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101 Best Songs of 1986 vs 1996: #1 There Is A Light That Never Goes Out - The Smiths / A Long December - Counting Crows (1 Viewer)

Leroy Hoard said:
Ramsay Hunt Experience said:
Kiss is definitely one of the five or so Prince singles that I'm likely to pick as my favorite at any one time. That spare funk groove is absolutely iconic. It is also incredibly fun to switch between Prince vocals and Tom Jones vocals when singing it in the shower or making a fool of yourself at karaoke.
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I always wonder what the original songwriter thinks about cover versions of their songs. They usually say nice things, but that might be because of those extra royalty checks going into their bank accounts.
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And Tom Jones was kind of a prick about it. I remember seeing an interview with him where he said he thought the original lacked energy. Which totally misses the viewpoint of the song (Prince is a snarky, sexy, messy *****). But as with many great songs, it works with Tom Jones transforming it into a big ****-energy anthem too.
 
scorchy said:
In 1996, my love for all things Teddy Riley had already spanned a decade - maybe it was from DJing at the roller rink but New Jack Swing was my jam. Add in Dr. Dre and a Bill Withers sample and you get an absolute atomic bomb of a track
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Most of the music we were listening to back then--some variation of heroin poetry with constipated vocalist--wasn't really made for a party.

Not for nothing, but if you are with a mixed group of men and women, I'll prefer a roller rink soundtrack every day.
 
So, here we are at the top of the mountain. Or maybe the #2s were the top of the mountain and these are just my personal favorites. Tough call.

#1

There is a Light That Never Goes Out - The Smiths

And if a double-decker bus crashes into us
To die by your side is such a heavenly way to die
And if a ten-tonne truck kills the both of us
To die by your side, well, the pleasure, the privilege is mine

Yeah, I know it’s the fourth song from The Smiths in the countdown. Sue me - they’ve been one of my three favorite bands for almost 35 years.

I hadn’t heard of the Smiths until late 1987, when a friend of mine that was attending boarding school in Michigan mailed me a copy of Strangeways Here We Come. The band had already broken up, which I wouldn’t even learn until seeing a solo Morrissey video on 120 Minutes. I managed to find two earlier records (Louder Than Bombs and The Queen Is Dead) at Camelot Records, and pretty soon I was transcribing Moz lyrics in my journal entries.

One of my favorite critics, Rob Sheffield, put There Is A Light... atop his rankings of all 73 Smiths songs. Rolling Stone ranked it as the 226th best song of all time. NME goes even further, naming it as the 12th best song of all time. I’ll end with Johnny Marr:

I didn't realise that 'There Is a Light That Never Goes Out' was going to be an anthem, but when we first played it, I thought it was the best song I'd ever heard.
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A Long December - Counting Crows

This time last year, more than a few “reconsiderations” of A Long December got published, where cynical critics came around and admitted how they had grown to love it since the pandemic started. I always did. Still, at first I felt a little unsure about naming such an unhip song as the best track of the year. Then I saw that my beloved new favorite podcaster Yasi Salek tweeted twice in the past week about her love for A Long December and I felt free.

For me, it’s personal. I was at a low point in December 1996. I had finished grad school back in May, left a serious girlfriend in Gainesville, and moved back to rural Maryland to live with my parents while looking for a real job. Every Sunday I would read the big city papers and fax off resumes from the local Kinkos. Nobody wanted me. Even my parents were getting sick of me.
Maybe the most hopeless I’ve ever felt.

We did a Secret Santa at the restaurant where I was working and someone gave me a gift card to Waxie Maxie. I had liked the Counting Crows earlier record well enough so used the card to buy their latest release, Recovering the Satellites. The second-to-last song, A Long December, became my sad anthem.

Then everything changed. The week after Christmas, I got a phone call offering me a “real” government job in Philadelphia - I’m still with the same agency 26 years later. A couple of days after that, a girl from a class that I TAed at UF emailed me out of the blue to tell me she just got selected for a summer job in DC and would love to hang out when she got there - we were engaged 18 months later and still married today. Hell, my Gators even won a national championship the next week.

