60. Sly & the Family Stone: "Hot Fun in the Summertime"(Sylvester "Sly Stone" Stewart)
1969
Chart info: U.S. (#2), UK (N/A)
Available on Anthology
Sly Stewart's band could play anything, and here they lay out plush vibes over words that seem a bit realist (moral: things come and go?). No surprise, however, that it's the sweet and psychedelic soul sounds that win out. Or do they? Sometimes, this song becomes an actual source of nostalgia for me, making me think about someone's old summers when both the sun and fun were hot. But then the bridge happens, and the bass drops out, and even though I know that summer ends soon, and that I'm constantly running out of time, and that life is just a meaningless exchange of particles-- well, fuck it, things come and go. --Dominique Leone
(John Cale/Lou Reed)
1967
Chart info: U.S. (N/A), UK (N/A)
Available on The Velvet Underground & Nico
The Velvets rap is always about "influence," but how many artists influenced both the Strokes and Belle and Sebastian? The opener to 1967's The Velvet Underground & Nico has more in common with the latter, as John Cale's celeste tinkles beside the feedback wash of Sterling Morrison's bass-guitar plod, and Lou Reed's gentle melody explains what an early-morning comedown felt like before Crate & Barrel invented downtempo. It's a walk of no shame, solitary and serene despite submerged bursts of paranoia. Like their non-evil twins the Modern Lovers, the Velvet Underground introduced not so much a sound as an aesthetic, and that's pretty hard to bite. --Marc Hogan
(John Lennon/Paul McCartney)
1964
Chart info: U.S. (#1), UK (#1)
Available on Meet the Beatles!
Something about a Kennedy dying, and an airplane arriving in New York. And though the Beatles got more consistently great-- or at least more self-consciously artistic after their initial impact-- they never really got much better than 1964 and "I Want to Hold Your Hand". People still won't shut up about Kurt Cobain mish-mashing the Beatles and Black Sabbath, but here are the Fabs themselves shaking up both twee and punk before either was invented. --Marc Hogan
(Tommy James/Peter Lucia)
1968
Chart info: U.S. (#1), UK (N/A)
Available on Crimson & Clover
Not gonna front: I loved Joan Jett's version first. But her cover rocks too hard. This song-- quite possibly the closest white pop musicians have ever come to approximating how making love actually feels-- is meant to be an afternoon roll in the hay, not an alleyway screw. Even though the climaxes are certainly there, "Crimson and Clover" isn't about the payoff, it's about the journey: those three chords descending like pieces of clothing hitting the floor, the sweaty droplets of reverb, the backbeat thrusts. Over and over, over and over. --Amy Phillips
(Serge Gainsbourg)
1968
Chart info: U.S. (N/A), UK (N/A)
Available on Comic Strip
During his collaborations with then-lover Brigitte Bardot, Gainsbourg nurtured a near Warholian obsession with American iconography: Ford Mustangs (bang!), Coca-Cola, comic strips, and, of course, gangsters. Portraying himself as a cultural outlaw (which, in his most transgressive work, he undoubtedly was), Gainsbourg narrates the lives and deaths of the infamous bank robbers. For listeners who don't parlez français, it's one of Gainsbourg's most fascinating songs in that, from start to finish, it never really changes. Its acoustic foundation is miraculously filled out by a fat, creeping bass line, dizzy strings, and a bizarre hiccupping backing vocal, all of which turn simple strums into something hypnotizing. --John Motley
(Gary Jackson/Raynard Miner/Carl Smith)
1967
Chart info: U.S. (#6), UK (#11)
Available on The Greatest Hits of Jackie Wilson
It's no shock that the finest four-stringer to ever lay in the cut, James Jamerson, provided the base for Wilson's late-1960s resurrection. With the can't-miss arrangement, the then 33-year-old Detroit deity emotes with enough searing intensity to even explode through today's layers of post-pop cynicism. Truth is, there's not much depth. But Wilson's idyllic, soul mate destination is so inviting that, by the time the horns sweep in, you may stop snickering at Brangelina and start to appreciate their forever bond. The thing can move mile-high peaks-- or at least the Statue of Liberty. --Ryan Dombal
(John Stewart)
1967
Chart info: U.S. (#1), UK (#5)
Available on The Birds, The Bees & the Monkees
There's something extra-touching about a band that's ostensibly "for the kids" singing a song about the end of childhood. The lolling piano line and the big, bright chorus-- "Cheer up sleepy Jean"-- are irresistible to people of all ages, but there's something moving about the way the narrator's daydreams are ever-so-slightly punctured in the verses: even a young kid glued to the Monkees' TV show knows that the sweet comes with the bitter, so why try to hide it? --Chris Dahlen
