Blue. 1977. Jet

This is obviously the best Beatles song that the Beatles never wrote. The staccato guitar during the verse combined with the strings present in just about every ELO song combine to make a force that is undeniably catchy and musically challenging at the same time. This is really what makes ELO so good. I didn’t discover this song till probably Nov. 2005, and it was one of the best days of my life. I didn’t want to include two songs by the same artist in my top 10, but if I did, I probably would’ve added “Turn To Stone” on this list too because it is almost as awesome as this one. It’s a shame that just like Billy Joel, most critics at the time hated ELO for being overly creative musically (they called it pretentiousness). These days we have acts that really are pretentious (see Radiohead), but everyone loves them, even critics. I’m not knocking all Radiohead, just most everything post OK Computer. Sorry, got a little sidetracked there.

Only In Dreams – Weezer

Weezer. 1994. Geffen

This has been my favorite Weezer song since about a month into me picking up Weezer’s debut album back around early 2000. It has this ostinato (a repeated motif over and over again) in the bass throughout most of the whole song, never even really resolving to the Gb major chord (excluding chorus, which never really resolves) that it wants to until the end of a 3 minute contrapuntal guitar duet when everything dies out except the bass which just retards on its own until it finally plays the single Gb we’ve all been waiting for. The song on the whole up until the guitar duet is pretty tame, but once those contrapuntal guitar lines start intertwining, my ears perk up every time. I can sing both lines at separate times upon request and when the drums finally kick back in fully at the climax of the song, I let out a sigh of relief or bang on my car wheel in exultant joy, whichever is more of an option at the time.

All Is Forgiven – Jellyfish

Spilt Milk. 1993. Charisma

I always loved this song from the first time I heard it, but I didn’t realize how much I loved it until maybe April 2006. I found out about Jellyfish first semester of college in the Fall of ’02 and heard this song, and knew it was great. The constant tom-tom driven drums, the fuzzy, almost white noise distorted guitar, and the half time bass throughout. It was great. Then in April I put it on my mp3 player for the walk to school, and then I listened to it for about two weeks straight. Seriously. It runs into the next song entitled “Russian Hill” which is almost as good, but because it’s a separate song, I couldn’t include it on the list, but in my mind, they always run together and are basically one long 9 minute song. The ending just gets more and more white noise filled until you can barely take it anymore and then it just cuts off completely into the slow acoustic intro for Russian Hill. It’s perfect in every way. I think this would fall into the category of great song. And the way the song builds up right to the middle of the song and then cuts out completely except for some very VERY faint xylophone noodling, and then busts back in with some feedback directly into guitar solo. Man I love this song.

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randomvarious · 4 years

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The Champs - “Tequila” Fetenhits: Oldies Song released in 1958. Compilation released in 1999. Frat Rock / Rock & Roll / Latin Rock

Though The Champs spawned a handful of hits in their improbable seven-year run, it was their first hit, the instrumental, “Tequila,” which was originally recorded as a throwaway b-side, that would make them an indispensable piece of both popular music and rock and roll history. But before getting into the band’s formation and the song itself, let’s do a little bit of scene setting.

From history-of-rock.com:

The year 1958 saw a dramatic increase in short-lived fad rock and roll instrumental combos. Not that Rock and roll instrumentals hadn't been around before or that they wouldn't be around later. It was just that the floodgates opened wide in 1958. A year earlier, the biggest selling instrumental was "Raunchy" by it's co-composer Bill Justis. By the end of 1959, there was Santo and Johnny, Johnny and the Hurricanes, Dave "Baby" Cortez, Duane Eddy, the Fireballs, the Virtues, the Wailers, Link Wray and His Ray Men, the Royaltones, the Rock-A-Teens, Sandy Nelson, Cozy Cole and Preston Epps. However the group that really created the demand was the Champs.

It’s The Champs, a loose collection of session musicians who officially formed as a band after “Tequila” was released, who are responsible for the most memorable rock and roll instrumental of all time. It’s not groups who dedicated themselves full-time to rock and roll instrumentals; it’s these guys, who, not long after they released their debut album and started to tour, became a revolving-door-band, and added people like Glen Campbell and the duo that would become Seals and Crofts to their ranks. A random session that was originally intended to be just a one-off to fill a b-side for a 45 ended up selling millions of records, rocketing up to #1 on the Billboard charts, and winning a Grammy. Go figure.

Now for the origin story of the band, with more from history-of-rock.com:

The story of the Champs began with Dave Burgess, who was born December 13, 1934, in Beverly Hills, CA. Burgess first recorded for Okeh Records, a subsidiary of Columbia that issued country, blues, and jazz records. Burgess was eighteen when he recorded his first two Okeh singles: "Don't Put A Dent In My Heart" and "Too Late For Tears." In 1955, he recorded two singles for Tampa Records "Don't Turn Your Back On Love" and "Five Foot Two, Eyes Of Blue." All were country and had no success.

In 1956, Burgess was recording for Top Records. Top would take unknown, but talented artists, have them cover the latest hits as closely as possible to the original, then issue them four-to-a-record for forty nine cents. Top's slogan was "twice the music at half the cost" and it was a bargain until the unsuspecting buyer got home and played the record. Burgess appeared on an unknown amount of records, but at least ten came out with his name in the credits.

Ethics aside, Burgess got a first hand education in recording and performing while at Top. In 1957, while working as a deejay in Lancaster, CA. to [pass] time he composed songs and sent them off to various music houses. Two became very successful that year" "I'm Available" in the "pop" field and "I'll Be There" in the country market. [The Champs would later record an instrumental version of “I’ll Be There” as a b-side for “Tequila” in 1958.]

His songwriting brought him to Challenge Records, a Los Angeles company founded in April, 1957 by Gene Autrey (sp.).. There he recorded as Dave Dupree, as well as under his own name. Four of Challenge's first singles were recorded by Burgess, who became a regular session guitarist for Challenge.

A couple days before Christmas in 1957, a session was arranged in Hollywood by Challenge to record Burgess’ next single, “Train to Nowhere,” due to be released in January, along with a b-side. Sitting in on the session with Burgess, who was on rhythm guitar, were, according to Wikipedia, “Cliff Hills on bass, the Flores Trio (Danny Flores on saxophone and keyboards, Gene Alden on drums, and lead guitarist Buddy Bruce), and Huelyn Duvall contributing backing vocals.” The group had recorded two other songs to consider for the b-side, “Night Beat” and “All Night Rock,” the latter of which has never been released. But at the tail-end of the session came an instrumental ditty.

history-of-rock.com has more:

With some studio time remaining, Burgess asked the other musicians to stay to help him come up with a B-side for a record he had previously recorded.One musician offered a Tex-Mex sax line, another a snappy guitar riff, the drummer played a backbeat on the bell of his cymbal and Burgess plucked the muted strings of his electric guitar.The song was called "Tequila" and was spoken after each bridge. In ten minutes they had a take.

And that was that. Sometimes a musician or a producer knows when they’ve got a hit on their hands...but this wasn’t one of those times. “Tequila” was a pure filler track. The seller was gonna be “Train to Nowhere”. Everyone at the session knew that. But then, sometime in January, some radio DJ in Cleveland got a hold of “Train to Nowhere” and decided he would spin the b-side instead. And three weeks later, “Tequila” was all of a sudden the #1 song in America. Wild.

“Tequila” is nothing without Danny Flores, the man who graces the track with his trademark “dirty” sax melodies and the intermittent gravelly murmur of the word “tequila.” At the time of the song’s recording, he was actually signed to another label, so he couldn’t use his actual name on the record. Instead, he went by Chuck Rio. It was because of “Tequila” though, that Flores was crowned as the godfather of Latin rock. And while that’s a really cool title to have bestowed upon yourself, one can’t help but think of all the money he missed out on from selling his American rights to the song for what’s been reported as a paltry amount of money. However, it wasn’t all bad. He still had the global rights to the song, which was said to have netted him about seventy grand a year up until his death in 2006. A lot more than probably any other 50s rocker can say they made in residuals off a single song.

“Tequila” has staying power, I think, because it pulls a bunch of different ideas from a bunch of different music styles. Its composition is simple, its melodies are catchy, and the fact that rock and roll instrumentals were popular at the time was definitely a contributing factor to its success, too. But this song also simultaneously carries that hip, 50s cocktail lounge kind of vibe with its cymbal taps and its mambo beat; it has hand claps and an upbeat rock and roll tempo for dancing and partying; its guitar strums are poppy; the chorus has a definite, escalatory big band jazz/swing feel to it; and Flores’ sax tone is very reminiscent of the jazz-brass-sleaze that had constantly complemented burlesque and striptease dance routines (it’s hard to imagine that strip joints used to have house bands, but they did) for years prior. In fact, something could even be said about how “Tequila” manages to combine an air of lounge-y sophistication with its beat, while supplying over-the-top, trashy amounts of sax melodies with its lead, representing a sort of convergence of two opposite styles of contemporaneous nightlife: artsy hipsterdom vs. raw, transparent transactionalism. It’s all in one track and all at the same time. A song by The Champs, made for both camps.

Without a doubt, “Tequila” is the most popular rock and roll instrumental ever recorded. Its success was totally unforeseen, so much so, that The Champs formed after the thought-to-be-a-one-off, just-before-Christmas recording session in 1957 that birthed the song. They weren’t even an official band; mostly just some session musicians recording a b-side and having a bit of innocent fun in the studio. But that fun was both evident and highly contagious, which ended up lending to the song’s overall immortality, landing it as a staple track for just about any classic party mix, and opening the door for an oncoming era of pre-garage-frat-rock behemoths like “Louie Louie,” “Surfin’ Bird” and “Shout”.

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justforbooks · 4 years

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Little Richard. Prime force of rock’n’roll who made an explosive impact with songs such as Tutti Frutti, Good Golly, Miss Molly, Lucille and Long Tall Sally

Little Richard, who has died aged 87, was the self-proclaimed king of rock’n’roll. Such was his explosive impact that many of the baby boom generation will vividly recall the moment when they first encountered his assault on melody.

Awopbopaloobop alopbamboom! That first hit, Tutti Frutti, released in October 1955, was wild, delicious gibberish from a human voice as no other, roaring and blathering above a band like a fire-engine run amok in the night. We glimpsed a new universe. The Sinatra-sophisticats were slain with a shout. Enter glorious barbarity, chaos and sex. With a few others – Fats Domino, Bill Haley, Elvis Presley, Chuck Berry, Jerry Lee Lewis and Buddy Holly – Little Richard laid down what rock’n’roll was to be like, and he was the loudest, hottest and most exhibitionist of them all.

Richard Wayne Penniman was born in Macon, Georgia, one of 12 children of Charles, a bricklayer, and his wife Leva Mae Stewart. His family were Seventh-day Adventists and Richard learned the piano and sang gospel in the local church choir, but was thrown out of the family home at 13. He performed in medicine shows - with “miracle cures” promoted between entertainment acts – before hitching to Atlanta, where he signed to RCA Records in 1951, using the name Little Richard.

He recorded several undistinguished singles for them, including Every Hour (1951), but none had much impact. His optimism undimmed but his style still unformed, he tried the independent Peacock label in Houston, recording sides on which he began to reveal a delicate, elaborately filigreed vocal style that would resurface years later on slow gospel numbers. This same style would sometimes ornament his rock sides too, as on She’s Got It (1957), where that “got” is twiddled into 10 syllables.

These Peacock sides brought no success, and at the beginning of 1955 – the year that was to end in triumph for him – he returned to Macon and to washing dishes. He sent a demo to another indie label, Specialty, whose owner, Art Rupe, soon became so sure that Little Richard defined the future that he rejected Sam Cooke as too pallid.

Brought to New Orleans in September and given almost the same band as Fats Domino, Penniman went into the studio with the producer Bumps Blackwell, and came out with Tutti Frutti. The single was a hit with black and white audiences and sold 500,000 copies – despite the popularity of Pat Boone’s cover version released shortly afterwards – and reached 17 in the US pop charts and No 2 on the R&B list.

A cascade of frantic but tight hits followed, establishing Little Richard as a prime force in rock’n’roll. His piano work, crucial to his sound, was limited to hammered chords and skitterish riffing (he did not even play it himself on Tutti Frutti) but with that megaphone voice, falsetto squeal, bursting energy and powerhouse band, his records became classics: songs every local group played every weekend for years to come; songs the other rock greats covered; songs that fired the ambition of those artists who would change the 1960s, the Beatles and Bob Dylan.

Long Tall Sally, Slippin’ and Slidin’, Rip It Up, Ready Teddy, She’s Got It and The Girl Can’t Help It were all released in 1956. The following year, Little Richard recorded Lucille, Send Me Some Lovin’, Jenny, Jenny, Miss Ann, and the awesome Keep A-Knockin’. And 1958 produced the last great batch: Good Golly Miss Molly, True Fine Mama and a glorious pillage of the music-hall oldie Baby Face.

It is obvious now from the titles alone that a formula soon set in with these records. Back then though, it was just how Little Richard was: an unstoppable force. Within the flailing combustion of True Fine Mama we now recognise a conventional 12-bar blues; at the time we heard formless galactic meltdown. Similarly, we now see that his presentation was partly “outrageous queen”, his catchphrase “Ooh ma soul” pure camp. But these were cliches from the future. When rock’n’roll and Little Richard were new, his preening, boasting and benign lasciviousness seemed highly individual.

He was an inspiration to younger black musicians with white audiences. The young guitarist Jimi Hendrix learned a lot from backing Little Richard on tour; and as Richard once observed of Prince, “the little moustache, the moves, the physicality – he’s a genius but he learnt it from me. I was wearing purple before he was born; I was wearing make-up before anyone else.”

