Wednesday, December 28, 2011

Sams Best of 2011

You know I’ve been seeing a lot of Best of 2011 list floating around the internet and TV and I figured since I enjoy top 5’s and it’s just that time of year to do so I’d compose my picks for the best cuts of the year, but before I get into anything I’m going to point out that while I enjoy just being all about me, myself, and I on this faithful little blog I’m going to have to point out a few tunes that while aren’t the most quality tunes that really do deserve to be noted for just how freaking big they were this year like…


5. Super Bass-Nicki Minaj



This year was chocked full of high energy pop infused electronic mess’ all over radio and for the better part of this year I was forced to listen to quite a bit of top 40 and of all the guilty pleasures I endured this one was honestly the biggest surprise. Now I’ve always been aware of Nicki Minaj and her various assets, but the music she does at best was a very well done series of Rap Verses and easily avoidable songs but one day I’m trolling the Youtube’s and I see this odd little square box for this Video on the main page for this song with a very pink Nicki and decided to give it the old college heave ho and give this song a listen.

I’m not going to lie to you at first I was a good bit unprepared for the 808 heavy blast of sugary sweet pop coated catchiness that I was about to listen to and for whatever reason the only thing that came to mind was that white people would love this….Don’t judge me.

Needless to say I was more then correct because not too soon after a Taylor Swift endorsement this song blew the fuck up and the next thing I know I’m hearing it EVERYWEHRE and while I will note that Party Rock Anthem was the bigger tune this one I feel I would rather note as being worthwhile in the realms of pop tunes I have to note as being worthwhile to losing some credibility over.

Ok I’m going to make note that Pop radio always tries to get atleast one alternative act into their rotation of tunes in order to 1. Give people a break from the auto tuned mess and 2. Give some sense of credibility but every year something odd seems to creep in and oh was this year’s underdog a dozy.



4. Pumped Up Kicks-Foster and the People



Now if threre was one surprisingly HUGE hit that occurred this year it’d be this song by a landslide because I honestly didn’t even remotely expect this spaced out little jam about someone losing their shit and going on a killing spree to even remotely crack top 40 but for whatever reason by the grace of god these guys have become the breakout act of 2011.

You know even after the massive amount of radio play this song has been subjugated to it still has this kind of refreshingly strung out sound to it that’s still as warm and tripped out as the first time I heard it and thought Pumped was some radio edit. The sheer hypnotic nature of this little indie rock gem seemed to really creep into radio and just took over person after person and while I will admit that Mumford and Sons folk rock styling’s where the kick in the balls modern radio needed this song just more seems like a radio staple that’s less pretentious more accessible and think for that it really is one of the best tunes and my personal pick for brake out song of 2011.

Now as great as this song is your reading Sam’s Song Of the Day people and if you’ve been reading every day you know that there’s one particular artist that’s probably dominated more post then anyone else this year.



3. Cry Baby-Cee-Lo Green



AHHHHH yeah people it’s time to yet again write about the all mighty lady killer himself Cee-Lo, “MO Fakun Lady Killa,” Green and I’m guessing this choice is at best a bit confusing but let me explain myself here.

Ok now I’m going to have to say people that while, “Fuck You,” was not only a monumentally amazing number and the most gratifyingly successful number of the year I personally feel that while the song as a whole lacks what really is the finer points of the Lady Killer album which is the showcasing of how Cee-Lo is really the modern day sultan of soul, the man with the master plan to make all them panties drop, the undeniably most well crafted performer out there when it comes to taking that retro-grooved sound and making it sound like an instant classic and of all the songs off the masterpiece that is The Lady Killer I feel that this is the best released single in terms of giving the listener an idea of what’s to come on that album.

Although now that I’m sitting here listening to it for the sake of really being able to review it I’ve come to realize that over its sincerely soulful vocal performance and it’s slower pace it’s really one of the classiest get the hell over yourself tunes I’ve ever heard and in it’s smoother then smooth sound it’s hiding this mildly egocentric tale of how her broke the ex-lovers heart to a point where she’s now made him the bad guy in this situation which is both classy and awesome, but even an amusingly off beat video staring the all mighty Urkle couldn’t catapult this song to the heights of the next two tunes which to say the least was a decision I really had to think hard about.



2. Rolling in the Deep-Adele



Honestly amongst the heap of tunes that felt the desire to come out this year this one slowly but surely managed to chug it’s ever so powerfully soulful sound onto radio and just carved out a path of destruction that almost no one could match.

This song was a slow burner in a lot of ways because the first time I heard it I didn’t really quite understand what I was about to be completely overtaken by but this song grew and grew and then out of nowhere it just suddenly became this behemoth of a hit that everyone just couldn’t escape and didn’t really want to for that matter. This song is even now after so many rotations still this overwhelmingly huge sounding blast of misery that only someone who is both pissed off and vocally gifted could do because this song just starts off ever so simply with a bare boned guitar and Adele’s voice in a hollow room before then erupting in this huge almost tribal sound that she then belts out these god given bits of rage and power that just grab you from the heart strings and make you want to yell fuck you to that person that broke your heart this year.