(John Bonham/Willie Dixon/John Paul Jones/Jimmy Page/Robert Plant)
1969
Chart info: U.S. (#4), UK (#21)
Available on Led Zeppelin II
According to Joy Press and Simon Reynolds' The Sex Revolts, American soldiers in Vietnam would ride into battle blasting "Whole Lotta Love", the part where it roars out of its fuzzed-out miasmic free-jazz middle section and back into its titanic brontosaurus riff. It's a terrifying image, bloodthirsty heavily armed children fueling themselves with the heaviest, most violent music available. But it's oddly exhilarating, too, and that's the genius of the song. Zeppelin turned teenage sex-drive into apocalyptic precision-tooled violence. Even in that experimental stretch, the peals of feedback sound like bombs falling. --Tom Breihan
(Hoagy Carmichael/Stuart Gorrell)
1960
Chart info: U.S. (#1), UK (#24)
Available on Anthology
In its conception, "Georgia on My Mind" was about songwriter Hoagy Carmichael's sister, not the Peach State. But when native Georgian Ray Charles wrapped his sultry pipes around it, it became an obvious choice for official State song, despite the weird image of a landmass competing with "other arms" and "other eyes" for the singer's affections. (Come to think of it, that's a rather odd thing to write about one's sister as well.) The string section hovers just this side of schmaltz, and Charles' twinkling piano and supple inflections imbue the song with an elegiac sway, peaceful as those moonlit pines. --Brian Howe
(Jeff Barry/Ellie Greenwich/Phil Spector)
1966
Chart info: U.S. (#88), UK (#3)
Available on Proud Mary: The Best of Ike & Tina Turner
50. Love: "Alone Again Or"(Bryan MacLean)
1967
Chart info: U.S. (N/A), UK (N/A)
Available on Forever Changes
Written by Love guitarist Bryan MacLean, "Alone Again Or" was in its original conception a simple, flamenco-tinged folk song. But as the opening and greatest track on Love's 1967 magnum opus Forever Changes, it became a perfect reflection of the L.A. group's unique and conflicted dynamic. Producer Bruce Botnick enlisted David Angel to supply the distinctive mariachi horn section and Nelson Riddle-like string arrangements that provide the song its strange, out-of-time luster. Meanwhile, bandleader Arthur Lee infamously mixed his own harmony vocals louder than MacLean's lead vocal to give the track an asymmetric wobble to match its elliptical title, and lending MacLean's heart-stirring, alone-in-a-crowd lyricism an added degree of poignancy. --Matthew Murphy
(Lee Hazlewood)
1968
Chart info: U.S. (#26), UK (N/A)
Available on Nancy & Lee
Even after thousands of listens, I still don't know quite what to make of this bizarre, creepy song. A country-outlaw singer drowning in a pool of reverb, constantly interrupted by dazed-hippie interludes, and haunted by a storm cloud orchestra. Sure, Phaedra is part of a Greek myth and all, but I prefer to think of "Some Velvet Morning" as a love song to drug rehab, Hazlewood longing for a time when he'll be sober enough to reminisce about his addiction (ephedra = amphetamine, natch) and Sinatra in the role of the drug-personified siren calling him back to her clutches. --Rob Mitchum
(David Bowie)
1969
Chart info: U.S. (#15), UK (#5)
Available on Space Oddity
Bowie's first bona fide hit, "Space Oddity" was rush-released to coincide with the Apollo 11 moon landing. The lyrics, with their strong ties to 2001: A Space Odyssey, tell the sad and paranoid story of poor Major Tom, lost in the void of space. They've alternately been interpreted to be about drug abuse, and the psychedelic folk backdrop certainly supports the position that Tom's experiencing the bad trip to end all bad trips. But while the themes foreshadow the symbolic sci-fi narratives in Bowie's first true taste of super-stardom-- the Ziggy Stardust era-- the song stands on its own, showcasing Bowie's gifts for building atmosphere through arrangements and thematic elements. --Cory D. Byrom
(John Lennon/Paul McCartney)
1966
Chart info: U.S. (#11), UK (#1)
Available on Revolver
Big ups to George Martin, who wrote the score for the eight-piece string section (four violins, two cellos, and two violas) floating behind Paul McCartney's libretto (with assistance from John Lennon and George Harrison on the harmonizing and background vocals). The meditation on loneliness is just over two minutes long, but the characters are fleshed out so strongly that each individual feels packed with a novel's worth of details. When the stars come together-- "Eleanor Rigby died in the church and was buried along with her name/ Nobody came/ Father McKenzie wiping the dirt from his hands as he walks from the grave/ No one was saved"-- think back to Rigby cleaning up the post-wedding rice. She and McKenzie partake in these solitary rituals constantly-- never finding a conscious overlap. Seems bizarre that it was released as a single with "Yellow Submarine": Let's paint the Revolver black. --Brandon Stosuy
