There’s something about this song that–I don’t know–no matter how many times I listen to it, it never gets old. For this song, it’s not so much the guy’s voice (though, again, it is beautiful); it’s the lyrics and the fantastic talent of the musicians.
The whole 5000 hours of last season’s schmaltzy “Idol Gives Back” was worth it for Kelly Clarkson (with Jeff Beck(!)) singing Patty Griffin’s wonderful Up to the Mountain.
Ratatat’s “Seventeen Years” (available on their myspace). I was blown away when I first heard it, it was music someone chose for a juggling act I was doing. A year after first hearing them, I saw them live, and when they played this song, it was as though they were the best band in the world playing the best song in the world, and they and the audience all knew it. Fantastic.
When I first heard the song “Dayvan Cowboy” by Boards of Canada, I thought it was a good song, one of their better songs. However, when I then saw the music video for the song, I was utterly blown away and watched it multiple times in a row.
Finally, just recently I heard His Name is Alive’s “How Dark is Your Dark Side”, and listened to it litterally all night on repeat. I can’t find it legally online, but some good Google searches should come up with it. It can’t be found for free online except from KEXP’s podcast (where it is included with a bunch of other songs on their “Songs that matter” podcast number 72), so I recommend buying the MP3 (or whole album) from Amazon.
Knights of Cydonia by Muse has to be the most amazing song I’ve ever heard- and it has an equally awesome music video, too.
A recent find, Nellie McKay’s “Identity Theft” is just such a cool, cynical but upbeat-Broadway-sounding song, I can’t stop playing it. I can’t find it on YouTube, but you can find other McKay songs there.
All Rights Reversed by the Chemical Brothers featuring The Klaxxons.
A few weeks ago, I heard Concrete Blonde’s cover of Everybody Knows on the radio. It didn’t blow my socks off, but it made me remember a sock blowing live performance of the song from MTV’s 120 Minutes from the early '90s. God bless youtube.
Thanks for all of these, I can hardly wait to go home so I can check out all the links that I can’t here at work. I’ve got to mention two that I’m surprised haven’t shown up yet: John Cale’s Hallelujah and the Johnny Cash version of “Hurt.” They’re both chilling in their own ways.
I love “When They Ring Those Golden Bells” and have versions from Natalie Merchant and Emmylou Harris.
Here’s a Loretta Lynn version.
I also was blown away by “Blow Gabriel Blow” as done in the De-Lovely movie. I plan to have it played at my funeral. 
I thought of a few more Blow Me Away songs last night…
Peter Gabriel’s Signal to Noise is truly epic. (I ended up using the instrumental version in a play I directed - it was amazing, IMHO). Trust me - you’ve got to hear this one.
And then there’s Pink Floyd’s Fletcher Memorial Home, from the underrated Final Cut album. A very biting, political song that still gets me every time.
Preach it! Almost anything by PG falls into this category for me. Rhythm of the Heat is one of the most visceral songs I can remember ever hearing.
(Note: the above YouTube video is Rhythm of the Heat accompanied by snippets of the movie Princess Mononoke. Given this and my previous post in this thread, I probably sound like more of an anime fangirl than I actually am…I normally don’t go for homebrew “music videos” like this, but this one is quite excellently done IMHO - the two go together really, really well.)
I’ve seen them. They were followed by Daft Punk. Daft Punk live kind of redefines “best band in the world”. But I did mostly enjoy Ratatat’s set.
The first time I heard this, I was blown away. The video is pretty lame - crank the volume up and turn away from your monitor.
A friend played this song while I was stationed in Italy in about 1995.
Tomorrow, Wendy by Concrete Blonde.
If you can download the live version (the one I heard), you’ll see what I mean; specifically the track included on Bloodletting. The studio version is featured in the above-linked YouTube clip.
Just. Wow.
I found it! This is the same live version to which I was referring in the previous post.
“Biko” off Peter Gabriel Plays Live is in this category for me.
Wow, that’s awesome. Thanks for that link.
Man, I shouldn’t have listened to that at work. wiping away tears at desk
Thanks for sharing that.
I heard a song on the radio a while back, sounded like 60’s rock, will never forget it. I nearly cried. It was 60’s rock, mostly acoustic i think, and a story about a young guy that goes off to war and dies. <b>Anybody know what I’m talking about?</b> I’ve never been able to find it since…
To get you to dance even if you don’t know how (electronic):
Praise You – Fatboy Slim
Nuttin No Go So Remix – DJ Mummy
Emerge – FischerSpooner
Epic Soundtracks:
Gladiator, especially “Now We Are Free”
The Island, especially “My Name is Lincoln”
Donnie Darko
But if I had to pick just one song:
<b>Amie by Pure Prairie League</b>
I’m assuming it wasn’t “Billy, Don’t Be a Hero”. 