Friday Featured Tracks
Colourmusic
For today’s Friday Featured Track, I’m going to attempt to list my favorite song from each of my top 10 albums of 2008. In some cases, it will be tough to choose just one; in others, one song is so incredibly sublime that it stands out from the rest.
Here they are, in the order the albums appear on my list of the best:
1. “The Right Place to Fade,” from Lindsey Buckingham’s “Gift of Screws.” This frenetic, amazingly catchy pop ditty is so nice, this is its second appearance on the FFT.
2. “Spring Song,” from Colourmusic’s ”f, monday, orange, february, venus, lunatic, 1 or 13.” I simply cannot resist this effervescent song. “I’m blowing bubbles in the air …”
3. “Warwick Avenue,” from Duffy’s “Rockferry.” It was tough to choose an absolute favorite from this big-voiced Brit’s excellent debut, but I went with this powerful heartbreaker. I can barely watch the video without tearing up.
Metallica
4. “Broken, Beat & Scarred,” from Metallica’s “Death Magnetic.” This is another song making its second appearance on the FFT. Have I mentioned lately how great a guitar genius Kirk Hammett is? No? Then, I’m gonna mention it right now.
5. “Strange Way,” from Shawna Russell’s “Goddess.” Again, there are so many great songs on this Okemah singer-songwriter’s debut album it was hard to pick just one. But this country girl proves she can flat-out rock ’70s style on her cover of Firefall’s 1978 hit.
6. “Chapter I: The River,” from Samantha Crain & the Midnight Shivers’ “The Confiscation”: Talk about hard to choose just one song: Crain’s debut EP actually is a musical novella, so the five storytelling tracks are all part of one overarching narrative. But the most amazing track has got to be the first one, a chilling tale of a preacher drowning those he baptizes, delivered with jaunty harmonicas, bouncy percussion and Crain’s smoky voice.
7. “Life in Technicolor,” from Coldplay’s “Viva La Vida”: The first time I hard this lushly beautiful song, I had a strong feeling this album would be on my top 10 list.
Jason Boland & the Stragglers
8. “Comal County Blue,” from Jason Boland & the Stragglers’ “Comal County Blue”: I actually probably like the Red Dirt band’s cover of the late Bob Childers’ “Outlaw Band” a bit better, but the title track really speaks to me. I can really relate to the restlessness in Boland’s voice as he sings about getting out of his small-town rut.
9. “What a Friend We Have in Jesus,” from Brad Paisley’s “Play”: Paisley has a tradition of including a hymn on all his albums, and his instrumental version of this old favorite is wonderful.
10. “This Land Is Your Land,” from “Ribbon of Highway Endless Skyway: The Woody Guthrie Tribute Tour”: The late Bob Childers, Eliza Gilkyson, Jimmy LaFave and other folk/Americana luminaries unite to do a soaring live version of Guthrie’s most famous song. I doesn’t get much better than that, folks.
-BAM
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