Your Favourite Song Of 2003

[Chrille]

Allthough played live at least a year before, it wasn't officially released live until 2003. King Crimson's Level Five is the best song released this year imo.

[Evil]

Um, I will do a countdown...

#4) Hot Hot Heat - Bandages
#3) Marilyn Manson - mOBSCENE
#2) Radiohead - There There
AND for Evil's #1 song of 2003 on his 4 song count down is...!

#1) Weird Al - Angry White Boy Polka

[Trapezoid]

Y'know, if I may be a conceited ass for a moment, I'd like to say that either "Mold en Mono" or "Mr. Wolfgang" on Lemon Demon's upcoming new CD is the best song of 2003. Perhaps even of all time.

How's that for hype?

[Flippy_D]

Coldplay have an excellent song just out, but I still have no friggin' idea what the title is. All I know is some of the lyrics:

"Where do we go, no-body knows, yeah."
"God give me style, and give me grace, yeah. God put a smile, back on my face... oh yeah."

7 nation army is a fantastic song. Skillful use of sounds, sampling, and structure. A solid favourite of mine, now.
Eminem's Lose yourself had one of the longest and most well constructed creschendo's I've heard in any song, and was a great piece.

There'll be others, of course, but I can't remember them.

[Trapezoid]

Flippy, whenever you know lyrics of a song but don't know the title, Google is your friend. The Coldplay song is called "God Put a Smile Upon Your Face"...

[MrColossal]

i just saw busta rhymes in concert a few weeks ago, i was working at the venue and his show was the best of them all. Missy Elliot, Ja Rule, 50 cent, Busta and Spliff and some other guy who i missed

I can't say Busta is a puppet, what is your reasoning for saying anyone is really? Have you seen them, spoken to them, been with them at meetings? to oppose the advertising is fine but how can you possibly know what it's like to be a musician in the mainstream of the music industry?

having no musical history class but basing my knowledge of classical painting, the artists of the past were not free to paint whatever they wanted. Paint, a studio, workers, canvas, brushes especially, these were very expensive back then [still are] and they had to work FOR the ruling class painting what THEY wanted [hence all the christian centric art] So the question is, are classical composers the same?

oh yea Danger High Voltage by Electric Six gets my vote also, the video is one of the most beautiful things I've seen in a long time.

and Mindless Self Indulgence - Frankenstein Girls Will Seem Strangely Sexy album is also awesome

[Trapezoid]

* Trapezoid has a breakdown.
AKJKNONJIUINJOFEIUJPNFEUIPFESIFEBOUYFESDOBISFDPNIUSFD

That Danger High Voltage video scarred me a million times over.

[Las Naranjas]

Gal- Yeah, it was an unfinished master for the EP.

[Rincewind]

Well, to be honest, the only "newer" band that I actually find to be really good is Queens Of The Stone Age.
Josh Homme's delicate, almost whispering voice alongside his innovative and deadly riffs make a combination that at least I can't resist... Different than Kyuss, but absolutely not worse.
I'm not sure if "No One Knows" is from 2002 or 2003, though...  (Bad memory... Ack)
Ah, what the heck, I say that's the best song of the year anyway.

[Evil]

Am I the only one who has heard Poodle Hat... Or listens to Weird Al for that matter!?!

[Trapezoid]

Didn't you see my original post?

[Evil]

Heh...  

[Sluggo]

This thread was started today and it's already on its second page!

Here are some responses to assorted quotes:
Dimitri:
"-More instruments and musicians, I like music that's HUGE! one of the reasons I love that particular concerto... the piano sounds HUGE! Also the reason my runner up song is Requiem by Mozart"

Uh, you could like orchestral music for that reason, but I'd wager that most classical music falls into the solo/chamber music category. Plus a piano concerto isn't a song, and neither is a Requiem.

"-Complexity, classical music has a lot of musicians, and a lot of flexibility. There's only so much you can do with 5 voices and synthesised music ala boy band, but you get a good orchestra (which has more than 5 people) and you can do anything (within the limits of the instruments and voices)"

Hmm, boyband crap is...well crap, but that doesn't mean the musicians themselves are limited by their own technical abilities. And I guess the only reason that music is simple is because it works best with the crowd they're trying to please. Mozart, while being a musical genius, is one of the more simpler composers in the respect that he conforms to moderately strict rules of theory.  I think the reason his music is appreciated is that it is very clear and precise. It's almost hard NOT to understand his music. Plus he composed some of the most beautiful melodies ever. Although classical music does have its share of complex composers such as Bach ,who is probably the only really complex and difficult composer until late Romantic and modern eras, and all those modern weirdos.

"Even rock groups that can actually play instruments, the music just isn't complex enough."

Maybe they're striving for clarity above all else?