His sexuality was no simple thing. As he revealed in his candid autobiography, The Life and Times of Little Richard (1984, as told to Charles White), he fancied men and women, but most of all he fancied himself.

However, touring Australia in 1957, he threw his rings off Sydney Harbour bridge, renouncing the devil’s music for God. The performer who had once said of gospel that “I knew there had to be something louder, and I found it was me” now divided his time between bible school in Alabama and the Seventh-day Adventist church in Times Square, New York. He met his wife, Ernestine Campbell, at an evangelical rally in October of that year. They married in 1959 but divorced four years later.

Specialty kept the hits coming until 1959, when the long line ended with a game By the Light of the Silvery Moon. An era was over. Elvis had been drafted, Holly was dead. With God on his side, and Quincy Jones producing, Little Richard made the religious album It’s Real, for Mercury Records, billing himself “king of the gospel singers”. A 1962 single, He Got What He Wanted (But He Lost What He Had), fused old and new, its parables sung in vintage style: a steaming, raging, funny tour de force to equal Long Tall Sally. It was a minor hit.

He returned to rock’n’roll and Specialty, recorded Bama Lama Bama Loo (1964), and played Britain with the Rolling Stones, Bo Diddley and the Everlys. As the rock critic Nik Cohn testified, “he cut them all to shreds”. While in the UK he also made a TV special with the Shirelles (It’s Little Richard, 1964) – one of the rare times when rock was truly exciting on television.

I saw him live in this period, backed by the instrumental group Sounds Incorporated. He never paid them a moment’s attention, and was magnificent. When he stood on top of the piano, took off a ring and threw it into the audience, even those of us at the back with no chance of getting within a 100ft dived forward, hypnotised by this consummate artist.

But while the debut record from the 60s soul king Otis Redding was titled Shout Bamalama, Little Richard himself slid through failed comebacks, vainglorious live theatrics and indifferent re-recordings.

Exceptions included fine versions of Lawdy Miss Clawdy (1964) and Bring It on Home to Me (1966), while 70s covers of the Beatles’ I Saw Her Standing There and the Stones’ Brown Sugar emphasised how much he had inspired those bands in the first place. Attempts to update himself brought small success and in 1976 he retreated back to religion. By the decade’s end he was a late but rapacious convert to drug abuse.

In the 80s, however, the world and Little Richard were ready for each other again, and in 1986 he appeared, smiling with Hollywood good health, in the hit film Down and Out in Beverly Hills. It says much for his unquenchable charm that so soon after his upfront autobiography he could remake himself as a Disney favourite, with an album of children’s songs and a TV series, on which a revisited Keep A-Knockin’ incorporated knock-knock jokes swapped with his new young audience.

In 1993, the 60-year-old gospeller had supposedly found Judaism but was also rock’n’rolling again. In 1996, wavy hair down his back, he was to be seen playing on a truck at the closing ceremony of the Atlanta Olympics, and, as gloriously incongruous as ever, in an episode of Baywatch, performing on the boardwalk, his eerily plastic-smooth face that of a 35-year-old.

Little Richard became embedded in showbiz, appearing frequently on American television, in roles and as himself, including as a judge on Simon Cowell’s Celebrity Duets in 2006. He voiced a Disney World pineapple, saw his hits recycled in ads and films, was the subject of a 2000 biopic, and recorded anew with partners from Bon Jovi to Elton John. As a preacher, he conducted weddings for celebrities including Bruce Willis and Demi Moore, and spoke at the funerals of Wilson Pickett and Ike Turner.

Gaining multiple awards for his pioneering early work, he was among the first to be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, in 1986, and received a lifetime achievement Grammy in 1993. Little Richard needed none of these awards or hall of fame citations to tell him who he was or what he had achieved. He knew that all along. He was one of the gods, and almost the last among them.

His health declined in the 2000s, and he had heart surgery in 2008, cancelling a planned European tour with Berry. In 2009 he had hip replacement surgery, after which he still performed, yet giving audiences the novelty of seeing him seated at the keyboards.

In 2013 he announced his retirement. His last appearance was while attending the ceremony at which he received the Distinguished Artist award at the 2019 Tennessee Governor’s Arts Awards in Nashville.

He is survived by a son, Danny.

• Little Richard (Richard Wayne Penniman), singer-songwriter, born 5 December 1932; died 9 May 2020

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eugene-my-love · 6 years

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@mostlydaydreaming. we were limited to the number of pages we could write. i could have gone on for so much longer

This is my argument paper from writing 2 I took in the spring. Enjoy!!

Singin’ in the Rain:

Putting Smiles on Faces for More than 60 Years

Kandace Feorene

“I like old movies too! My favorite oldie is Pulp Fiction/Forrest Gump.” These are the words every classic film lover despises. My blood boils every time I hear similar phrases. The bubbling is new, yes, I will admit that, but it is genuine. I got into classic movies in July of last year, and I hope I never see the light at the end of this sometimes black and white, sometimes silent tunnel. Movies have been around for over 100 years, and the golden age of them is just that, golden! It started when the talkies were introduced in 1927, and there was no stopping them from there. That is of course until television came along and put an end to it slowly but surely (but let’s not open up that wound). Yes, films still have a significant role in today’s world, but the 30s, 40s, and early 50s were special to the industry. The studio system was roaring as though it would never end. Great characters who deliver beautiful words were the focus in the movies. Good stories were prominent because they couldn’t blow up buildings. The movie musical was big and beautiful being filmed on huge studio lots. There were many made in the golden era of Hollywood, but the best musical and movie ever made is Singin’ in the Rain.

If you’ve never seen it, get a hold of it as soon as possible and watch it. Make sure there are no distractions around. Tell people around you to be quiet. This masterpiece demands your undivided attention. Also, if you haven’t seen it, the title is referencing the title number. I would agree that not all old movies are accessible to most audiences. Some are slow and boring, as are some today. But Singin’ in the Rain is the best example of how people can enjoy movies that are over 60 years old. It is a classic in the true sense of the word.

Singin’ in the Rain was released in 1952 by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and is number one on the American Film Institute’s (AFI’s) list of Greatest Movie Musicals of all Time (American Film Institute, 2006) and number five on their list of 100 Greatest American Films of All Time (American Film Institute, 2007). It was inducted into the National Film Registry in 1989 (its first year) for being “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant” (Library of Congress). Starring Gene Kelly, Donald O’Connor, and Debbie Reynolds, with supporting cast members Jean Hagen, who was nominated for an Oscar for her role as the screeching star, and Millard Mitchell, the plot is simple: “talkies” are introduced into Hollywood, and a fictional silent film production company (Monumental Pictures) must convert. Their problem is Lina Lamont, a gorgeous star whose voice rivals nails on a chalkboard. Laughs ensue as producer R. F. Simpson tries to hold on to Lina’s star status through filming her first talking picture, The Dueling Cavalier. Monumental Pictures replaces Lina’s voice with Kathy’s. Hollywood icon Debbie Reynolds was 19 while filming Kathy Selden’s journey from, in the words of Don Lockwood, “humble player” to star. Life imitated art after the picture was released, because Singin’ was Reynold’s breakout role.

Classics are hard to define, but easy to recognize. Singin’ in the Rain is, obviously, also the best classic movie ever made. The title number is often regarded as the most recognized dance sequence in all of film. Audiences appreciate it even more when they learn that Kelly had a fever of 103 while filming it (Ward Kelly, 2016). The script is unlike most musicals. The lines are witty and smart. One of my favorites is when a member of the publicity department says “Lina, you’re a beautiful woman—audiences think you’ve got the voice to match. The studio’s got to keep their stars from looking ridiculous at any cost.” O’Connor’s character responds with “No one’s got that much money” (Comden and Green). There is a story, and it interests the audience. Most musicals just have some scenes in between numbers that distract from the singing and dancing, but the scenes and numbers combine beautifully to create the perfect film that never skips a beat. The story is also educational. Writers Betty “Comden and her long-time writing partner, Adolf Green, interviewed washed-up silent film actors, read old magazines and viewed archival films during their writing process” (Laffel, 1992). So, the comical situations throughout the movie are true on top of hilarious. Jean Hagen’s comedic timing is gold. Similarly, Donald O’Connor’s, who won a Golden Globe for Best Actor in a Musical or Comedy, humor is never distracting from the story. His iconic Make ‘Em laugh number makes audiences of all ages light up. The 17-minute Broadway Melody number is a sight to behold. The colors are bright and exciting. The sets provide for lavish sequences. Each dance number, choreographed and staged by Gene Kelly and Stanley Donen, is special in its own right and doesn’t let you take your eyes off the screen. “Each draws from a different technical and aesthetic base: the traditions of lyrical ballet, modern dance, theatrical dancing, exaggeratedly hackneyed tap, familiar social dances, Euro-western folk steps, and a light feathery tap style form an elaborate grammar, the breadth and mastery of which was unique to dance” (La Pointe-Crump, 2004, 66). Kelly and O’Connor’s tap sequence Moses Supposes is very often regarded as the best tap number on film. Singin’ created a star out of Reynolds. She had no previous dancing experience, so Kelly had to teach her from scratch. She was a gymnast, so she knew a little bit about physically working hard, but dance is a whole other ballgame when it comes to technique. Future EGOT recipient Rita Moreno was also a player in the film’s success playing the “Zip Girl of the screen” Zelda Zanders (Comden & Green). Its influence is startling. Let’s take me, a pessimist. I want to sing in the rain now. A self-proclaimed pessimist is happy when it rains because I can play the song and sing along to the greatest classic film ever made.

I am not the only one in the world who has been impacted significantly by this glorious movie. I have met others online who share my thoughts. We talk occasionally, and they were nice enough to give me quotes on their thoughts on the film. Sherrie (2018) perfectly summarizes why people should watch it:

“I think it is the perfect introduction to movie musicals. It’s the first time I really appreciated all the time and skill that went into them. Most modern type musicals are mostly sung (and many auto-tuned) with maybe a few simple dance steps put in. Singin’ in the Rain is just a showcase of “triple threat” performers tied together by a brilliantly written script managing to combine heart and humor without being dated. The supporting characters are solid and memorable. The musical numbers are so well put together sometimes I’ll just watch them back to back and marvel at how all these came from the same movie. This coming from someone who, with a few exceptions, didn’t even like most old movie musicals.”

Sherrie mentions the most amazing feat of this film: the fact that there are so many iconic numbers. Almost all of them are extremely recognizable to people. The title number is the obvious one. It is the most recognizable dance number in all of film, and for good reason. Kelly exudes joy and love, and even though the steps are some of the easiest for a skilled dancer, he makes each special with a different splash in a puddle or shrug of his shoulders. My other friend Lena (2018) explains a concept that is talked about a lot with Singin’:

“It’s special to me because it was my first introduction to Old Hollywood movies. My family is full of movie buffs, and Old Hollywood movies are a staple for references we all make. When I was ten, my mom told me she thought I was old enough to appreciate it. I don’t think I’d ever laughed so hard at a movie up until that point! The colors, the music, the humor, the romance, it all got to me! Its quality and story still hold up to this day! And it stuck because Old Hollywood is a huge part of my life now, and it’s all because of Singin’ in the Rain!”

If you were to ask people what their first Old Hollywood movie was, a good amount would say Singin’ in the Rain. I showed the film to my best friend a couple of months ago (it was her first Old Hollywood film too) even though she insisted on not watching it. When it was over, she just stared at the screen and apologized to me for saying she did not want to try it. It really is the perfect combination of most genres. There is humor, romance, drama, singing, dancing, and even a little bit of action! If you want to start watching classic films, there is no better movie to introduce you to them while meeting your needs of different movie genres.

The film earns the title of best picture ever made for not just what you see on film, but for the dedication that went on behind the camera as well. The film was directed by Gene Kelly and Stanley Donen, and the witty screenplay was written by Betty Comden and Adolph Green, who were legends in their field. Singin’ was Kelly’s second directing venture. He and Donen directed On the Town in 1949, which was a huge success. MGM was happy to see the two team up again since On the Town resulted in a healthy profit. Kelly was involved in practically every aspect of filming. Rita Moreno (2013) remembers filming, "I visited the set every single day. I did maybe, oh, a week and a half's worth of work on that show. But I visited all the sets every single day.” She only had a few scenes, so she could spend her time observing a legend creating his masterpiece. Kelly even had input in the wardrobe. For the iconic Broadway Melody sequence, he cheated the despised Hays Code, which was the code movies had to follow so films were family friendly. He told the wardrobe department to put slits in Cyd Charisse’s bright green flapper dress because a dancer’s lines should be seen (Ward Kelly, 2016). The slits disobeyed the Hayes Code’s rules on how short a dress can be, but since the material met the requirements, the censors couldn’t touch it. It is worth noting that Charisse had given birth just a few months before shooting her scenes. Kelly’s directing style was unique. He wanted the camera to dance along with the dancers, so the audience didn’t miss a single move. This is evident in Kelly’s part in Broadway Melody before he dances with Charisse. As an audience member, you feel as though you are dancing with him. Kelly’s service in the photographic unit in the Navy gave him the opportunity to explore the filmmaking process. Before the Navy, he was mostly interested in choreography, but after leaving the service, his interests in the movie making process as a whole grew. The Broadway Melody sequence is 14 minutes long. The studio had no problem with the number, since Kelly’s An American in Paris won best picture the year before. An American in Paris had a 17-minute-long ballet sequence, also directed by Kelly, that is also spectacular and should be watched by everyone. Kelly wanted Donald O’Connor for the part of Cosmo Brown. Rita Moreno (2014) said she once told Kelly, “I hope finally people will recognize what a great talent this man is, and he said that’s precisely why I had him in the film.” For his solo number, the film was lost so he had to do the whole energetic sequence again. Since he smoked many packs a day, he had to rest for a few days because the tricks took so much out of him.

