75 Days, 2 Lists, 1 Giant Waste of Time

[Idioteque Stalker]

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75 Days, 2 Lists, 1 Giant Waste of Time



Idioteque Stalker: In Spring 2007, after finishing my last favorite songs list, I promised myself I would update it four years later.

quido8_5: Everything in It’s Right Place was #1. Spoiler: It was a good list.

Idioteque Stalker: It was alright.

quido8_5: So good, in fact, that when IS told me about his new list I decided to copy him. This time around, we decided to fully exploit social networking. All our posts will be published on Twitter, Facebook and our website thisisalist.com. This allows you greater flexibility when digesting it and us greater torpidity when creating it. As such, we’ve put restrictions on the commentary.

Idioteque Stalker: Out of respect for our new found allegiance to all things social media, our comments will be tweet-sized, increasing or decreasing by one word with every subsequent song.

quido8_5: The number of words for each of my entries will coincide with the song’s position. For instance, when Shania Twain’s “Man, I Feel Like a Woman” lands at 1, I will write 1 word about it. A difficult, but rewarding experience. Today’s entry will have 75 words.

Idioteque Stalker: And mine will be the opposite: My #1 will have 75 words while today’s entry will have only 1.

quido8_5: ...i.e. the easy way.

Idioteque Stalker: Only if you’re insecure about your #1.

quido8_5: or really confident.

Idioteque Stalker: Anyway, just so you know what you're getting yourself into, I’ve recently found myself drawn to the psychedelic, moody and/or just-plain-odd end of the pop spectrum.

quido8_5: And I seem to dig polar ends of said spectrum, with penchants for sparse works or grandiose themes. Either way, my central tendency is toward honesty, whether it’s lyrical or instrumental.

Idioteque Stalker: Just so you know, I've disqualified any song that made my list last time around. Marcel Duchamp told me to do it:

"I force myself to contradict myself in order to avoid conforming to my own taste." - MD

We hope you enjoy.

[Idioteque Stalker]

75. "No Awareness" - Dr. Octagon

[youtube]W__sSidbMHg[/youtube]

?

[quido8_5]

#75
$20 by M.I.A.


Oh my God, that trick stole that hook? And so I wrote the album off for around two years. Unsurprisingly it was this beguiling, undeniable anthem that brought me back. Smart, eclectic and totally badass, $20 is probably the best distillation of what made MIA such a force. It is also one of the biggest songs I have ever heard, filling stadiums or headphones with equal depth. That hook on that artist… :sigh: sounds amazing.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d59AI12xgwo

[Skitch]

What the hell is going on here? This thread is suspect.

[Derek]

What the hell is going on here? This thread is suspect.

2 posters listing their 75 favorite songs in one thread. What's not to get?

[Skitch]

2 posters listing their 75 favorite songs in one thread. What's not to get?

Nevermind me, then. ritch:

[Idioteque Stalker]

FYI, it's been a long while for quido (pretty sure he was a member before the days of rep), but I post occasionally and am sure there are some people around who might remember my list from four years ago.

And the thread title is somewhat of a joke. We're not trolls. :P

[Ezee E]

Well I dig the first song enough that I picked it up. Looking forward to it now.

[Idioteque Stalker]

74. "Monk Time" - The Monks

[youtube]4MmSl0xu0ec[/youtube]

Furious, prescient.

[Derek]

74. "Monk Time" - The Monks

Furious, prescient.

Yup, love Monks. They're nuts.

[Glass Co.]

Like/love every song so far. Great start. "No Awareness" has been stuck in my head more than only a handful of songs.

[Idioteque Stalker]

Derek's probably seen this, but here is a short video of the Monks on German tv in '65.

I'm curious as to what part of No Awareness could get stuck in your head, Glass Co. Nothing in that song makes sense to me.