"-emotion, now I'll grant, I've heard good modern music (not including rap)that provokes good emotion. But when you hear "Night on Bare mountain" and "Oh Fortuna" you just think "Evil". When you hear "Requiem" or the choral in Beethoven's ninth symphony you think "powerful". When you hear the moonlight sonata you think, 'Sad'"

My opinion is that music is expression, so all but the most monotonous garbage has emotion, but I see your point. But if you look at the entire scope of classical music, it's almost a "new" thing to put so much emotion into music such as the examples you mentioned. I mean, listen to any other Beethoven sonata and you'll hear more of a subdued emotion, which you could argue is what the music actually is, but it's also a development of the sonata form and almost a compositional exercise for Beethoven. The level of emotion in it is probably equivalent to much of the music you might hear on the radio. The Romantic period is when emotion became the sole reason for writing music (which, incidentally, Beethoven started), and that's when you begin to hear the angst and painstaking beauty in classical music.



Trapezoid:

"Sort of. I like classical music, but I prefer contemporary music and personally think it has has more unexplored potential than classical. Obviously what you hear on the radio is mostly homogenized crap, but with contemporary music, creative ingenuity is much more blatent. It may have less instruments than classical, but those few instruments can be ecclectic as the artist wants. It's hard to find any utterly bizarre classical music. Utterly bizarre can be good. Very good."

I think the term "Classical music" is very misleading, as it encompasses a wide range of music that has monumental differences. Most people think of music before the 20th century as classical, but there's a whole era of 20th-21st century classical music. The music can be weird and "utterly bizarre", and there's tons of it. This weirdness probably is the influence behind the "contemporary" music you might listen to. Plus, there are still contemporary classical composers and are continuing to explore music's potential, and are almost on par to what modern dance has become, since after classical form was broken, anything's acceptable.  I can only recommend some composers to listen to:
Stravinsky, Shostakovich, Holst, Prokofiev, Falla, Debussy, Ravel, Bartok, Grofe, Villa-Lobos, Copland, Orff, Britten, Poulenc.
Here are a few names of people I've heard of, but never listened to:
George Crumb, Philip Glass, William Bolcom, Shulamit Ran.
And even these Romantic composers have some weird stuff:
Brahms, Franck, Grieg, Mussorgsky, Liszt, Mahler, Dvorak, Saint-Saens, Chabrier


Sorry everyone, I didn't mean to sound preachy or anything, just clearing up some misconceptions.

[Gregjazz]

I believe the main purpose of music is communication. It doesn't matter whether a certain song is more or less complicated than another. Most of that stuff is just opinions and personal preferences.

BTW: I think Stravinsky rocks. I think the Rite of Spring has many common elements with heavy metal. I think it was that whole "powerchord string section" thing.

[taryuu]

my word are we actaully having an intelligent conversation in the gen forum?  to listen to the doom and gloom i thought i'd never see the day

you know what's funny, throughout the ages, tribal, classical, jazz, rock, whatever, there's always going to be music like crap-pop because of dick clark's american bandstand Rate-A-Record first unified theroey on music:

"It has a good beat and you can dance to it.

fast fact, did you know that the only performer not to lip sync on american bandstand was b b king?  big ups wherever you are buddy.

[Sluggo]

I saw BB King live. It was pretty damn cool.

Geoffkhan Quote:
"BTW: I think Stravinsky rocks. I think the Rite of Spring has many common elements with heavy metal. I think it was that whole "powerchord string section" thing. "

Yeah, but does heavy metal remind you of a Russian pagan ritual sacrafice?

[remixor]

Not to nitpick further, but "classical" actually DOESN'T refer to a very large period.  It refers to a very specific period mainly in the 1800s, though the boundries are obviously a bit blurry.  People tend to include categories such as baroque, romantic, and contemporary into the "classical" category but that's actually not accurate.  Of those periods, they would be organized chronologically in the following way: baroque, classical, romantic, contemporary.  Those are what are often referred to as the Common Practice Period.  Anyway, that's basically unnecessary information.


I'm not sure if we're still talking about stuff released in 2003, but it doesn't really seem like it.  Has anyone here ever listened to Godspeed You Black Emperor!'s stuff?  I find it incredible.  To me, it's hands down among the most innovative and incredible music to come out of any genre in years.  If I had to come up with some sort of category, I guess I'd call them orchestral rock, although they're not the type of band you can really pigeonhole.  For the past few years, they've had nine members, although that has at time swelled to twenty.  Currently they use three guitarists, two bassists, two drummers, cello, and violin, although since several of them play multiple instruments they often switch around to include things like viola, glockenspiel, piano, french horn, flute, more guitars, etc.  Friggin fanstastic music.  I recommend it to anyone.  If anybody is actually planning on checking it out, their EP entitled Slow Riot For New Zero Kanada is a great place to start.  It's only 20 minutes long and it's really great stuff.  Lift Your Skinny Fists Like Antennas to Heaven is their magnum opus and I aspire to some day create any music that begins to approach its genius.