This film has brought so much happiness into my life, and I know it will do so for others. If you are sad, the song, dances, and jokes will bring out of your slump. If you are happy, it will enhance your mood. Adolph Green once said, "You know what's wonderful. To be somewhere strange in a foreign country where no one knows you and to be introduced as the people who wrote Singin' in the Rain and to watch the people smile. It's a favorite film the world over. There and here people are always telling us that the family sits together to watch it” (as cited in Laffel, 1992). This quote was from the 90s, but it is due to this day. The dialogue, performances, music, and moves make Singin’ in the Rain the greatest motion picture of all time.

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ts1989fanatic · 7 years

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All 115 of Taylor Swift's Songs, Ranked

From teenage country tracks to synth-pop anthems and little-known covers, a comprehensive assessment and celebration of Swift's one-of-a-kind songbook

Taylor Swift the celebrity is such a magnet for attention, she can distract from Taylor Swift the artist. But Swift was a songwriter before she was a star, and she'll be a songwriter long after she graduates from that racket. It's in her music where she's made her mark on history – as a performer, record-crafter, guitar hero and all-around pop mastermind, with songs that can leave you breathless, or with a nasty scar. She was soaring on the level of the all-time greats before she was old enough to rent a car, with the crafty guile of a Carole King and the reckless heart of a Paul Westerberg – and she hasn't exactly slowed down since then.

So with all due respect to Taylor the myth, the icon, the red-carpet tabloid staple, let's celebrate the realTaylor – the songwriter she was born to be. Let's break it down: all 115 tunes, counted from the bottom to the top. The hits, the flops, the deep cuts, the covers, from her raw 2006 debut as a teen country ingénue to "...Ready for It?" – her latest offering. Every fan would compile a different list – that's the beauty of it. But they're not ranked by popularity, sales or supposed celebrity quotient – just the level of Taylor genius on display, from the perspective of a fan who generally does not give a rat's nads who the songs are "really" about. All that matters is whether they're about you and me. (I guarantee you are a more fascinating human than the Twilight guy, though I'm probably not.)

Sister Tay may be the last true rock star on the planet, making brilliant moves (or catastrophic gaffes, because that's what rock stars do). These are the songs that sum up her wit, her empathy, her flair for emotional excess, her girls-to-the-front bravado, her urge to ransack every corner of pop history, her determination to turn any chorus into a ridiculous spectacle. So let's step back from the image and pay homage to her one-of-a-kind songbook – because the weirdest and most fascinating thing about Taylor Swift will always be her music.

115. "Bad Blood" (2014)

Melodically parched, lyrically unfinished, rhythmically clunky – this was a mighty strange pick for a single from an album as loaded as 1989. There are a million things Taylor has in common with Paul McCartney – one is that celebrity grievances tend to sound like a penny-ante waste of their time, even when they're totally understandable (unless you're a fan of Macca's "Dear Boy," where John Lennon is his Katy Perry). The single remix is improved by Kendrick Lamar – but he wasn't saving his A-game for this one.

Best line: "Band-Aids don't fix bullet holes."

114. "Santa Baby" (2007)

Yes, she made a Christmas album, which is full of contenders for the basement of this list. But an oldie about a gold digger wooing Little Saint Nick was perhaps a dubious pick for a singer still in her teens.

Best line: "I've been an awful good girl."

113. "A Place in This World" (2006)

Apprentice work from the debut, when she was still learning the ropes as a country songwriter. Yet, the seeds of greatness are already there. Historical significance: This was the song where Tay discovered rain imagery, which in her hands was the equivalent of Sir Isaac Newton inventing calculus.

Best line: "I'll be strong/I'll be wrong/But life goes on."

112. "Christmas Must Be Something More" (2007)

A hymn about how Jesus is the reason for the season, with the hook, "So here's to the birthday boy who saved our lives." Unlike most boys Swift sings about, Jesus didn't comment publicly.

Best line: "What would happen if God never let it snow?"

111. "I'm Only Me When I'm With You" (2006)

Could there be a less Swiftian sentiment? For better or worse, this girl is always herself. That's kinda the point.

Best line: "I'm only up when you're not down/Don't wanna fly if you're still on the ground."

110. "Two Is Better Than One" With Boys Like Girls (2009)

A long, long, very long duet with former Good Charlotte and Fall Out Boy tourmates Boys Like Girls, who are either from London or Nashville (they seem to switch accents at random).

Best line: "You already got me coming…undone."

109. "Out of the Woods" (2014)

Taylor loves to sing about boyfriends who are terrible drivers, but this guy takes the prize – he crashes her snowmobile and gets 20 stitches in the hospital. Call a cab, girl.

Best line: "Two paper airplanes flying, flying, flying."

108. "Silent Night" (2007)

This bizarre version manages to miss almost every single note in the melody. They sure were in a rush to get this Christmas album out.

Best line: "Shepherds quake at the sight."

107. "Both of Us" With B.o.B (2012)

Nice try at remaking "Airplanes," but that Hayley Williams lightning does not strike twice.

Best line: "Your money's all gone, and you lose your whip."

106. "The Last Time" With Gary Lightbody (2012)

Her duet with the guy from Snow Patrol. Unfortunately, their voices don't mesh at all – what, is he auditioning for a Spandau Ballet tribute band? The funny moment is the très Eighties synth-horn blurp at the three-minute mark.

Best line: "This is the last time I'm asking you this/Put my name at the top of your list."

105. "The Outside" (2006)

Still a rookie, still learning, still trying to get away with "read between the lines" and "the road less traveled by" in the same verse.

Best line: "Nothing ever works the first few times/Am I right?"

104. "Girl at Home" (2012)

A perfunctory cheating-is-bad homily, with barely any chorus.

Best line: "I feel a responsibility/To do what's upstanding and right."

103. "Come in With the Rain" (2008)

She leaves her window open overnight, just in case her ex falls out of a cloud. There's a great "oooh" in the second chorus – one of those moments you can tell she's an Oasis fan. (This song makes you suspect "Don't Look Back In Anger" is a fave.)

Best line: "I could stand up and write you a song/But I don't wanna have to go that far."

102. "Half of My Heart" With John Mayer (2009)

The real prize from his Battle Studies album is "Heartbreak Warfare"; this is lesser J.M., with an underexploited T.S. cameo and an increasingly irritating premise of hearts having fingers, which they don't. No wonder the girl in the dress cried the whole way home.

Best line: "Half of my heart's got a grip on the situation."

101. "The Other Side of the Door" (2008)

Again with the slamming doors. Tay Tay – even the great songwriters can get away with exactly one slamming door per career. And just to be on the safe side, she throws in pouring rain, photo albums, a little black dress (which rhymes with "mess" and "confess"), a guy throwing pebbles at her window….In other words, this would be the ultimate Swift song – except there are a hundred better ones.

Best line: "Me and my stupid pride, sitting here alone/Going through the photographs, staring at the phone."

100. "Superman" (2010)

A Lois Lane fantasy, left off Speak Now for good reason.

Best line: "Tall dark and beautiful/He's complicated, he's so irrational."

99. "Cold as You" (2006)

"I start a fight because I need to feel something" – give her credit for honesty, even in this raw phase.

Best line: "Oh, every smile you fake is so condescending."

98. "If This Was a Movie" (2010)

"Good evening, sir. May I help you? You're a guy in a Taylor Swift song who wants to stand outside the window in the pouring rain, begging the love of your life to forgive your sorry ass? Take a number and get in line. No, that line."

Best line: "But I take it all back now!"

97. "Sweeter Than Fiction" (2013)

A warm-up for the synth-pop of 1989, from the One Chancesoundtrack.

Best line: "What a sight when the light came on."

96. "A Perfectly Good Heart" (2006)

"It's not unbroken anymore"? Paging the eminent cardiologist Dr. Toni Braxton.

Best line: "Why would you wanna make the very first scar?/Why would you wanna break a perfectly good heart?"

95. "White Christmas" (2007)

Unlike "Silent Night," this was a yuletide carol she could handle, with a straight-down-the-middle country rendition.

Best line: "Where the treetops glisten."

94. "Never Grow Up" (2010)

A folksy fingerpicking change of pace on Speak Now, pining for childhood innocence – though it feels more like a leftover from the debut.

Best line: "You're mortified your mom's dropping you off."

93. "I Don’t Wanna Live Forever" With Zayn Malik (2016)

Neither she nor Zayn sound deeply interested in this dueling-falsettos battle from the Fifty Shades Darker soundtrack. Maybe it works in the movie, but who wants to go find out? Really, they sound like two ghosts standing in the place of…sorry, sore subject, let's drop it.

Best line: "I've been feeling sad in all the nicest places."

92. "You Are in Love" (2014)

One of her through-the-years romances, this one featuring a snow globe.

Best line: "For once you let go of your fears and your ghosts."

91. "Mary's Song (Oh My My)" (2006)

Another through-the-years romance, but with a sweet homespun touch.

Best line: "I'll be 87, you'll be 89/I'll still look at you like the stars that shine in the sky."

90. "Highway Don't Care" With Tim McGraw and Keith Urban (2013)

A duet from McGraw's album Two Lanes of Freedom, with a guitar solo from Keith Urban. The plot: His ex is driving away, listening to a Taylor song on the radio, as Tay tries to coax the woman into turning the car around and going home. Perhaps McGraw's finest duet since his great lost Nelly jam, "Over & Over."

Best line: "I bet you're bending God's ear talking 'bout me."

89. "Change" (2008)

Oh, the fall of 2008 – Chuck and Blair were still an item, Suede was killing it on Project Runway, and "Change" was a de facto victory song for Obama, complete with a thumbs-up for "the revolution." Yeah, those were different times.

Best line: "These walls that they put up to hold us back will fall down."

88. "Nashville" (2010)

A cover of an obscurity by country singer David Mead, tucked away as a bonus on the Target edition of the Speak Now Tour Live DVD.

Best line: "Was that a blood or wine stain on your wedding dress?"

87. "The Sweet Escape" (2010)

From the same live DVD, a remake of the Gwen Stefani solo hit. Taylor's vocal sure fits the Gwen just-a-girl sensibility.

Best line: "I must apologize for acting stank."

86. "Look What You Made Me Do" (2017)

The reason fans once cared about rap beefs: They inspired great songs, whether it was Queens vs. the Bronx ("The Bridge" vs. "The Bridge Is Over" vs. "Have a Nice Day") or LL Cool J vs. Kool Moe Dee ("How Ya Like Me Now" vs. "Jack the Ripper" vs. "Let's Go" vs. "To Da Break of Dawn"). But this just sounds like a trivial time-waster by her standards – Swift's celebrity feuds are not really one of the hundred most interesting things about her. The main attraction here is the retro Panic! at the Disco vibe. Here's hoping it gets outshined by the rest of Reputation, the way "Shake It Off" was instantly eclipsed by the rest of 1989.

Best line: "It's much better to face these kinds of things with a sense of poise and rationality." Oh wait – that actually is Panic! at the Disco.

85. "Stay Beautiful" (2006)

An early stab at a take-the-high-road breakup song.

Best line: "He whispers songs into my window."

84. "I Want You Back" (2010)

A live acoustic tribute to the then-recently departed Michael Jackson, with a bit of Motown tremble in her voice.

Best line: "Now it's much too late for me to take a second look."

83. "The Way I Loved You" (2008)

She meets a low-stress boy who doesn't want love to be torture. Alas, this suitor is toast, because he reminds her how much she misses the manic pixie drama vampire she dated before. Sorry, dude – she loves the players, and she loves the game.

Best line: "He respects my space/And never makes me wait."

82. "Thug Story" With T-Pain (2009)

The classic T-Pain and Taylor duet from the 2009 CMT Awards, still T-Swizzle's finest rap performance.

Best line: "No, I never really been in a club/Still live with my parents, but I'm still a thug/I'm so gangsta you can find me baking cookies at night/You out clubbing, but I just made caramel delight."

81. "I Wish You Would" (2014)

One of her many, many songs set at 2 a.m. – clearly the most inspiring hour on Swift Standard Time – with a staccato disco guitar lick.

Best line: "We were a crooked love in a straight line down."

80. "Umbrella" (2008)

The Rihanna hit, briefly covered on the Live in SoHo digital album. Her finest Ri tribute remains her 2011 version of "Live Your Life" with T.I. onstage in Atlanta – sadly unreleased, but a duet that deserves to be enshrined for the ages.

Best line: "Stand under my umbrella, ella, ella."

79. "I Heart ?" (2008)

The trad country sound she soon left behind, from her Beautiful EyesEP.

Best line: "Wake up, and smell the breakup/Fix my heart, put on my makeup."

78. "Breathe" (With Colbie Caillat) (2008)

A gorgeous duet full of low-key nuances – her humming after the first verse, that "sorry, sorry, sorry" fade, the way Colbie's voice lifts hers.

Best line: "It's tragedy, and it'll only bring you down."

77. "The Moment I Knew" (2012)

A somber piano ballad about getting stood up on your 21st birthday.

Best line: "There in the bathroom/I try not to fall apart."

76. "Untouchable" (2008)

A rare case where she retools somebody else's song on one of her proper albums – the all-but-unknown Y2K-era rock band Luna Halo, who went on to open for Hoobastank. Her Fearless version sounds practically nothing like their original (though both name-check .38 Special's Eighties classic "Caught Up in You"). In fact, it's tough to fathom how she heard the original as raw material she could use – now that's ears.

Best line: "In the middle of the night when I'm in this dream/It's like a million little stars spelling out your name."

75. "Pour Some Sugar On Me" With Def Leppard (2008)

She makes a daring leap into the hair-metal mom market by teaming up with Def Leppard on CMT Crossroads, a move that works almost frighteningly well. Peak glam, especially when she asks the gender-torching question, "Demolition woman, can I be your man?"

