Major upheaval on the iPod this week. Lots of new (old) stuff. It's been months with the old playlist and this is long overdue...1. "Rough Boys" - Pete Townshend
2. "Slow An' Easy" - Whitesnake
3. "Torture" - Jon Spencer Blues Explosion
4. "Kingdom Come" - Coldplay
5. "Fools In Love" - Joe Jackson
6. "Little Bird" - White Stripes
7. "Possum Kingdom" - The Toadies
8. "Say It Ain't So" - Weezer
9. "Bang a Gong (Get It On)" - The Power Station
10. "Walkin On A Thin Line" - Huey Lewis and the News
Go to the comments for the post-game analysis...
9 comments:
Major upheaval on the iPod this week. Lots of new (old) stuff.
1. "Rough Boys" - Pete Townshend If I'm a big Who guy (I am), then I'm an even bigger solo Townshend guy. I absolutely love his first three albums. When I first bought a CD player and quickly started spending all my money on CDs and eventually HiFi gear, Mr. Townshend was a staple. A nice reminder. 9
2. "Slow An' Easy" - Whitesnake From the seminal (pun intended) "Slide It In." The second song off one of the greatest album sides ever. This line-up bears almost no resemblence to the hair band poseurs that Coverdale hired later in the 80s. Jon Lord played keys, and Cozy Powell just absolutely laid down the law behind the kit. Among the rare 80s hard rock tracks that holds up and still sounds just as hard twenty-plus years later.
Bonus for the most obvious sexually charged album cover, song titles and lyrics ever.
(If anyone knows how I can get my hands on the reputedly stronger UK/Canada mix of this album, let me know.) 10
3. "Torture" - Jon Spencer Blues Explosion A good song from the great "Acme." And as much as I love this album, I just never warmed up to the others... 7
4. "Kingdom Come" (studio album) - Coldplay I was neither enamored with nor opposed to Coldplay, but after catching the Freeview of their Austin City Limits show, I'm a fan. I'm not sure what it is, but sometimes it takes me watching a band to really appreciate them. This song, which in the concert turned into a Johnny Cash medley, cinched it for me. 8
5. "Fools In Love" - Joe Jackson A good cup a Joe. From the Look Sharp / I'm the Man incarnation. The best version of Joe Jackson. 7
6. "Little Bird" - White Stripes After a long car trip where every other song that shuffled up was the Stripes I really pared 'em back on the iPod before our trip last week. This made the cut, and for good reason. Meg White is the anti-Cozy—possibly the most tentative drummer ever. 8
7. "Possum Kingdom" - The Toadies Deserves a spot on any "90s Collection." It's actually dangerous to listen to this in the car—kind of an updated "Radar Love" in its direct connection to my accelerator. 9
8. "Say It Ain't So" - Weezer Ouch. this is a good tune, don't get me wrong, and it's not often that Weezer is a low point, but not what I wanted to hear... 6
9. "Bang a Gong (Get It On)" - The Power Station Sorry, but I love this song. I'm a sucker for Robert Palmer, and Tony Thompson hits it as hard as anyone on this track. Even those Duran Duran guys rocked. Depressingly, both Palmer and Thompson are now dead... 9
10. "Walkin On A Thin Line" - Huey Lewis and the News Ugh. When I ripped this CD, I thought "Hey, that was a pretty good song, wasn't it?" Not so much. 4
7.7 Average (!) The '80s giveth and taketh away this week.
Re: Whitesnake "Slide It In"
Have to agree.
Even the big hit album which followed was written by this lineup. Coverdale just decided they didn't have "the look" and dumped them for guys who he thought did. And what happened on the album after that with the new guys? It tanked of course.
Yeah, but if you listen to "Here I Go Again" now, it's a damn joke. They cut two versions of that song—one softer and one harder. Even the "hard" one now sounds like it was recorded by Kip Winger's little sister.
I'll comment on the other songs after I recover from seeing Bang A Gong . . . by POWER STATION on this list.
As it is, I'm typing from the floor.
Not like I'm a Marc Bolan afficianado or anything (and speaking of dead guys, does this song kill people?), but c'mon Furious.
Rough Boys is a great song, but as a teenager I was a bit freaked by my man Townshend telling the rough boys he wanted to buy them leather.
Rough Boys is a great song, but as a teenager I was a bit freaked by my man Townshend telling the rough boys he wanted to buy them leather.
That didn't get any easier after Townshend was arrested for some odd internet child porn charges a few years ago...
As for the Power Station, damn I have been taking some abuse for that over at LLPON too. As I said in response over there:
Close your eyes and pretend you don't know guys from Duran Duran are the axemen, and that's a pretty damn fine piece of funk-rock. Also, the fact that I have no affection for Marc Bolan or TRex helps.
What can I say? I like it. Perhaps the "9" was a bit much, but I heard it in the car, and was really feeling it.
Oh I'm not saying that I liked Whitesnake's self-titled megahit album. I'm just saying that the same guys who wrote "Slide It In" wrote it and Coverdale thanked them by firing them.
I confess to liking the first single, "Still of the Night", when it came out, but once I heard the rest of the album, I cringed. And then it got massively overplayed and... well... the rest is Pop Music History.
I'm just busting chops.
If I listed my own top 10 every week, I'd have no readers, just abusers.
Yeah, that stuff got so overplayed, I blocked it out. "Still of the Night" was a pretty good song.
No harm, no foul, Mike.
Oh, and since I had flipped back to write down the songs, "Rough Boys" was cued up to play again.
Forget about buying leather, how 'bout these lyrics...
"Rough toys
Under the sheets
[...]
Tough boys
Come over here
I wanna bite and kiss you..."
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