Every day our countdown continues all the way to #1. Monday’s album is #820: Percy Mayfield – His Tangerine and Atlantic Sides One of bluesman Percy Mayfield’s albums from the late 1950s is called My Heart Is Always Singing Sad Songs, and it perfectly captures his esthetic. Ironically, it’s not those songs that he’s best remembered for: his first big hit was Please Send Me Someone to Love. A few years later later he wrote Hit the Road Jack, iconically covered by Ray Charles. In 1969, covered; twenty years later, Mose Allison did a killer version of that one.

But Mayfield, an old soul if there ever was one, was the best interpreter of his own material. A star of the West Coast blues circuit in the early 50s, he narrowly survived a 1954 car accident that left him disfigured for life, with a sizeable crater in his forehead (the inspiration for ). This is a 2003 reissue of 1962-74 recordings. Mayfield always sounded older than he was: among the 28 tracks here are the shuffling R&B of; the lushly orchestrated piano blues; the even lusher, far more modern-sounding; the slow, brooding; the funky, psychedelic and the Louis Jordan-esque.

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The titles pretty much speak for themselves: it’s some of the most wrenching stuff ever recorded. Mayfield’s stuff from the 50s is equally good: other albums worth checking out are his Specialty Singles compilation as well as the Poet Of the Blues, Memory Pain and Two Years of Torture anthologies. Posted by ,,, ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, . Every day our countdown continues all the way to #1. Wednesday’s album is #832: Little Milton – Grits Ain’t Groceries Milton Campbell’s 1969 second album, a mix of live and studio tracks, perfectly capsulizes the point where the blues had evolved to include elements of 60s soul and funk. Little Milton’s growling, charismatic presence here owes more to singers like B.B. King, but the songs sprawl out with long vamps and intros like Lou Rawls and his contemporaries were doing in the mid-60s.

Little Milton was always better known as a frontman than a guitarist, but here he reminds how underrated he was, with a bite and a precision similar to Luther “Guitar Jr.” Johnson, or what Buddy Guy was doing early in his career. They open it slowly with Let Me Down Easy and follow that with the blustery, iconic: “If I don’t love you, grits ain’t groceries, eggs ain’t poultry and Mona Lisa was a man.” Subsequent controversies over who Mona Lisa really was only enhance the drama. There’s also a fervently stretched-out cover of B.B.’s the sultry blues ballad and the haunting, epicand that ends the album. Although he never quite hit this hard again, pretty much everything Little Milton ever recorded is worth owning, even the crooner albums from his Malaco Records period later in his career. After a life on the road, vital to the end, Little Milton died suddenly of a stroke in 2005. Posted by ,,, ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, . Every day our countdown continues all the way to #1.

Sunday’s album is #835: The Essential Sonny Boy Williamson Famously covered by the Stones, Van Morrison and the Yardbirds (whose live album with him is a complete trainwreck), Sonny Boy Williamson’s sly, often leering vocals and somewhat unhinged playing have made him an icon among blues fans. The great blues harpist, songwriter and showman was, like every bluesman of his era, a singles artist. For that reason, we picked this 1993 compilation from among the dozens of out there, many of them bootlegs, since it has the most tracks.

45 in all, recorded with a Hall of Fame list of Chess stars: drummer Fred Below, bassist/producer Willie Dixon, guitarist Muddy Waters, pianist Lafayette Leake and too many others to name. To blues scholars, this guy, Alec “Rice” Miller was Sonny Boy Williamson #2, to differentiate him from the first, John Lee Williamson, who was younger and whom #2 outlived by over a dozen years. From his days hustling on the chitlin and party circuit and then emceeing the King Biscuit Flour Hour,Williamson #2 developed a rakish persona to go along with a voracious appetite for alcohol and a knack for an aphoristic turn of phrase that fueled a succession of hit singles in the 50s. The best-known one, if not his best one, is, butchered by the Allman Brothers to the point of being almost unrecognizable. Others you may recognize here are,,,, and Some of the other tracks here are ephemeral but virtually all of them are choice. Pretty much anything did during the 50s is worth hearing, if you’re into this stuff: by the 60s, he was pretty much running on (alcohol) fumes. Posted by ,,, ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, .

For albums #900-1000, and an explanation of what this is all about – other than just plain fun –. For albums #800-899,. For albums #600-699,. Millie Jackson – Live and Uncensored The funniest woman in soul music, Millie Jackson got her start singing gospel, but by the mid-70s she’d gone from the sacred to the profane and stayed there, taking Bessie Smith innuendo to its logical, smutty extreme. L’il Kim and Foxy Brown have nothing on this woman. Her studio albums were popular for obvious reasons, but her live shows were beyond hilarious.

This double live lp from 1979 doesn’t have the classic, but it’s got most of her funniest songs, recorded in front of a well-oiled, extremely responsive crowd – as much as she plays the role of a woman who’s been dissed too many times and isn’t going to let a guy do that to her again, the guys love her. She does the innuendo thing with, and the deviously juvenile Never Change Lovers in the Middle of the Night. The big over-the-top hit – a Beethoven spoof – is the. Much of the time, the band launches into a funk vamp for her to rap over: the best one of these is a particularly venomous, obscene and those who watch them (she’s not a fan – she thinks they’re racist and they rot your mind). When she’s on top of her game, her covers, like and are viciously satirical – this may be soul music, but the vibe is pure punk rock.

This one was reissued sometime in the 90s as a twofer with the equally raunchy 1982 Live and Outrageous album. Now in her sixties, Jackson has toned it down a bit, most recently as the afternoon drive dj on an Atlanta radio station. – A growling, cynically lyrical Americana rock songwriter in the twangy Steve Earle vein, James McMurtry plays midsize venues around the world to a cult audience who hang on every word.

He’s never made a bad album. We picked this one, from 2005 because it’s got his signature song,, probably the most vivid depiction of the economic consequences of the Bush/Cheney reign of terror. McMurtry is a potent, vivid storyteller, and there are a handful of first-rate ones here: the ominous, murderous foreshadowing of Bad Enough; the swinging dysfunctional holiday-from-hell tale and the family road trip from/to hell,.

The rumbling alludes to the hopelessness of depressed rural areas that McMurtry has chronicled so well throughout his career; the swaying, funky looks at the hope or lack thereof for relationships there. There’s also the brooding European vignette Charlemagne’s Home Town, the sly – a duet with Joe Ely – and the poignant prisoner’s recollection Six Year Drought – is it told from the point of view of a POW?

A Holocaust survivor? If you want a torrent, here’s a – because we’re in a depression, and nobody knows that better than McMurtry, he’d understand if you downloaded it for nothing. Because he’s an independent artist and could use the support, there’s a link to his site in the title above.

Lefty Frizzell – 16 Biggest Hits Lefty Frizzell was a legendary Texas honkytonk singer from the 50s, a guy who sounded a lot older than he was. By the 70s, now in his 40s, he sounded close to 70. One of the songs here, an early proto-rockabilly number, is titled but in real life he didn’t seem to have any problem with that. He drank himself to death at 47 in 1975.