Best line: "Do you take sugar? One lump or two?"

74. "Christmases When You Were Mine" (2007)

Taylor writes her own ace lovelorn holiday standard, ambushing her ex with one of those squirm-packed Merry-Christmas phone calls. Awkward question: "When you were putting up the lights this year/Did you notice one less pair of hands?" Eat your heart out, Mariah.

Best line: "I bet you got your mom another sweater."

73. "American Girl" (2009)

A bang-up claim on the Tom Petty classic – she used his original as her live entrance music for a while. Then she switched to Lenny Kravitz's "American Woman."

Best line: "Oh yeah! All right!"

72. "Invisible" (2006)

A teen ditty about a boy who doesn't realize she's alive, from pretty much the last moment in history that was possible. Clever pop-obsessive touch: The final steel-guitar twang echoes Elton John's "Rocket Man." If you think that's an accident…this is Planet Tay. There are no accidents.

Best line: "We could be a beautiful miracle, unbelievable, instead of just invisible."

71. "Jump Then Fall" (2008)

Ironclad rule of pop music: Songs about jumping are never a bad idea. Dig that "listens to Sublime once" vocal.

Best line: "I watch you talk, you didn't notice."

70. "Breathless" (2010)

Digging deep in the Nineties modern-rock crates, she does right by a previously obscure (to me) nugget from the New Orleans band Better Than Ezra – from 2005!, 10 years after their MTV hit! – as a charity benefit for the Hope for Haiti Now album.

Best line: "I'll never judge you/I can only love you."

69. "Superstar" (2008)

"You smile that beautiful smile, and all the girls in the front row scream your name." No relation to the 1970s Leon Russell ballad immortalized by the Carpenters – except they're both poignant ballads about groupies crushing on distant guitar boys. Well, as Journey warned, lovin' a music man ain't always what it's supposed to be.

Best line: "You sing me to sleep every night from the radio."

68. "Crazier" (2009)

Her ballad from Hannah Montana: The Movie, snagging her a cameo in the film. (But the highlight of the soundtrack will always be "Hoedown Throwdown.") This is where Taylor and Miley crossed light sabers – although they'd meet again. Great title, too – even Taylor might probably admit Miley had her beat in this department, at least until the "Blank Space" video.

Best line: "Every sky was your own kind of blue."

67. "Innocent" (2010)

Little-known fact: Did you know Kanye West once went onstage to interrupt Swift's acceptance speech at the VMAs and threw a misogynist tantrum about how she didn't deserve an award? Strange but true! "Innocent" was her song publicly forgiving him – seven freaking years ago – then they both released brilliant albums, and we all moved on with our lives. Dear Lord, if only this story had ended there.

Best line: "It's okay/Life is a tough crowd."

66. "Come Back…Be Here" (2012)

A yearning prayer for a rock & roll boy on tour, weak in the knees as she pleads for him to jet back on any terms he chooses.

Best line: "I guess you're in London today."

65. "Tied Together With a Smile" (2006)

An unsung highlight of the debut – a teen pep talk about self-esteem.

Best line: "Seems the only one who doesn't see your beauty/Is the face in the mirror looking back at you."

64. "Last Christmas" (2007)

Tay does the Wham! legacy proud – she should have also covered "Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go." The ache and quaver of her voice fit the George Michael melancholy; this might be the saddest "Last Christmas" since the original. Plenty of us communed with this version last Christmas, the night we said goodbye to the guy who wrote it. R.I.P., George Michael.

Best line: "A girl on a cover, but you tore her apart."

63. "Tell Me Why" (2008)

From Neil Young to the Beatles, "Tell Me Why" songs are tough to screw up, and even at 19, Tay's too seasoned to let that happen.

Best line: "I need you like a heartbeat/But you know you got a mean streak."

62. "Beautiful Eyes" (2008)

If you're a fan of Swift's Nineties modern-rock radio jones – one of her most fruitful long-running obsessions – check out this shameless tribute to the Cranberries. (But did she have to let it linger? Did she have to? Did she have to?)

Best line: "Baby, make me fly."

61. "Everything Has Changed" (2012)

She and Ed Sheeran wrote this duet together in her backyard while bouncing on a trampoline, because of course they did.

Best line: "All I've seen since 18 hours ago is green eyes and freckles and your smile."

60. "Love Story" (2008)

Romeo meets Juliet: proof that star-crossed teen romances never go out of style. She's kept going back to the well of Shakespearean tragedy, quoting Julius Caesar in the "Look What You Made Me Do" video. It's never been clear what the line "I was a scarlet letter" is doing in this song, but now it's a hint that Tay was just a few years away from going full Hester Prynne in "New Romantics."

Best line: "Just say yes."

59. "Speak Now" (2010)

In real-life weddings, the preacher hardly ever invites the groom's ex up to interrupt the ceremony. But if you're a fan of Tay in stalker mode, this is priceless – crouching behind the curtains in the back of the church, waiting to pounce. "Horrified looks from everyone in the room" – you don't say.

Best line: "It seems I was uninvited by your lovely bride-to-be."

58. "Shake It Off" (2014)

A clever transitional single – great verses, grating chorus, pithy lyrics with a shout-out to her obvious inspiration, Robyn's "Dancing on My Own." As a lead single, "Shake It Off" might have seemed meager after 1989 came out – she was holding back "Blank Space" and "Style" and (Lord have mercy) "New Romantics" for this? But "Shake It Off" got the job done, serving as a trailer to announce her daring Eighties synth-pop makeover.

Best line: "It's like I got this music in my head, saying it's gonna be all right."

57. "Better Than Revenge" (2010)

One of the basic rules of stardom is "never punch down" – don't go after somebody one-thousandth as famous as you – but rules were made to be broken, and Taylor is the girl made to break them. Here, she goes Bruce Lee on a sexual rival who may or may not be the actress who had Alyssa Milano as her babysitter in the erotic thriller Poison Ivy 2. But as usual with Swift, her self-owns are the funniest part of the song.

Best line: "She thinks I'm psycho because I like to rhyme her name with things."

56. "Welcome to New York" (2014)

People sure do love to complain about this song – in fact, the most authentically New York thing about it is how it sends people into spasms of mouth-foaming outrage. An explicitly queer-positive disco ode to arrivistes stepping out in the city that invented disco – "You can want who you want, boys and boys and girls and girls" – that will be bugging the crap out of you in rom-coms for years to come. (It made me throw a napkin at my in-flight screen during How to Be Single, when Dakota Johnson's cab is going the wrong way on the Brooklyn Bridge – and I love this song.) Bumped up a few bonus notches for pissing everyone off, since that's one of this girl's superpowers.

Best line: "Searching for a sound we hadn't heard before/And it said welcome to New York."

55. "Drops of Jupiter" (2010)

I mistakenly thought this Train hit was deep-fried garbage until I heard Swift's version and realized, "Hey, she's right – this is the best soy latte I've ever had!" Props to Tay for bringing out the hidden greatness in this song – the stargazing lyrics and her voice go together like Mozart and tae bo. (The astrophysicist in my life would like me to point out that you can't "make it to the Milky Way" because that's the galaxy we already live in. In fact, you couldn't leave the Milky Way if you tried. Science!)

Best line: "Tell me, did Venus blow your mind?"

54. "Haunted" (2010)

Enchanted to meet you, Goth Taylor. We'll meet again.

Best line: "Something keeps me holding on to nothing."

53. "Today Was a Fairy Tale" (2011)

Don't let the title scare you away – it's a plainspoken and genuinely touching play-by-play recap of a worthwhile date. In fact, "Today Was a Fairy Tale" and "If This Was a Movie" should trade titles, since this one feels realer and would make a better movie. It could rank higher, except she hugely improved it when she rewrote it as "Begin Again." (Docked a couple notches for coming from the soundtrack of Valentine's Day, which is the most dog-vomit flick Jessica Alba has ever made, and I say that as someone who paid money to see The Love Guru.)

Best line: "I wore a dress/You wore a dark gray T-shirt."

52. "All You Had to Do Was Stay" (2014)

A 1989 banger that could have made an excellent single – it sounds a bit like "Out of the Woods," except with a livelier chorus and a stormier range of electro-Tay sound effects.

Best line: "Let me remind you that this was what you wanted."

51. "Eyes Open" (2012)

Finally, her long-overdue metal move, from The Hunger Games: Songs from District 12 and Beyond.

Best line: "Every lesson forms a new scar."

50. "Treacherous" (2012)

"Put your lips next to mine/As long as they don't touch" – now there's an entrance line. Taylor braves the ski slopes of love, with a seething acoustic guitar that finally detonates halfway though.

Best line: "Nothing safe is worth the drive."

49. "You Belong With Me" (2008)

One of her most pop-friendly early hits, singing in the role of a high school geek crushing on her best guy friend. When he comes out in college, they'll have a few laughs about this. (And never let us forget the wisdom of Alicia Silverstone in Clueless: "Searching for a boy in high school is as useless as searching for meaning in a Pauly Shore movie."

Best line: "She wears high heels, I wear sneakers/She's cheer captain, and I'm on the bleachers."

48. "I Almost Do" (2012)

A Red slow jam that could have worked even better sped up into a punked-out rocker – though it's plenty affecting as is.

Best line: "Every time I don't, I almost do."

47. "...Ready for It?" (2017)

If by "it" you mean "literally any song that isn't 'Look What You Made Me Do,'" the answer is "extremely ready." A major rebound from her previous release, a week earlier – the chorus of this one actually sounds like a Swift song, with a little air in the mix, giving the room she needs to pull off her intricate breathy effects. Max Martin knows how to shape a production around her voice. A hopeful omen for the rest of Repu TAY shun (hey, I just got that).

Best line: "You can be my jailor/Burton to my Taylor."

46. "Stay Stay Stay" (2012)

"Before you, I only dated self-indulgent takers" – but here she turns into a self-indulgent taker herself and (surprise!) she likes it, a phone-throwing nightmare dressed like a grocery-shopping daydream. She finally meets a guy who can roll with her mood swings – even if she's more in love with the mood swings than with the guy.

Best line: "You came in wearing a football helmet and said, 'Okay, let's talk.'"

45. "Safe and Sound" (2012)

She ventures into rootsy folkie territory on the Hunger Gamessoundtrack, teaming up with the Civil Wars and producer T Bone Burnett, exploring crevices of her voice she hadn't opened up before. Everyone steps out of their comfort zone, and it works. The Swift-Burnett connection raises the question of how long it'll take her to collaborate with Elvis Costello, a songwriter with whom she shares some fascinating affinities. At the very least, Tay should cover "New Lace Sleeves."

Best line: "Don't you dare look out your window, darling/Everything's on fire."

44. "Ronan" (2012)

A little-known charity single for cancer research, unlike anything else in her songbook. She wrote this about Ronan Thompson, a four-year-old Arizona boy who died of neuroblastoma, after she read his mom's blog. She turned the blog entries into a disarmingly eloquent ballad (crediting Maya Thompson as co-writer) and performed "Ronan" at the Stand Up to Cancer benefit. You might expect it to be manipulative and obvious; it isn't.

Best line: "We had our own secret club."

43. "You're Not Sorry" (2008)

A dramatic piano-and-strings ballad from Fearless, showing off how much her voice has deepened between her first two albums.

Best line: "It's taken me this long, baby, but I figured you out."

42. "I Know Places" (2014)

She goes all Kate Bush, pursued across the moors by the hounds of love. This 1989 deep cut is underrated, but count on "I Know Places" to loom large in her canon over the years.

Best line: "My love, they are the hunters, we are the foxes."

41. "Bette Davis Eyes" (2010)

Her kickiest left-field cover, from Speak Now Live. "I'd love to play you some music that I'm a fan of that's come from L.A. – is that OK?" she asks the West Coast crowd, strumming her guitar. "This one came out in 1981 – eight years before I was born!" Virtually nobody seems to recognize it or sing along. Kim Carnes hit Number One with "Bette Davis Eyes," but it was written by the great Jackie DeShannon, the only songwriter to collaborate with both Randy Newman and Jimmy Page. (Page wrote "Tangerine" for DeShannon!) The fact that Swift loves this classic ode to romantic espionage explains a lot.

Best line: "She's pure as New York snow/She's got Bette Davis eyes."

40. "Wonderland" (2014)

Why did it take her five albums to get to Alice in Wonderland? Needless to say, Taylor Alison Swift fits right in on the other side of the looking glass, with white rabbits and Cheshire cats. Feed your head!

Best line: "It's all fun and games till someone loses their mind."

39. "The Lucky One" (2012)

She's so lucky, she's a star. For the record, T.S. did cover "Lucky" live once (and damn well, too), as a Britney tribute in Louisiana back in 2011.

Best line: "It's big black cars and Riviera views/And your lover in the foyer doesn't even know you."

38. "Wildest Dreams" (2014)

You rang, Goth Taylor? At first this might have seemed like a minor pleasure on 1989, but it really sounds stronger and stronger over the years, especially when she hiccups the words "my last request ih-ih-is." The video features giraffes and zebras.

Best line: "He's so tall and handsome as hell/He's so bad, but he does it so well."

37. "White Horse" (2008)

Teen Romantic Tay meets Bitter Adult Tay in a superbly disenchanted breakup ballad that gives up on princesses and fairy tales.

Best line: "I'm not the one you'll sweep off her feet/Lead up the stairwell."

36. "Starlight" (2012)

"Oh my, what a marvelous tune" seems like a dauntingly quaint chorus, yet she makes it stick, in what sounds like an F. Scott Fitzgerald-themed whirlwind romance. That hook comes straight from the AC/DC playbook (specifically, the opening lines of "You Shook Me All Night Long") – the sign of a truly sick pop scholar.