So even if it’s trite, I can listen to A Long December in my lowest moments and remember where I was when I first heard it and be thankful for where I am now. And that’s the power of music.
 
Highly Personal Selections at #1. And that’s good. It’s why Cortez the Killer is my #1 Neil Young song and why my #1 in our American artists thing is what it is.

There Is a Light is my #2 Smiths after How Soon Is Now.

I find most of the Counting Crows songs that I’ve heard to be meh, but A Long December is fantastic. To my ears it sounds like The Band, which helps.
 
Beautiful story, Scorch. Everyone's #1's should have a personal connection. It's one of the miracles of music. Certain songs can pull me out of my current reality and put me in a very specific place and time. Sometimes that's good, sometimes not, but amazing regardless.

Thanks for doing this. These are fun to follow, and your anecdotes are what make it that way.
 
FatMax said:
Beautiful story, Scorch. Everyone's #1's should have a personal connection. It's one of the miracles of music. Certain songs can pull me out of my current reality and put me in a very specific place and time. Sometimes that's good, sometimes not, but amazing regardless.

Thanks for doing this. These are fun to follow, and your anecdotes are what make it that way.
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Appreciate all the feedback along the way, Max. You made this a lot more fun!

ETA;: feel free to chime in with what you would have included whenevs.
 
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scorchy said:
FatMax said:
Beautiful story, Scorch. Everyone's #1's should have a personal connection. It's one of the miracles of music. Certain songs can pull me out of my current reality and put me in a very specific place and time. Sometimes that's good, sometimes not, but amazing regardless.

Thanks for doing this. These are fun to follow, and your anecdotes are what make it that way.
Click to expand...
Appreciate all the feedback along the way, Max. You made this a lot more fun!

ETA;: feel free to chime in with what you would have included whenevs.
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I'm still out West, so unfortunately, stuck at work for a bit. When I get home, I'll do a small write up with links on the 4-5 that would have made my own list for 1996. One of them I promise you will hate. Tune in a few hours from now ....
 
Ok, here are a few that would have made my list. That isn't to say that you missed something, just different tastes. First, the one I'm most surprised didn't make your list.

Johnny Cash - Rusty Cage https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9CrBqRb3VGM

At first, I hated everything about this song. I grew up listening to classic country via my father, and already loved Soundgarden. To me, this sounded like a poor attempt at either style. But that wasn't the point. He's not trying to be country, or rock, just Johnny. After God's Going to Cut you Down and Hurt were released, I began to embrace this one as well. Also, having Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers as your backing band ... that doesn't hurt either.


Second, Tracy Bonham - Mother Mother https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Xi8NvSetZc
I think this would have been bigger had Alanis not come around a few months earlier released the Angry White Girl Anthem.

couple more coming ... gotta grab a bite
 
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Great number one for 1986.

Just an excellent song even though I'm not a Smiths fan, really.

1996 is more of a cool story than a song I really enjoy. It's kind of a bummer of a song. I can see how it would be a bummer of an anthem for a bummer of a time. But good memories come after! Way to be. I have songs distinctly tied to pleasant memories, too, and the songs are always that much more powerful for having been associated with a time in one's life.

Great countdown, scorchy. I'm not sure 1977 will ever recover from tim, but you did '86 and '96 some justice here.
 
FatMax said:
Ok, here are a few that would have made my list. That isn't to say that you missed something, just different tastes. First, the one I'm most surprised didn't make your list.

Johnny Cash - Rusty Cage https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9CrBqRb3VGM

At first, I hated everything about this song. I grew up listening to classic country via my father, and already loved Soundgarden. To me, this sounded like a poor attempt at either style. But that wasn't the point. He's not trying to be country, or rock, just Johnny. After God's Going to Cut you Down and Hurt were released, I began to embrace this one as well. Also, having Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers as your backing band ... that doesn't hurt either.


Second, Tracy Bonham - Mother Mother https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Xi8NvSetZc
I think this would have been bigger had Alanis not come around a few months earlier released the Angry White Girl Anthem.

couple more coming ... gotta grab a bite
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Cool. The Johnny Cash song was never in the mix for everything you said before "but." I like Johnny Cash, and I know this puts me on island, but I feel like he's ruined a few of my favorite songs.

