My 500 All-Time Favorite Songs: #370-361

Let's see, it's Monday once again, so I think I'll lay out the next ten songs on my all-time top 500 list, along with the customary commentary.  Man, do I ever like these songs...

370 NIAGARA FALLS...Sufjan Stevens
This is one of the songs on my list that was neither a standard album track nor a singles release (or B-side).  Niagara Falls can be found on Stevens' 2003 Michigan album, but only on the vinyl edition's second disc.  I discovered Sufjan Stevens in 2009 and quickly came to like much of his earlier music, including this brief and sweet, nostalgic song of childhood when he could see Niagara Falls from way off in the distance.  In today's Internet-world, Niagara Falls is pretty easy to find: the singer's mellow voice and his trademark banjo highlight it...

369 POSITIVELY FOURTH STREET...Bob Dylan
Possibly the greatest putdown song of all time, the closing line was beyond hilarious: "Yes, I wish that for just one time you could stand inside my shoes, you'd know what a drag it is to see you".  I never did care all that much for Dylan's 1965 blockbuster hit Like a Rolling Stone, but when this song came out I had to stop and take notice.  He's got some more entries on my favorites list in weeks to come...

368 THE BITCH IS BACK...Elton John
The summer and fall of 1974 in my life was a time that I look back on as being positive and optimistic...this song captures a lot of that feeling with the singer asserting his dogged determination to succeed and those standing in the way could just step back or get bowled over.  It's one of those "I'm gonna succeed and if you don't like it, too bad" anthems along the lines of Tom Petty's I Won't Back Down.  I wish Elton had recorded more of these strong rockers...

367 GET BACK...the Beatles
The Beatles' monster hit single Get Back...sung by Paul McCartney with guest Billy Preston working wonders on the keyboard...came out in 1969, the year before their final album Let It Be was released. Get Back was a track on that album but they cut off the great ending and ruined it...listen to it from another source than Let It Be.  Back during '69 I remember strongly disliking both of the band's Abbey Road  hits Something and Come Together...it wouldn't be for another couple of years before I listened to the whole album and discovered some masterpiece tracks on it.  Get Back was more of an old-style Beatles song, very fun to listen to...

366 THE PORPOISE SONG...the Monkees
In 1968 when the Monkees recorded Head, their sixth studio album in only two years, during which time they acted in 107 Monkees TV series episodes and went on numerous publicity and concert tours and interviews, the critics panned them claiming that they were a manufactured band.  But how many award-winning, lauded musical acts since then don't write their own music or play their own instruments...the hypocrisy here is outrageous, in my opinion.  Head's The Porpoise Song is a collaborative singing effort of Davy Jones and Mickey Dolenz, with a dreamy-sounding accompaniment backing them...the album was recorded after the TV series was canceled and was the soundtrack for the same-named movie starring the band. The Porpoise Song was featured in the movie Vanilla Sky...

365 WILL IT GO ROUND IN CIRCLES...Billy Preston
I enjoyed the summer of 1973, and this song was a big hit then...hence the positive associations with going to the beach.  It's also the second song on today's list Preston was involved in...look back a couple of songs.  He reminded me a bit of Stevie Wonder on this song, a great compliment to be sure.  And Will It Go Round in Circles contains one of my all-time favorite lines: "I've got a story ain't got no moral, let the bad guy win every once in a while".  This comes in handy from time to time, like when I'm watching the Alabama Crimson Tide or New England Patriots play or receiving the disappointing news on election night...

364 WONDERIN'...Neil Young
In the early 1980s, much to his recording company's chagrin and who later sued him for it, Neil Young made a string of narrowly-themed and just-as-narrowly-appreciated albums...one of these, from which Wonderin' came, was a tribute to old-time fifties rock n' roll.  But Wonderin' is Neil Young through and through, and the official music video to it is one of the funniest I've seen...and which to me is the forerunner to Peter Gabriel's artistically-styled Sledgehammer video that came out three years later...

363 WELCOME TO THE BLACK PARADE...My Chemical Romance
This song...as well as its entire 2006 concept album The Black Parade...by this indie/alternative rock band, deals with the unsettling and often taboo subject of death, especially in the accompanying official video.  It's hard to imagine, with the vivid and disturbing imagery of that video, that this piece would be a source of comfort and impart a sweet spirit as a moving tribute to someone recently deceased, but that's the impression I got from it.  One of the reasons I think death is often taboo in our society for discussion and artistic expression is the absolutist way in which religions treat the subject...all of them have their own ideas on exactly what happens and if someone comes out with a creative and imaginative treatment of it, there's not only a possibility but rather a certainly that it will garner criticism.  I thought the song stood well on its own without the video, but that video...

362 BABY LET ME TAKE YOU HOME...the Animals
Back in 1964 when as a seven-year-old brat I thought of the Animals...not the Beatles...as my favorite rock band, this great song was released in the USA following their big hit House of the Rising Sun.  I always looked forward to watching the Ed Sullivan Show when they were scheduled and on one of those evenings came to despise President Lyndon Johnson when the show...and their appearance...was preempted because of his televised nationwide address about some far-off place called Vietnam.  I still think of Eric Burdon as the greatest singer in the genre's history...it's too bad the band couldn't write their own songs the way the Beatles or Rolling Stones did...

361 SAW LIGHTNING...Beck
Saw Lightning is easily my favorite song of this year, by the accomplished LA-based alternative rock artist Beck.  The funny thing about it is that after it came out my wife Melissa and I were walking down Daytona Beach early one evening when the whole western sky erupted into lightning...kinda scary, although some dumbbell beachgoers just stood there out in the ocean staring at it all and others thought it would be just peachy recording it all on their smartphones: the two of us hauled ass back to the hotel.  Later I heard of someone out on Ormond Beach getting struck by lightning and killed...I wonder if it happened when we were out walking.  This song, with a strong blues and religious flavor, is heavy on percussion and awesome riffs...

That's it for this week...next week I'll cover songs #360-351...