But he left a rich legacy. This album is missing some of his best-known songs – notably – but it’s packed with classics. Frizzell’s 1950 version of topped the country charts and beat Hank Williams – a frequent tourmate – at his own game. Other 50s hits here include the western swing-tinged the fast shuffle and Frizzell’s iconic version of – with its echoey, ghostly vocals and simple acoustic guitar, it’s even better than the Johnny Cash version.

From the 60s, there’s the surprisingly folkie version of, the sad drinking ballad, the torchy, electric piano-based and. His later period is best represented by, later covered by both George Jones and Merle Haggard. This is one of those albums that pops up in used vinyl stores from time to time, but isn’t easy to find online. There’s a popular “500 greatest country songs” torrent with several of these on it out there; if you see one for this particular album, let us know! The Church – The Blurred Crusade This 1982 classic is the legendary Australian art-rockers’ jangliest album, if not their most lyrically rich – on all but the gorgeously ghostly (named after a cemetery in Sydney), it sounds as if frontman Steve Kilbey wrote them in a rush on the way to the studio.

But the melodies are sublime, a lush, rich wash of clanging, overtone-drenched Rickenbacker guitar textures. Features a beautiful flamenco-inflected acoustic guitar solo from Peter Koppes;, An and are big anthems and concert favorites. Just for You and are among the band’s Byrdsiest songs. Each of the album sides ends with a beautiful, barely two-minute miniature: and Because we’ve carefully considered all the feedback we’ve received from you people out there, we’re generally trying to limit this list to one album per band. We just might make an exception for these guys. Here’s a; there’s also a brand-new cd reissue out with extensive new liner notes by guitarist Marty Willson-Piper.

– Taqasim One of the world’s great oud players and composers, Marcel Khalife has been called the Lebanese Bob Dylan. As the leader of the Al-Mayadeen Ensemble in the 70s, he achieved extraordinary popularity for his politically-charged, anthemic, classically-tinged songwriting, often using lyrics by the great Palestinian poet Mahmoud Darwish. Together with his human rights efforts on the part of the Palestinians, Khalife came under fire from the anti-Palestinian wing in Israel and was eventually driven into exile in Paris. This 2008 album, a hauntingly terse, pays homage to Darwish. Backed only by bass and drums, Khalife builds a tense, shadowy atmosphere, brooding and often downright tormented; mournful resignation gives way to a stately dance that eventually goes deeper into darkness, with a barely restrained desperation. Only a small portion of Khalife’s extensive catalog has been released outside of the Arab world; this is one of the best.

Likewise, torrents are hard to come. It’s still available from Khalife’s site. Funkadelic – America Eats Its Young Here’s a band that pretty much everybody agrees on. But the two most popular “best-of” music lists up here in the cloud already grabbed One Nation Under a Groove and Maggot Brain. So what’s left?

Pretty much everything P-Funk ever did. Here’s one you might not have thought about for awhile. This characteristically sprawling, eclectic, amusing, and frequently scathing 1972 double lp might be George Clinton’s most rock-oriented album, stone cold proof that these guys were just as good a rock act as a funk band. This is the core of the early group: the brilliant and underrated Tyrone Lampkin on drums, Bootsy on bass, Eddie Hazel on guitar and Bernie Worrell on swirling, gothic-tinged organ putting his New England Conservatory degree to good use. A lot of this takes Sly Stone-style funk to the next level: the fast antiwar/antiviolence shuffle; the artsy, orchestrated eco-anthem; and the vicious, bouncy antidrug anthem.

Is epic and funny; the is even more so, a slow stoner soul vamp with a message, an orgasmic girl vocalese intro, and a faux Isaac Hayes rap by Clinton: “Who is this bitch?” The pensive ballad predates Radiohead by 35 years; Bootsy gets down and dirty with an oldschool R&B feel on. Offhandedly makes the case that if we don’t pull our act together, nature just might do it for us – without us.

And it’s got a pedal steel solo?!? The album closes with a, the guys in the choir trading verses with the girls. Gogol Bordello – Gypsy Punks It’s only fair that we’d follow one great party band (P-Funk) with another. Gogol Bordello may not have been the first gypsy punks, but they took the sound gobal.

This one, from 2005, is their most punk album and the closest studio approximation of the pandemonium of their live show, the guitars roaring like the Clash on Give ‘Em Enough Rope. As usual, frontman Eugene Hutz alternates between English and Ukrainian when least expected; this time out, he adds Spanish to the mix.

It’s got some of his most direct songs, especially, an anthem for a million kids (and old kids) to sing along to. Never identifies the specific act which, back in the day, used to be legal, but it doesn’t have to – it’s a classic for the paranoid post-9/11 world. Is self-explanatory, and it’s a classic. There are also plenty of surreal stories here: the bizarre East Village bathhouse scenario; the crazed wedding narrative, and a far more punk version of than the one on the Everything Is Illuminated soundtrack. Toward the end of the album, the songs stretch out, with reggae and dub on andand latin on. Everything Gogol Bordello did is worth owning – they’re a band everybody who would never wanna be young again should see at least once in their lives.

Here’s a 792. Burnside – Burnside on Burnside R.L. Burnside played a whole bunch of different styles, depending on the times. He started out as an early 70s style, Marvin Gaye-inspired soul man, went into Chicago style blues, took a fortuitously brief turn into early 80s pop before finding his groove in hypnotic Mississippi hill country blues. Fans love this style for its trance-inducing, pounding vamps that hang on a single chord for minutes at a clip: it works as well as dance music as it does for stoners and drinkers. This 2001 live set recorded at a rock club in Oregon is his last and best album, capturing him at the absolute top of his game, amped to eleven and blasting through one careening number after another. Even though there’s no bass – the only other instruments in the band were drums and longtime slide guitarist Kenny Brown – the songs come at you in waves.

At one point, he indulges in a little autobiography, but the crowd wants tunes. Robert Johnson’ roars and gallops; Muddy Waters’ is a tsunami of guitar distortion and primal stomp. The best track here might be the eerie, ominously clattering hobo tune; Brown gets to take his usual long slide solo on and makes the most of it. Burnside died of a stroke in 2005; his grandsons Cedric and Kenny continue to play blues in the same raw, rustic vein.

Kenny Garrett – Songbook Who would have thought when he made his debut as an elevator jazz guy back in the 80s that someday he’d be capable of this kind of brilliance? As both a composer and player, alto saxophonist Kenny Garrett was one of the 90s’ and zeros’ most potent forces and remains just as vital today. This one from 1997 really solidified his reputation, a retro, Coltrane-inspired triumph.

With relentless energy and intelligence, Garrett locks in with Kenny Kirkland on piano, Nat Reeves on bass and Jeff “Tain” Watts on drums, through a diverse collection of cerebral workups and lyrical ballads. The opening track opens it lyrically, picking up the pace with the catchy, insistent and then the magnificently Middle Eastern-inflected, modal epic, the most Coltrane-ish number here and one which became a real crowd-pleaser live. There’s also the funky Freddie Hubbard tribute Brother Hubbard; the boleroish ballad Ms. Baja; the magisterial Nat Adderley homage The House That Nat Built; the darkly syncopated blues She Waits for the New Sun; the pensive, expansive and the warily exuberant Sounds of the Flying Pygmies.

