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54. Belle & Sebastian – Get Me Away From Here, I’m Dying

This list wouldn’t be complete without at least one twee song. Sarah Records, Beat Happening, Dan Treacy, I love ‘em all because I’m a huge sissy. Each encompasses a different strain of twee, but remain consistent in naivety. In many ways, Belle & Sebastian represent the most commercial manifestation of the genre. Or maybe the most successful manifestation. In any case, like many twee listeners, they were my introduction the concept. It’s all about wimpy clean guitars and tender melodies. I don’t believe in the idea of guilty pleasures, but if I did, I could probably be put on trial for my collection of twee tunes. Naturally, I would have to enter a plea. A twee plea, if you will.

God, that was awful.

53. Swell Maps – Full Moon in My Pocket / Blam!! / Full Moon (Reprise)

Glory to the magnificent bastards that conceived this suite. I’m not quite sure what to write about this set of songs. This is rock and roll at its finest, three chords and a sneer. Though each song technically is a separate track, when combined, they transform into a Voltron-like force of post-punk awesomeness.

52. Marva Whitney – Things Got to Get Better

Marva was one of James Brown’s funky people. Along with Vicki Carr and Lyn Collins, Whitney provided the feminine perspective to Brown’s libidinous funk charge. But lets not confuse feminine with dainty. All three ladies proved to be just as fierce as Brown himself when it came to laying down a track and this track exemplifies that fact. It’s a flat-out soul haymaker with a vocal performance that can compete with any studio performance recorded by Brown himself. There are a few different versions of the song, some of which include backup vocals with Brown and Carr. I couldn’t find my favorite (the solo Whitney version), but the version linked above gets the point across just fine.

51. Silver Jews – Random Rules

In this dude’s opinion, David Berman is one of the finest wordsmiths of the 90s. There’s something uniquely engaging about his plain-spoken lyrics. And the versatility! While some songwriters strive to be serious and taken seriously, Berman seems unconcerned with that hang-up. In fact, his brittle sense of humor and devil-may-care attitude are the most humanizing aspects of his craft. Admittedly, there is an inconsistency to the entire Jews catalog, but the bright spots shine with incredible luminosity. “Random Rules” is the most radiant of all, a melancholy tune of loss and regret served up with a spoonful of twang.

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This post is part of a series counting down my favorite songs of all time. Follow the links at the bottom of this post to read related posts.

60. Bob Marley – Concrete Jungle

Some artists just follow you. I must have heard my first Bob Marley song back when I was five. My aunt was a huge Bob Marley fan. In fact, the first CD I can remember owning was “Legend,” the best-selling multi-platinum Bob Marley greatest hits collection. She bought it for me. At the time, I was sucked in by the anthems most people closely associate with Marley: “I Shot the Sherriff,” “Jammin’” and “Get Up, Stand Up.” Sometime in high school though, I finally got around to checking out his other albums. I even checked out that remix rap album that came out with Black Thought, Bone Thugs-n-Harmony and all those other dudes.  Marley worship – like Hendrix worship or Beatles worship – can get pretty cringe-worthy, but I still like his stuff and I still dig this song.

59. Nico – These Days

I feel bad for leaving Lou Reed off this list. I’ve already mentioned him once, slagging him off while praising John Cale. And now I went and put a Nico song on this list. I mean, I like Lou Reed. I don’t particularly like Nico. What’s up with that? Not sure, but this is a pretty sweet song. Normally, I think Nico’s voice is mind-numbingly dull. But it works here. She perfectly executes the pastoral, 60s British folk vibe. Oh, and yes, this song did appear in a Wes Anderson film. But I won’t hold that against it.

58. Deltron 3030 – Memory Loss

“Deltron 3030” is one of those epochal albums that came out during my youth. It reminds me of summer vacations and the awkwardness of high school. It’s so damn nerdy and that’s why it appealed to Little Paul. I first caught wind of Del tha Funkee Homosapien through the Hieroglyphics albums. My brother loved them and I leeched off that. Hell, “Oakland Blackouts,” “Miles to the Sun” and “You Never Knew” all just missed the cut for this list. They’re definitely Top 200 songs. But Deltron 3030 was my find. I remember sharing the album with just about everyone I met at the time, which was a pretty rad feeling.

57. Sam Cooke – Wonderful World

Sam Cooke is the greatest pop vocalist of all time. Again, no hyperbole. This is the ineffable truth, he’s the high holy totem of all pop, the discreet godliness that all other pop vocalists aspire to. And it’s all so effortless. Forget the fact that he invented soul, this man helped define the very cadence of pop. The transmogrification of the spiritual into the rutting and thrust of crude pop is in every note here. Now it sounds so innocuous, but in an abstract way, Cooke as an artist is one of the sources of every provocation that came later. If you don’t believe me, listen to “Live at the Harlem Square Club” and then we’ll talk. Cooke died young, still potent and in his prime. But frankly, his sound was too good for the world.

