I was listening to random music on the iPod at the weekend and Beat It by Wacko came on. It is 30 years old next year but it still sounds so fresh and new.
So - given an arbitrary 20 year old cut-off - what old songs still sound like they were written yesterday (production values disregarded).
My top three:
Beat It - Michael Jackson
Sign o' the Times - Prince
Bob Dylan - Blowin' in the Wind
Anything by JLS
Yesterday, Beatles
God is a DJ, Faithless
Clouds, Joni Michell
Ghost Town - The Specials
Good call Muppet - one of my all time faves there.
Ghost Town - The Specials
Big +1 on that one.
Billie Jean
Big Yellow Taxi
West End Girls
If Appetite were released today, it would still sound astonishing.
Rock n Roll Part 2 - Gary Glitter.
You reckon, CFH? Some of it maybe but I listened to a good bit of it at the weekend and thought quite the opposite.
I listened to a good bit of it at the weekend and thought quite the opposite.
I thought it the first time I heard it. 🙂
I meant the opposite of sounding like it had been written yesterday but 🙂 I have to say, much as some of AFD is brilliant, I would have always said that some tracks were a bit filler-ish.
Beach Boys [i]God Only Knows[/i]
The Beatles [i]Tomorrow Never Knows[/i]
Talk Talk [i]Life's What You Make It[/i] 1986)
Beach Boys [i]God Only Knows[/i]
Good choice Count de Zero...in fact, a lot of Pet Sounds sounds that way - I think maybe that's because it's influenced so many of today's artists.
Paul McCartney has said that [i]God Only Knows[/i] is the most perfect pop song ever recorded, and the one he really wishes he'd written. I find it difficult to argue with that.
Sandy Denny's [i]Who Knows Where The Time Goes[/i] is another timeless song, (pun intended), and all the more remarkable considering Sandy was, IIRC, only fourteen when she wrote it. Utterly wonderful song.
House of Pain - Jump Around
Aerosmith/Run DMC - Walk This Way
The Stranglers - Golden Brown
The Undertones - Teenage Kicks
Fast Car - Tracy Chapman
The Boys are back in Town - Thin Lizzy
Papa was a Rolling Stone - The Temptations
Superstition - Stevie Wonder
Connected - Stereo MC's
EDIT : Removed Placebo as I got my years mixed up and it was too new to be included
As an aside there's some great songs being suggested here! I can see me on iTunes later!
"Could you be loved? (WhoooNowandBeLoved)" Bob Marley
Most of Bob Marley's stuff, in particular One Love, No Woman no Cry.... 🙂
EDIT
**High Fives Bikebouy!** We were 2 seconds apart there! 😀
deadlydarcy in not mentioning f'in JLS on a music thread shock.
Ok, some songs. Disagree with nearly all of the above, but each to their own eh? I'm sure you'll disagree with mine (not sure if I agree with them) 😉
Donna Summer - I Feel Love
New Order - Fine Time
Funkadelic - Free Your Mind and Your Ass Will Follow
Grandmaster Flash - The Message
deadlydarcy in not mentioning f'in JLS on a music thread shock.
FAIL 😳
Sorry though...I'm working on it.
New Order - Fine Time
+1
Add to that Bizarre Love Triangle & many others from Substance...hard to believe sometimes it was an 80s album.
Maybe one of JLS's mums was making music?
Most of those songs are great songs, but far too good to have been written yesterday!
I just can't imagine any modern band coming out with Golden Brown for example.
*sigh*
*sigh*
😆
Yeah, gramps.
I just can't imagine any modern band coming out with Golden Brown for example.
Fair comment, but there's some superb songs around these days.....
I've just listened to Yuck on Spotify...they sounded pretty good to me 🙂
"Rainbow Rising" - erm Rainbow.. hahaha
OR
"Smoke on the Water" - erm Deepest Purple, phah..
OR
"Paranoid" - Black Sabbath (finished with me woman cos' she wouldn't do the washing up) yadda yadda
Ok, so I've been searching for metal tunes on Classic Rock..and??