Pretty much everything Garrett else has done since 1990 is also worth hearing. Dolly Parton – Little Sparrow If you’ve followed this list as we’ve been rolling it out (or as it’s been unraveling, as somebody here put it), you’ve probably noticed an absence of classic country albums. That’s because so many great country artists were singles artists. Their albums tend to have a few good cuts surrounded by lots of filler: songs written on the fly by the producer, or included as a favor to the producer’s out-of-work friends, that kind of thing. Here’s one that’s solid all the way through.

Dolly Parton had written a ton of good songs by the time she put this one out in 2001, the second in a series of extremely successful acoustic albums that saw her return to her bluegrass roots. It’s a loosely thematic Nashville gothic album of sorts with a supernatural theme, its centerpiece the whispery witch’s tale, followed by the winsome, compelling She’s always been known for wacky covers (she’d do Led Zep the next time out); this one has an actually excellent, unrecognizable version of by Collective Soul (featuring Nickel Creek), and a surprisingly effective cover of Cole Porter’s I Get a Kick Out of You. There’s also the soaring, plaintive and a lickety-split; a version of I Don’t Believe You’ve Met My Baby that’s even bouncier than the original; the ballads and The(thematic, you see); the Irish traditional song, and the country gospel mainstay to wrap it up. Dolly sings her heart out and the energy is contagious: the band sound like they’re about to jump out of their shoes with joy in places. Redman & Method Man – Blackout Back in 1999, two of the biggest weedheads in hip-hop teamed up for an all-night blunt session, brought along some relatively minimal backing tracks, wrote a bunch of lyrics and this is the result. Or at least that’s what it sounds like.

One of the most kick-ass party albums ever made, Redman comes as close here to playing elder statesman as he ever has, pushing Meth to take his game to the highest level. It’s less a cutting contest than two of the last of the golden age hip-hop stars airing out their rhyme books. Most of the jokes, the skits and scenarios involve weed and/or women, their usual specialty, ranging from mildly amusing to off-the-scale hilarious. Would become a movie theme., and especially are classic examples of hook-based hip-hop that keeps going just as memorably after the chorus flies by; at the opposite extreme, and have a freestyle feel.

Features Ja Rule and Cool J while Ghostface joins them on. Too bad that when these two teamed up again for a sequel to this one late in the zeros, the chemistry wasn’t there: and with all the emphasis on big, cliched, commercial, “R&B” flavored choruses, they didn’t have nearly as much room to move. Sometimes a classic isn’t worth trying to repeat.

Holst – The Planets – Walter Susskind/St. Louis Symphony Symphony Orchestra Full disclosure – as a child, one of us had a favorite recording of this which turned out to have been conducted by a member of the Nazi party. That was the end of that. British composer Gustav Holst’s richly cinematic suite (John Williams brazenly ripped this off – Luke Skywalker blowing up the Death Star, for example) has been recorded by a million orchestras. Leonard Bernstein & the NY Philharmonic did one (the links you see here are all his). But is there a version that stands out among all of them? You bet there is.

Walter Susskind’s 1975 recording with the St. The Hunger Games Book 1 Audiobook Free Download here. Louis Symphony is loaded with dynamics, vividly illustrating what are essentially astrological themes. Most of these will be instantly familiar to moviegoers, particularly the suspenseful. Is cast as a mystical tone poem; is puckish with bubbling brass; likewise, is boisterous and bustling. But the three segments here that are absolutely riveting are the hauntingly bell-like, funereal; a big, evil, ominous; and a chilling, viscerally otherworldly version of who is more like Hades here. Here’s a 787.

Bo Diddley – The Chess Box When we began this countdown last July, one of our original rules was no box sets: among other things, they’re kind of an easy way out. Choosing the Beatles box, or the Pink Floyd box, for example, takes away the fun of being able to pick an unexpected gem out of all the goodies. But Bo Diddley’s 1950s heyday was much like today, with most everyone listening to singles instead of full-length albums. This double-cd reissue, dating from MCA’s acquisition of the Chess Records catalog in the late 80s, is as good as just about any representation of the guy with the cane and the square guitar. It’s got most of the growling Diddleybeat hits:,, and Ride On Josephine. It’s also got the novelty songs: doing the dozens with his deadpan maraca player Jerome Green on, and Signifying Blues, along with the proto-glam junkie anthem (famously covered by the New York Dolls). But Ellis McDaniel was a lot more than just a hitmaker comedian who liked to do bit parts in cult movies: he was one of the most technologically advanced musicians of his era.

He built his own guitars and pioneered the use of electronic effects including chorus, flange, reverb, and delay, even foreshadowing the use of the vocoder by twenty years, “talking” through his guitar as on. And since he played mostly rhythm on his big hits, they don’t offer much of a hint of what a wryly compelling lead guitarist he was. Or how diverse his songwriting was, from the practically punk R&B of stuff like to ballads like Before You Accuse Me, to cinematic themes like, which wouldn’t be out of place in the Lee Hazelwood or Ventures catalogs.

A few of the later tracks here are marginal, but most of this stuff is choice – and in the public domain, at least in Europe. Jimmy Martin – 20 Greatest Hits As chronicled in the 2003 documentary film King of Bluegrass, Jimmy Martin was a tragic character – a mean drunk, a bad bandmate, a micromanager as a bandleader – and one of the greatest figures in the history of the music. He got his start as a harmony singer and guitarist in Bill Monroe’s band in the late 40s, then hit with his Sunny Mountain Boys in the 50s and continued to tour festivals until he died in 2005. His high lonesome vocals and biting, no-nonsense guitar picking continue to influence bluegrass bands from coast to coast. This reissue from the late 80s mixes standards (Blue Moon of Kentucky, Rollin’ in My Sweet Baby’s Arms, Foggy Mountain Breakdown and Knoxville Girl, to name a few) with hits, many from the peak of his career. Martin was the first to do Truck Drivin’ Man and followed up the success of that one with another eighteen-wheeler standby,. Some of these songs play up his reputation as hard to deal with, notably his first big hit,, and the bitter Who’s Calling You Sweetheart Tonight.

The only duds here are the, and if the sheer number of these that he wrote throughout his career are to be taken at face value, he went through as many hounds as bandmates. For spirited live versions of many of these songs, check out the 1973 double live album featuring Martin along with Jim & Jesse & the Virginia Boys, Flatt & Scruggs and Bill Monroe and his band. The Abyssinians – Satta Massagana One of the deepest, darkest roots reggae albums you’ll ever hear, the oldest singles on this 1993 reissue date back to 1969. Best known for their hit – the “national anthem of reggae,” a song whose producer failed to see its potential until it topped the Jamaican charts two years after it was recorded – Bernard Collins, Donald Manning and Lyndford Manning distinguished themselves with their eerie close harmonies and fondness for murky minor key grooves. They mix up the socially conscious anthems like, and with haunting, gospel-inflected numbers like and along with ominous orthodox Rasta themes such as,, and the organ-fueled. The group called it quits in the late 70s, reuniting improbably twenty years later and proving they hadn’t lost a step; their 1999 comeback album suffers from overproduction but also has plenty of good songs. Come – Gently Down the Stream One of the small handful of truly great indie rock bands from the 90s, Come’s two-guitar frontline of and were that era’s Keith Richards and Mick Taylor, combining for a ferocious, intuitive maelstrom of growling, roaring, reverb-drenched, evilly smoldering noise.

