115. Minor Threat: Minor Threat

Now we're back in my wheelhouse. My favorite (and many's favorite) hardcore band ever, I must've listened to this song 500 or 1000 times. The directive to "play it faster" taken seriously right from the get-go, this rocks through 90 seconds of heart-on-your-sleeve stuff that Ian MacKaye was so damn good at. The lyrics giving the punks a philosophy they could scratch into their school book covers ("pay no mind to us!...").

I've never been a big fan of the thrash choruses (although I'm sure it was fun live). This one at least doesn't devolve into screaming, and the anticipation in the build-up back into the verses makes the change at the chorus more than worth it.

Do you like the blue cover better than the red? I like the blue, but secretly feel like a sellout for it.

RATING: 89.

114. Bad Brains: Pay to Cum

I watched American Hardcore for the first time and just thought "they were black?" That's really fucking crazy. Sitting in Eric Stempel or whoever's room, listening to the album in 1987 after getting them to stop with the Dag Nasty or the Circle Jerks, how would you know that? And hell if I knew that they were real musicians and just idolized by the rest of the hardcore scene.

This is nice hardcore, everything it should be: melodic, sincere, fast and driving. With the whole band getting to shout a word now and again.

Don't fear the dirty title of the song; the lyrics are unintelligible like much good hardcore.

The original release doesn't appear to be widely available. Here's my favorite of the second generationals:

RATING: 78.

Pay To Cum - Bad Brains

113. Journey: Don't Stop Believing

The tune was drilled into my head first through a video game, Atari 2600 version:



My 9 year old self had assumed that with the sci fi album cover, this would be a space game. Instead, you inhabited Steve Perry and ran away from various agents, promoters and groupies (which were giant hearts that chased you ... running away from girls was something 9 year old me could get behind).



PF500 does well: "You can tell something about a person's relationship to popular music as a whole by how they feel about this song. Generally, people fall into two camps." PF500 goes on to describe the "guilty pleasure" camp and the "just plain like it" camp. "You'll notice no consideration of those who don't care for the song at all."

RATING: 77.

Don't Stop Believin' - Journey

112. Atlantic City: Bruce Springsteen

I was one of those kids that, at age 11, spent several years not getting the irony of Born in the U.S.A., so I certainly knew nothing about "Nebraska" Bruce.

So this, when I first heard it 5 or 6 years ago, was a nice surprise. I've yet to just listen to Nebraska end-to-end. I deal with a little too much manufacturing world depression in my everyday life. I don't need it in the car ride to and from work as well.

Quick folk. That's what I'd call this. The story keeps going.

RATING: 74

Atlantic City - Bruce Springst...

111. Under Pressure - Queen [ft. David Bowie]

Is Leonard Nemoy anything but Spock? Is Jaleel White anything but Urkel? Some things just are what they are, even if you feel bad about it. Wikipedia embarasses itself by not mentioning it. PF500 goes meta in its description: "And notice we don't mentio nthe bass line once." Of course it's the baseline!, ranked as the greatest of all time by people that might even know.

I used to love Mr. Ice's descriptions about how he added an extra "bum" to the bass line. Which, you know, is true, if you listen to it (link here is to his apology).

But with this song diced and stuck into commercials, you forget its scat-ripoff aspects (ee do bo bup bup), finger snaps, the ascending chorus. You recall the ending, but the whack-job third minute isn't one you remember.

Most big star collaborations have sloppiness going against them (no one can be a control freak; limited studio time; etc.). But they can normally make up for it with joy, and that nets out to a positive here.

RATING: 71.

Gotta love mashups:

Under Pressure - Queen & David...