The 333 Best Pop Songs of the 2000s: #219

#219: "It Overtakes Me (Single Version)" (2006) - The Flaming Lips

The American alt-rock/pop trio The Flaming Lips are renowned (in some circles, for they've never had massive mainstream success) for two recordings: their mid-'90s song "She Don't Use Jelly," and their 2002 album, Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots. Of course, this list concerns records released this decade, so the aforementioned single doesn't qualify. The latter LP, though....no. I think it's a dandy of an album, as not since the Beatles had any band created a pop concept album of any critical (or monetary) significance. It's an important piece of pop, but it's a true album, not just a long-playing collection of randomly-sequenced songs; being an album that works best as a whole, the individual songs that comprise that album don't stand alone very strongly, and I'm not including any in this list for that reason.

The best single song--maybe the only single song--The Flaming Lips have recorded this decade has been the single version of "It Overtakes Me." The album version--from the Lips' At War with the Mystics--logs in at over six minutes, so this mix is a true single in the old-fashioned sense, meaning that (here) the Lips reconfigured an album track for use on the radio (or for other commercial use). By reducing the length of the album track by half, the Lips move the focus of the record from the noodling sound effects at the end to the noodling sound effects within the song proper.

This compression truly enhances the sonic impact of the song, giving the record more bounce, more punch. The effects--and part of the Lips' acclaim come from their use of effects--used are jaw-dropping in their variety: theramin, dive-bombing synths, extreme fuzz, a Darth-Vader-lowering background vocal, a Chipmunk-raising background vocal, a mix-and-scratch turntable, handclaps, and some of which I'm stil not sure the origin, and rarely do any two drop at the same time. The production is--in the best sense of the word--Beatlesque. The insanely catchy, follow-the-bouncing-ball melody's worthy of one McCartney might have composed forty years ago, and the chorus...well, the song's almost all chorus, and it's repeated ad infinitum, but the chunky guitar lines keep the song from being too airy, so--if it doesn't drive you up a wall--you'll be wanting to hear the record again and again and again. And even if it does drive you batsnit crazy, you'll still find the song in your head.

Pigskin Prognostications, Week Sixteen

Three huge games this week. So big, that I'm going to have to kick my family out of the house in order to hear every grunt. Seriously.

Colts 26, Jaguars 12 - Colts have been keeping the games close until the fourth, and I don't believe that'll change this week.

Cowboys 14, Ravens 9- Baltimore's coming off their most emotional game of the season, one who's result surely left them emotionally devastated, and considering how mighty their opponent is this week, I'm just not sure if they can muster up enough grit and determination to defeat the Cowboys, 'cause it'll have to be the defense that does so.

Bengals 19, Browns 9- Will I watch this one? Maybe a few snippets, if only to see Shaun Rogers play.

Lions 20, Saints 19 - You know, if ever Detroit is going to get its first win of the season, it would probably be this week, as New Orleans is out of the playoffs, the Lions are playing at home, and they might have gained a slight bit of confidence after playing so well against the Colts last week. No team should ever have to go winless.

Dolphins 21, Chiefs 19 - Miami's been keeping their games close, too, and I don't believe this week'll be any different. In fact, KC will probably find some way to lose this one in the last two minutes. They've done so at least four times this year already.

Patriots 31, Cardinals 17 - I have a feeling that Warner's going to throw a couple of picks more than Cassel, and that we could see a repeat of the Jets/Cardinals game.

49ers 24, Rams 12 - Samurai Mike's swordsmen have to win this one--and maybe next week's--for him to have a chance at retaiing his job next year.

Steelers 14, Titans 13- Like Baltimore, Pittsburgh is probably spent after last week's match. Plus, Tennessee's probably upset about being upset last week. BUT...Albert Haynesworth is out, and Kyle Vanden Bosch is out, and without that D-line force, then I think Pittsburgh's offense will have more room to breathe than they have the last two weeks, and I think that'll be enough.

Buccaneers 24, Chargers 13- The past two weeks, Tampa Bay has been run on for over 350 yards. Luckily for them, San Diego cannot run.