This is their last album, from 1999, and it’s their best. The songs are longer, more ornate and complex, foreshadowing the art-rock direction Zedek would take in the years following the demise of the band. There’s no other group that sound remotely like them: while Zedek would borrow a little of the noiserock she’d been drenched in as frontwoman of legendary New York rockers in the late 80s, ultimately she’s more of a Stonesy rock purist.

Brokaw invents new elements with his trademark leads, expertly negotiating an underworldly labyrinth of passing tones. The album opens with the epic One Piece, continues in that vein with Recidivist before going more punk with the slightly shorter Stomp and then eventually the loudest track here, the screaming, riff-rocking. The most magnificent track is the kiss-off anthem New Coat, another scorching dirge. After the band broke up, Brokaw would go on to even greater heights as the lead guitarist in the original incarnation of as well as a noteworthy career as a solo act as well as with first-class indie songwriter.

– The Night’s Last Tomorrow As the leader of dark, artsy Nashville gothic rockers, Mark Sinnis and his ominous baritone have been a forceful presence in the New York music underground since the late 90s. Lately, he’s been devoting as much time to his solo acoustic project, most fully realized with this one, his third solo release, from early 2010.

It’s an obscure treasure and it’s probably the best thing he’s ever recorded with any group. This one mixes brand new tracks with a couple of radically reworked Ninth House songs and classic covers., a not-so-thinly veiled requiem for a New York lost at least for the moment to gentrifiers and class tourists, is a stampeding rockabilly number just a little quieter than the Ninth House version. Likewise, the lyrically rich (which made our list) doesn’t vary much from the original, although the Cure-inflected is.um, quite a change. With a new last verse, Sinnis’ version of leaves no doubt that it’s a suicide song. Likewise, the cover of is definitely an obituary, although the Sisters of Mercy’s Nine While Nine is a lot more upbeat, a vividly brooding train station vignette. The catchy, rustically swaying and the downright morbid, Johnny Cash-inspired wind it up. This is one of those albums that’s too obscure to have made it to the usual share sites, although it is available at shows and.

Country Joe & the Fish – Electric Music for the Mind and Body Country Joe McDonald and his bandmates’ mission on this crazed 1967 gem was to replicate the ambience of an acid trip. It’s by far the trippiest thing they ever did: their other albums have much more of a straight-up folkie or country-rock feel. Univers Family Fonts Free.

Maybe because of that, it’s a lot looser and less earnest as well. Most of it has aged remarkably well, even the Grateful Dead-inspired and (a snide anti-LBJ broadside). Much of this, like and the hypnotic instrumental, is unusually carnivalesque and eerie for these guys. Is surprisingly subtle and funny; the genuinely haunting and way-out-there, with its “did you just hear that” sound effects are anything but. None of us here can vouch for how this sounds under the influence of LSD but the band reputedly tried it and gave it their seal of approval.

Elliott Smith – Figure 8 Here’s somebody who never made a bad album. Elliott Smith’s albums from the 90s alternate gorgeously harmony-driven, George Harrison-esque pop with austere, sometimes charming but more frequently brooding little vignettes. This one, from 1999, is the only one of his albums that has a fully realized, lushly produced atmosphere from beginning to end, Smith playing virtually all of the instruments himself including the drums. There isn’t any obvious hit single here, but every single one of the fifteen tracks is excellent. Nobody wrote about drugs, or specifically heroin, more elliptically or poetically than this guy; here, he broadened his worldview and it paid off.

Lyrically speaking, it’s the high point of his career. Was withering when it came out; these days it’s positively scathing, as is the anti-trendoid broadside. There’s also the gently bucolic; the quaint tack piano pop of; the hypnotically crescendoing Everything Means Nothing to Me; the ragtime-tinged and which quietly foreshadows the unrest and eventual doom that he’d meet up with there.

Elliott Smith was murdered in 2003 in a vicious knife attack. William Bratton, the former New York City police commissioner whose most dubious achievement here was underreporting homicides in order to drive the official murder rate down, did the same thing in Los Angeles; Smith’s case was declared a suicide, even though he’d taken a knife through the chest twice. His killer remains at large. Louis Jordan – Let the Good Times Roll: The Anthology 1938-1953 Like the Sonny Boy Williamson anthology on this list (see #835), this one gets the nod over the dozens of other Jordan releases out there simply because it has more songs: 46 in all over two cds. It’s as good a place to start withas any if you want to get to know the guy that many feel invented rock and roll. Actually, that was probably Link Wray – Louis Jordan was the king of 1940s jump blues who inspired guys like Bill Haley and later, Elvis. A charismatic, wildly energetic performer, bandleader and saxophonist, his boisterous, cartoonish and sometimes buffoonish songs have a tongue-in-cheek lyrical sophistication that sometimes gets forgotten as the party gets underway.

Which he doesn’t seem to have minded at all: he sold a ton of records that way. All the hits are here:;; (later appropriated by B.B. King and dozens of others);;;;;;; and of course the. It’s also got the funny sequel I’m Gonna Leave You on the Outskirts Of Town, the topical WWII home front number Ration Blues, a blues version of the old mento standard Junco Partner, Saturday Night Fish Fry (later redone by B.B. And then by Tony Bennett, as Playing with My Friends), and Ella Fitzgerald singing Stone Cold Dead in the Market. The Vapors – New Clear Days Best known for their inscrutable and uncharacteristically new wavey 1979 hit, this ferocious and surprisingly eclectic British punk band put out two excellent albums, this one and 1981′s Magnets, the latter featuring one of the.

The two standout tracks here are the raging, an alienated kid going off on his conformist, complacent dad, and the artsy, Asian-flavored epic, told snidely from the point of view of a kamikaze pilot who was luckier than most. Is just as snide: “You’re just another little girl with stars in your eyes, and I don’t wanna go home with you.” shares Turning Japanese’s pop feel; is more like the Clash; a rare respite from the gloom; and and have a scurrying, furtive angst. The album closes with, a postapocalyptic reggae-punk number. Frontman/rhythm guitarist David Fenton would go on to play in a considerably harder-rocking second edition of Bow Wow Wow in the 90s; afterward, in a considerably bizarre twist of fate, he would become a lawyer with the British equivalent of the RIAA. Tom Waits – Blood Money This was a hard choice. The game plan here is still pretty much to pick one album per artist, and Waits is a guy pretty much everyone agrees on, someone who arguably deserves four or five on this list.