Mother Mother just missed the cut. It was the screaming "Everything's fine!!!" that clinched it. I don't know all the timing, but I wonder if Tracy Bonham gets a record deal without Alanis coming first. Regardless, it's a very 1996 pick.
 
scorchy said:
A Long December - Counting Crows

This time last year, more than a few “reconsiderations” of A Long December got published, where cynical critics came around and admitted how they had grown to love it since the pandemic started. I always did. Still, at first I felt a little unsure about naming such an unhip song as the best track of the year. Then I saw that my beloved new favorite podcaster Yasi Salek tweeted twice in the past week about her love for A Long December and I felt free.

For me, it’s personal. I was at a low point in December 1996. I had finished grad school back in May, left a serious girlfriend in Gainesville, and moved back to rural Maryland to live with my parents while looking for a real job. Every Sunday I would read the big city papers and fax off resumes from the local Kinkos. Nobody wanted me. Even my parents were getting sick of me.
Maybe the most hopeless I’ve ever felt.

We did a Secret Santa at the restaurant where I was working and someone gave me a gift card to Waxie Maxie. I had liked the Counting Crows earlier record well enough so used the card to buy their latest release, Recovering the Satellites. The second-to-last song, A Long December, became my sad anthem.

Then everything changed. The week after Christmas, I got a phone call offering me a “real” government job in Philadelphia - I’m still with the same agency 26 years later. A couple of days after that, a girl from a class that I TAed at UF emailed me out of the blue to tell me she just got selected for a summer job in DC and would love to hang out when she got there - we were engaged 18 months later and still married today. Hell, my Gators even won a national championship the next week.

So even if it’s trite, I can listen to A Long December in my lowest moments and remember where I was when I first heard it and be thankful for where I am now. And that’s the power of music.
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This is very touching, but Angels of the Silences is still the best song on that record.
 
Ok, last two. These I wouldn't expect on your list, but have some good memories for me.

Seven Mary Three - My My https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WNP527rGRec

in the summer of '96, I lived with two other guys in a two bedroom ####hole. One guy made a bedroom out of the back porch/laundry room. He didn't bring much money to the household, but he did have good stereo equipment. In retrospect, "good" meant it could play loud with massive distortion and the speakers wouldn't blow. This album was pretty much on repeat that summer. It had bigger hits, but My My was my favorite. One of those songs that I can't help but turn up if I come across it.


311 - Down https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lYBIRHi5-o8

I was an engineering major in college. Lots of math and science and other classes that were populated by very few women. Much to my surprise, my assigned lab partner in a physics class was this quirky, lanky, subtly hot girl. She hated doing the lab work, I liked it. I hated doing lab reports, and she made the most beautiful lab reports I have ever seen. She was also into 311, and I kinda loved her and everything about her. This song reminds me of those times. It's also the song I feel like you'd hate, but would be in my top 30-50
 
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scorchy said:
FatMax said:
Ok, here are a few that would have made my list. That isn't to say that you missed something, just different tastes. First, the one I'm most surprised didn't make your list.

Johnny Cash - Rusty Cage https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9CrBqRb3VGM

At first, I hated everything about this song. I grew up listening to classic country via my father, and already loved Soundgarden. To me, this sounded like a poor attempt at either style. But that wasn't the point. He's not trying to be country, or rock, just Johnny. After God's Going to Cut you Down and Hurt were released, I began to embrace this one as well. Also, having Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers as your backing band ... that doesn't hurt either.


Second, Tracy Bonham - Mother Mother https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Xi8NvSetZc
I think this would have been bigger had Alanis not come around a few months earlier released the Angry White Girl Anthem.

couple more coming ... gotta grab a bite
Click to expand...
Cool. The Johnny Cash song was never in the mix for everything you said before "but." I like Johnny Cash, and I know this puts me on island, but I feel like he's ruined a few of my favorite songs.

Mother Mother just missed the cut. It was the screaming "Everything's fine!!!" that clinched it. I don't know all the timing, but I wonder if Tracy Bonham gets a record deal without Alanis coming first. Regardless, it's a very 1996 pick.
Click to expand...