Broncos 21, Bills 12 - Buffalo choked big time last week, and...they might again this week, if they're even up to it. And I don't think they will be.

Texans 28, Raiders 6 - Houston's on fire right now. Oakland's...not.

Jets 31, Seahawks 12 - With the way Seneca Wallace and the Seattle D have been playing, they could trip the Jets; unfortunately, Seattle can't run, and the Jets can, and by the fourth quarter, Wallace'll be forced to pass much more often than he should, and he'll throw a few picks, and then it's Hello Nasty.

Falcons 24, Vikings 20 - Three words: Pat. Williams. Out.

Eagles 27, Redskins 10 - Philly's playing for playoff spot; Washington's playing for their--and their coach's--job. The latter certainly tops the former (as far as motivation goes), but then again, Philly's playing great football now, and Washington's offense has been completely inept for weeks. It won't change this game.

Panthers 17, Giants 13 - Momentum: Carolina's got it; the Giants don't.

Bears 27, Packers 21 - Chicago's playing for a win and hoping for a few key losses by other teams. Green Bay's hoping their defense can bottle up Matt Forte.

The 333 Best Pop Songs of the 2000s: #220

#220: "Engrish Bwudd" (2006) - Man Man

Possibly the strangest song (at least lyrically) on my chart, Philly band Man Man's "Engrish Bwudd" documents the fable-like journey of a protagonist who was stolen as a baby by a seagull (straight from his Mama's hands) that dropped him in the jungle, where he...well, the story only grows stranger, and ultimately, no lesson is taught nor learned, though we do get to hear who taught Man Man what they learned. The band takes its lessons from John Kander, Paul McCartney, Captain Beefheart, Tom Waits, and the oom-pah rhythm of Volkstümliche Musik, and they filter it through the absurd, through Dadaist concepts, through a protagonist made up of equal parts Jonah, Job, Gulliver, and Jim Dandy. It's experimental music for sure, but it's experimental pop music, and Man Man have fashioned a keen melody to ensure that the less musically adventurous can still follow the song and perhaps have their ears and minds open to the possibilities of music that's not primarily designed to sell: in other words, this is art for art's sake, but it's art that's not completely indulgent, as it's makers have too much pop smarts for that.

Though the melody is absurdly catchy, the singer Honus Honus (the other members are named Sergei Sogay, Pow Pow, Critter Cat, and Chang Wang) uses his serrated bellow to assault, landing just this side of obnoxiousness, thus balancing out the sweet with the sour (which means critics can appreciate it, too). The band plays a bevy of instruments here: barrelhouse piano, kazoo, mandolin, tuba or trombone (I can't tell which), theramin (or something that sounds like one), possibly a French horn, and a few other instruments the origin of which I can't quite discern. The arrangement mixes all these disparate elements slightly beneath the main mix of the oom-pah of piano and bass so that the strange instrumentation complements, adding a richness (albeit, a strange one) of sound that'll have you plumbing the song's musical depths again and again just to catch all the different sounds Man Man throws our way.

And then, there's the drumming--it's wild! Pow Pow plays all over the set during the verses, rolling and filling and crashing sporadically, accenting the music, more chaos than control, letting the piano handle the rhythm. It's jazz drumming in spirit (though definitely not in letter), and Pow Pow's sense of abandonment gives the record a manic sense of excitement, that makes this one more than just typical alterntive/indie chamber pop.

The 333 Best Pop Songs of the 2000s: #221

#221: "The Widow" (2005) - The Mars Volta

In every review I've read of their work, The Mars Volta--who are, basically, just the re-christened remains of At the Drive-In--have been described as a progressive rock band (or some variant thereof); what's never mentioned, is that no prog-rock band of the past thirty-five years has had a vocalist with anywhere near the power nor range as the Volta's Cedric Bixler-Zavala; in fact, his banshee-wails are so phenomenal that his vocals come close to overwhelming whatever noise and velocity his backing band--and any band with Omar Rodriguez-Lopez at guitar is a great backing band--may produce. With those vocals, and the Volta's use of electrified power chords, the Mars Volta more closely sounds like Black Sabbath and Led Zeppelin than they do Yes or King Crimson--and they're the better for it.

