Earlier, I found a very nice website where guest DJ's picked their ten favourite songs and explained why. I liked this, somewhat inevitably from someone who spent much of her youth online, filling in pointless questionnaires to pass the time. And so, here I am, pretending people are interested in my vague thoughts, and I am going to tell you my ten songs. Which I shall pick at random as I go along, because who can possibly actually just have ten favourite songs? These are in no particular order. Obviously.
Give a Little Bit – Supertramp (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x1Uicc-6I-M)
My husband and I had this song played during our wedding ceremony, somewhat unorthodoxly I suppose, and I just love it. I love it for it's honesty and it's simplicity and it's real grasp of relationships. It doesn't promise everything, but it means everything. It's beautiful.
The Battle of Evermore – Led Zeppelin (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4axrTFBV3cU&feature=related)
I always wanted to like Led Zep, but remained slightly unsure until the moment I discovered this song, roughly age sixteen and just as I was lurching into being a massive Lord of the Rings geek, and had it on repeat on my portable CD player for longer than I care to remember. I remain incapable of turning it off if it starts, even if I am late for something, I must wait until it's finished. So I apologise if this song has ever meant that you've been standing waiting for me somewhere, but I won't admit this is why. Besides, I have it on my iPod now, so I should be punctual in future.
Excitable Boy (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7eUsSXXc8wU) and Desperados Under the Eaves (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0J3ossUzhU) – Warren Zevon
Trying to pick one Warren Zevon song is a bit like trying to decide which air particle you favour breathing. It's an impossible task, so I am afraid I've had to pick two. Excitable Boy is from the album of the same name, being the first of his records I owned. It's mad, stupid, and demonstrates all the wit and ridiculousness I love about his lyrics. Desperados Under the Eaves is one of the most beautiful songs ever written, in my humble opinion, and is sorely unknown by most people.
Nobody can write lyrics like Warren Zevon could, they can be completely outrageously stupid, as in Excitable Boy (and also Werewolves of London, the only song of his you're likely to have heard of), or he can write uncompromisingly beautiful, haunting lyrics you'd like to have etched painfully into your heart, like Desperado's.
Big Love (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mZZp76M4NGc) – Lindsey Buckingham
When I was about twelve, my parents had friends from London come to stay with us. Along with themselves, they brought a video of Fleetwood Mac, The Dance. It was the first time I particularly remember properly appreciating a band not associated with the charts or how pretty one of the members was. I sat, completely enraptured, and thought about how stunning it was. And then Lindsey Buckingham stood on his own, with one guitar, and played as though he had five hands and fifty strings and I knew I would always love this song.
It has since followed me about from year to year, from house to house, from relationship to relationship and if I could write something with even half the skill in it as this song, I would be a contented woman.
Blue – John MacLeod
I can't give you a link to this song yet, I don't think, but still there it is. My brother's songs have sound tracked much of my misspent youth, but in particular the year I moved from our family home and into a mid terraced house with my then best friend. Most of that particular year was spent out, drinking with friends, usually at the pub John also called his regular.
The Full Moon used to be a bikers' pub until a while before we started frequenting it, when it became the absolute place to be if you wanted a good atmosphere, excellent beer, and wonderful live music. Sunday night was Open Mike Night and we were always there (well, we were always there pretty much every night) as was John, playing killer set after set. I picked this song because my favourite memory of these nights was sitting at a big table next to the stage, playing Risk and begging John to play this song.
Which he did, beautifully. I didn't win the Risk though.
We're Going to be Friends (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PKfD8d3XJok) & A Martyr for My Love for You (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nDfsYnjrOtw) – White Stripes
Remember how I said I couldn't pick a song for Warren Zevon? I can't pick a song for White Stripes either, so I had to pick two again. I'm such a cheat.
We're Going to Be Friends is the reason that I got into them in the first place; we had a random video that came with a music magazine and a video of this song was on it. I went out and bought the album and for quite some time, my pop addled brain could only really listen to this and Hotel Yorba, but during a night time encounter with my on-again off-again insomnia I listened to We're Going to be Friends roughly a hundred times, and somehow I still love it. So it must be good.
A Martyr for my Love for You I am picking just because I think it's a wonderful example of Jack White's ability to come up with a brilliant riff and incorporate it with great lyrics. It's catchy
but poignant and beautiful and slightly rock-y all at the same time and I can listen to it forever.
The River (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nAB4vOkL6cE) – Bruce Springsteen
Okay, yet another person who I can't possibly pick just one track for, but I thought I couldn't cheat again, so I've just had to come up with one which I find myself coming back to more often.
This is a song I've known reduce grown men to tears, it's so heartfelt and, honestly, storytelling at its finest. This is not a personal account of Bruce's life, though inspired I am lead to believe by his brother, but written and performed so stunningly that it is almost painful to listen to.
Gin Soaked Boy (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DXP1oLtPyDA) – The Divine Comedy
This is the song which always, without fail, makes me wish I had written it. There's not many songs which make me think that and I can't even put my finger on why, but never the less there we are. I wish I had put pen to paper and discovered this on the page afterwards. It opens simply with a voice and one instrument and build up and up until you feel like you're riding on a wave of joyously fabulous lyrics. And it ends on the line “I'm Jeff Goldblum in the fly.” If that doesn't sell a song to you, I don't know what will.
9) Lilac Breeze (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tj7Zf9dG7Ag) – Eels
Eels were probably one of the first 'proper' bands I liked, mainly because I was trying to be moody and angsty and cool all at the same time, so bought a lot of albums I didn't really want. Thankfully in doing so I stumbled upon Eels, who I actually ended up adoring, much as you can adore anything whilst attempting to be moody and angst riddled. This is a slightly more recent track than others I might want to pick, and one I've been listening to a lot lately. Loud and shouty and perfect for a sunny day in a car with the window down.
Tombstone (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r9CdGIoIjLc) – Crowded House
My brother got a tape of Crowded House's Best Of just around the time they split up and we all said “shit. They've split up, now we can't see them.” And thus began my relationship with Crowded House, still going strong a good sixteen years later. I love this song because of it's lyrics and heart. The short story which got me into university was prefaced with the line “Look at all the plans I made/Falling down like scraps of paper”, taken from this very song and so I now also see it as a lucky charm.
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