[quido8_5]

With nearly 10 minutes of distorted guitars and slightly disaffected vocals, Godsend shouldn’t be the unrepentant appeal to tenderness that it is. Yet from the first few lines, the sense of immediacy is both charming and disarming. Trading traditional pop patterns for interweaving lines and layered sounds, it's a taciturn and imprecise thing anchored by its resolute simplicity. Embellishing absolutely nothing, the statements are so guileless they penetrate with familiarity and warmth. Plain and beautiful.

[youtube]D0wDo3pQ7MQ[/youtube]

[Idioteque Stalker]

73. "Love Song for the Dead Che" - The United States of America

[youtube]ttJe_nw6Mcs[/youtube]

Psychedelic love.

/Morricone

[quido8_5]

I was 11 when I heard my Dad singing this to himself. His soothing baritone was impressive, but could not match the aching swagger of Jerry Lee Lewis. Giving the song a victorious desperation, the “Balls 'Afire” guy plays the fool with unparalleled strut. Even Hank Williams’ original doesn’t reach such plaintive heights, probably because he wasn’t such a screw up. Getting hen-pecked never sounded so cool or, as a result, painfully oblivious.

[youtube]44qfLooXq2I[/youtube]

[Thirdmango]

As of an hour ago I had never heard of The Monks, now I've heard about 8 of their songs and I love them. Thank you muchly.

[quido8_5]

What is Billie Jean really about? It sounds like a dance song, reads like a public service announcement and feels like the morning after. Thanks to the timeless hook(s!) and impeccable production, we never have to ask these questions. Instead, we can enjoy the peerless confidence of pop’s preeminent prince at his precisionist best. Whether grooving, growing up or, ironically, making babies, Billie Jean might really mean whatever we want it to.

[youtube]75sx7U6dAB4[/youtube]

[Idioteque Stalker]

72. "Time Vampires" - Flying Lotus

[youtube]AO2NpUDVgII[/youtube]

Light dubs to this.

[quido8_5]

“The Beauty and the Beat” has some of the most appropriately titled songs of the last decade- Promised Land is no exception. Victorious, beautiful and optimistic; it's the triumphant conclusion to Edan's idealistic conception of musical positivity. A dense landscape brought to life by a vivid mix of innovative sampling and evocative imagery; it is rap as poetry and poetry as sublime. It’s not milk and honey, but beauty and colors.

[youtube]8CIi8ZRrAn0[/youtube]

[Idioteque Stalker]

71. "Reflections After Jane" - The Clientele

[youtube]RweztawAnls[/youtube]

Jangly ballad exploits major sevenths.

[quido8_5]

There is angsty music and then there is Kiss Off. Frustrated, brittle, confrontational, it embodies the satisfaction buried just below the surface of teenage dissatisfaction. Years before Emo wallowed in self-righteousness, Violent Femmes raged through emotions with the giddy disregard of youth. The result was more catharsis than melancholy. Much like the masochistic discontentedness of adolescence, Kiss Off is insular, self-absorbed and a whole lot of fun. Sing it loud.

[youtube]gproa6vzgws[/youtube]

[Boner M]

gr8 lists.

[Idioteque Stalker]

70. "Everybody's Got To Learn Sometime" - The Field

[youtube]jmWA7if9ESs[/youtube]

Slow grindin' at the pearly gates.

[Idioteque Stalker]

69. "Ping Pong Affair" - The Slits

[youtube]ljRhU0K-ooI&feature=fvwrel[/youtube]

Cool, erratic song structure. Dub groove kills.

[quido8_5]

33, 34, 35, 34, 68, 27, orange, 82, sixtyten, 5, 7, fifty, 6. Forget defying logic, Boards of Canada create their own logic. It operates off half-remembered childhoods and the collective unconscious. It’s propelled by persistent beats and beautiful splashes of melody. It drenches familiar things in a thick fog of atmosphere, rendering them strange and alluring. Somehow inspiring, sinister and nostalgic, just listen and it’ll all make sense.

[youtube]rg-iKP0zI9Q[/youtube]