Agadoo - Black Lace
[i]Fair comment[/i]
I really can't go into the 1000s of reasons why it is far from a FAIR COMMENT!
It's like an old bid sitting slumped in the day centre, Vera Lynn on the gramophone... "Ooh, they don't write em like they used to eh, Ethel?"
[warble]We'll meet again, don't know where don't know whennnnnnnnnnnnnn,
But I know we'll meet again some sunny, dayyyyyyyyyyy[/warble]
Molgrips - you missed the point of the thread completely.
There are bands around now equally able to write good music (although Golden Brown IS an amazing song - agreed). The point of the thread is to reflect on older songs that have stood the test of time and still sound as fresh and exciting now as when they were released over 20 years ago.
Wichita Lineman - Glen Campbell
New York, New Yawk - Franky Sinatra
La Trav - Verdi
Oh, I see. So basically, classics then?
Fair commentI really can't go into the 1000s of reasons why it is far from a FAIR COMMENT!
Ah, that's not what I meant. I didn't mean that all modern music was rubbish - just that it was different, because of course musical trends vary all the time. The thread title confused me, I thought it was about songs that were before their time or sounded like modern songs.
Most of the tracks mentioned above are "of their time" in that they are similar to/derived from other music being made at that time (Pet Sounds/some Beatles being exceptions). However, I'd argue that both Bohemian Rhapsody and Bat Out of Hell were sufficiently unique at the time that they stand out from their eras and would sound fresh even today.
[i]they stand out from their eras and would sound [s]fresh[/s] [b]utterly shite and irritating[/b] even today[/i]
Couldn't help myself. I really should stay away from music threads
I think people are confusing stuff they like and causes them to reminise, or even old stuff they have discovered, with stuff that sounds fresh.
You clearly have no idea what is down with the kids these days. Its certainly not the Stranglers, Thin Lizzy or the Stereo MC's! 😆
What's down with the kids is factory farmed RnB.
Is there actually anything specific that is "down with the kids"? Apart from chart music, there is such variety out there.
Unless you would be so kind as to enlighten me...
Step away from the music thread Dez 🙂
[color=fuchsia]ok[/color]
You clearly have no idea what is down with the kids these days. Its certainly not the Stranglers, Thin Lizzy or the Stereo MC's!
Really? Then how come I regularly see teenagers wearing Thin Lizzy, Ramones and Led Zeppelin tee shirts?
Do you go to see live bands? The likes of The Smoke Fairies, The Joy Formidable, Cerys Matthews, Howling Bells, attract loads of teenagers, as well as people like me, in their 50's, who still find more quality music around every day than they can afford to buy. So far recently I've got Mechanical Bride's new album, new album and EP by Gemma Hayes, and new albums by The Dears, Wye Oak, Cerys Matthews, Kate Bush, The Submarines, Foo Fighters, Anna Calvi, Emmylou Harris, and there's still Likki Li's album, and Emmy The Great, Paul Simon and The Pierces albums to get. I'd bet that there would be very significant numbers of audience members under twenty at most of those gigs.
I'm sure that lots of teens and early twenties will be surrounding me in Hyde Park on the 30th for The Vaccines, Beirut, Mumford and Son and Arcade Fire. Just because some middle age bloke at the BBC thinks that Radio One is representative of the only music teenagers listen to doesn't make it a fact; my experience at actual gigs proves that.
mmm joy formidable, wye oak and the vaccines, might put them on now although reminds me need to get wye oak album 🙁
I think there are a few Queen tracks that would sound new/fresh now
Boom Town Rats...... "Tell me why, I don't like Mondays."
Today's Tuesday isn't it?
I was in the lab at work the other day when 'Love will tear us apart' came on and I told the students / youngsters that work in there to be quiet and listen as it was one of the best songs ever.
Half of them didn't even know who it was...... there's surely no way that song is 30+ years old?
