My 500 All-Time Favorite Songs: #410-401

Here we go with my reactions to ten more songs on my 500 all-time favorites list.  And with it go the first hundred songs...after this only 400 to go...

410 SIMPLE LIFE...Elton John
I liked of lot of Elton John's songs from the early-to-mid 1970s...and then suddenly just when it seemed he was at his peak stardom, I didn't like his output.  Since then he came out with some four songs that I really like, among them this long 1992 single that got a lot of airplay on adult contemporary radio.  Although Elton is more of a piano man, it is the harmonica on Simple Life that makes it special...

409 LORDS OF THE BOARDS...Guano Apes
A German rock band singing about snowboarding?  An unlikely combination to make the airwaves, yet Rock 104 in Gainesville played this song in their regular rotation during 2000.  Female lead vocal, heavy guitar riffs, and over-the-top screaming made this one ultimately my favorite song of the year...and no, I never snowboarded and probably never will...

408 TICKET TO RIDE...the Beatles
Before he bought the band's Help! album containing Ticket to Ride, my father, in 1965 decidedly a Beatles fan, recorded this song off the radio on his big tape deck and then played it and replayed it over and over.  I thought...and still do...that it was one of their very best songs, but I heard it so much back then that I tired of it, not recovering until relatively recently...

407 SOMETHING IN THE AIR...Thunderclap Newman
This is a late sixties song marked by a high-pitched male lead singer, lush accompanying strings, and a unique ragtime piano instrumental break in its middle..."we've got to get together sooner or later, because the revolution's here and you know it's right."  A piece that sounds like it was promoting itself as the anthem of those counterculture times. The Who's Pete Townshend was the creative force in both forming the band and intricately producing the record...

406 ORINOCO FLOW...Enya
Orinoco Flow, referring to a long South American river, gives that place a sense of mystery and anticipation, and Enya's singing is wonderful. Plus, I think the video she made for it will greatly enhance your enjoyment of this 1988 hit as it did for me. Very dreamy, just let it all go and fall back into this musical and lyrical adventure...

405 WICHITA LINEMAN...Glen Campbell
I used to hear this a lot on the radio during my DXing hobby phase in the late 1960s: this consisted of trying to pick up as many different AM radio stations from across the country as I could...I ended up with a little more than 500 from 31 different states plus several other countries using an ordinary cheap radio we picked up from Walgreens.  The song is what I call "thoughtful country", an introspective look from a man missing his love and whose job at times makes him feel a bit alienated and cut off...

404 POLICY OF TRUTH...Depeche Mode
Michael Corleone would definitely dig the lyrics of this song off Depeche Mode's 1989 Violator album, which in my opinion was easily their finest work.  Great dance tune and wicked synthesizer licks, along with lines like "Things could be so different now, it used to be so civilized, you will always wonder how it would have been if you'd only lied".   There's a cynical kind of wisdom here that I find lacking elsewhere, which makes Policy of Truth stand out to me...

403 ONE WAY OR ANOTHER...Blondie
Back in the early 1980s, New York-based Blondie was the premier New Wave band with a female lead singer...followed closely by Missing Persons from Los Angeles.  Deborah Harry sang so expressively and put a lot of humor into her craft...this song is a case in point.  Such personality and presence...too bad they didn't last longer than they did after one of their founding members fell chronically ill and Harry left the business to care for him...

402 RASPBERRY BERET...Prince
Prince was one of those confounding musical artists who was so talented and creative, but tended to choose musical styles that steered me away from him instead of following him.  In 1985, though, he seemed to be turning in a different, more listenable direction...but didn't go there in the end.  Still, I always have his singles hit Raspberry Beret, in a style more reminiscent of the Beatles' Sgt. Pepper era than of his own catalogue of recordings...

401 MAKE ME BAD...Korn
This is a peculiar example of a wild and crazy hard/metal rock song packaged in such a slick way that at moments it seems like a lounge act.  I heard it for a couple of years around the turn of the century on the radio until they finally told me who did it...of course, it had to be Korn, with Jonathan Davis screeching his demented heart out...one of the catchiest songs of that time while hard-hitting and not a little bit bizarre...

Next week: #400-391...