(D. Phillips/Kenny Pickett)
1967
Chart info: U.S. (N/A), UK (N/A)
Available on We Are Paintermen
That riff's an instant mod flashpoint on par with "I Can't Explain" or "You Really Got Me", but only in the parallel universe ruled by Max Fischer did this song achieve the same legendary status. What differentiates "Making Time" from its peers is that it trades in teen angst for ennui: Kenny Pickett sings, "Why do we have to carry on/ Always singing the same old song," so after the second chorus guitarist Eddie Phillips obliges him and changes the tune, slashing a violin bow across his fret board-- years before Jimmy Page stole the shtick-- and inverting the song's riff into something far nastier. They may have been called the Creation, but they excelled at the art of destruction. --Stuart Berman
(John Hurley/Ronnie Wilkins)
1968
Chart info: U.S. (#10), UK (#9)
Available on Dusty in Memphis
Aretha Franklin famously rejected this song, only deciding to record it once she heard Springfield's version. Lyrically, it's clichéd, trite even. Good girl and equally good boy meet, sneak off, give in to each other: It's a Danielle Steele novel waiting to happen. But Springfield's quavering tenor is clear and warm enough to turn an underwritten character into an archetype, and it dissolves into the glistening guitars and hard-rolling horn riffs just perfectly. --Tom Breihan
(Lamont Dozier/Brian Holland/Eddie Holland)
1964
Chart info: U.S. (#1), UK (#3)
Available on The Ultimate Collection
This No. 1-- the Supremes' first-- marked the beginning of an astonishing 1960s chart reign that included 12 pop toppers. Whereas many of their sister groups barreled with boldness, this trio veered away, mastering the seductive coo led by whispery glass goddess Diana Ross. As claptrap percussion gallops away, Ross sidles up to the typical teen heartbreak sentiments and instantly matures them with breathless pathos and sensuality. Punctuated by 15 seconds of blustery sax that hints at a full recovery, "Where Did Our Love Go" is a come down that comes on strong. --Ryan Dombal
(Vince Guaraldi)
1965
Chart info: U.S. (N/A), UK (N/A)
Available on A Charlie Brown Christmas
Perhaps inseparable from images of pathetic little Christmas trees and ice-skating puppy dogs, "Linus and Lucy" is, for many kids, still the first "jazz" they ever hear. (It was certainly the only "jazz" record in my household; my mom held jazz in disregard as weird dialectic beatnik music without a beat.) That 12-note main theme (with Guaraldi's left hand answering with five low notes) is possibly the most memorable melody on this list. Guaraldi's crates run deeper than his Peanuts work, obviously, but there are certainly worse things to leave as your legacy. --Jess Harvell
(Robbie Robertson)
1969
Chart info: U.S. (N/A), UK (N/A)
Available on The Band
Nothing like a group that's 80% Canadian singing about The War of Northern Aggression. Fortunately, the other 20% is Levon Helm, whose dramatic performance here turns a period piece that could have been a "Schoolhouse Rock" episode into a mournful piece of folk-rock. Helm's vocals alone are perfectly evocative of the song's character, but subtler and more crucial is his simultaneous drumming, skipping like a heartbeat whenever he gets to the really sad parts. With the rest of the Band bobbing and weaving within that perfect John Simon production, they get closer than ever to achieving their goal of escaping to a sepia-toned past. --Rob Mitchum
(Leonard Cohen)
1968
Chart info: U.S. (N/A), UK (N/A)
Available on The Songs of Leonard Cohen
Cohen wrote this perfect ballad about a night with Suzanne Verdal, who was married at the time to the Montreal sculptor Armand Vaillancourt. It was initially a poem, "Suzanne Takes You Down", collected in Parasites of Heaven, and the drenched dreamscape language situates the listener via all senses: "And she shows you where to look/ Among the garbage and the flowers/ There are heroes in the seaweed/ There are children in the morning." Suzanne, holding a mirror, supposedly really did give Cohen tea and they had some sort of slinky walking tour of Montreal and the St. Lawrence River, but, also supposedly, they didn't sleep together-- didn't want to ruin the wavelength. Still, even without the nookie, Cohen recasts the night as worthy of the Bible-- turning the simplest moment into something extraordinary. --Brandon Stosuy
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