As much as they venture off into the sci-fi Galaxy of Excessive Noodling and Ephemery, Bixler-Zavala's delivery always bring the songs back to Earth, for as loud and as much as he can scream, Bixler-Savala knows how to connect, knows how to dial it down during the verses, knows how to use breathiness to intimate intimacy. His use of vocal dynamics is expert; he can build to a crescendo like nobody's business, then float back down, seemingly spent. This technique--one that professional public speakers use--can be evidenced (how sloppy a sentence construction was that?!?) in capsule form (as most of the Volta's songs are of epic length) in "The Widow," a song that actually made it to the Billboard Hot 100; how it charted there, I'll never know, for it sounds nothing like any other rock song that charted at the time (which means it didn't sound like as if it were cloned from a Nickelback record).

Not only do we get Bixler-Zavala's rise-and-fall wail all over the record, we also get some cryptic and creepy lyrics, ostensibly about someone who stays up with someone dying from lung cancer--or in a coma--and unable to rid himself of the nightmares caused by whatever strange things happen when the narrator's in the room with the patient. Rodriguez-Lopez's frenetic soloing adds to the paranoic frenzy, as do the spare (but effective) use of strings, and the acoustic strumming during the verses, and some subtle, strange effects used throughout the song, mixed in (and mixed in well) simultaneously with the other instrumentation. There's even a trumpet--played by Flea! It's Pearl Jam's "Jeremy;" it's Led Zeppelin's "Stairway to Heaven;" it's all these, but it's scarier, and weirder, and it's got a strange backstory.

In the prepartaion of the album (Frances the Mute) on which this song would appear, sound tech (and one-time member of At the Drive-In) Jeremy Ward found a diary from a car he repossessed, and the diary--and its characters--inspired the creation of all the songs on the album. This song--"The Widow"--was, of course, inspired by one of the characters in that diary, but it was also inspired by Ward himself, as Ward died from a drug overdose in 2003, not long after he had given the band the diary he'd found. So...you've got those undercurrents running through the song, as well as the fact that both Bixler-Zavala and Rodriguez-Lopez vowed never to use opiates again after Ward's death.

Listen to this song, and then ask yourselves, "If this is what the Mars Volta sound like when not influenced [directly] by drugs, I wonder what they sounded like when they were?"

The 333 Best Pop Songs of the 2000s: #222

#222: "Big Wheel" (2007) - Tori Amos

In her sixteen years as a professional recording artist, Tori Amos has had six albums chart in the top ten of the Billboard Top 200 Album charts, one gold albums, two platinum albums, and two multi-platinum albums. She's also never had a Top 40 single hit the chart. What does this mean? That she's an album artist, thank you, that her material is bought by the folks who don't listen to Top 40 radio. Or, it could mean that she's not very pop-smart. Or that she doesn't care to cater to the whims of Top 40 radio. Or all of the above.

It's a rare (though not unique) feat, though, as Tori Amos has never been really an underground artist. From her first album onwards, she's been relatively high-profile, much of the publicity she sought herself (and I don't mean that observation to be a pejorative statement, either). In fact, on her last studio album, she recorded the songs under the narrative guises of five different facets of her personality/of popular conception of women/of mythological Greek goddesses/heroines. I delve into any further detail, for I am a chickensnit, and I fear I may irk and offend some if I offer my true thoughts on Ms. Amos's concepts, one of which--the one I do find intriguing--is the concept Ms. Amos has of herself.

She calls this character/persona Tori, and she writes "Big Wheel" from Tori's perspective (no, really). Here, she addresses and lambasts her critics, her audience, and herself, sometimes all at the same time: it's a sliding narrative point-of-view technique, and that technique is tricky to pull off successfully (pioneered by William Faulkner, and Tom Waits and Bob Dylan and Elvis Costello do it well, but they've had years thirty-plus years experience), as much depends upon expecting the audience to at least subconciously understand the general message.