Best line: "We snuck into a yacht-club party/Pretending to be a duchess and a prince."

35. "Picture to Burn" (2006)

The dawn of Petty AF Tay, as she serves her ex beatdown threats. Every boy who ever complained when Taylor wrote about him – this is where you officially got fair warning.

Best line: "Let me strike a match on all my wasted time."

34. "Forever and Always" (2008)

She added this to Fearless at the last minute – just what the album needed. It's a blast of high-energy JoBro-baiting aggro on her most anomalously shade-free album. "It rains in your bedroom" is a very on-brand Tay predicament.

Best line: "Did I say something too honest? Made you run and hide like a scared little boy?"

33. "Back to December" (2010)

One of the rare ballads where she goes crawling back to an ex she treated like dirt – and she's surprisingly effective in the role. Although breaking into the guy's house is a little extreme. (If she's blocked by the chain on his door, that means she already picked the lock, right?) And sorry, but you're seriously dreaming if you think I'm bothering to Google the name of that Twilight guy, don't @ me.

Best line: "It turns out freedom ain't nothing but missing you."

32. "The Best Day" (2008)

Her tribute to Mama Swift. A weapons-grade tearjerker and not to be trifled with in a public place. NSFW, unless you are a professional crier.

Best line: "You were on my side/Even when I was wrong."

31. "The Story of Us" (2010)

You could credit this hit with single-handedly driving John Mayer out of the pop heartthrob business and into the Grateful Dead – which is just one of the things to love about it. Along with the Joey Ramone-style way she says, "Next chapter!"

Best line: "See me nervously pulling at my clothes and trying to look busy."

30. "How You Get the Girl" (2014)

She busts out her trusty acoustic guitar, teardrop stains and all, just to turn it into a beatbox.

Best line: "Stand there like a ghost shaking in the rain/She'll open up the door and say 'Are you insane?'"

29. "Hey Stephen" (2010)

Loaded with classic girl-group flourishes, right from the opening "Be My Baby" drum beat. Plus, it begins and ends with her finest humming solos. If she wanted to hum on every song, she could make that work.

Best line: "All those other girls, well, they're beautiful/But would they write a song for you?"

28. "Should've Said No" (2006)

A pissed-off highlight of the debut, with an Oasis-worthy chorus. Savor the perfect Liam Gallagher way she milks the vowels of "begging for forgiveness at my fee-ee-eet."

Best line: "It was a moment of weakness, and you said yes."

27. "Last Kiss" (2010)

Toward the end of Speak Now, when you're already wrung out from sad songs and begging for mercy, this six-minute quasi-doo-wop ballad creeps up on you to inflict more punishment. One of those flawless Nathan Chapman productions – so sparse, so delicate, flattering every tremor of her voice.

Best line: "I'm not much for dancing, but for you I did."

26. "Teardrops on My Guitar" (2006)

One of her defining early smashes – and the one that marked her crucial crossover to the minivan-mom adult audience, where country stars do most of their business. It also inspired the first anti-Taylor answer song – Joe Jonas sang, "I'm done with superstars/And all the tears on her guitar" in 2009, on the JoBros' instantly forgotten Lines, Vines and Trying Times.

Best line: "Drew walks by me/Can he tell that I can't breathe?"

25. "Sad Beautiful Tragic" (2012)

She must have heard a Mazzy Star song on the radio that morning and thought, "Hey, this sounds like fun." All the details are in place, from her woozy Hope Sandoval mumble to the way Nathan Chapman nails Sandoval's exact tambourine sound. Such an underrated Red gem, one she's almost never done live. Would any other songwriter on Earth have the sheer gall to get away with that title? Let's hope nobody tries.

Best line: "You've got your demons, and, darling, they all look like me."

24. "Mine" (2010)

"You made a rebel of a careless man's careful daughter" is one of those hooks where she seems to cram a whole life story into one line.

Best line: "I was a flight risk with a fear of falling."

23. "This Love" (2014)

A meditative 1989 nocturne – half acoustic introspection, half electro reverie – as she genuflects in the midnight hour.

Best line: "I could go on and on/And I will."

22. "22" (2012)

Approximately 22,000 times more fun than actually being 22. The best song about turning the double deuce since Neil Young's "Powderfinger," if not the Stratford 4's "Telephone," it's also her first shameless disco trip, with that Nile Rodgers-style guitar flash. But the power move is that "uh oh" into the chorus – the oldest trick in the book, except she makes it sound brand new every time.

Best line: "This place is too crowded, too many cool kids."

21. "Mean" (2010)

A banjo-core Tay-visceration of people who are mean, liars, pathetic, and/or alone in life, including the ones who live in big old cities. Always a concert highlight, showcasing her murderers' row of a band, the Agency.

Best line: "Drunk and grumbling on about how I can't sing."

20. "I Knew You Were Trouble" (2012)

It slams like a lost Blondie hit, from somewhere between Parallel Lines and Eat to the Beat. The way she sings the word "drown-i-i-i-ing" alone makes it.

Best line: "He was long gone when he met me/And I realize the joke is on me."

19. "Tim McGraw" (2006)

We knew she was trouble when she walked in – or at least we should have guessed from her debut single. You couldn't make this up – a nervy high school kid shows up with a country ballad she whipped together after math class one day, about slow dancing in the moonlight to the pickup truck radio: "When you think Tim McGraw/I hope you think of me." Within a couple of years, she's an even bigger star than McGraw is.

Best line: "He said the way my blue eyes shined/Put those Georgia pines to shame that night/I said, 'That's a lie.'"

18. "Style" (2014)

Not always a subtle one, our Tay. This extremely 1986-sounding synth-pop groove is full of hushed-breath melodrama, where even the guy taking off his coat can feel like a plot twist. (Why would he keep his coat on? This is his apartment.) And the long-running songwriting badminton between her and Harry Allegedly is pop call-and-response the way it ought to be – no matter how much misery it might bring into their personal lives, for the rest of us it means one great tune after another. (Yeah, OK, plus the one about the snowmobile.)

Best line: "You got that James Dean daydream look in your eye/And I got that red lip classic thing that you like."

17. "State of Grace" (2012)

She opens Red with one of her grandest love songs in arena-rock drag, and the U2 vibe makes sense since she's also got a red guitar and the truth. If "State of Grace" is her U2 song, what's the U2 song that sounds most like Taylor? Probably "All I Want Is You," though you could make a strong case for "A Sort of Homecoming."

Best line: "Up in your room and our slates are clean/Twin fire signs, four blue eyes."

16. "Sparks Fly" (2010)

"Drop everything now! Meet me in the pouring rain!" Oh, this girl loves her precipitation scenes, but "Sparks Fly" really brings the thunder. It shows off her uncanny power to make a moment sound gauchely private and messily public at the same time. (The new Waxahatchee album has another excellent song called "Sparks Fly" – no relation.)

Best line: "Just keep on keeping your eyes on me."

15. "Fifteen" (2008)

"In your life you'll do bigger things than date the boy on the football team/I didn't know that at 15." Still south of her twenties, she sings her compassionately, sisterly yet hardass advice to her fellow teenage girls. (Spoiler: Boys are always lying about everything.)

Best line: "We both cried."

14. "Ours" (2010)

Like so many of her songs, "Ours" sounds like it could be channeling the 16-blue mojo of the Replacements' punk-rock bard Paul Westerberg. (Melodically, it evokes "When It Began," though it feels more like "I Will Dare.") Especially the best line, which is possibly the best-est "best line" on this list, and which I sing to myself a mere dozen times a day.

Best line: "Don't you worry your pretty little mind/People throw rocks at things that shine."

13. "Begin Again" (2012)

"You said you never met one girl who had as many James Taylor records as you," indeed. Sweet Baby Tay drops a deceptively simple ballad that sneaks up and steamrolls all over you, as an unmelodramatic coffee date leads to an unmelodramatic emotional connection. She's always been outspoken about her mad love for her namesake JT and Carly Simon, but "Begin Again" could be the finest collabo they never wrote.

Best line: "You don't know why I'm coming off a little shy/But I do."

12. "Fearless" (2008)

Oh, Fearless, it's easy to take you for granted sometimes. The first time I heard her sophomore record (the record company literally played it over the phone for me because they were so afraid of it leaking) I thought, "Holy cats, this is a perfect pop album. She'll never top this." Then she topped it three times in a row, to the point where it's one of history's most curiously overlooked perfect pop albums. The title anthem gathers so many of her favorite tropes in one chorus – rain, cars, fancy dresses, boys who stare at her while driving instead of watching the damn road, shy girls posing as brave and faking it till they make it – and builds up to a swoon.

Best line: "You're so cool, run your hands through your hair/Absent-mindedly making me want you."

11. "Enchanted" (2010)

The moment where this bittersweet symphony leaps from a nine to a 10 comes at the 4:25 point, when it feels like the song has reached its logical conclusion, until the Interior Monologue Voice-Over Taylor beams in to whisper: "Please don't be in love with someone else/Please don't have somebody waiting on you." In the final seconds, for the coup de grace, she duets with herself.

Best line: "The lingering question kept me up at 2 a.m./Who do you love?"

10. "Our Song" (2006)

The hit that made me a Swift fan, the first moment I heard it in 2007 – it knocked me sideways in the middle of lunch. (The CW played it as interstitial music between afternoon reruns of the Clueless sitcom and What I Like About You.) "Our song is a slamming screen door," what a genius hook. I Googled to see who wrote this; it turned out the songwriter was also the singer and – how strange – she was just starting out. I hoped she might have at least another great tune or two in her. This song and that voice have kept slamming those screen doors ever since.

Best line: "We're on the phone, and you talk reeeeeal slow/'Cause it's late and your mama don't know."

9. "Red" (2012)

The mission statement for Red, this century's most ridiculously masterful megapop manifesto. Eurodisco plus banjos – the glitter-cowgirl totality Shania Twain spent years trying to perfect, with a color-tripping lyric worthy of Prince himself, faster than the wind, passionate as sin. Plus, her all-time gnarliest pileup of Swiftian metaphors. (Nitpick: What kind of crossword puzzle has no right answer? What self-respecting puzzlemaster would sign off on that?)

Best line: "Lovin' him was like driving a new Maserati down a dead-end street."

8. "Clean" (2014)

Love is the drug. "Clean" is the stark synth-folk ballad of an infatuation junkie struggling through some kind of detox, with a big assist from Imogen Heap. An intense finale for the all-killer homestretch of 1989.

Best line: "Ten months sober, I must admit/Just because you're clean don't mean you don't miss it."

7. "Holy Ground" (2012)

Nobody does zero-to-60 emotional peel outs like our girl, and "Holy Ground" is her equivalent of Evel Knievel jumping the Snake River Canyon. Note the sly brilliance of how she steals that Eighties guitar riff from none other than Billy Idol, making this her "White Wedding" as well as her "Rebel Yell." (Though the lyrics are about dancing with herself.) A highlight on the Red tour, showcasing Tay's drum-solo skills.

Best line: "Hey, you skip the conversation when you already know."

6. "Dear John" (2010)

A slow-burning, methodical, precise, savage dissection of a failed quasi-relationship, with no happy ending, no moral, no solution, not even a lesson learned – just a bad memory filed away. "Dear John" might sound like she's spontaneously pouring her heart out, but it takes one devious operator to make a song this intricate feel that way. ("You're an expert at sorry and keeping lines blurry and never impressed by me acing your tests" – she makes all that seem like one gulp of breath.) Every line stings, right down to the end when she switches from "I should have known" to "You should have known."

Best line: "I'm shining like fireworks over your sad empty town."

5. "We Are Never Getting Back Together" (2012)

Like, ever. Her funniest breakup jam, because it's her most self-mocking. She could have made the guy in this song a shady creep—a cheater, a liar, a scarf-stealer, etc. But, no, he's just a needy little run-of-the-mill basket case, exactly like her, making the same complaints about her to his own bored friends, though his complaints can't be as catchy as this chorus. And the video is a gem, especially when she's wearing the Tay Is Seriously Mad Now glasses. Where is that indie-rock bar that still has a pay phone?

Best line: "I mean, I'm just like, this is exhausting, OK?

4. "Blank Space" (2014)

A double-venti celebration of serial monogamy for Starbucks lovers everywhere, as Tay zooms through the whole cycle – the high, the pain, the players, the game, magic, madness, heaven, sin. Every second of "Blank Space" is perfect, from the pen clicks to the "nasss-taaaay-scarrr" at the end. The high might not be worth the pain, but this song is.

Best line: "Darling, I'm a nightmare dressed like a daydream."

3. "Long Live" (2010)

This is her "Common People," her "Born to Run," her "We Are the Champions." An arena-slaying rock anthem to cap off Speak Now, for an ordinary girl who suddenly gets to feel like she rules the world for a minute or two. "Long Live" could be a gang of friends, a teen couple at the prom, a singer addressing her audience. But like so many songs on Speak Now, her secret prog album, it reaches a point where it feels like it's over and Tay's bringing it in for a landing, except that's when the song gets twice as good. In the final verse, she makes a gigantic mess. (Actual lyric: "Promise me this/That you'll stand by me forever." WTF, girl, you were doing so well there.) Yet that's the moment that puts "Long Live" over the top – a song nobody else could have written, as she rides those power chords home. That's Taylor: always overdoing it, never having one feeling where six would do. Long live.

Best line: "I had the time of my life fighting dragons with you."