56. Love – You Set the Scene

I’ve listened to more hippy bands than I can even recall at this point. Love is among the top of the heap as far as that crowd goes. Arthur Lee was a firecracker and the words that came out of his mouth are baffling and glorious, sometimes utterly stupid, but often glittered with poignancy. There’s no better example than this song, which is obviously his finest tune by my standards. Lee’s lyrics, combined with a rather beefy baroque-rock arrangement (complete with swelling string and brass sections) make this an epic of middle-era psychedelic philosophy. The song comes from the album “Forever Changes.” Critical hindsight reappraised that album as a 60s masterpiece and this is the crowning jewel.

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This post is part of a series counting down my favorite songs of all time. Follow the links at the bottom of this post to read related posts.

65. Guided by Voices – Echos Myron

Robert Pollard has the unique ability to make nonsense lyrics evoke an incredible amount of urgency. It’s a gift, really. For generations, pop songwriters strove to viscerally evoke a mood, an emotion or a scene. Then Dylan came around and nobody knew what that guy was talking about. It was a great moment, the liberation of lyricism from the kingdom of the literal. Sure, things quickly descended into parody and self-indulgence, but I’ve always been a keen supporter of conveying a lot while saying very little. And as far as the 90s go, Guided by Voices was a foremost practitioner of the art. If you polished the production on this song, made the words more literal and tweaked the sound ever so slightly, it might have been a huge hit. As is though, it’s a masterpiece.

64. The Velvet Underground – Who Loves the Sun

Here’s a little spoiler: There are four Velvet Underground songs on this list. That’s more than any other artist. So I guess that makes them my favorite band of all time. Yep, that sounds about right. Even if their mystique is fashionable – perhaps a bit hipster-passé at this point – they laid the groundwork for just about every rock band that has ever mattered to me. Outside of influence, the sound of the Velvet Underground is also the soundtrack for plenty of scenes in my memories. I’ve been listening to them since the nascent interest in music began to spread like a cancer. But let’s not get too sentimental. As for this song, a give it a slight edge over iconic favorites like “Rock & Roll” and “Sweet Jane” because I love the dopey vocal harmonies.

63. Robert Wyatt – Sea Song

In 1973, a fall from a fourth-floor window left Robert Wyatt paralyzed from the waist down. Prior to the fall, Wyatt had made his career as the vocalist and drummer for pioneering psychedelic band Soft Machine. Though he still played percussion, for his sophomore solo album “Rock Bottom” Wyatt made a much more pronounced shift to keyboards. Typical rock and roll drumming was obviously out of the question, so the emphasis on piano-driven compositions forced the album to take on an ethereal quality. This song is the opening track from that album. Wyatt’s distinctive voice is the centerpiece here, only accompanied by piano, synthesizers and a sparse, metronomic rhythm.

62. Jorge Ben – Eu Vou Torcer

Songs like this one make me really want to learn Portuguese. There’s something about the phrasing and tonality of the language that brings a unique rhythmic element to a song. Just listen to “Eu Vou Torcer.” The fricatives sizzle like a mid-summer afternoon in Rio. And even if Ben doesn’t have a technically graceful voice, his performance here is flawless. The hypnosis of acoustic strumming and the florid percussion only add to the effect. Side note: this song is from the album “Tabua de Esmeralda,” which is one of the best albums of all time. Cop it if you can find it.

61. Shuggie Otis – Inspiration Information

I don’t know when I first heard about Shuggie Otis. All I can say is that there was a time when I wanted nothing more than to listen to every odd-ball soul album ever released. I started with obvious albums, stuff by Isaac Hayes, Funkadelic and Curtis Mayfield. Gradually, I moved toward weird soul hybrids and obscuro classics by folks like Jon Lucien, Eugene McDaniels and Terry Callier. And somewhere in between those two stages, I came across the Luaka Bop reissue of Otis’ “Inspiration Information.” The title track is a gorgeous piece of soul that parallels the work of Sly Stone and predicts the sensual glitter space funk of Prince. It’s a showcase of an absolute genius. But like so many geniuses, Shuggie Otis registered as a mere blip in his own time. I’ve heard suggestions that he turned out to be a bit of a prima donna, but the whole story about his disappearance from the music scene is still untold. The guy should have been bigger than Jesus.

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