My friend Chance recently cranked out his 300 favorite songs on his Facebook page, and that inspired me to create my own list. I’ll post 10 songs a day over the next 30 days.
Feel free to share your reminiscences of these songs and comment on whether you love ’em, hate ’em or are indifferent. The really great ones will be higher up on the list, of course. But I can say that at one point or another, I liked all 300 of these songs.
300. Green Day — “Time of Your Life (Good Riddance)” — It was the soundtrack to all the poignant moments of the late ’90s, most notably the “Seinfeld” finale.
299. Rick Springfield — “Jesse’s Girl” — There are a lot of horrible, overplayed songs on the cover-band circuit, but this one always gets my feet tapping. It still holds up a billion plays later.
298. AC/DC — “Hard as a Rock” — My favorite AC/DC song is a somewhat obscure choice, but to me, nothing else competes with this riff.
297. Dido — “Here with Me” — Being the “Roswell” theme song bumps this one up a notch, but it’s not a bad tune to begin with.
296. Crash Test Dummies — “Mmm Mmm Mmm Mmm” — The deep voice and the simple-as-it-gets chorus give this entry oddity value, but it’s also a powerful little number.
295. Remy Zero — “Perfect Memory” — One of those classic farewell songs, with the obvious but effective “I’ll remember you” lyric.
294. Motley Crue — “Girls Girls Girls” — If you’re looking for an obnoxiously great hair band rocker, look no further than this ditty about “long legs and burgundy lips.”
293. Presidents of the United States of America — “Peaches” — The best song ever written about fruit paved the way for other semi-jokey pop bands at the turn of the century.
292. Everlast and Santana — “Put Your Lights On” — A steamy, sultry summer song that shows off Santana’s talent while still being an Everlast song.
291. Treble Charger — “Ever She Flows” — Katie Holmes danced on a truck bed to this tune in “Disturbing Behavior” and thus I discovered one of the many talented Canadian pop bands to emerge in the ’90s.
Comments
PEACHES! I had totally forgotten about that song!# Posted By chance | 7/3/10 1:00 AM
Ahhh…some classics on here. Girls, Girls Girls is an epic! Who doesn’t hear the motorcycles revving and doesn’t get fired up to do whatever they’re doing??
Some of Tommy’s best drumming to boot.# Posted By Neal | 7/3/10 10:51 AM
Glad you guys liked the choices. Hopefully I’ll have more “Hey, I remember that song!” responses as I go through the list. Yeah, “Girls Girls Girls” is a song where you know you are supposed to dismiss it as a stupid hair band song, and yet it is impossible to deny that it is awesome once that opening lick kicks in.# Posted By John Hansen | 7/3/10 1:48 PM
Girls Girls Girls is amazing. I’m not afraid of my butt-rock past. Jesse’s girl is classic but the only thing I can think of when I hear it is that classic scene in Boogie Nights. For those two songs I’ll let you slide for picking a terrible AC/DC song# Posted By Matt | 7/11/10 10:34 AM
There’s no shame in liking good butt-rock. The problem is with bad butt-rock, and unfortunately it’s the bad butt-rock that gets most of the attention. C’mon, that AC/DC tune has an epic riff to it. I bet it sounds great in an arena. All their other good songs are too overplayed for me to enjoy them anymore.# Posted By John Hansen | 7/11/10 2:09 PM
I dig the Crue. I’ve seen them in concert numerous times and have met them. Rock music and the world would be a lesser place without them.The problem I have with that AC/DC tune is its the same song as every other song they’ve written since Brian Johnson joined the band. They’ve made a career out of writing the same song 100 times and changing the lyrics slightly. The Bon Scott era is much better. Give me Let There Be Rock or Whole Lotta Rosie anyday. Oh, and I especially hate the way the chorus of all their songs is just the song title repeated over and over# Posted By Matt | 7/11/10 4:08 PM
Not exactly. The chorus is “Hard as a rock/ Well it’s harder than a rock.” So there.# Posted By John Hansen | 7/12/10 2:10 AM