Totally agree about the reasons she likely got a record deal. Disagree about the screaming ... that's what I like to most.
 
FatMax said:
It's also the song I feel like you'd hate
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Correct, but the cute lab girl story merits it an honorary spot. Sort if like those long distance dedications that Casey shoehorned into AT40.

The only Seven Mary Three song I know is Cumbersome.
 
FatMax said:
She was also into 311, and I kinda loved her and everything about her. This song reminds me of those times. It's also the song I feel like you'd hate, but would be in my top 30-50
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My friends and I liked those two 311 albums a lot, they were part of two different summers' soundtrack, that sticks with you.
But man, they get no love.
 
FatMax said:
311 - Down https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lYBIRHi5-o8

I was an engineering major in college. Lots of math and science and other classes that were populated with very few women. Much to my surprise, my assigned lab partner in a physics class was this quirky, lanky, subtly hot girl. She hated doing the lab work, I liked it. I hated doing lab reports, and she made the most beautiful lab reports I have ever seen. She was also into 311, and I kinda loved her and everything about her. This song reminds me of those times. It's also the song I feel like you'd hate, but would be in my top 30-50
Click to expand...
"Oddly infectious" is how I would describe most of 311's radio songs, including this one.
 
Dammit, looks like that was released in 85, peaked in the charts in early 86. Stupid bogus list that I hit first on search.
 
massraider said:
FatMax said:
She was also into 311, and I kinda loved her and everything about her. This song reminds me of those times. It's also the song I feel like you'd hate, but would be in my top 30-50
Click to expand...
My friends and I liked those two 311 albums a lot, they were part of two different summers' soundtrack, that sticks with you.
But man, they get no love.
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So you #### on Counting Crows but rep 311? Oookay then...
 
plinko said:
1986, I could toss out a bunch of ****ty hair metal but who cares, I can't believe you skipped Blow Monkeys though
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The last 5 out for 86: Boy by Book of Love; Tough Enough by The Fabulous Thunderbirds; Oh L'Amour by Erasure; Welcome to the Boomtown by David & David; Hey, We Want Some P***** by 2 Live Crew

For 96: Closer to Free by The Bodeans; Faded by Afghan Whigs; A Design for Life by Manic Street Preachers, Mother Mother by Tracy Bonham; Photograph by The Verve Pipe
 
scorchy said:
plinko said:
1986, I could toss out a bunch of ****ty hair metal but who cares, I can't believe you skipped Blow Monkeys though
Click to expand...
The last 5 out for 86: Boy by Book of Love; Tough Enough by The Fabulous Thunderbirds; Oh L'Amour by Erasure; Welcome to the Boomtown by David & David; Hey, We Want Some P***** by 2 Live Crew

For 96: Closer to Free by The Bodeans; Faded by Afghan Whigs; A Design for Life by Manic Street Preachers, Mother Mother by Tracy Bonham; Photograph by The Verve Pipe
Click to expand...
Some good stuff in here.
 
scorchy said:
The last 5 out for 86: Boy by Book of Love; Tough Enough by The Fabulous Thunderbirds; Oh L'Amour by Erasure; Welcome to the Boomtown by David & David; Hey, We Want Some P***** by 2 Live Crew

For 96: Closer to Free by The Bodeans; Faded by Afghan Whigs; A Design for Life by Manic Street Preachers, Mother Mother by Tracy Bonham; Photograph by The Verve Pipe
Click to expand...

Ohhh, I loved that David + David song. ETA: Also Erasure song.

And props to whoever mentioned the Blow Monkeys. I hadn't thought of that song in...checks watch...36 years, but I love it.
 
A couple from '86 that I really enjoy which didn't make the cut:

Love Kills - Joe Strummer

This was on the Sid and Nancy movie (never saw it) soundtrack. Hits pretty hard.

I'm Supposed To Have Sex With You - Tonio K

Straight up tongue in cheek stupidly direct lark. The verse lyrics aren't great, but I like the music tracks, it's got a nice groove, and I can't help but sing along and laugh with the (not at) the chorus. We've all been there. This one was also on the Summer School movie (seen it a few times) soundtrack.
 
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