2. "New Romantics" (2014)

The way Taylor exhales at the end of the line "I'm about to play my ace-aaah" is perhaps the finest moment in the history of human lungs. "New Romantics" is where she takes the Eighties synth-pop concept of 1989 to the bank, with a mirror-ball epiphany that leaves tears of mascara all over the dance floor. She tips her cap to the arty poseurs of the 1980s New Romantic scene – Duran Duran, Adam Ant, the Human League, etc. – yet sounds exactly like her own preposterously emotional self. (One of my weirdest moments of recent years: explaining this song's existence to the guys in Duran Duran.) "New Romantics" is hardly the first time she's sung about crying in the bathroom, but it's the one that makes crying in the bathroom sound like a bold spiritual quest, which (when she sings about it) it is. The punch line: Having written this work of genius, exceeding even the wildest hopes any fan could have dreamed, she left it off the damn album, a very New Romantic thing to do.

Best line: "We show off our different scarlet letters/Trust me, mine is better."

1. "All Too Well" (2012)

So casually cruel in the name of being awesome. This towering ballad is Swift's zenith, building to peak after peak. For "All Too Well," she teams up with her trustiest collaborators – songwriting sensei Liz Rose, producer Nathan Chapman – to spin a tragic tale of doomed love and scarves and autumn leaves and maple lattes. It's full of killer moments: the way she sings "refrigerator," the way she spits out the consonants of "crumpled-up piece of paper," the way she chews up three "all"s in a row. No other song does such a stellar job of showing off her ability to blow up a trivial little detail into a legendary heartache. (That scarf should be in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, though in a way it already is.) You can schaeden your freude all over the celebrity she reputedly sings about, but on the best day of your life you will never inspire a song as great as "All Too Well." Or write one.

Best line: "Maybe we got lost in translation/Maybe I asked for too much/Maybe this thing was a masterpiece till you tore it all up/Running scared, I was there, I remember it all too well."

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a-broader-sensibility-blog · 7 years

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Music for Radfems

A lot of people enjoyed the resource post I did on radical feminist literature, so I thought I would come back and do a second resource list, but this time for radfem music! Not all of these songs are specifically radical feminist, but I deliberately exclude artists that like to “reclaim slurs” or sing about how sexy they are or how they’re empowered because they’re different from other girls. I also stay away from the YAS, QUEEN/slay/goddess type music about how women are so amazing because they’re beautiful and glamorous. Also, some of the artists on this list are not people who identify themselves or their music as explicitly feminist, but I find feminist threads in how they make music and in their lyrics, in particular. This list is not exhaustive or necessarily as diverse as it should be; it’s just composed of some artists and songs that I personally have enjoyed.

Just some background info: I absolutely love making playlists (of all types) and I’ve made a number of playlists with feminist themes but this list is not a playlist, but more of a directory. If you end up discovering any songs or artist you love from this list, please let me know and share your own radfem playlists.

P.S. Bikini Kill is left out because everyone already knows Bikini Kill.

Artists

Ani Difranco

Ani has made a ton of powerful music with explicitly feminist themes, as well as devoting her life to activism . Also, she STARTED HER FUCKING RECORD LABEL AT THE AGE OF 18, LIKE IF YOU WANT TO TALK ABOUT “INDIE” MUSIC, THIS IS IT. Her music is also really beautiful, just in terms of unexpected rhythms and guitar riffs and yeah, I just love her. You’ve probably heard of “32 Flavours” but seriously, go beyond and explore her gigantic catalogue.

Teaser : And Lucille, your voice still sounds in me/Yeah mine was a relatively easy tragedy/The profile of our country looks a little less hard-nosed/But you know that picket line persisted and that clinic's since been closed

(”Lost Woman Song,” from Ani DiFranco, 1990.)

Bratmobile

I can’t possibly list every riot grrl-era punk band as this list would simply become copy-pasta from Wikipedia. However, I do feel the need to recommend Bratmobile, a quintessential riot grrrl band, because their lyrics explicitly reject liberal pablum and demand something more substantial not only from men, but from other women as well. They’re a good band to listen to when you’re feeling exasperated at how many women will expend so much effort defending their Nigels and making excuses for men.

Teaser: What do you mean against the feminine form/It’s girls like you who are always torn/Between salvation and one of the boy toys/Give them what they want, but I want more

(”What’s Wrong With You?” from Girls Get Busy, 2002.)

Dory Previn

Dory is a lesser-known folk artist, similar in style to Joni Mitchell. After her husband Andre Previn left her for Mia Farrell in the 1970s, she turned her attention from writing music for movies to writing incisive, deeply personal music. Sometimes she sings more explicitly feminist lyrics, (see “When A Man Wants A Woman,” for example) but what I find really powerful in her lyrics is in the ways she subtly highlights the unequal power dynamics between heterosexual men and women in the context of “loving” relationships. She’s also a good artist to listen to if you are interested in how aging and older women are treated in our society. Finally, she’s super sly at taking digs at “sexually liberated” left-wing dudebros of the ‘70s.

Teaser:

Whatever you give me I'll take as it comes/Discarding self-pity I'll manage with crumbs/I'll settle for moments, I won't ask for life/I'll not expect labels like lover, or wife

(”Lemon-Haired Ladies, from Mythical Kings and Iguanas,1971.)

Joan Baez

Joan Baez doesn’t consider herself a feminist per se, but she’s been an activist on the front lines of progressive politics for over 50 years. Aside from women’s rights, she sings about labour rights, civil rights, and anti-war activism. While Baez is most famous for her covers of classic folk songs, she has also written a lot of her own music, which is super underrated. “Diamonds and Rust,” which is quoted below, is kind of her fuck-you song about Bob Dylan.

Teaser: And there you stayed /Temporarily lost at sea /The Madonna was yours for free /Yes the girl on the half-shell/Would keep you unharmed

(”Diamonds and Rust” from Diamonds & Rust, 1975)

Le Tigre

Le Tigre is fronted by Kathleen Hanna, the most famous face of the Riot Grrrl scene, but also includes JD Samson a visibly gender-nonconforming lesbian artist who unabashedly identifies as lesbian and female. Le Tigre’s music is some of the most explicitly, directly feminist, and while I wouldn’t necessarily say that the band as a whole allies itself with radical (rather than queer) feminism, they’re still feminists. The music itself is electro-pop, VERY early 2000s sounding computerized instrumentals but somehow super catchy and polished anyway.

Teaser:

Carol Rama and Eleanor Antin/Yoko Ono and Carolee Schneeman/You're getting old, that's what they'll say, but/Don't give a damn I'm listening anyway

(”Hot Topic,” from Le Tigre, 1999.)

Sleater-Kinney

Probably every punk fan follower I have is already of a fan of them, but in case you don’t know, Sleater-Kinney is an all-female punk rock band that formed in the mid 1990s a little bit after the height of the riot grrrl movement. They were inspired by the earlier riot grrrl bands, but (in my opinion) their music has grown more sophisticated and rich melodically and lyrically than most of the Bikini Kill/Babes in Toyland stuff you would associate with riot grrrl. The two lead singers, Carrie Brownstein and Corinne Tucker are bisexual (I don’t know about the drummer, Janet Weiss) and briefly dated, continuing to perform side by side during and after their breakup. (The song “One More Hour" is a really searing, painful song that they wrote together about the dissolution of their own relationship.) Anyways, they have a really unique sound that’s a result of both Brownstein and Tucker playing lead guitar and lead vocals, with no bass or rhythm guitar. Rather than harmonizing, they sing overlapping lyrics in a really dissonant way and basically, if you love punk rock like I do, you MUST listen to them right now.

Teaser: Find me out/I'm not just made of parts/Oh you can break right through/This box you put me into

(”Heart Factory” from Dig Me Out,1997.)

Songs

“You Don’t Own Me” by Lesley Gore (Lesley Gore Sings of Mixed-Up Hearts, 1963)

Pretty much the classic oldies proto-feminist song. You’ve probably already heard and love it. Years later, Lesley came out as a lesbian. We love her.

Teaser: You don't own me/I'm not just one of your many toys/You don't own me/Don't say I can't go with other boys

“In Your Shoes” by Sarah McLachlan (Shine On, 2014.)

I saw her perform this song live, and she explained that it was inspired by and dedicated to (in her words) “the most badass teenager in the world,” Malala Yousafzai. The song does not reference Yousafzai directly, but it is very explicit in addressing young women (not men.)

Teaser: Say what’s on your mind with pride/‘Cause you are your own woman

“Stupid Girls” by P!nk (I’m Not Dead, 2006.)

This song came out when I was in middle school, which was shortly after the absolute peak (around 2004/2005) of “stupid girl” culture, when Paris Hilton, Lindsay Lohan, Britney Spears and their ilk were still really popular. (I do love Britney though.) This song really touched me and it felt like such a breath of fresh air to see a female pop star at that time who was also bothered by the way porn culture had created only one infantilizing and sexualized path to female stardom. Later on, I started to feel bad about liking "Stupid Girls” as liberal feminism made me feel guilty because, y’know, some women like being porn stars and getting plastic surgery and fake tans. Anyways, fuck that and this song is super amazing, especially when you’re a 12-year-old proto radfem in the year 2006.

#resource list #masterpost #music #ani difranco #radical feminism #radfem #feminist music #joan baez #sleater-kinney #sarah mclachlan #le tigre #bratmobile #riot grrrl #dory previn

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thotyssey · 7 years

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On Point With: Patti Spliff

Whether it’s painting, sculpting or performing, this Brooklyn queen with her signature tentacle braids is an artist we should all be watching, like, now. And a great place to start is Sasha Velour’s epic Nightgowns, returning to Brooklyn this week. Get high on Patti Spliff!

Thotyssey: Hi Patti! So, we are getting well into October now, yet I'm still asking people about their Bushwig experiences. I am particularly curious about yours, because you're such an intense stage performer. How did it go?

Patti Spliff: I loved it! I prefer to perform on smaller, more intimate stages, but this year's was epic! I had to try harder, so I pulled out all the simple choreography I know! What was the number you did? "Konsumier Mich" by PLASTIX, this 80s punk band from Vienna. I was having trouble settling on a song until a week before Bushiwg. It was just playing at a bar down the street (Rebecca's), and I immediately fell in love with it. You have such a refined, diverse musical lexicon for someone so young. The first time I became aware of you was your number with Chris of Hur and Sasha Velour last year that you did for the Austin International Drag Festival, and later for the Brooklyn Nightlife Awards. The B-52s! It was a long, eclectic, intense performance. Yes! I had performed that B-52s number solo a couple times. It's a great song but definitely needs someone to be the Fred Schneider. Chris of Hur came up with this mix including "Dance This Mess Around," and had Sasha and I debut it in Austin. I love the songs Chris and Sasha pull, so it was a perfect trio.

And now we're coming full circle! So, where is your hometown, and what were your earliest artistic pursuits? I was born and raised in Dallas, TX. I was definitely a nerdy kid that loved to draw, so I spent a lot of time sketching new X-Men, or repainting action figures i'd find at garage sales. I'd also cosplay at local Anime conventions, making my own costumes and props out of cardboard and hot glue. This eventually turned into a love of fine art and sculpture, so I moved north to attend the School of The Art Institute of Chicago. Aside from comic art, what other genres or artists inspired you during your formative years? I was introduced to Paul Thek's work my first year at college, It really influenced the art I make to this day. Before then, I had stuck with painting and drawing -- but Thek's pieces pushed me to explore installations, objects, and ephemeral work.

I see from your sculpture website that you have a particular interest in circular shapes and wheels. Ha! yes, it started out as a counter to the square/rectangular paintings I was making; but I've since used them to represent halos, orifices, and otherworldly objects.

Didn't you recently publish a coloring book as well?

I released my Look Book at LA Drag Con this year. It's a collection of 20 fashion illustrations I'd been working on; about half are looks I've done, and half are future looks. I plan on releasing a new one each year. I hadn't illustrated in a while, so it was fun to jump back in. As far as music is concerned, how were you exposed to such a diversity of genres? Even the most eclectic young queens today don’t seem to have have much knowledge regarding classic rock or old school punk, for instance.

My mother and father always played the "oldies" station, so that’s the only music I was exposed to when I was younger. In high school I listened to a lot of "downer" music like Cat Power and PJ Harvey, mostly female fronted bands. Now I'm usually just performing songs that I've loved forever and know the words by heart.

And then of course there's Patti Smith. She's the queen of counterculture, such a spectacular singer and poet and so vital to the underground history of this city. I love that photo recreation of you as Patti from the Horses album cover. I had been wanting to recreate that photo for a while. Horses is definitely one of my top 5 favorite albums, but that cover is what initially got me interested in Patti Smith. Luckily my husband is a photographer and uses the same type of Hasselblad camera Mapplethorpe used.

Did you always connect with her more than most, hence the namesake?

When I was starting out in Chicago, I had a couple names I was playing around with, but I always knew I wanted long, black, loose braids as an exaggerated reference to Patti Smith's braids. Her songs are also kind of perfect to perform to. I’ll be performing one for Nightgowns!

So, how did you discover Brooklyn drag?

I tried doing my research before moving here 4 years ago. I remember following performers like Untitled Queen, Macy Rodman, Horrorchata, Mocha and Misty to kind of get the feel of Brooklyn Drag. But I really got a crash course in BK drag from Brad Callahan (BCALLA). We met at SAIC in 2006, and have been friends ever since! What speaks to you about drag? And as a visual artist, do you sometimes feel more like a living installation then a traditional performer? I was definitely more into the look when I started drag. I could turn into the characters I had illustrated as kid. I was never a theater kid, and to this day I get nervous on a stage if I don't have an inch of makeup on, so it took me a while to get used to the performance side of drag.

youtube

Regarding your braids, we all identify you by those tremendous, swooping hair tendrils that are often longer than your entire body. Are they hard to maneuver onstage? Do you ever trip over them?

They are heavy! Usually I toss them around my neck by the end of the night.

So, it's an interesting time for the Brooklyn scene. It seemed dismal when TNT closed last year, but then a lot of new venues opened their doors to drag afterwards. And there's a whole lot of new queens too.

