Playlist Thunderdome, Week 20
wow – 20 weeks already?? Last week, Boston’s "More Than a Feeling" beat out Kansas’ "Carry On, My Wayward Son," 13 votes to 9.
Back to more recent times!
vote!
The winners thus far:
Posted on October 6, 2005, in Music, Polls. Bookmark the permalink. 16 Comments.
Steve Evans
RJH
Scott B.
John C.
Susan M
Aaron Brown
ninemoons
John Harrison
kulturblogadmin
Kyle M
Brad
KulturBlogGuest
MCQ
Wm
Rebecca
Ivan
Geoff J
btdgreg
Clark Goble
Aaron R.
Tim J
Ben
Marcus
Brad Williams
gibsonbn
I also call this “Battle of the One-Named Artists, Round One”.
Wow. Nice list. Some real art here… Part of me feels guilty for this but I think I’m going with Morrissey. Not because the art (or artist) is better than the other choices, but rather because I like the memories that song brings back for me.
I would just point out that The Smiths are past winners. Typically this would exclude them from further competition, but the other one-named artists didn’t really match well (and Beck also has come up before).
I’m passing this week.
That Morrissey song kinda annoys me. I have a lot of respect for Bjork and this song is awesome. Really awesome.
But Prince is a genius. Did you know this song has no bass in it? Here’s an interesting write-up on Prince:
Prince WAS a genius. What has he done in the last 10 — nay, 15 years? Batdance!
Ok, Steve, I listened to them. Still not voting. Can’t get excited about any of them.
My vote is for the Prince song. The other two (I know I speak sacrilege here) really should have stayed with their bands. Especially Morrissey.
People! How can you vote for anyone but Bjork? The Morrissey song is pretty good too I guess. I’ve never understood Prince’s appeal.
I admit it. I am a sucker for Bjork. I love her voice just enough to go on whatever wierd trip she wants to take me on. This was no contest.
Also, umlauts rock!
Gotta go with Prince. Morrisey is so depressing and to me Bjork sounds a lot like her famous dress to me. Sorry to offend just can’t get into her music.
Prince creeps me out, but I like some of his music. I don’t agree this is his best song. But it’s better than the others.
Supergenie: Prince’s last good album, the Love Symbol Album, came out 13 years ago, in answer to your question.
At least this week, I can vote. Preferably, I’d like to use it to take a vote away from Morrissey; since I can’t, it must go Bjork.
It is a very strange thing to try to compare or choose between Prince and Morrissey. Morrissey’s main gift is to put together strange and interesting lyrics. For him to really function as he should, he must be backed up by a very talented guitarist. His work with the Smiths shines for exactly that reason. His solo work has suffered a lot for that same reason. His song “Irish Blood, English Heart” mainly succeeds because the backup band (especially the driving guitar) sounds so much like the Smiths.
Prince is more multifaceted and talented than Morrissey. I feel weird saying that … because back in the day I spent a lot more money on Smiths albums. But I still think it’s true. Prince sings better and does more interesting things with his voice than Morrissey does. But above all, in my opinion, Prince is a great rock guitarist. It’s true his music gets played on R&B and pop stations … but when he’s at his best I see him as a funkified guitar god. He’s what happens when James Brown meets Jimi Hendrix. I once read an article about free music downloads that claimed the biggest baddest mostest downloads were from groups like Led Zeppelin, the Rolling Stones and um, yeah … Prince.
Supergenius … did you hear Prince’s song Musicology? That was a good song. Maybe not great … but it was solid old-school type music. And that song did in fact have bass.
Bjork?
I think the only other hit Prince had without a bassline was “Kiss.”
From that article I linked:
But there must be at least twenty ways to prove that hip-hop is damn-near patterned after Prince, including his genius, blatant use of sexuality and the use of controversy as a way to get attention. I don’t think any artist before had used that level of sex to get in the door and be accepted by the mainstream. I wonder what his mind state was in 1980, standing onstage in kiddie briefs, leg warmers and high heels without a Number One hit. That was a risk.
I had to cover my eyes for some of the comments thus far (Allison, your heresy was no surprise, but Danithew… that hurt). This isn’t Mozzer’s greatest stand-alone song as the tempo is a bit slow for a thunderdome showdown (and it’s also easily his most over-played song) but it is still great.
It’s a shame to put this up against “Joga” which could have been a winner on any other week. That both of them will lose to Prince is beyond words. At least it’s “Dove’s Cry” and not “Little Red Corvette.”