20:

Weezer – My Name Is Jonas. (381 Plays, New Entry.)

Oh Weezer, you’re the best. I could quite happily spend an entire day just laying down and listening to Weezer. I might have to do a special post about them sometime and put up my fave tracks. They’re the kings of geek cool. I genuinely think that if you don’t like Weezer then there’s something seriously wrong with you and you should seek some sort of therapy or medical help. As I’ve said before, it’s the simplicity of the brilliance that I like. They’re very understated. There’s no reason to be flashy or to show off, so they don’t. They just get on with it! Incredible band.

19:

Eric Carmen – Hungry Eyes. (390 Plays, New Entry.)

We’re vastly in danger of a video deconstruction here. It’s no secret that I love this song. I’ve talked about it before. One thing we haven’t done though, is discuss the MENTAL music video it has. Now… *sigh*, here we go. So, one thing that really helps a song is being attached to a big film. Obviously, as we all know, this is from Dirty Dancing, a huge film that happened to turn 30 years old this year. Let’s take a look at the video then…

Camera reel. Good opening. The classic trope of having a dude sit in a chair in a dark room watching some old home movie on a wall to remember a lost love, kind of thing. Only, they’ve taken the opportunity to sneak in some Dirty Dancing footage. Good move on the whole, and something that’s widely done in music videos from films. They’ll often have the film on TV screens in the background or projected onto a wall. The only problem with what they’ve done is they’ve just made it look like Eric Carmen likes to sit in the dark, watch Dirty Dancing and whack off to the three-way dance screen.

Eric gets up and moves to the window, opens it and looks out to find a woman in a corset kind of thing fucking up his flowers. She then sticks them in a vase or something and instantly changes into a red top and starts rubbing her cleavage. Then, all of a sudden, she’s on the wall, being projected, THEN SHE’S JUST THERE! She strokes his face and leaves. I say leaves, she dematerialises.

Now we’re outside and Carmen is on the wall singing. The woman in red shows up and rolls down a wall. DON’T FORGET THIS IS FROM DIRTY DANCING SO LOOK, HERE’S SOME FILM FOOTAGE!

Back to Carmen for a pull away camera shot that blends into that woman again, now dancing on an entirely white background like they forgot to photoshop something in. Back in on Carmen so he can give us the chorus. Back to the woman because they’ve remembered they were supposed to make it rain in the background of her dancing. Back to Carmen, for the same pull away camera shot, only this time the woman is now there, and she’s wearing gold. Now she’s dancing in gold in front of the rain. WHAT THE FUCK IS ACTUALLY GOING ON!?

Back to Carmen and he’s doing the classic move that people do to scratch their backs when no one else is around. The woman in front of the rain has changed clothes again. Back to Carmen before we get some…. REMEMBER THAT THIS IS FROM DIRTY DANCING! LOOK! MORE FILM FOOTAGE! ONLY IT’S THE SAME FILM FOOTAGE WE JUST SHOWED YOU MORE OR LESS! A quick interjection of Carmen, NOW BACK TO THE SAME FOOTAGE!

Wondering where the woman went… they’ve got you covered! NOW SHE’S GOT A SAXOPHONE. Don’t know where she was keeping that, although given the cut of her dress, I have some ideas. All of a sudden, we cut to a clearly made up café in an alleyway and that woman is back with a dude that looks like he walked off a porn set. She kisses said man and turns Asian. Carmen is back in his whacking off chair, and his video ends.

Answers on a postcard.

18:

Weezer – Susanne. (412 Plays, New Entry.)

So. Weezer. Again. I’ve just said a bit about them so I’ll keep this short. I implore you to go and listen to some Weezer. Get a copy of the debut album. It’s one of the best albums ever. EVER!

17:

Paul Simon – Hearts and Bones. (419 Plays, New Entry.)

What a song! Paul Simon has an effortless voice, and it has such a beautiful tone to it. It’s incredible. There’s a certain part of this song that I think is one of the best things ever. At 3:20 in the video below you can hear it. It’s where the song pulls back and just leaves in the beat, and his voice is super clear. He’s a genius songwriter. This song, as I’ve said before is perfect for car journeys or being on the train. Lean your head against the window, put this on, and watch the world go by.

16:

Little Shop of Horrors – Suddenly Seymour. (452 Plays, New Entry.)

Little Shop Of Horrors is one of the best musicals ever. It has a lot of good moments in it, but my fave will always be Suddenly Seymour. Ellen Greene’s ability to drift between the ditsy Audrey voice into full powerhouse vocals in fucking amazing. It’s a genuinely touching moment in an extraordinary film.

15:

Timecop – Lovers. (459 Plays, Up 16 places since last year.)

If I’m not mistaken, this is this year’s highest climber. Up 16 places from last year’s 31. This is such a fucking good song. I think I spoke last year about how I love the images chosen for the video below. Swayze was the 80s lover, and he’s still someone I very much miss. I wish he was still making films. Electro pop is something that I think I’ll always love. It makes me happy. It makes me nostalgic. It fills me with love and hope. When it’s done badly, it’s still generally pretty good. When it’s done well though, you get Timecop1983. He’s genuinely so good at it that I think some people would be hard pushed to know that this wasn’t just from the 80s. Talented bastard. Listening to this, in my head it’s like it was actually on the soundtrack to Ferris Bueller, or Sixteen Candles. It wouldn’t sound out of place at all. He’s essentially created a soundtrack to any John Hughes film.

14:

Jeff Buckley – Hallelelllullullejahh. (461 Plays, New Entry.)

Well I don’t know how to fucking spell it. Why didn’t you put the video for this up, Chris? Because I don’t like it, Chris! The video uses a different version of the song, and as we all agree (We do, accept it, it’s fact) the album version of the song is the vastly superior one. His 1994 debut album, Grace, from which this is taken, is a thing of beauty. Sadly, we never got another album from him. He died in 1997 after drowning whilst swimming in a river, something he’d done many times before. As you’re probably aware, Hallelujah is a cover of the Leonard Cohen original. Which is better? Buckley! Fuck you, Cohen. The part that really gets me is the opening verse and the way it rises. (I’ll be nice and apologise to Leonard since he wrote the fucking thing, so soz Lenny C!)

13:

Joe Cocker – Bye Bye Blackbird. (471 Plays, New Entry.)

I think the thing I’ve always loved most about Joe Cocker is his amazing ability to look like someone’s dad has got pissed up and just accidentally stumbled onto a stage, yet still possess the voice of a god. Here he is belting it out live, since there’s no studio version available on YouTube that I can find anyway. Go find it to listen to on Spotify though!

12:

Portishead – Roads. (499 Plays, Up 9 places from last year.)

Fave song ever! Back up from last year where it had dropped down from the top 10 I think. I never get bored of hearing it. Such a pure, beautiful song. Especially this live version from the Roseland in NYC. This whole show is available as an album and I suggest you own it. It’s a perfect example of a band showing how it’s done. Everything about this entire show is on point.

11:

Pixies – Where Is My Mind? (523 Plays, Up 11 places from last year.)

Another big climber here. Where Is My Mind reminds me so much of my youth. Few songs are this fucking good. The Pixies still sound current. Fairly sure they might all be Highlanders. Seriously, who listens to this and goes “Oh, yeah, 80s obviously!”.