This one from 2002 won out over the rest, perhaps ironically, because it’s probably the least eclectic one out of everything he’s released since the turn of the century. Here, there isn’t much skronk, Waits’ rustic croak and carnivalesque, phantasmagorical beatnik lyricism get set to gritty, brooding minor-key oldtimey jazz arrangements with some noir, cinematic instrumental miniatures like and interspersed among them to shift the dynamics around.

Might be the ultimate expression of Waits’ philosophy – or, that could be the opening track,. And (depression-era Harlem slang for “coat”) are the requisite cynical numbers; (an original, not the Lou Reed song) and a surprisingly good-natured, actually quite majestic version of lift the darkness just a little.

And is the most surreal of them all. Here’s a 777. – Tricks of the Shade Long out of print, this golden-age 1993 hip hop classic is a mix of songs and politically charged skits that remain as relevant now as they were in the age of Bush I’s first gulf war.

Frontman Oatie Kato and his cohorts Madd (a.k.a. “the M-A-the-double-D”, a.k.a. Maxx), and Swayzack wander through a twisted, surreal carnival featuring attractions like Columbus’ Boat Ride, Noriega’s Coke Stand, Indian activist Leonard Peltier in a cage, Rovie Wade the Sword Swallower (“Hey Rovie, that’s not a sword, that’s a coat hanger”), the Drive By Bumper Cars and at the end, the ominous Uncle Scam’s Shooting Gallery.

Along the way, they skewer Reaganomics and Fox TV (the viciously satirical ), smoke a lot of herb (the big hit ), and then dig in against the fascists with and then. Their follow-up album, No Goats No Glory, had another sizeable hit,, plenty of pot references, but no more politics. And that was that. But we still have this classic. – She Has No Strings Apollo The Dirty Three haunt the fringes where jazz, rock and film music intersect.

Their tense, brooding, often haunting soundscapes rise and fall as Warren Ellis’ violin mingles with Mick Turner’s guitar while drummer Jim White colors the songs with all sorts of unexpected tinges, often leaving the rhythm to the other musicians. They’ve never made a bad album. This one, from 2003, is a popular choice, and it’s as good as any. Sets the stage, slowly unwinding and then leaping to doublespeed. The t builds from pensive to purposeful to downright dramatic; is truly long, roaring and atmospheric. The best-known track here, No Stranger Than That nicks the piano lick from by the Clash, followed eventually by a memorable duel between Ellis and Turner with a Dave Swarbrick/Richard Thompson alchemy; the last two tracks segue from a whisper to a scream.

– Heaven Is Creepy Let’s stick with the dark instrumental rock for a bit, ok? Campilongo is a virtuoso guitarist, a favorite of the Guitar World crowd, equally at home with jazz, spaghetti western, surf music, western swing, skronky funk and straight-up rock. He gets a lot of work as a lead player with artists as diverse as Norah Jones, Jo Williamson, Marika Hughes and Teddy Thompson. The obvious comparison is to Bill Frisell, but Campilongo’s more terse and song-oriented, and unlike Frisell he doesn’t rely on loops, or for that matter much of any kind of electronic effects: it’s amazing what this guy can can do with just an amp. His signature trick is a subtly eerie tremolo effect that he achieves by bending the neck of his Telecaster ever so slightly. And every album he’s ever done is worth owning.

Why this one? It’s probably his darkest, notably for the title track and the self-explanatory, film noir-ish, -esque Menace. Reaches for more of a bittersweet vibe; is a feast of clever dynamics and tricks like mimicking the sound of backward masking; cinematically blends surf, funk, skronk and trip-hop. His version of Cry Me a River rivals for brooding angst. Despite its popularity, this one doesn’t seem to have made it to the usual share sites, although copies are available from.

The Viper Mad Blues anthology This compilation features old songs from the late 20s through the 40s about smoking pot, and occasionally, snorting coke. This old jazz and country shizzit is more punk than the Ramones and more gangsta than L’il Wayne ever dreamed of, and although it was banned from the radio it was wildly popular in its day. The coolest thing about the 25 tracks here is that only two of them, Cab Calloway’s 1935 hit (which is actually about smoking opium), and a gleefully adrenalized version of Leadbelly’s coke anthem, are really obvious. The others have proliferated thanks to youtube and file sharing, but when the compilation came out in 1989, it was a tremendous achievementfor those who like funny songs about drugs, at least. If ragtime guitar star Luke Jordan’s (not the version you’re thinking of) is to be believed, that stuff was a staple of hillbilly life back in 1927. Some other highlights: Larry Adler’s hilarious 1938 hit Smoking Reefers; Cleo Brown’s deadpan The Stuff Is Here and It’s Mellow; Champion Jack Dupree’s, a kick-ass piano boogie from 1944; Baron Lee & the Blue Rhythm Band’s 1935 tribute to their dealer,; and Fats Waller’s: “Hey, cat, it’s 4 o’clock in the morning, here we are in Harlem, everybody’s here but the police and they’ll be here in a minute.

It’s high time, so here it is” Here’s a. The Pogues – Peace & Love Conventional wisdom is that the Pogues peaked early, that the original Irish folk-punk band was at their best when they had Elvis Costello’s second wife on bass and a fairly lucid Shane MacGowan out in front. And as ecstatically fun as their early albums are, this one from 1988 is their most diverse, and most original, maybe because it draws on the songwriting talent of just about everyone in the band while Shane was going through aumdown period. The opening track, Gridlock, proves these great Irish musicians could tackle jazz and pull it off. The gorgeous hook-driven acoustic pop songs include, the bouncy Blue Heaven, the hypnotic and the beautifully rueful; among the more traditionally oriented numbers, there’s the characteristically snarling, MacGowan’s lickety-split USA, the psychedelic and the tongue-in-cheek. The best tracks are accordionist Jem Finer’s haunting Tombstone and the majestic, almost cruelly evocative, solitary wee-hours ballad. The 2005 cd reissue includes the less-than-stellar Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah ep from the previous year, which doesn’t really add anything.

Machito y Su Orquesta – Esta Es Graciela By the time the legendary Cuban-American bandleader and his sultry chanteuse sister released this album in 1964, he was in his fifties and she was getting close. But neither show their age. Only the arrangements are more lush and sensual, by comparison to the animated intensity of the band’s work in previous decades. Machito may or may not have invented salsa, but his orchestra was the one that everybody imitated, right through the end of the 60s and even beyond: the Fania era never would have happened without him.

Likewise, Graciela Gutierrez-Perez, who died earlier this year at 94, set the standard for salsa divas. She could be brassy or coy and she could work a song’s innuendo the same way she worked a crowd.

This one shows off both her sides:, a slinky, sly duet with Machito; the crafty, sexy Mi Querido Santi Clo; the fast, bubbly mambo Estoy A Mil; the downright seductive; the lavishly orchestrated son montuno of El Gato Tiene Tres Patas; the sad, brooding Ya Tu No Estas; the characteristically tongue-in-cheek, risque Celos Negros, and the balmy tropicalia ballad Si No Eres Tu, and four others ranging from lavishly lush to swinging dance numbers. Frequently reissued and often bootlegged, later versions constantly turn up in used record stores that sell latin music. Otherwise, has the cd; here’s a. Buddy & Julie Miller’s first album The breakout album by these husband-and-wife Americana music veterans.