Really this song is just one of many cuts on an album that really deserves all the credit as being the best of the year and as great as this song and it’s corresponding album are I just can’t call it number one even though every single best off 2011 list out there from Rolling Stone to VH1 would like to tell me there was just one song this year that blew my mind in ways I really couldn’t of ever figured it would and that would be….


1. Rope-Foo Fighters



Now if there was one song this year that I can say that not only made an impact on me that was both instantaneous and lasting it was this and not only did this song blow my damn mind but it finally made me realize just why these guys are constantly considered to be the best, yes ladies and gentlemen I have finally found the way of the foo.

As powerful as Adele’s voice is nothing beats the rush of power an electric guitar can bring and not only did they bring the rock they made my choice for the greatest song of 2011.

To be honesty I’ve always been on the fence about this band because as much as I dislike Dave Grohl as a person I’ve always felt that this band really just makes very catchy records that all grow old as soon as the radio decides to rotate them every five minutes but this song was different. From the first time I really heard the echoing intro I wasn’t sure what to expect but then out of nowhere I suddenly got blasted with this furiously steady stream of ever so heavy guitars before then being greeted with the familiar sound of Dave Grohl giving a very melodic verse before then erupting in a series of bouncing yelps before then singing this ever so larger then life Chorus that instantaneously made me have to go listen to this song another 150 times and buy the album.

No shit people this song alone made walk out and buy a copy of what was to be a surprisingly amazing album and even now after so many rotations just like the first time I ever heard this song I still can’t control my desire to jump up and scream this song as I feverously air guitar the fuck out of this very garage-rock influenced rocker that brought just the right amount of ass kicking rockers Alternative rock radio needed amongst the haze of electro-indie dominance and for that I have to give it credit as being my choice as the best song of 2011.

Well there you go people those are my picks for the 5 best songs of 2011 it really has been a bad ass year for music which is both a surprise and a pleasant change I can’t wait to go through yet another years batch of songs of the day hopefully covering some bad ass tunes before this predicted end of the world.

Thank you for reading this year here's to another year of shenanigans.

-Sam

Wednesday, September 28, 2011

WOO-HOO 1 year buddy :D

“Happy Birthday to me, Happy Birthday to me, Happy birthday Sam’s Song of the Day, happy birthday to me.”

Yes people I’ve done it one full year has passed since I started this wonderful little Blog of mine and to say the least it’s an accomplishment I feel some bit of pride for the fact that while I don’t have 365 post I’ve gotten a fuckload none-the-less and feel that I’ve greatly improved in my writing since the first post that one year ago.

Now rather than trying to come up with some grandiose thousand plus word filled article where I put some great piece of work under a microscope and analyze the hell out of it I’m going to instead write for you guy’s something very simple and kind of to the point.

I started this Blog because my buddy Verta one day read a post I had made on my facebook about the song, “Blow Up the Outside World,” where she exclaimed that I must start a blog. Now hearing some exclamation of satisfaction to something I’ve written took me back a bit because for the most part I felt that people just ignored my writings and that I wasn’t really ever likely to go past a few weeks, but time went on and the next thing I know I’d almost done this for a year so upon realizing that people actually could like the product I was posting I decided to give it a shot.

I will admit this does most of the time come off as a bit of a thing that the only real people reading are my close friends and occasionally my mother but the overall response has been positive, and as I near my 2nd year of actually writing these things up I’m going to take a second to sit back and bask in the accomplishment of keeping this bad boy consistently updated for a full year people so you know what why don’t we all sit back, relax, and enjoy this wonderful little celebration of today.

Wednesday, August 31, 2011

The Greatest Song Ever....

Fuck You-Cee-Lo Green

You know the world recently had to add another member to the infamous 27 club in the form of one Amy Winehouse, and really her influence will take time to notice but upon her death I came to some realization that along with her is most likely to come the death of the modern soul movement.

Modern Soul Movement I bet you’re probably thinking that I’m talking out my ass but let me take some time to explain what I mean by that. Whenever one Amy Winehouse hit it huge with her kind of retro-grooved old school inspired tunes I noticed that there was a but if a floodgate that had opened upon her reaching of the peak and all of a sudden the rise of the soul inspired throwback act came to be.After Amy we had artist like Duffy, The Noisettes, Fitz and the Tantrums, and of course Mr. Cee-Lo Greens most recent effort The Lady Killer. People weren’t afraid to sound like a time capsule to the 60’s and the music buying public weren’t afraid to embrace this trend and felt like actually giving these acts a try. The only issue in this movement before I get into things is that like the artist of the bygone 60’s most of these artist in question only really will end up being known for a single catchy tune that’ll in many ways represent the timelessness of certain genres but in many cases its’ ironic because it only further proves that history repeats itself.