Often with Amos, this p.o.v. technique doesn't work well, as her lyrics are often obscurant to the point of inscrutability--'cause no current recording artist writes abstract as well as Amos can. Her lyrics often strain for clarity--in fact, they'd work better as poetry*, 'cause Amos isn't known for her way with a hook or a strong melody, and--her first album withstanding--she's never had the raw, stark sound or pop production--nor the aforementioned sense of strong, pop-melodic writing--to make most of her lyrics resonate so that the hidden meaning is brought to the emotional fore.

Sure, Amos sings as if she feels something--she's never been less than dramatic, and that's both a strength and a weakness of hers--but exactly what the feeling means...I've rarely understood it. Amos doesn't marry lyrics to music very well, but I think this is more of a musical failing, which is ironic, 'cause what Amos's talent lies at the piano. She was an early prodigy, was granted a scholarship to a prestigious school for her piano playing, and played the piano bar circuit for years. You'd think she'd be able to roll off memorable melody after memorable melody, much like an American Elton John or a gender-reversed Billy Joel. She's got the chops, but...well, maybe it's that she takes herself too seriously. Or has in the past.

On "Big Wheel," though, she showcases a wicked sense of humor, calling herself a "M.I.L.F./Don't you forget," telling herself "Get off the cross/We need the wood," calling out "Gimme eight/Gimme seven" to the band. This self-satire works in her vocal delivery as well, as she--at times--sings with a sense of freedom, pouring some pouty-mouth pronunciations into some lines, speak-singing others. Perhaps looking at herself from a distance like this, from a satirical perspective, gave her a renewed sense of, I don't know, fun. Maybe. One thing, though: the beat certainly helps. It is--by far--the best pop sound she's ever managed on record. The handclaps; the slide, electric, distorted guitar; the dancing bass, playing and popping on the down beats; her barrelhouse style of piano playing: all seemingly geared toward radioplay.

The record, alas, never got any. Not surprising, considering Amos's track record, but I believe if given a chance--and I can't say this about every record on this countdown--this one could have been top ten. Number one, even--if Kanye had remixed it. Wonder what Amos would think of that? Fifteen years ago, I think I know what the answer would have been, but now...who knows?

NOTE* - Seems the folks at Image Comics thought highly of Amos's lyrics, as they produced a gigantic (sucker weighs fifty pounds easy) tome called in which eighty different artists take the words to Amos's songs and create a graphic story from them. It just came out this year, and the book is called Comic Book Tattoo. In many instances, Amos's lyrics work better graphically in this book than they did as songs. That's not necessarily slamming the songs; the book's just that good (and the artwork is--in most cases--stunning). It'd be a great Christmas present, especially for those who like pretty coffee table books. Don't get one for me, though, as I've already bought one, and it sits right next to the door to my office, and when I'm not reading it, I use it as a home-defense weapon. If anybody tries to break into my house, then they're getting a big helping heap of Tori upside the head. Guaranteed concussion.

Tori Amos Big Wheel
by skinandbones

Fifth Down, Week Fifteen

Ah, I'm ready for next Monday night, when I can find some time to tabulate. Until then....(original predictions in italics):

Saints 27, Bears 21 - Loss. Brees came up a bit short, but he can't play defense, can he? Actual score: Bears 27, Saints 24.

Falcons 21, Buccaneers 20 - Win. Atlanta racked up 175 yards rushing on the Bucs. And there you have it. Actual score: Falcons 13, Buccaneers 10.

Redskins 20, Bengals 10 - Loss. You know, if I'd been paying closer attention to the Redskins' last five games, I would have predicted something like this happening. Their offense is dead. Zorn may be, too. Actual score: Bengals 20, Redskins 13.

Titans 28, Texans 20 - Loss. Andre Johnson--who caught for two-hundred yards this game--is officially the best receiver in football. Actual score: Texans 13, Titans 12.

Packers 31, Jaguars 13 - Loss. Didn't watch this one, but I'm not surpised, as the Packers' D has seem deflated for most of the year. Actual score: Jaguars 20, Packers 16.