She writes the songs and sings them; he plays them. Buddy Miller flew pretty much under the radar until he became Emmylou Harris’ lead guitarist in the 90s, and then the cat was out of the bag. With dazzling bluegrass speed matched to an eerie, sometimes macabre chromatic edge, Buddy Miller draws a lot of Richard Thompson comparisons, which is apt.

It only makes sense that the duo and their band would open their first album together, from 2001, with a viscerally wounded, alienated version of Thompson’s. There’s also an almost unrecognizable, smartly reinvigorated version of the 1971 Dylan song Wallflower, along with a hardscrabble cover of Bruce “Utah” Phillips’. The originals here run from wistful – the sad oldtimey waltz, That’s Just How She Cries and the unselfconsciously gorgeous, rustic – to upbeat and oldschool, as with and. Miller reminds how good he is at ferocious electric rock on You Make My Heart Beat Too Fast. Julie’s vocals are understatedly plaintive and fetching; if you ever get the chance to see these two live, they put on a hell of a show. Jean Grae – Attack of the Attacking Things One of the past decade’s greatest lyricists, Abdullah Ibrahim’s daughter is a throwback to hip-hop’s golden age.

She’s as politically aware as she is self-aware, unapologetically proud of her lyrical skill yet down-to-earth – and utterly contemptuous of bling, status and fame. Literally everything she’s ever done is worth hearing. The popular choice is her bootlegs album, so to be perverse we picked this one from 2002 because it proves how ferociously good she’d already become by then. She romanticizes nothing: her is strictly for her struggling, round-the-way peeps; the portrayal of comes with all the bumps and bruises and somehow manages to avoid being completely cynical. In her world, revolution is global and impossible as long as we cling to our neighorhood provincialism: “Missionaries create foreign schools and change the native way of thinking, so in ten years we can have a foreign Columbine in some small village in the Amazon,” she snarls quietly on. There’s also a genuinely touching; a couple of vicious, spot-on anti-record industry tirades, and (“Crazy how I’m catching you with no major distribution”), a couple of aggressive gangsta-style tracks, a heartbroken and one of the ever to appear on a rap record. Peter Gabriel – Up Here’s another one from 2002.

If you were a fan at the time, you probably knew that this album took a long time to finish; if you weren’t, and you knew it existed, it probably came as a surprise. It’s Gabriel’s best solo album, as dark or darker than anything he ever did at his peak with Genesis back in the early 70s when they were a stagy, absurdist classical-rock band. By the time he began work on it in the mid-90s, he was heavily involved with WOMAD, his world music festival, and this reflects his qawwali obsession without drowning in it. The first track,, alternates explosive anguish with pensive lyrical piano passages; is dark hypnotic funk; is just the opposite, and very memorably so, followed by the vivid requiem and then the equally vivid, hypnotically atmospheric throws a jab at the idiocy of reality tv; the most unforgettable track here is a scream for sanity in an insane world. Other standout tracks include the ominous ballad the darkly trippy and, one of his most plaintive, poignant songs, just solo piano and vocals. Spearhead – Chocolate Supa Highway Smartly aware, low-key stoner funk from 1997. Brilliant lyricist that he is, Michael Franti can be maddeningly erratic, but this one’s solid pretty much all the way through, as cynically insightful as his cult-classic Disposable Heroes of Hip-Hoprisy project from five years earlier.

The isn’t just a stoner jam: “I can’t stand the pain outside my window/Why you think so many smoking indo?” It’s a feeling echoed on much of the rest of the album: and (“Geronimo Pratt done as many years as Mandela”) hit just as hard now as they did in the last century, along with the workingman/woman’s anthem. The acoustic Americana trip-hop of (with a surprisingly effective Joan Osborne cameo) and are more surreal; interpolates hits by Bob Marley and Jacob Miller; Gas Gauge assesses the future after peak oil. And are more lighthearted without losing sight of the grimness through the haze of blunt smoke.

The only miss here, predictably, is the love song. Most of this is streaming at; here’s a. The English Beat – Wh’Appen You will see more albums like this as we move up the list. There’s only one song here that’s a genuine classic – the gorgeous reggae-pop ballad – but every single track is solid. For us, that’s what defines a classic album, one that’s consistently good all the way through rather than one with a couple of great songs surrounded by filler.

The rest of the cuts on this British second-wave ska band’s 1981 sophomore album are a characteristically tuneful blend of ska and chorus box guitar-driven new wave. Is punk-style encouragement to fight the good fight: “You’re so scared of death you don’t know what life is.” sets flamenco-inflected guitar to Mexican-flavored ska; the franglais has an afrobeat feel. And dive into dub reggae, while has some deliciously watery Leslie speaker guitar. There’s also the sarcastic, the cynical (foreshadowing the more pop direction they’d take on Special Beat Service) and the big hit,. After the band broke up in 1984, various reconfigurations including General Public, Special Beat, and most recently, guitarist Dave Wakeling’s barely recognizable version of the group have continued to record and tour.

Oum Kalthoum – Rak El Habib 35 years after her death, Oum Kalthoum remains more popular than Jesus and the Beatles combined. Publicly, she played up her roots as an Egyptian country mullah’s daughter; professionally, she was a member of the avant garde, a committed socialist and someone who would have been a millionaire many times over had she not given virtually of her money to charity. Oum Kalthoum (in Arabic, spelled أم كلثوم‎ – there are innumerable transliterations which bedevil English-language searches) is the iconic mother of all Arabic singers, arguably the most popular singer of all time, although in the English-speaking world she remains virtually ignored.

Trying to choose among the literally thousands of her recordings is a thankless task. As a rivetingly beautiful example of one we have heard, we give you this haunting, hypnotic 1941 recording whose title track translates roughly as “Be Gentle, Sweetheart.” Arabic vocal music, like jazz, incorporates long improvisational passages, which she would work gradually so as not to blow out her voice after 45 minutes or so onstage. In additional to the title track, this lushly orchestrated album includes the optimistic the wary and two other tracks whose haunting microtonalities stretch out against the haunting, understated sweep of a Middle Eastern orchestra for over fifteen minutes at a clip. If she was alive today, she’d be on a terrorist watch list. Songs by Tom Lehrer “What I like to do is to take some of the songs that we know and presumably love [pause for audience snickering] and get them when they’re down, and kick them.” From the time he debuted with this 1953 independently released, lo-fi solo piano album, Tom Lehrer understood that 90% of humor is based on cruelty.

The prototypical funny guy with the piano was still at Harvard when he pressed a few dozen copies for his friends and classmates who’d seen his shtick in the student lounge. If he came out with this kind of stuff today, no doubt he’d have billions of youtube hits. Hostile, sarcastic and fearless, his satire is spot-on and strikingly timeless, despite the fact that it relies exclusively on innuendo and is therefore G-rated. One by one, he skewers dumb college football songs (); hillbilly music (); cowboy songs (); ghoulish; Stephen Foster-style schmaltz (); and Strauss waltzes (). He also includes an early stoner anthem (), a klezmer parody () that does double duty as a satire of academia, (which predates the Addams Family) and, a snide and equally ghoulish sendup of old people. While it doesn’t have the,, or, it’s the most consistently excellent Lehrer collection out there. If you like this stuff you’ll also probably like his 1959 live album.

