Rammstein - Stripped (Depeche Mode cover)
I’ve always heard Stripped as an unnerving song, in the way that it is quietly threatening. Rammstein amps up the threat and adds a layer of evilness to the song. Where Depeche Mode went for understatement, Rammstein went in for the kill. I love both versions, but this is the one I play more often.
Depeche Mode - Everything Counts
Construction Time Again was the album that set Depeche Mode apart from their Just Can’t Get Enough image. The dance-happy-pop sound was gone and a darker, deeper music took its place. That’s a good thing. Not that I didn’t love Just Can’t Get Enough, but that was nothing more than a simple dance tune. This was so much more. It still had that synth-pop feel, yet had an underlying industrial sound to it. Like mixing might with magic.
And when you’re 20 and going through an existential crisis, the words “Everything counts in large amounts” are totally profound.
Brand New - Me vs. Maradona vs. Elvis
Because I’m mad at myself for not being at their Coliseum show tonight.
This is such a beautifully sad song. Meaning, it’s beautifully written and composed, but there’s such sadness in the lyrics, the tone and the resignation in Jesse’s voice. Try to listen to this twice - once from the view of the singer, and once from the view of the person he’s singing about.
For some reason I find the part where he says “You’re a drunk and you’re scared, it’s ladies night and all the girls drink for free” to be heart wrenching.
Fear - I Love Livin in the City
Writing about Christmas songs ended up with me listening to Fear’s The Record.
It’s funny how so many people dismiss Fear as a bunch of noise. They probably never really listened to the music. Beneath the sometimes odd (Beef Bologna), sometimes angry (Let’s Have a War) and sometimes funny (New York’s Alright) lyrics there were some driving rhythms, air-guitar worthy licks from Lee Ving and damn good music.
It’s a testament to the music that you really don’t care what the band is singing about. Sure, the lyrics can be a bit offensive and you might not agree with a single word they are saying, but there’s something so powerfully raw about the music, something that makes you want to shout “Let’s have a war!” even though you really don’t want to.
This is music that was made to piss people off. Not in a social commentary kind of way, but in a “I want to make you hate me” kind of way. Fear, living up to its name, certainly made people hate them, but they also separated the wheat from the chafe among my friends who claimed to love punk rock. You either embraced Fear, or you went on to become one of those people who later on would say “Punk rock died in 1979.”
INXS - Never Tear Us Apart
This album (Kick) had the most hits for the band and I think made the best use of Hutchence’s voice, showing off both the power and sexiness of it. While songs like Devil Inside and Need You Tonight/Mediate are great reminders of the awesomeness of the band, it was Never Tear Us Apart that left its mark on me. At this point in my life, I had graduated from singing with a fake microphone (broom handle, brush) in my room to singing with a fake microphone (cigarette, thumb) in my car. I’d put that song on, roll up the windows because nobody but me needed to hear this, turn the volume all the way up and drive, drive, drive until I wore my voice out singing it over and over. I was off kilter and off key and sounded like the bastard love child of Yoko Ono and Kim Carnes, but I owned this song when I was in the privacy of my Mustang.
Eagles of Death Metal - Cherry Cola
Preparing Thanksgiving food calls for some hyper music.
This song - and the whole Death by Sexy album - is a decadent, sleazy, campy, hip-shaking good time. It’s like a Friday night in a small town bar, where the women are wearing tight jeans and loose morals and pitchers of beer are half price. The guys have mullets and wear denim jackets with the sleeves cut off and have regrettable tattoos. There’s a wild time ahead and there will be dancing on the tables, beer bottles will be broken, pool cues will be used as weapons, hearts will be broken, there will be fogged up car windows in the parking lot.
There’s so much going on here, despite the fact that there’s not much going on. Musically, it’s simple, 70’s garage rock. Lyrically, it’s sexual innuendos, humor and total camp. Together, those things make one hell of a party album. This is the “Napoleon Dynamite” of records; it’s not supposed to be ironic, it’s not supposed to have a lot of meaning, you’re just supposed to enjoy it for what it is, without straining your brain to figure out if there’s a statement being made.There’s no statement here except get up and dance. If the music makes you vaguely uncomfortable, you’re putting too much thought into it.
Death by Sexy is not something people are going to put on an “essential albums to own” list, but it’s definitely on the “essential albums to party to” list.
Talking Heads - Cities
This was today’s wake up call (at 4:30 am - thanks, dog). Probably stuck in my head since yesterday when I declared it my favorite Talking Heads song ever. This week.
Hellacopters - Fire Fire Fire
Rock fueled guitar licks. Ear splitting distortion. Heavy metal vocals trudging over punk rock simplicity. Those are the things that made me a Hellacopters fan.
It’s blistering music that’s not for the faint of heart. It’s mean, it’s evil, it’s fun, it’s something you listen to while you are doing shots of some illegal liquor that you set on fire before throwing down your throat. It’s dirty, distorted, fast as hell and will make you wish you were 17 years old again just so you could get in a car with this blasting and go knock over some garbage cans and leave tire tracks and empty bottles on your teacher’s lawn.
Just trust me on this. If you never heard this song or this band, listen to this.
Queens of the Stone Age - Better Living Through Chemistry
This song is not just a song. It is an entity unto itself. I believe it can cure sickness and raise the dead.
There are so many singular parts to this song that hit you somewhere in your soul or your heart or brain that to list them all would just be saying hey, listen to the entire song, people. From start to finish. Especially that part where it breaks down and you almost hold your breath waiting for it to start up again and when it does, it’s like you’re being carried away on a wave of colors and sound. This song is tactile; you can feel it around you, it envelops you and closes you in, not in a claustrophobic way, but in a way that makes you shut out everything else that’s around you until there’s just you and the music and this incredible jam that feels like riding through Space Mountain on acid. It’s fuzzy, it’s clear, it’s loud, it’s soft, it rises and falls, it’s a hook that grabs you around the neck and pulls you closer and closer and closer until you are one with the song. It becomes you. You have merged with this tune and it will live inside you forever and you are the better for it.
There’s no one here
And people everywhere
You’re all alone