I just love that there is so much new drag, new shows all throughout the week. More is more to me! Some of the newer queens are pulling the best looks/ shows. Ruby Fox Is killing it!

Right!? Ruby Fox, Suburbia, the House of Femanon are some of my favorite new queens!

Pearl is your drag mom, right?

Yes, we met in Chicago and were roommates for a bit. I made a couple of her early looks, and she would paint my face when I first started going out. Are you still in touch with her, or is she just all over the place these days? She's definitely all over the place, but I see her when she's in town. Sometimes I take care of her adorable dog Honey when she's away. You must've been way happy when Sasha won Drag Race this season... not only is she your Judy and amazing, but it sort of introduced a different style and aesthetic of drag to the show's fans around the world. SO HAPPY! It's crazy how quickly that all happens. She is one of my favorite drag performers, and I'm glad more people can have a chance to see her live! It was nice to see a sweet and collected queen with a very specific aesthetic make it to the top.

Sasha’s show Nightgowns was a special monthly event at Bizarre Bar before her TV win; it combined a more dramatic repertoire of numbers from the drag performers with gorgeous visual elements projected on them and the backdrop. Since she's brought back the show post-win, it's exploded in scale and popularity, and often includes other popular Drag Race queens in the cast. What do you think about the change?

I’m really into the change! I think they're being smart about it, and I think this is the level of production value that Sasha has always wanted for Nightgowns. A lot of the original BK queens make appearances, but I love seeing queens that don't normally perform these emotional torch songs, have a chance to perform something they are passionate about. Well, for the most part, this session of Nightgowns starting tomorrow is mostly Brooklyn performers. It's gonna be three shows over two nights at the gorgeous National Sawdust. How psyched are you? I can't wait! Definitely a little nervous -- haven't performed at this venue yet. My last Nightgowns was at Bizarre! This cast is amazing too! I'm excited to see what Neon Calypso ends up doing. I performed right after her Missy Elliot mashup at Bushwig, I was standing right off stage with my jaw open the entire time. I hope I'm not performing after her again!

And in other exciting news, last month you started an interesting new monthly at the Rosemont, “Sad Songs,” which I'm guessing is self-explanatory!

Yes! Very-self explanatory. I had one of the saddest queens I know be my first guest, Untitled Queen.

You're gonna be back there doing it with Charlene on Tuesday, October 17th. What made you want to do a sad song show? I just wanted to do a simple drag night that was exclusively sad songs. "Sad" is up to the performers own interpretation. I usually perform a bunch of slower songs anyway, but I also don't like turning a big Friday night drag show into a Debbie Downer moment. So this is my night to test them all out. I also like the idea of hosting queens that don't normally perform sad songs. I can't wait to see what Charlene brings!

What else is coming up for you? I'll be giving Halloween shows on October 28th in London for Cybil War's "CYBIL's HOUSE : CIRCUS OF HORRORS" and probably a couple of last minute shows before then. That's right, you've done a lot of performing abroad... do you have any wacky road stories? Well, the plane ride to Life Ball 2017 in Vienna was nuts. Susanne Bartsch brought a bunch of us with her to represent NYC. The entire ride was one giant party the second we took off. Pearl and I drank straight whiskey while watching Amanda Lepore give a strip tease for everyone. The music on the portable speakers wasn't loud enough, so the whole plane drummed a rhythm for her to dance to. It was just such a surreal mix of people -- Dionne Warwick was somewhere in the front of the plane. At the end of it, we all took a 30 minute nap and started painting our faces because a red carpet and the foreign press were waiting for us when we landed. It's the quickest and drunkest I've ever painted my face! And that was just the beginning of the trip! that whole weekend was "wacky." That is the stuff of legend! Okay then, so last question... where in the world should Patti Spliff go next? Wherever they'll take me! I went to Queef Latina's Wigwood in Miami last spring, it was too much fun! I want to go back and perform next year! It's like Bushwig, but with a Miami beach!

Sounds like heaven... hope you get there soon! Thanks, Patti!

Patti Spliff hosts “Sad Songs” monthly Tuesdays at the Rosemont. Check Thotyssey’s calendar for other upcoming NYC-area gigs, and follow Patti on Facebook, Instagram, Tumblr and her sculpture website.

On Point Archives

#npointwith #patti spiff

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fionaapplerocks · 7 years

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Fiona Apple: Strange Fruit Onstage, a great songwriter turns into our lady of the perpetual breakdown

Blender Magazine, March 2006 By ANN POWERS

Fiona Apple balances on her piano bench as if it were a log bobbing in the ocean after a shipwreck. Her slight body rocks and weaves, is this some of her famous crazy behavior? No, the 28-year-old rocker-chanteuse is just pumping the foot pedals, big black shoes peeping out from beneath her witchy geisha gown. She's riding the squall of 'Get Him Back,' her opening salvo on the second show of the first tour she's done in five years. Yellow stagelights flash a warning as Apple hollers revenge. 'Oh, he made my blood just burn,' she growls, showing pleasure at the revenge of turning a bad relationship into good music.

Apple, pop's Contessa of Crisis, is still acting out the dance of id and superego that made her a star as a troubled teen in 1996. She has endured a decade of career strains, notably the shelving and complete re-recording of her third album, Extraordinary Machine (released October 4 to very strong reviews), and the resulting self-examination has helped her refine the art of falling apart. Apple is now 'good at being uncomfortable,' as she sings in a breakneck acoustic version of her fine new disc's title track. But judging by this up-and-down show, she's still learning how to stress the 'good' over the mess.

Apple's stage fright isn't feigned. 'I do get nervous about screwing up during a show, just because I tend to beat myself up about the littlest thing, and then I have trouble regaining my confidence,' she explains later via her tour manager's BlackBerry. Often, she turns those nerves into melodrama. And the capacity crowd of 1,400 reacts delightedly when Apple flashes the flummoxed grin of a treed cat and assures them that she's really freaked. Nearly any theatrical gesture makes her fans react as though Apple has just turned a triple axel in an Olympic figure-skating trial.

But it's a shame for her to be celebrated for her mood swings rather than for her extraordinary songs. She introduces her earliest hit, 'Criminal,' as 'junk food,' acknowledging her own growth away from blatant confession. Her newer songs add distancing wit to her youthful raw power, she has gone from a self-mutilating slam poet to a mordant song architect. And when she and her new band settle into her rhythmic crossword puzzles, you can feel her music evolving.

That lineup, which features two synth wizards, bass and drums but no guitar player, could take Apple somewhere entirely new or drag her down off her bobbing log. Rhythmically heavy and hairpin-sharp, the quintet recalls, of all elders, Tom Waits. There's a psychedelic vaudeville vibe to recast oldies like 'Shadowboxer,' and the sprung rhythms of the new 'O' Sailor' galvanize. On these aggressive takes, Apple's voice sounds bloodier than it should only two nights into a tour, as she sprints to fit all of her words and changes into the song.

Standing languidly at center stage for the torchy 'I Know,' she nearly earns the Billie Holiday reference made by the blue flower in her hair, stretching vivid lines like 'You can use my skin to bury secrets in' for full impact. Apple's not a jazz singer, but in trying on that role she lets the music direct her emotions for once, rather than the other way around. At moments like this, Apple unveils the smarts her panic hides, and her prospects stretch out before her, the promise of an artist, not a drama queen.

Fiona Apple The Moore Theatre, Seattle, Washington November 23, 2005

#Fiona Apple

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tweetadvise · 7 years

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Contextual Advertising: What Is It and Why?

Contextual Advertising and marketing, as a phrase, seems so advanced, does not it? Toss that a person around in a number of conferences and also it seems like you, as the advertising and marketing supervisor, know what you are speaking regarding as well as expert in all points advertising and marketing. First, let's jump right into some sources that you can make use of, to obtain started with contextual advertising:

Infolinks

Infolinks is the epitome of contextual advertising.

Infolinks is a creative peek at contextual marketing, enabling classy solutions that are less advertising-like and also much more natural. An instance is a pop-up that would certainly give more info on a specific word (revealed above). This enables the viewers to click on the infolink as well as find out more about that subject, expanding their knowledge (while making you cash, as the website owner).

The appeal of Infolinks and also BuySellAds (described below) is that you might use them with each other, really optimizing the capacity for making additional money on the site.

Google Adsense

Google adsense, the one that a lot of us reduced our teeth on, provides the ability to pick the sort of ads that you want shown. It is a wonderful tool to obtain started as well as to understand the procedure. It is not the only online game in town.

BuySellAds.com

BuySellAds. com supplies the capability to supply up particular advertisement areas on the site and the advertiser can 'acquire' those ad spots, comparable to the paper idea where various ad areas have different price. In the very same method, traffic, like paper blood circulation, is a factor. For BuySellAds.com, the publisher/site owner notes the advertising inventory. The contextual advertising component is where you determine whether you will certainly accept a marketer, based on the relevance to your site. It is manual in the very same method that Google Adsense and Infolinks are, yet it belongs. You can think of BuySellAds as a kind of advertising and marketing brokerage firm firm.

Wikipedia has an entire checklist of contextual advertising and marketing networks, consisting of the now-defunct Yahoo Network.

Still Wondering What Contextual Advertising and marketing Is?

According to the ever-popular Wikipedia, contextual marketing is 'a form of targeted marketing for advertisements appearing on sites or various other media, such as material shown in mobile browsers. The advertisements themselves are selected as well as served by automated systems based on the material presented to the customer.'

Let me offer you a live instance ... Just today, I was fulfilled with my very own instance of contextual advertising and marketing. I was checking out various sites and also kept seeing my very own grinning face smiling back at me. You see, since I take pleasure in Jazz songs, the contextual marketing formulas on the advertising and marketing networks maintained showing advertisements for me, Deborah E. Currently, if I lured you into clicking that link, you will likely see the same thing when you check out websites that use contextual marketing, because your internet browser task shows that you have an interest.

This is why, if you are using a specific online software program, state, Zoho, Mavenlink, Teamwork, you will certainly see their advertisements stand out up while you read your favorite blog. It identifies the passion since you have gone to and also it dishes out those advertisements via the network, which impacts a number of various sites.

Have you ever saw a site, specifically on those one-off gos to for a competition or something then, for the following hour or so you see their ads anywhere where you browse? There you have it. Contextual advertising and marketing at work.

Why Do I Want Contextual Advertising?

The key is relevancy.

As an individual, you desire to see advertisements that attract you and also to your interests.

As a business, you wish to serve up advertisements that appeal to your site visitors. You may not wish to serve up an advertisement that is from your competitor, however something that pertains to your visitor and related to your item or service.

If your services or product is social network sites advertising, you would not wish to have a photo of an elephant on your site, for no reason. Unless. you desire individuals to be asking themselves why you have that elephant on your site (and click to a touchdown web page for something), or the elephant is the mascot for your firm. Otherwise, arbitrary photos of objects and also animals may not have anything to do with the item of social networks marketing.

Ok, I take that back, charming cat pictures succeed on social media sites, so possibly ...

Keep that Base Line in Mind In any way Times

Unless you are distributing things for goodwill, you are most likely curious about earning money. Maintain that lower line in mind. After you have actually made sure that your website is monetized and also that you have your sales channel, then ensure that the advertising and marketing that appears on your site is pertinent. Several contextual advertising sites supply opportunities to undergo and select exactly what you desire displayed on your site, even, in some cases, the actual advertiser.

Remember, select free advertisers, but not contending. For my video advertising services, I present video clip devices ads, yet not various other video marketing services or production services.

Oldies, however Goodies, Referencing Contextual Advertising

Want some oldies yet goodies? It may give you 'context' for the 'contextual advertising and marketing.' Right here online Advertising and marketing Ninjas blog site, we have gone over contextual advertising in these articles:

Making Millions with Contextual Marketing (composed in 2006 by Jim Boykin)

Effective Affiliate Methods (created in 2008 by Lisa Barone)

and another fascinating post: (QualityGal) Graywolf, Individual Kawasaki, and also Paid Links Guidelines that Can not Be Implemented (composed in 2008, however just how much do YOU think matters today?)

Now What?

While it may have held true that you can make numerous bucks with contextual advertising, 'back then,' it is still a sensible alternative, even today. Why rule out adding it as one of the income streams for your business? It may just pay sufficient for the early morning coffee at Starbucks.

#advertisement #business #marketing #marketing services #marketing strategy #online advertising #social media #social media management #social media sites #social network #social network sites

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bolachasgratis · 5 years

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NOS Primavera Sound 2019

Hugo Lima / NOS Primavera Sound

It’s starting to be too common: no matter how warm and sunny it is in the week leading up to the festival, NOS Primavera Sound (NPS) is doomed to be ruined by at least one day of rain. The first day did not look promising after the announcement of the passage of depression Miguel (no, not the rnb star who performed there a couple of years ago) through the north of Portugal. Flights were cancelled, Ama Lou and Peggy Gou could not reach Porto in time to perform, strong winds and rain showers threatened to turn Parque da Cidade into a muddy mess, the gates were opened almost an hour later than it was scheduled.

JARV IS.... Hugo Lima / NOS Primavera Sound

But then there was music. Under a temporarily clear sky, and in front of probably the smallest crowd ever in the 8pm slot at the main NOS stage, Built to Spill performed what was one of the longest shows in NPS history. In over an hour and a half, they have not only revisited Keep It Like a Secret in full, but have also played selections from their 25+ years long career, from the marvellous “I Would Hurt A Fly” off their 1997 masterpiece Perfect from Now On to Untethered Moon’s “Living Zoo”. At times, the stage looked too big for a quartet of introverts playing for other introverts, but their set was engaging enough for us to have to miss a few songs off Jarvis Cocker’s first solo show in the country in nine years. JARV IS… a six-piece band complete with guitars, a harp, sax, keys, and, of course, a rolling-all-over Jarvis, agile and charming as ever. A couple of new songs were the highlights among songs off Further Complications (“Homewrecker!”, “Further Complications.”). There was also time for a single incursion into Pulp material (“His ‘n’ Hers”) that left everyone nostalgic for one of the best Portuguese festival shows in recent history: Pulp’s takeover of the Paredes de Coura festival back in 2011.

