Sam's Top 20 of 2016: #1

1.Cool Heat-Momma's Boy

You know my fascination with this song was a very slow burning kind of deal because I remember seeing these guys at The Homegrown Buzz Showcase and being told how dope they were by my favorite local DJ and all I remember about their set was that it was one of the most awesome fucking shows I'd seen but oddly enough I couldn't remember any of the details about it and all I had was this awesome little sheet of paper with a download code and whenever I redeemed that download code it seemed to have opened a crazy little world for me.

From some of the nicest outdoor spaces, to slick city bars, to this bands god damn basement Momma's Boy are a hell of a captivating act that craft some ingeniously simple tunes that just take your attention and make you think to yourself, “GOD DAMNIT THIS IS THE BEST FUCKING BAND EVER!” and all I've gotten to just cling on is this one fucking song and OH GOD DAMN is it just too fucking good for it's own right.

You know basic songwriting 101 verse chorus verse the idea that you give a verse and then follow it up by the hook to you know give everyone something to remember and cling onto since it's what we all remember you know things like, “Sweet dreams are made of the years, who am I to disagree,” “Don't Stop Believing, hold on to that feeling, Streetlights people oh-a-oh,” “I fucked 17 girls in a grocery store and I didn't lose my erection,” you know stuff like that.

This song on the other hand is a bit different because in a way it reminds me of a song I adore called, “Standing in the Rain,” by Husker Du in that it instead of going verse chorus verse it instead uses the first half of it's run time to bust out a couple of verses in succession before reaching around the 2 minute mark when you finally get a proper chorus that's just one god damn phenomenal if not ingeniously simple piece of songwriting and performance that at that very second hooks you and GOD DAMNIT did this song hook me.

This song starts out very unassumingly with some simple strumming of a very surf rock tuned guitar that then bust out in an awesome little swirling burst of everyone jumping into the pool at once with the whole band just then making things very dreamy and awesome before the vocals then start and just mesh so perfectly well with things in such a natural way that you can't help but not realize that you're almost 2 minutes in before it bust out one simple but so perfectly executed line, “cause you're coming closer, closer,”and GOD DAMNIT that fucking line it's just so fucking simple but so good because it's simple to sing along to and it'll make you fucking move I know because I just love jumping around singing it over and over either in the privacy of my own humble abode or whenever I'm seeing them perform it live this oh to awesome bit of musical nirvana just kind of reminds me of why under 4 minutes is so good because out of nowhere and most immediately it just ends...done...bam that's it the song is in a whirling haze of totally fucking awesome just done leaving you standing there cold, a little bit scared, and feeling like you just had the best god damn 3 minutes and 55 seconds of your god damn life.....but then you hit that repeat button.

There's a reason this song is Number 1 and I said it back when I first talked about it earlier this year this song will just kind of crawl into that special little part of your brain that tells you, “Hey this is totally fucking awesome,” and it'll just make a cozy little spot there maybe pour itself a nice cold one and it'll just fucking take residence there and never leave and to be honest I don't think I'd let it leave either because the unexplained out of nowhere quality of fascination this song brought me this year is something I definitely wouldn't want to have just leave.

Also in all honesty this song kind of is a bit symbolic for my year in a nutshell because between April to October of this year I probably attended more shows than I could have even possibly thought I'd ever of been able to and it's because of this Homegrown Showcase that I attended and the vast amount of immensely talented and incredible acts that this city is filled with from Rachel Mallin and the Wild Type, Yes You Are, Kangaroo Knife Fight, Vigils and Thieves, The Uk's, Brave the Spirit, and of course Momma's Boy I've meet some bad ass and talented fucking people that have made my life quite a bit more eventful and given me a load of new friends and some of the best god damn performances I could have ever thought of seeing and fuck I even had a god damn concert in my house which is fucking mind blowing to say the least.

It's this band and the fact that I decided to give them a view at the showcase that eventually lead me to drive out to a house in some random part of Kansas to see them again which lead to me meeting a variety of people that I'm not sure that I'd ever of really gotten to know and managed to make things a little bit better even if I'm still kind of all over the place in my emotions at least I got to rock the fuck out to some great god damn songs and this one in all honesty is more definitively than any other year of top 20's the truest number 1 song of the year Momma's Boy are the fucking best god damn band in Kansas City and every song is a god damn winner that they do and I'll keep supporting them as long as possible and keep treasuring every set list even if I could literally have enough to wallpaper and an entire wall in my house.

Well there you go Kansas City proved that it has the best songs of the year let's see if next year everyone else can catch up thanks for all the support to every band who shared and everyone who enjoyed what I write you're the best here's to what I plan to be a drastic change in style here in 2017 so stay tune for that change to be announced come January but until then happy holiday's to all and here's to one crazy year.