As far as all-time favorite artists, I could not possibly pick anyone other than Beethoven.  I'm not going to go into why right now because if I start I'll never finish writing.


EDIT: I noticed someone else mentioned The Flaming Lips.  They are also awesome.  If you haven't checked out The Soft Bulletin, pick it up immediately.  Yoshimi is great but Soft Bulletin is magnificent.
The Black Heart Procession's new album (particularly track 2) is also tremendous.
Also, I'm really into Aimee Mann at the moment, for good old fashioned singer-songwriter stuff.  For those who aren't familiar, she contributed most of the soundtrack to the beautiful 1999 film Magnolia, which was originally inspired by her work.
Mogwai has been doing really innovative and awesome things for years now.  I just picked up their brand new album but haven't really digested it yet.  Another band I'd recommend in a heartbeat.

Anyway, those are some of the current bands I'm into at the moment.  No time to even get started on anything older.


EDIT AGAIN: to whoever mentioned Rite of Spring, that piece also rules.  And to whoever mentioned Beethoven's 9th Symphony (which includes Ode to Joy), in my opinion that's arguably the best piece of music ever composed.


LAST EDIT I PROMISE: I forgot to mention Radiohead.  I posted in a thread a while back that I wasn't particularly impressed with their new album.  I'm still not going crazy over it but I think I've come around a bit.  I've listened to it a lot more since then and I realize I was trying to hold them to too high a standard.  They're still far better than most of what's out there.

[LL Notorious B.I.G. Will C-H]

Hey Gravity by M.A.S.S. is by far my favourite song this year. You can download it off their website i think www.masstheband.com
I just saw them live at the truck festival this weekend as well and was blown away. bo.
also Pints of Guiness Make You Strong by Against Me, although i think that may have been last year.

edit: actually thinking about it I reckon they are both from last year. oh well

[Pet Terry]

Okay...

Black Eyed Peas - Where is the love
I like that kind of music... duh! I just like it

Don Johnson Big Band - Jah jah blow job / One MC, One Delay
Many of you haven't probably heard of this band, because it's Finnish band, but I like what they do. They mix many genres and results are great IMO.

There's probably more good songs than those, but can't think of anything more now. I listen almost anykind of music, but hiphop/rap is probably the genre I listen most...

[Dmitri]

eric: Wow, did you work with Busta? Did you meet him personally? It'd be cool if you did.

Anyway, I think you misinterpreted my post. I said that people like Busta are paid big bucks to have their characters... as Busta does have a character (otherwise I'm gambling that we'd know his real name)

I called the teenage airheads who like Ja Rule and Busta just because 'it's cool' lemmings. Not Busta, Ja Rule, Jennifer Lopez or any of those who are famous. My main gripe was with the advertising industry, not the artists themselves.

Your point about painters is interesting though, I believe Mozart was employed by some lordy type figure and he composed a lot of music for that lord, got a pretty high standing and a nice house (This is from memory and may not be accurate, I'm not really interested enough to look it up... but if anyone knows otherwise, feel free to teach)

Sluggo: Sorry to start like this... but PLEASE spell my name right... call it a pet peeve  

Your first point about a piano concerto not being a song confused me... I suppose I can see what you mean, I guess... it's certainly music though... and I like it very much. Would you like to expand on that please... I'd like to know what you mean exactly.

A lot of the chamber music I like. It's sort of soothing backgroundy type music. It makes a good backdrop for writing stories. I don't like all classical mind you, I did say that I found some quite bad earlier (or I at least implied I thought that way.) Bach's harpsichord pieces I've had bad experience with. I have three cd's of simple harpsichord music. By the end of the first I'm so incredibly bored I don't think I've ever bothered with nos. 2 or 3.

Complexity is a personal taste of mine, but I guess there is just too much of a good thing. Bach's harpsichord works for example. Maybe my point about liking complex pieces was not entirely truthful to my feelings. I'm glad you helped me realise this. I like pieces that sound nice to me.  a lot of music these days doesn't sound good to me.

Your points about emotion is why I like a lot of post romantic music. I still appreciate the great masters of Baroque and Classical, but I mean, again, the overall sterile feeling I get from Bach's harpsichord is probably what turned me off it.

Sonatas, any classical music written to a form is hard to write, I don't have the capacity to do it, and I greatly respect anyone who can. With new age classical, any bum, even me, can write a chord progression and the basics of what to do. But mind you, my music stinks.

Phillip Glass is a great musician. Of his work, I LOVE Akhenaten, Running horses (Poetry written with a splash of Blood), and his violin concerto.


About Stravinsky: He's cool I guess... but... I had to hear his Rites of Spring I dunno, five times before I liked it. Stravinsky's very messy... I'm no fan, but to write a piece like Rite of Spring does require skill, and I respect him.