Allen Halloween. Hugo Lima / NOS Primavera Sound

At the green, lush Pull & Bear stage that once was sponsored and programmed by ATP, and after another surprise rain shower, local hip hop hero Allen Halloween was on. Although he has struggled to gather a big crowd as headliner Danny Brown prepared to take over the NOS stage, and his Portuguese lyrics clash into a language barrier that drove most foreign visitors somewhere else, his devotees seemed to be delighted after his short set (we know we were). In “greatest hits” mode, he and his two fellow Kriminal crew MCs dropped hit after hit, starting with the catchy “Drunfos”, a song off A Árvore Kriminal about prescription painkillers that miraculously solve back pain. The most recent album Híbrido got plenty of love throughout the show, too, as Allen strolled through “Bandido Velho”, “Youth”, and “Mr. Bullying”, the best revenge song of the 2010s. But the highlight of the show had to be set closer “Fly Nigga”, off 2006’s Projecto Mary Witch.

Stereolab. Rita Carmo / BLITZ

Back at the SEAT stage, a blast from the past as Stereolab performed for the first time in ten years. The long, jammy, jaw dropping “Metronomic Underground” was the highlight in the first half of the show that had to be cut short so we could witness the full extent of Tommy Cash’s odd world. The Estonian rapper/producer combines the funniest visuals of the whole festival with nonsensical lyrics in a seemingly faux-Eastern European heavy accent, but it’s when the Russian hardbass-influenced tracks drop that the Super Bock stage crowd properly erupts. But the greatest moment of the night was still to come, as Solange took the NOS stage by storm. Not in a bombastic way, as we know her sister would do, but through a meticulously prepared, aesthetically spotless show. The finesse of the performance, focused on her latest record When I Get Home, was only interrupted in the semi-ecstatic, early-career banger “Losing You”, before an epic, copious rain shower sent half of the audience home halfway through the encore. We wanted to see Yaeji later on, but perhaps she shouldn’t have ordered all that rain.

Courtney Barnett. Hugo Lima / NOS Primavera Sound

Friday started with yet another major headache for the organisers: a radar problem in the airport has led to major delays and flight cancellations, and Mura Masa’s show was also cancelled, but the rest of the festival ended up going on as planned. Major headache for us, then: a somewhat tedious Aldous Harding show didn’t let us see what was one of the highlights of the festival for everyone who saw them (Jambinai); on the other hand, the triumphant return of the Basque rock powerhouse Lisabö (two drummers, plenty of guitars, beautiful, beautiful noise) made up for our choice of dropping our favorite Nilüfer Yanya, who we have seen earlier in May. We haven’t seen Courtney Barnett ever since she released her latest record Tell Me How You Really Feel, and we feel like we made the right call on this one, even though that means snubbing another marvellous Sons of Kemet show. Unlike Built to Spill the day before in the same exact time slot and stage, the Australian singer-songwriter’s trio knew exactly how to fill up a big stage. And how can something go wrong if you start off with the addictive “Avant Gardener”, the song that made us quit the Slowdive reunion show ten minutes into the concert so we could see her perform for an half-empty Pitchfork tent back in 2014? With a setlist that drew equally from both her LPs, plus a couple of oldies (good to know “History Eraser” is still part of the show) and non-album tracks (“Small Talk” and the very recent RSD single “Everybody Here Hates You”), Courtney Barnett’s band is a well-oiled machine destined to make new fans in every single festival show this season.

J Balvin. Hugo Lima / NOS Primavera Sound

Speaking of well-oiled machines, do we really need to review Shellac’s show yet another year and tell you it was the best hour we spent in the festival? This time around we got a few funny lads in the pit, including one dressed like Mickey Mouse (the true MVPs), and Steve Albini dropping some Ed Sheeran diss lines during “The End of Radio”. Wash your bedsheets you pig. And then the little, sad, grey world of “underground” indie purists that can only dance to “Blue Monday” fell apart as reggaeton giant J Balvin took the stage; the word “Reggaeton” filling up the screen as he performs the song with the same name. It looked like a foreign power taking by force a territory that will be their colony for the next hour and a half, sticking a pole and hoisting their flag as high as they can. But, this time around, it’s not a bossy bunch of Europeans landing in a tropical island; it’s the “tropical island” folks biting back, as the sound of Latin barrios becomes, at least temporarily, the lingua franca at the NOS stage. The show itself could have used more tracks off the excellent Vibras, released last year, and both “Machika” and “Ambiente”, two standout tracks off that record, could have gotten the full treatment instead of being only partially played; some songs in which Balvin features are perfectly discardable. But the apotheotic finale with his biggest hit to date “Mi Gente”, featuring a colorful bunch of cartoons, both on stage and on screen, has to be the highlight of the day and possibly of the whole festival. Dios bendiga el reggaeton.

JPEGMAFIA. Hugo Lima / NOS Primavera Sound

Elsewhere, Interpol has recovered from what was possibly the worst trainwreck we have witnessed in NOS Primavera Sound history (not sure if the 20 minutes long Neil Michael Hagerty show a couple years back was as terrible or the best thing we’ve ever seen, so there’s that) by performing a pretty solid show, anchored in what they know are the most vital records they’ve released: Turn On the Bright Lights and Antics, going fifteen and seventeen years back in time to bring us some of the most iconic guitar-driven of that decade (“C’mere”, “Take You On A Cruise”, “Leif Erikson”, “Obstacle 1″, “Roland”...). If you know when to avoid any recent tracks - although we have to say new single “Fine Mess” did not sound as bad as anything else they have released in the past decade - it’s a fine moment to see Interpol for old times sake, as Paul Banks apparently learned how to sing. With his sunglasses on at midnight, of course. Our night ended at the Pull & Bear stage with JPEGMAFIA wishing Morrissey was dead, rapping, jumping and crawling around the stage as a one-man-show should, and with a late night SOPHIE live act. If the more atmospheric, less interesting first half of the show threatened to send us all home with the feeling we could have went home earlier instead of freezing to death, the “Whole New World”/“Ponyboy”/“Faceshopping” combo was enough to bring us back to life.

Shellac of North America. Hugo Lima / NOS Primavera Sound

Saturday was the most guitar-driven day of the bunch, and our decision to have lunch in a nearby restaurant paid off when we learned Shellac was playing an extra 4pm show at the entrance of the festival for a handful of lucky people, including Low’s Alan Sparhawk, who sat at the floor as happy as any of us. Hop Along had the tough task to open the big stage as a dozen of Rosalía fans were already lining up for her much later show on the same stage. The Saddle Creek-signed indie rock quartet spearheaded by songwriter Frances Quinlan is always great live, as we have recently seen as they opened for the Decemberists on a recent European tour, but we soon had to hop to the SEAT stage to check out post-punkers Viagra Boys. You wouldn’t tell from their looks (frontman Sebastian Murphy is up on stage half-naked, showing a full-tattooed torso) that this funny group of Swedes loves taking the piss of macho men (and, apparently, everything else), but that’s just what they do.

Viagra Boys. Hugo Lima / NOS Primavera Sound

Coming up next was Big Thief, our favorite new band of the past couple of years. This meant we had to miss both Lucy Dacus and Tomberlin, who we would be obviously excited about, if only we had three sets of eyes and ears (and another couple of brains to process it all). We seem to get plenty of Masterpiece songs every time they perform in Portugal, and we’re not complaining. From “Paul” to “Real Love”, with the sad but hopeful “Parallels” thrown in the middle, there was plenty of songs off their debut to enjoy until the whole crew joins the band for one last performance of the title track to finish off the European leg of their tour. There was even time for guitar player Buck Meek - finally back with the band - to shine and play one of his solo songs, and for a couple of unreleased songs. Please release a studio version of “Not” ASAP, guys. Thanks. Still on the SEAT stage, Guided by Voices tried their best to stuff 36 songs in one and a half hours - and although we did not count them, someone else did. I cannot seem to memorize half of my passwords, and yet Robert Pollard can go through lyrics of three dozens of songs from eleven different albums (with a focus on the most recent albums - both released this year - Zeppelin Over China and Warp and Woof), including semi-hits “Game of Pricks”, the highly celebrated “Tractor Rape Chain”, and set closer “Glad Girls”. A lesson of what we now call “indie rock” for newcomers to learn from.

Kate Tempest. Luís Sousa / Música em DX

The 10pm slot of the festival was one of the busiest. We’re sad to know Tirzah was playing for less than a hundred of people at the Pull & Bear stage and decided to check out Rosalía, way closer in the NOS stage. It was the busiest we saw the main stage during this edition of the festival, and the Spanish singer seemed to have full control of the big stage as she, accompanied by half a dozen of dancers dressed in white, performed her duet with James Blake, “Barefoot in the Park”, a new flamenco-inspired song (“De Madrugá”), and “Catalina”, a highlight from her debut album Los Ángeles. Too bad we cannot be near Kate Tempest and not go see her, even though we were at one of her ‘trial’ shows for the upcoming new album tour less than a month ago, and we had to go back to the SEAT stage, where Tempest was already performing “Europe Is Lost”, one of the standout tracks off 2016′s Let Them Eat Chaos. She’s on stage with only her keyboard player and a very simple setting: some sort of circular canvas where her figure is sometimes projected as she delivers the heaviest, the most hopeless, but also the most hopeful lines you’d hear all festival. Especially on the second half of the show, as she focuses on her yet unreleased new album, The Book of Traps and Lessons, from which she draws tracks like the "singles” (if we can call it that) “Firesmoke” and “Holy Elixir”, plus “Hold Your Own”, one of the most beautiful moments of the whole weekend. We do not deserve Kate Tempest, one of the best artists of our generation.

Low.

Along with the fantastic Shellac/J Balvin sequence, the last three shows of the festival ended up being the best we’ve seen. There were legitimate concerns that Low’s music was too quiet and solemn to be played simultaneously with the likes of Modeselektor and Neneh Cherry in nearby stages, but although some of the sound from other stages made its way into the surroundings of the Super Bock stage as the Duluth band played their set, we wonder if people in the other stages were not equally affected by the whirlwind of sound Low has managed to produce during a breathtaking and extra loud “Do You Know How To Waltz?”, the majestic, noisy long track off 1996′s The Curtain Hits the Cast, complete with a maelstrom of strobes and visuals that were absent from the arguably quieter European 2018 fall tour. Although the setlist was more focused on their recent Double Negative, an album with a radically distinct production but that sounds exactly like classic Low when translated to a stage, there were a couple of trips to older records (“Lazy”, from debut I Could Live in Hope) and some of the most interesting tracks off their albums from the 2010s (Ones and Sixes’ “No Comprende” and C’mon’s “Especially Me”). If we knew the show would be as good as it was, we would have hugged Alan Sparhawk as much as he was hugging Bob Weston halfway through during that extra Shellac show.

Yves Tumor. Hugo Sousa Photography

But the real surprise of the night (and of the whole festival) came on our final show: as Erykah Badu was already more than half an hour late at the main stage, Yves Tumor took the opportunity to steal the show with one of the most energetic concerts of the festival. The androgynous performer, some kind of 22nd century glam-rock inspired Prince, completely dominated the stage from the moment he sets foot on stage and starts giving out signed tour posters (“nobody buys them anyway, just have them for free”). And off-stage too, as he was carried in the arms of an army of fans trying to avoiding being hit by his large heels. He performed only four (very celebrated) songs off his latest record, Safe in the Hands of Love, including the sing-along masterpiece “Lifetime”. Instead of being safe in the hands of his familiar old tracks, Tumor chose to focus on unreleased songs instead, completely suiting his band (guitar, bass, drums, and electronics) that sounds like has been playing together for ages. No video can truly capture what it was to be there, but here you go (Thanks Campainha Eléctrica for doing the Lord’s work).

NOS Primavera Sound

All in all, we left Parque da Cidade with the feeling we have witnessed what was, against all odds (weather included), the best NOS Primavera Sound edition of all time. It was the only time since we first visited the Barcelona festival, back in 2009, that we could not find half an hour to sit down, relax and have a long chat with our peers because there was nothing interesting going on (and, in that regard, we have to thank the recent decision to open all stages during the first day of the festival). Sure, some overlaps of artists that appeal to the same groups of fans (Allen Halloween vs Danny Brown, Big Thief vs Lucy Dacus vs Tomberlin, Hop Along vs Viagra Boys, Amyl and the Sniffers vs Guided by Voices, Tirzah vs Rosalía vs Kate Tempest) look like they could have been avoided. This could have attracted more people to the festival, especially those who feel the organisation have somehow “betrayed” them by focusing less on indie rock and guitar music on the festival’s prime time slots. That being said - all the bands we could not see could have easily filled another full day of the festival. And, at the same time, we feel the smaller amount of festival attendees has ultimately benefited and rewarded whoever still decided to go to the festival, as less people also means less queues, better views of the stages, a friendlier environment, less people chatting over the artists - we have never experience such a quiet festival in Portugal, with no one to argue with. Except those four girls who couldn’t turn the volume down during Kate Tempest’s quiet songs - you know who you are, and, well, your loss! Maybe we have hit the ideal spot, and entrances could and should be capped to 2019′s levels. See you at Porto’s Parque da Cidade in June 11-13 2020, where Pavement is scheduled to perform one of the only two shows of the second coming of their long awaited reunion. Tickets are available next June 17 for a short period of time, only for 2019 ticket holders, and from July 4 (for a period of 48 hours) for everyone else.

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