Retrocrush has posted its opinion on the 50 greatest parts from rock songs. 50 Greatest Song Parts
What changes would you make? In an effort to keep the thread readable let us try to limit our posts to such (please don’t post your full list of 50):
3 song parts that weren’t included that you think should have been included.
3 song parts that were included that you believe should have been left off.
Your choice for #1 coolest song part.
(+ short reasons why)
Mine:
Should have been included:
David Bowie – Space Oddity – Space Oddity/David Bowie – “Planet earth is blue and there’s nothing I can do” We could start a list of the 100 greatest moments in songs by David Bowie, one of the greatest innovators in modern music, but this early example is still the best. So simple a lyric so simply sung, yet so profound and meaningful, so unexpectedly beautiful and melancholy; this line transformed what might have been a gimmick song into a beautiful work of art.
Eddie Van Halen – Eruption – Van Halen – The Baroque Scale Guitar Solo – Who can make rock sound like Bach and still make it sound cool? Eddie Van Halen, that’s who. With Eruption, Eddie shut the mouths of those claiming that rock requires no technical skill; and he opened the mouths of millions of kids who had discovered the greatest guitarist since Hendrix playing rock with a technical ferocity that reshaped the sound of rock for decades to come.
**Metallica ** – Wherever I May Roam – Metallica – The 1-2-123 drum re-entry – I don’t care what the purists say, the Black Album is Metallica at their best and Roam is metal at its finest – simply great guitar riffs, drums, and vocals combined with lyrics that display the archetypical metal lifestyle. The big pause interrupted by Lars’ drumming which leads into the guitar solo showed the rock world how to do this rock cliché the right way - the Metallica way.
Omit These Please:
Biz Markie - You Got What I Need - not music, not even funny Berlin - Sex - only memorable for the pathetically horny Madness - One Step Beyond - kinda cool but not really worthy of the top 50
My number one - The Who - Won’t Get Fooled Again - I’m not a The Who fan (I don’t own a single album) but that scream is the most famous sound in all of rock history - very cool.
The Beatles- Got To Get You Into My Life- Horns/Tamborine intro. Also, when Paul first sings “Got to get you into my life!”. IMHO, you could take out any part, from any song, on Revolver, and should be on this list. The guitar solo in Taxman. The reverse tape loops in Tommorrow Never Knows. Paul’s background vocals in Doctor Robert. And on and on.
The Knack- My Sharona- Guitar solo. Best damn guitar solo of all-time! Don’t laugh!
Guns-n-Roses- Welcome To The Jungle- Axl’s restrained scream in the beginning of the song. Awesome stuff! The tempo change towards the end, where the bass picks up, followed by Slash’s weird slide-guitar drops, is also right up there.
Omit these please:
How about the trip-out part of “Whole Lotta Love” by Led Zeppelin which segways very nicely into one of my favorite guitar solos. Or the guitar solo in “Heartbreaker.” Also “The Wanton Song” has a great riff, and one of the best bridges of any rock song.
The flute solo in “Locomotive Breath” by (you guessed it) Jethro Tull is pretty memorable.
The intro’s to “Arc Arsenal” and “Cosmonaut” by At the Drive-In are awesome.
Hüsker Dü - “New Day Rising” - right when the guitar first kicks in. When I was sixteen, that was the most badass distortion I had ever heard. I’m convinced Nirvana’s “Territorial Pissings” was Kurt Cobain’s attempt to replicate Bob Mould’s tone.
And yes, Roger Daltrey’s “Won’t Get Fooled Again” scream is indeed the best in the history of Rock.
And I really like the piano bit in More, More, More by the Andrea True Connection.
The build up and then soaring release in Born to Run: these lyrics and the instrumental part right before it.
The highway’s jammed with broken heroes on a last chance power drive
Everybody’s out on the run tonight
but there’s no place left to hide
The list is decent, but this is a great thread topic. [One of the SDMB’s 50 Greatest Ever? ;)] There are some really good picks in there that part of Rock Lobster, Immigrant Song, Gimme Shelter - but a lot of lame, cliche ones too. And Number One? Come on. Surely something in the entire history of rock has been cooler than that part of In the Air Tonight. And three Queen songs? THREE? :dubious:
Leave off:
Purple Haze. It’s a great song, but it’s a cliche pick. Be more original. How about the beginning of Ezy Rider, Manic Depression or Message to Love? The awesome main riff in Power of Soul? Voodoo Child has been done too, but it’s so damn cool I’ll give it a pass. I think Jimi’s greatest moment is in Machine Gun. That one note. You know the one I mean. Actually, just because it’s Jimi I should leave this and ditch Motley Crue…
Bohemian Rhapsody - as done as Purple Haze, except it’s not a great song. It’s a really pretenious, overly long song that remains worthwhile only because Wayne’s World made it funny). And as a choice, it’s a million times more cliche.
Third, drop Tenacious D. Tribute is funny, Tenacious D is funny. To suggest it’s one of the greatest moments in the history of rock is just stupid. (In my fourth place, Don’t Fear the Reaper? Meh. Another retread. At least they didn’t say anything about the dumb cowbell sketch.)
And I’d add the following:
Stevie Wonder, Superstition. It just doesn’t get any funkier than the theme to this song. The fact that Stevie plays all the instruments doesn’t hurt either.
Howlin’ Wolf, Moanin’ at Midnight. The liner notes say some great things about how the wordless hummed/moaned intro to this song sounds like a fever dream and is one of the greatest non-verbal moments in music. It’s all true. This is the blues (the one-chord variety), but if the ‘rock’ list includes several rap songs and Phil Collins, it can include this too.
I see my Allman Brothers made the list, but the slide part in Ramblin’ Man, though it’s very sweet, isn’t even close to the best moment in their catalogue. I’m tempted to pick the big, climactic scale in Whipping Post or Berry Oakley’s monstrous bass intro, but I won’t. For my number one moment, I’ll pick the very end of the song [although they never appeared in sequence on an album until The Fillmore Concerts a few years ago] when Butch Trucks starts playing the tympanis and Whipping Post segues into Mountain Jam. That band could play anything - rock, jazz, blues… Whipping Post lasts 22 minutes and travels all over the musical spectrum, and Mountain Jam is 33 more. Rock music never sounded more like an orchestra in all the right ways - the song just feels huge, and despite the different movements it doesn’t meander, it flows. I could pick two or three more moments in the song itself (like Duane’s Will the Circle Be Unbroken? jam), but I’ll go with the beginning.
All Along the Watchtower. When Jimi got that muted stacatto going during the solo, I defy any rock fan to avoid feeling a rush. And can anyone correct me here? I think he pioneered that sound. I certainly don’t remember any earlier songs that used it.
When the Levee Breaks. John Bonham. 'Nuff said.
Tie between openings of *Hell’s Bells * or Highway to Hell.
Too many more. Limit is 3, so on to the favorite.
The cannon fire in For Those About to Rock.