Now after taking all of almost 250 words to describe just how influential of an artist one Amy Winehouse was would I be writing a recently released cut not done by her as being the greatest song ever? Well you see here as amazing as she was the only real way I could go as to explain her greatness is by writing about a song that came long after she established this formula and has probably yielded its most amazing result.

"Fuck You," it was the second coming for one Cee-Lo Green Crazy had gotten him out there but nobody was quite sure of who he really was or what he had to offer. It was an unusually spaced out cut that Rolling Stone named the greatest song of the decade and Gnarles Barkely as a group that left as fast as they came, but then during the summer of last year Cee-Lo comes out with this throwback jam and just comes back in ways that no one could ever really comprehend.

Here he was singing about the love that couldn’t be and making that painfully pissed off declaration that we all have from time to time upon being hurt by the one’s we loved, “Fuck You,” it’s a ballsy move there’s no way the mass public could accept something that profanity laden, that raunchy, that upfront and I really didn’t expect it to not only give Cee-Lo yet another top 10 smash hit, a slew of Grammy Nominations, and 15 more minutes in the spotlight but it brought my attention to an album that was more then, “Fuck You,” and a whole bunch of filler tracks it was the most finely crafted series of pop songs that showcase an entire range of an era many consider to be the best, and this song is the thing that brought all of this to the spot light.

Why is this the greatest song ever? Well it’s unapologetic, catchy, upfront, and instantly memorable there’s something in it the whole world can relate to and upon release the world not only did but it wholeheartedly took this man who many had thoughts time had come and brought forth some sense that talent matters again, and I don’t think any of this would have been possible if not for Amy Winehouse making it hip to be old school again.


Sunday, June 12, 2011

The Greatest Song EVER!!!

What a touchy subject my friends, what is the greatest song ever made? We all have our own opinions as to what we would consider to be the best and we all have a different song, but you know what there’s a certain set of tunes that if you were to ask a group of people as being universally known for being great then we’d have the starting of a segment I stole from another website that I’ll say I don’t remember the name of.

So here I present to thee an ongoing segment that I’m calling, “The Greatest Song Ever…” and the premise is simple I write about the most universally or at least what I see as being the most universally accepted tunes that one would consider the best, and it’s as simple as that people.

So this being a new segment let's start this bastard out with the biggest fish in the sea....

Billie Jean-Michael Jackson

He’s known far and wide as the king of pop for a reason people. It wasn’t that he could dance, it wasn’t that he could entertain, and it wasn’t even that he made thriller it was the songs he did that made Mr. Jackson the most successful artist in the world people and if there was a song that I would have to say was his crown masterpiece it would be this one.

“Billie Jean is Not my Lover, She’s just a girl who claims that I am the one, but the kid is not my son,” what a morbid line for one of the biggest hits of his massive career, it’s a song about betrayal, it’s dark, moody, and unlike anything you could possibly expect from the same man who was partly responsible for songs like Don’t Stop till you get enough, Ben, ABC, and I’ll be there it’s really an example of what happens when an artist tries to step out of their boundaries and perform a song that is completely out of character and it’s an example of that artist completely taking over and showcasing that they’re here and they’ve accomplished just what they set out to do showcase that they are in fact someone to pay attention to.

Really, from its steady synth intro you know you’re in for something different and whenever you hear Michael deliver that opening line there’s a sense of maturity in his delivery that no other song he was able to do afterwards could exactly showcase. Its’ a straightforward number there’s no theatrics to it, it’s video is as simple as he could make it, and the songs a masterpiece and really the best thing Jackson ever did in his mighty career and the only shame is that there doesn’t exist a recording of him singing it with nothing more than an acoustic guitar backing him up because I’d kill to just get one listen to a pure vocal track just to hear the intensity that this man had in his voice on this masterpiece of pop music.

Thursday, May 19, 2011

Sams Song of the Day 200th Post Spectacular!!

(Now let me take a second to make note that the reason this is 2 days late is because life likes to force me to miss these things but that's besides the point)

Holy damn people I just made a realization that today after a little over 9 months of doing these damn things is my 200th post!! Now of course I’m aware that 200 isn’t really anything when you think about it but it seems special enough for me to actually make an attempt at having some fun here. So for today as late as it is I’m going to rather than posting a song of the day I’ve decided to instead to a post the kind of bands or songs that bring that special feeling to us all.

Now 200 post not being so special I decided to enlist my old buddy in crime and past contributor to this fine Blog of Mine one Dyllan Adams to help by writing about what I’m going to call your special song.

Now as cheesy as that sounds there’s a time in all of our life when we hear a song and for whatever reason it sticks with us, and for whatever reason that song always puts us in that special place. Now I being a bit of a square had decided to say fuck it and write about a song that makes life suck a little less, so what’s the criteria you might ask? Well a special song is as it sounds that song that gives us all that warm feeling of worth, that song that brings us to a time when life of course sucked a little less, the song that started this terrible addiction we have to any specific artist or band, and most importantly a song we feel our own. As I said this is going to be cheesy.

Now you see here Dyllan’s going to write about his favorite band, and since I’ve already covered that in my wonderful little 30 Day song Challenge and just about every song of theirs I’ve written about I’m going to instead write about a song that is very special to me, now I’m going to let you guys read his post while I write about the song I find to be noteworthy enough to write about in explicit detail so Dyllan here’s the floor:

I know, I suck.

We break bounds every day and don't know what people will say when we throw a bone into the boulevard that belongs to dogs. Portishead is one of those bands that make madness look like a work of art, you see the world (and the universe) with all its beauty and decayed diseased filth look like home sweet home. Western eyes does just that, I feel dead and beat to the point where no one can tell the starting point between me and the concrete. But Beth Gibbons draws me back like a siren does to sailors at sea. But let’s be honest, we all want to swim along them in oblivion. We want to lay back and revel in the waste of our own human filth and sin. Because “ i feel so cold, all hookers and gin. Just look at the mess we’re in” speaks it all. So sit back, relax and light up son. Because the world is gonna end with or without you

-Dyllan Adams



Trippy stuff My good friend Trippy Stuff it’s glad to see you’ve yet to lose your integrity as a human being. Now here are my thoughts:

I Do-Placebo

You know after writing about so many different songs in that Thirty day Song Challenge, and more recently having a whole mess of things on my mind I’ve made a realization that I don’t much care to talk about myself on here. Now there’s plenty of reasons behind that mostly the one’s involving me not wanting the whole world to be open to the various faults I possess, and also because I just frankly like to keep my shit to myself, but really there has been something on my mind these days and that would be that very special relationship we all have with that person we like to think of as our own.

Now this kind of relates about as much to my love of certain bands as it does the people I feel to be involved with, and here’s the thing people while I try my damndest to not associate people with bands, events, or songs because of some irrational fear that if things don’t work out then those bands, songs, and events shall forever be ruined I don’t often associate these specific artist, band, song, and such to these things. To be forever ruined by that individual is really something that I strongly dislike, and while I’ve dealt with a couple of losses here and there the one band that’s managed to survive a near fatal brush with this would happen to be Placebo.

Now before I get into this whole situation I’m just going to say that I’m not naming names and things aren’t really going to be talked about in explicit detail because for the most part I’m looking to discuss the band in question and more importantly why this particular song feels so damn special to me.

Placebo as I’ve written about before, are a band I heard about from a friend and fell in love with a single song. Now the thing about this band that no matter what my mental state is, they’ll always remind me of the only girl I have ever said, “I love you Too,” and for the longest time I did not like that because of course as so often is the case when we don’t like something, things didn’t quite work out for us, and because of that I almost stopped liking this band, but luckily enough I eventually came to acceptance with that whole situation and can now safely listen to this band without feeling like hell.

Now by this point I’m guessing you’re all wondering what in the holy hell this damn song has to do with any of that.

You see here if there was ever a song that I could best describe just what love felt like for me it’d be this one. For those who are actually listening to the song as your reading this you are probably thinking, “What the fuck?” and honestly I couldn’t blame you because I often think the same thing but let me attempt to explain it all. Whenever I felt that special feeling of actually caring for someone beyond the hey your cool let’s hang out stage it was a lot like this song a nervous yet exciting tale of wanting to be with that person that’s completely taken over your entire thought process, you want to constantly be with them, learn their little quirks, and even to an extent know what it’s like to be them. You have this feeling of being on top of the world and your looking down on the creation of a blooming relationship that you hope maybe could end in your own bitter quest of being alone to end vanishing. You want to say, “I Do,” just like the chorus and yes I felt that way at one time not to a point of wanting to marry the person but I wanted them and to be with them.

Now by some point in the various situations where I’ve been listening to my MP3 player and just letting the songs dictate my thoughts for whatever reason no matter what this song will always and forever reminds me of that person in question, and for the longest time I wasn’t too happy with that, but more recently as I’ve frankly grown the hell up and learned to deal with it all I have come to accept it and have found myself feeling many a butterfly in my stomach whenever I hear it come on my MP3 Player and honestly if that isn’t special then I don’t know what is.



There ya go people, what a special post about those special little songs that take us all back to a time and a place where we all love to go and can only really do so by listening to the music we love, thanks for reading these 200 post you crazy bastards let’s hope we can go for another 200.

-Sam’s Song of the Day