Dolphins 14, 49ers 13- Win. You know, if the San Fran allow Samurai Mike to keep coaching next year, this could be a playoff team...and Miami's playing like one. Actual score: Dolphins 14, 49ers 9.

Seahawks 24, Rams 13 - Win. Senaca Wallace--the next big star? Could be. Showed some fire and spunk. Actual score: Seahawks 23, Rams 20.

Jets 30, Bills 9 - Win. The Jets let other teams run on them like this the next two weeks, and they won't make the playoffs. Actual score: Jets 31, Bills 27.

Chargers 35, Chiefs 31 - Win. Philip Rivers had one heckuva game; heck, he's having one heckuva year, especially considering the dismal display of defense the first half of the season, and the completely dormant running game. If the Chargers make the playoffs--they'll have to win their next two, and Denver will have to lose the next two--then I'm starting a petition for Rivers to be MVP. Actual score: Chargers 22, Chiefs 21.

Colts 30, Lions 12 - Win. At one point in the fourth quarter, Detroit had this game tied at 21. How can the Colts hope to win in the playoffs if they continue to let teams stick around like this? Same way they've won the past seven games in a row--let Peyton take control.
Actual score: Colts 31, Lions 21.

Cardinals 27, Vikings 24 - Loss. I tune in about midway thorugh the first quarter, and the Vikings are up 21-0. Goodness. Has Whisenhunt not properly prepared his team? That's ridiculous. Actual score: Vikings 35, Cardinals 14.

Steelers, Ravens - Win. Hah! I forgot to put a score down. I did, though, predict the Steelers to win, and I predicated that predication on Ben R.'s will to win. I was right. One of the best games of the year. Actual score: Steelers 13, Ravens 9.

Panthers 31, Broncos 21 - Win. Steve Smith and DeAngelo Williams took over the game, and the Carolina D--without much effective work from Julius Peppers--stymied Cutler all game long. Actual score: Panthers 30, Broncos 10.

Patriots 17, Raiders 8 - Win. Zip! Zip! Zip! Zip! Four quick touchdowns. Looked like last year's Patriots for the first time. Actual score: Patriots 49, Raiders 26.

Cowboys 24, Giants 21- Win. DeMarcus Ware is having one of the best seasons a defensive player has ever had. They double team him and nick him on third downs, and he still gets sacks. Actual score: Cowboys 20, Giants 8.

Eagles 26, Browns 11 - Win. Whenever Shaun Rogers is out of the line-up (every third play), then the Eagles could do what they wanted to. When he was in, the Eagles could...well, Rogers did make several plays, otherwise this would have been much worse. . Actual score: Eagles 30, Browns 10.

The 333 Best Pop Songs of the 2000s: #223

#223: "Anyone Else but You" (2001) - The Moldy Peaches
Made famous by its inclusion/cover in the "It's Cool to Be Teenage and Pregnant" movie Juno, "Anyone Else but You" had been on my radar ever since 2001, when The Moldy Peaches released their (still-to-this-day) only studio LP, 'cause one line from the song--which (though cute and fragile and disheveled as a hangdog puppy) treads familiar low-fi folk ground, paved by Captain Beefheart, Jonathan Richman, Pavement, and the Velvet Underground (whenever drummer Mo Tucker sang)--was inspired by an incident my brother (a booking agent for several indie bands) witnessed and later related to Adam Green and Kimya Dawson. The line: "Shook a little turd out from the bottom of your pants." The incident: my brother was working at a grocery store, and he saw a man--who had been standing in the restroom queue for quite a long time...well, you can finish the rest of the story yourself.

Anyway, it's still a clever little song, and it's lackadaisical attitude and kitchy lyrics are all made wonderful by Dawson's girl-next-door delivery, which masks a talented voice. She's downplaying it here--as she does on most of her songs--but the talent's still detectable, and maybe that's why I find the record so charming: in a song about loving someone despite (or, maybe, because) of one's imperfections, Dawson dials down so that her vocals will complement Green's, and that type of humility is more than just charming--it's comforting and hopeful.