Skip to main content

Ten Best Tracks For A Hot Day

Eyewear loves music, as you probably know, and loves a good list.  Given the London BBQ moment, here are ten songs - arguably the greatest in the rock/pop canon - that go with hot times.  I should add that I am of the opinion that rock/pop has two key themes: sex and love.  Here then 10 recommended blistering summer songs, G & T optional:

1. '99.9 F' - Suzanne Vega
2. 'Mesopotamia' - The B-52's
3. 'Sex On Fire' - Kings Of Leon
4. 'Blister In The Sun' - Violent Femmes
5. 'Summer of 69' - Bryan Adams
6. 'Summer's Cauldron' - XTC
7. 'Whole Lotta Love' - Led Zep
8. 'Real Cool Time' - The Stooges
9. 'L.A. Woman' - The Doors
10. 'