Rules

Hi all,

In order to help get this sub up and running I propose we hold a weekly discussion about an album of our choice. Every weekend we can nominate a few records, vote on which one we'd like to listen to, and then discuss. Ideally we would aim to highlight newer releases but you can nominate whatever the hell you want.

If you're interested, comment any suggestions you have and upvote other suggestions you like.

ITT: Post a track (one) you are working on and other channers will give you feedback. The only rule is that if you post a track you must give feedback to someone else.

How to Moderate this Idea: Low effort/ only posting for promotion will get your comments deleted and potentially banned from the thread.

I will start with how I think posts should be formatted.

There are the most upvoted songs on that thread on the playlist. I hope some people can enjoy it!

http://open.spotify.com/user/zspyk2wziyva7nd4fdlcpb1tz/playlist/0sz25A0UqAfcQdso97w3kA

EDIT: I see a decent amount of comments in here that critique the selection, so I just want to reiterate that these are the songs from that thread that had the most upvotes, and they were in no way influenced by my personal taste in music.

EDIT #2: some of the songs were the wrong versions as noted by some people, so they've been replaced by their originals.

EDIT #3: Huge thanks to everyone who expressed their gratitude for the list. I am ecstatic that so many of you are enjoying it, and appreciate the time it took to put it together.

I know, I know, believe me, I know, but listen, can we just — for a minute — forget about Shrek and memes and eggs and Guy Fieri, and overcome our knee-jerk cynicism, and consider that this might actually be a better song than we give it credit for?

There’s actually a lot more going on there than I knew back in the late ‘90s when it was all over the radio. Key to my newfound appreciation of it is reading the lyrics, most of which I couldn’t actually make out just from listening. Here they are, in their entirety:

It ain't no joke, I'd like to buy the world a toke

And teach the world to sing in perfect harmony

And teach the world to snuff the fires and the liars

Hey, I know it's just a song but it's spice for the recipe

This is a love attack, I know, went out but it's back

It's just like any fad, it retracts before impact

And just like fashion, it's a passion for the with it and hip

If you got the goods, they'll come and buy it just to stay in the clique

So don't delay, act now, supplies are running out

Allow, if you're still alive, six to eight years to arrive

And if you follow, there may be a tomorrow

But if the offer’s shunned, you might as well be walkin' on the sun

Twenty-five years ago, they spoke out and they broke out

Of recession and oppression and together they toked

And they folked out with guitars around a bonfire

Just singin' and clappin', man, what the hell happened there?

Some were spellbound, some were hellbound

Some, they fell down and some got back up

And fought back against the meltdown

And their kids were hippie chicks or hypocrites

Because fashion is smashin' the true meaning of it

So don't delay, act now, supplies are running out

Allow, if you're still alive, six to eight years to arrive

And if you follow, there may be a tomorrow

But if the offer’s shunned, you might as well be walkin' on the sun

And it ain't no joke when a mama's handkerchief is soaked

With her tears because her baby's life has been revoked

The bond is broke up, so choke up and focus on the close up

Mr. Wizard can't reform, no God-like hocus-pocus

So don't sit back, kick back and watch the world get bushwhacked

News at ten, your neighborhood is under attack

Put away the crack before the crack puts you away

You need to be there when your baby's old enough to relate

So don't delay, act now, supplies are running out

Allow, if you're still alive, six to eight years to arrive

And if you follow, there may be a tomorrow

But if the offer’s shunned, you might as well be walkin' on the sun

I’m not saying it’s Dylan, but those lyrics are much more clever and intricate than they appear on first listen. Reading the lyrics also gives me the impression that the song is less cynical and sarcastic than I originally thought. I used to think it was just making fun of hippies, and how Baby Boomers abandoned their principles, and how the hippie movement was co-opted into a fashion statement. But giving it a closer look, the singer sounds genuinely sad and angry that we’ve forgotten the ideals behind the fashion.

I completely missed the meaning of the lines, “And if you follow, there may be a tomorrow / But if the offer’s shunned, you might as well be walkin’ on the sun.” Maybe I’m reading too much into it, but to me this sounds less dismissive and more apocalyptic. I don’t know if he’s talking about global thermonuclear war or global warming, or both, but the impression I get from these lines is: the hippie ethos of peace and love and living in harmony with the earth is not just nice to think about; it’s necessary for our survival as a species. And if we as a society don’t reconnect with that, we will literally destroy ourselves. And these fuckers turned it into a meaningless fashion statement and sold it back to us as New Beetles and flared jeans, and now the only remnant of this incredibly vital counterculture is more widespread use of substances that destroy people’s lives. I mean, that’s fucking horrible!

And seeing those lines that way casts new light on the part, “Allow, if you’re still alive...” I used to think that was just making fun of Baby Boomers for being old, and/or the endless cycle of old fads becoming cool again. But in light of “And if you follow, there may be a tomorrow,” it sounds more like a warning.

Funnily enough, it’s now been almost 25 years since this song was released. And the ice caps are melting at a terrifyingly fast rate and we are, thanks to Trump, once again perilously close to nuclear war. And we’re all kind of avoiding thinking about it by drowning ourselves in exactly the sort of distractions this song is about (drugs, consumerism, etc.). The hippies’ offer was definitively shunned, and now we’re closer than ever to our own destruction.

This is a surprisingly good song, man. It’s catchy, well-crafted, and well-written, with something to say and actual relevance to our time. Laugh at me all you want, but I’ve got genuine respect for Smash Mouth right now.

Also, the first person to comment “someBODY once told me” is getting downvoted so hard their grandchildren will lose karma.

Edit: Added formatting for clarity.

Also, Elton John on "Levon" and Rick Wakeman on "Life on Mars?" It's the Bechstein at Trident Studios in London. Source.

It was at the beginning of my senior year in college, I came across this post in Askreddit after seeing it linked on Facebook. I went to high school with the author, I think he was a year or two above me. That’s not important though.

What is important is that I read his post and I saw all the replies, especially this part of the thread where /u/GiraffeKiller tells him to start in the 1950s and work his way through the decades to which /u/pH responds basically stating that if he starts then, he misses the entire jazz age.

When I read this I realized just how set in my ways I was musically, mainly listening to the same 40-60 songs, pieces and soundtracks.

Reading /u/deafstoryteller’s post and those two comments and I realized that a man who, until that point in time, had never understood or appreciated music was undergoing the experience of a lifetime. He was listening to all these songs for the very first time.

Now, I may not be able to magically forget a song like Bohemian Rhapsody so I can listen to it for the first time again, but I figured I could do the next best thing and choose a starting point which I could begin my own musical journey.

The key was figuring out where to begin. Starting anywhere in the 1900s would mean I miss a lot of musical foundations and at the same time, starting in the 1800s would mean skipping a lot of influential musical evolution.

So I started at the beginning and set out to listen to everything I could find chronologically. I found Wikipedia’s table of years in music, went to 2nd Millennium BC and listened to the Hurrian Song from the 2nd Millennium BC.

Now I’ve just hit 1900.

Behind me has been a slew of fantastic music, from Handel’s Messiah and Alessandro Grandi’s plorabo die ac note to Mozart’s Eine kleine Nachtmusik and Luigi Boccherini’s String Quintet in E Major. From Charles Wesley’s Soldiers of Christ, Arise to Stephen Foster’s My Old Kentucky Home to Gilbert and Sullivan’s HMS Pinafore.

It’s taken me four years to get this far and in those four years, I’ve seen music go from something that could only be enjoyed by the high class upper crust of society to something even the common man can enjoy.

Further, what’s been a pretty straightforward evolutionary journey is about to explode into every possible direction stylistically and I’m looking forward to every minute of it.

I might post what really stands out to me too.

--EDIT--

Many have expressed their interest in a playlist with the pieces and songs that have really stood out to me. During the Baroque era and early classical era, I had started a playlist and as I kept going, I started posting what I really enjoyed to Facebook.

Give me a few weeks and I'll consolidate them into a single playlist.

Just got a notification via the Associated Press. Family attorney conformed the blues legends death.