He retired from music early in the 1960s and went on to a slightly less acclaimed but ostensibly just as rewarding career as a Harvard math professor. Culture – Two Sevens Clash This is a concept album about the apocalypse. 7/7/77 in Jamaica was a day of dread, especially for Rastas – a lot of people thought the day of judgment was at hand, and its anthem was this album’s. The rest of it is some of the best roots reggae ever recorded, frontman Joseph Hill’s defiant back-to-Africa and sufferah’s ballads pulsing along on the beat of Sly Dunbar’s drums and Robbie Shakespeare’s fat bass, with soaring harmonies, chirpy keyboards and pinging guitars: psychedelic pop, Jamdown style. The downbeat stuff –, and – is every bit as memorable and catchy as the triumphant songs:,,, Cand.

Culture would continue to tour and record (although Hill’s first-rate songs suffered more and more from cheesy production as the years went on) until his death in 2006. His son Kenyatta Hill now leads a revamped version of the band.

– Urban Urbane No disrespect to Peter Murphy or Daniel Ash, but the member of Bauhaus who would go on to do the greatest things was bass player David J. Over a prolific solo career that spans more than 25 years, his diverse catalog spans the worlds of noir cabaret, catchy Britpop, lush art-rock, austere minimalism and Americana: literally everything he’s recorded is worth owning, even his silly, sarcastic cover of Madonna’s What It Feels Like for a Girl. This one, his 1992 major label debut, pretty much sank without a trace outside of his cult following: we picked it because it’s his most diverse effort. Jazz Butcher guitarist Max Eiger delivers some of his most memorable work throughout it, particularly on the bitterly ecstatic Bouquets, Wreaths and Laurels.

The songwriter’s powerfully lyrical side is also represented by the snarling, sardonic Tinseltown (where “your biggest dream is made small”), the surreal Pilgrims, Martyrs and Saints and Hoagy Carmichael Never Went to New Orleans. The goth songs here are classics: the macabre Smashed Princess and, and the S&M-gone-wrong tale. There’s also the surprisingly funky opening track, Some Big City; the hypnotic, Velvets-inflected Man of Influential Taste, Space Cowboy and Serial Killer Blues.

Supertramp – Paris Gentler and more pop-oriented than the rest of the great art-rock bands of the 70s, Supertramp’s ecstatic 1980 double live album captures the band at the peak of their power in front of an adoring crowd (they were huge in France). The album gets extra props for being as good as it is despite the inclusion of the cloying, annoying pop singles Dreamer and Bloody Well Right – the rest reaches a towering, majestic grandeur. The long songs are the best: the scathing antiglobalization indictment; the crescendoing nonconformist, which resonates as much today as it did thirty years ago; the poignantly sweeping Soapbox Opera and an epic version of the historically-charged, complete with samples and sound effects. Pianist Rick Davies is at the top of his game on incisive versions of and, both of which deal with madness; the centerpiece here is multi-instrumentalist Roger Hodgson’s classic, with its eerie, reverberating electric piano.

The good side of their pop hits is represented by a cheery romp through, a subdued, ragtimey and the understated poignancy of Hide in Your Shell. The rest of the band’s albums, with the exception of their erratic but sometimes brilliant debut, don’t rock as hard as this, but are all worth hearing if smart, artsy songwriting is your thing. The band broke up in 1984; Davies has continued to tour a loud but less-inspired version of the group, while Hodgson, now in his sixties, remains as vital and incisive a songwriter as ever. – One More in the Cabin By the time this Brooklyn/Pennsylvania bluegrass band (formerly the Pine Barons) put out this album, their third, in 2002, they’d honed their period-perfect oldtime sound to a high lonesome wail, in the process helping to jumpstart an already nascent New York country music scene. Unlike so many other bluegrass traditionalists, Jim Krewson and Jennie Benford write their own songs, and they hit hard: these folks are throwbacks to a harsh, bucolic era, which they h.

Hypocrisy in action. Face it Tux RP, at least, would be better off without you. Note the lack of any emoticons here by the way!!! Lack of emoticons only affects those that have no sense of humour. RP is not better off without me, neither off you or anybody else.

You're on the edge of being offensive. Personal attacks have absolutely nothing to do with musical taste (or your obvious lack of it). You might be a good person, in some area, but I think with opinions like yours I rather not have you as an acquaintance. I utterly enjoy all comments, probably the negative more than the possitive, even if they are towards music I really like.

I agree that its not necessary to call PG a horse's ass. But PG is a troll. His comments are intended to cause acrimony, not spark intelligent, thoughtful discussion about the merits of the music. I've read enough of his stuff to be able to say that he rarely says anything good.

Its frankly shocking when he does. Maybe that is how you percieve it. I personally find hist posts utterly ammusing, but that might be because I somewhat share his taste. Well, that is one of the merits of RP. There's soany ways to enjoy it.

We are just finishing the same playlist. Does that make this the worst hour on RP or second worst? I've been switching to Stellar Attraction a lot lately. I might move there more. I didn't hear a bad thing at all so far, and after all the good new stuff I heard here, the bad stuff starts to irritate me more than the finds for new jewels is making me happy.

Downside of Stellar is the availability of the station. RP is for more reliable in serving us:) shua wrote. Physicsgenius is a horse's ass What a stupid thing to say. And he didn't even post a comment here. Physicsgenius has shown that his taste qualifies here with the bests tastes available here:) He might express his feelings sometimes in a way you don't like, but cope with it. That's not hate, that is honousty.

He at least dares to say that good music is good, and bad music is bad (though he most often expresses that as really bad, but then again, most of the time he's right) Look in the mirror and say it again. Having a different taste, and expressing that is not making you a horse ass or whatever negative objects you have in mind (to put it in). You can always listen to WCRAP Radio on your FM dial? My filter already switches to other stations automatically when crap like this is played, so I don't hear it.

But RP `usually' has a better avarage quality than this. The extra fun of RP is that you can rate song to your enjoyment factor, and comment on the things you hear.

Not many other stations do that. Combine the good parts of RP (and believe me, that should be a lot for ALL of us, however much our tastes differ) with other fine stations, and you get a thorrough internet-radio enjoyment. I was faster than my filter:) The playlist was late, so I recognized it on the first two tones, which was enough to hit mute. I still wonder where one defines 'zero information' Evene posts that just agree with one of both sides with just 'me too' or 'I don't' have information value.

I feel so pitty for all of you poor people that are brainwashed to think U2 songs are actually good to listen to. I won't hold you from it.

I just thorroughly enjoy the new stuff I hear here, like 'Butch Baldassari Trio' (Super stuff) and 'Outback', both of which I never heard before. I went to an Irish pub in Birmingham, and they had no problem in selecting the Dubliners over U2:) Those were great meals! Just so we understand your methodology, do you rate songs based on how good you think they are on a scale from 1-10 or how much you do or don't want them played on RP?

Do you really think Radiohead's 'Street Spirit' is a 1? Or the Beatles' 'Let It Be?' I never rate based on `quality'. I rate on how much I like or dislike the song, which is probably equal to how much I would like to (not) hear it being played on RP (or any other station). My rates are an honoust reflection of my taste, at least at the moment I rate the song when I hear it. The song that preceded the song being rated might influence my rating when I percieve the current song as a (anti)climax to the song before.

Synth80s wrote. To each their own, I suppose, but you have an awful lot of popular songs from highly regarded artists on your list of 218 1s. Until RP starts playing Right Said Fred, I don't hear a lot of 1s!

As you say, to each their own. Luckily RP still plays more than enough of the `good' stuff, so I think I'll be around some more. I've also just browsed through my most recent song comments, and I think I'm pretty much in balance on my possitive and negative comments too. Even though I must admid that ranting on bad songs is so much easier than giving possitive comments with a meaning to something you like. It proves much harder to say why I do not like something than it is to tell why I do like something. No one takes you seriously sunshine. Your critique is always of an obsessive nature and nearly always about what are over-rated bands.

You just get in a total tizzy fit cos other people love em. Pointless; you'll start swearing in emails and then die a bitter man. I *know* there are enough people around that do take me serious. It's just that you don't like to see that some people don't like what you like and don't fear being flamed for stating that. Sorry for you, but expressing an opinion is absolutely not pointless, but rather causing a comfortable feeling. Getting it out is good for you.

My critique is far from obsessive. It is *honoust*, and fair. It is *my* opinion, and I do not care if you do not agree with that. It just makes my stomach turn to hear this song.

I'm a Led Zep fan (saw them in '75) but this song has no place on Radio Paradise (in my humble opinion), as it was used by the Kings of Redundancy (FM formula radio stations) to torture us in the past. Playing this song on Radio Paradise is like making Senator John McCain stay in a dark grass hut for an hour. To your credit, not many of these pop up on the radio of paradise! I have no opinion on the second part of your comment, as I never heard of mr McCain, except as of being it a brand for pre-fried potato-chips. IMHO (maybe not so humble) this song fits perfectly well on RP.

It shows how versatile Led Zeppeling is. I realy enjoyed it.! Wow, I was just sitting here doing some work when I suddenly realized I was listening to a U2 song and furthermore it was one I'd never heard before (except insofar as hearing any U2 song duplicates the experience). Fortunately I have catlike reflexes and was able to immediately jump over to my RP tab and rate this a 1, the rating for all U2 songs. Well, rating is probably the only thing I did not automate yet.

Should be doable though. Best would be to scan the newly uploaded songs, and be able to give U2 the so well deserved *avarage* of 1, being the first to rate it. You are entitled to your opinion, but so am I and I just gave this song a 10.

I don't toss 10s around lightly either. I toss 10's around more lightly than when I started rating, because of the great variaty in the songs, and the difference with between this and what I rate a 1 is so big that it just warrants the 10. So indeed thanks to Bill & Rebecca to offer us this variaty, so I learn to value and appreciate the songs I like even more. (The downside being that I dislike the songs I already disliked more every time I hear those). With every truly great band you have those that love them and those that hate them usually just because they're great and won't admit to it. A great band usually polarizes and this one is no exception.

Bands in which some love them and the rest are at most apathetic are usually ordinary or good at the very best. To be truly great you usually have to upset someone. That is often an indication of greatness. Not always but sometimes it is. I am still listening to this band after 26 years and have seen them live 4 times at all stages of their careers and they remain one of my favorites and I have seen all the greats during the time when they were great.

SO BUGGER OFF!!!!!!!!! I think agree that the truly great bands (which for me obviously does not include U2), mark itself here on RP with a fierce camp of pro's and con's.

Look at the comments to songs from Supertramp, Genesis, Queen, Pink Floyd, and the Stones (or any of the solo performers of these super bands) to see that you are right. Especially Supertramp amazes me with the negative comments. And no, I will not bugger off. WOW - what a great way to rock start the morning The Arcade Fire - Rebellion (Lies) Morcheeba - Trigger Hippie (remix) Beatles - I Am The Walrus Pixies - Where Is My Mind The Shins - New Slang (When You Notice the Stripes) Pink Floyd - San Tropez The list changed, but not to the better.

They've taken away the only really good song (Pink Floyd), and a good son (Morcheeba) and replaced it with a good song (the Cure). 12:44 am - The Arcade Fire - Rebellion (Lies) 12:36 am - The Cure - Disintegration 12:32 am - Beatles - I Am The Walrus 12:28 am - Pixies - Where Is My Mind 12:24 am - The Shins - New Slang (When You Notice the Stripes) 12:19 am - Vince Guaraldi - Charlie Brown Theme Why don't they play sequences like this when I am away.

I can do without these. I won't give him higher than a 2. Check out the amount of Beatles on his 1 rating list. I mean, honestly. If I dislike the Beatles, mostly because they are the most overplayed band, does that rate me?

Honestly, what does someone's taste, and therefor their rating, cause to rate a person? You don't know me (and maybe you don't want to know me), but that has nothing to do with taste. My taste is well spread here on this radiostation: Low ratings: 1 48 groups, 217 songs 2 78 groups, 185 songs 3 60 groups, 73 songs 4 50 groups, 55 songs 178 groups, 530 songs High ratings: 5 33 groups, 33 songs 6 44 groups, 46 songs 7 138 groups, 165 songs 8 208 groups, 283 songs 9 110 groups, 197 songs 10 26 groups, 70 songs 419 groups, 794 songs Total: 597 groups, 1324 songs Avarage rate: 5.6 Enjoy, Have FUN! Are you aware Tux that you are coloring my opinion of an entire country.

Are you choosing the wrong hash?? Just listened unfiltered again, and I just cannot listen beyond that annoying voice. I'm trying, I really am, and the music isn't that bad, but every time that voice comes in I want to rush for the mute button.

I think that I must admit I would really like Radiohead if they were there as a instrumental group without someone opening his mouth (I deliberately do not use the word singer here, as he does not deserve that). And you're the one who's bashing Bill Gates for no apparent reason. B.Gates sucks for imposing software that looks useful, but is useless for lack of support of international standards. Same as Oracle btw. They both work from the arrogance that they are the biggest and can do whatever they like.

M$ Word doesn't even support proper RTF, which is a very simple and old (as in 'not changed recently') standard. Bono and Bill G both had very much influenced their own field (of destruction).

Neither for the better of the world. If there wouldn't have been a Bill G., Aplle and/or OS/2 might have become the `common' desktop.

If there would not have been a Bono, we would probably also have had no Coldplay, Radiohead, Muse, Remy Zero, My Morning Jacket, and all other junk that wants to lift on Bono's success. Commercial both B's don't have to work another minute for the reest of their lives. Maybe they shouldn't.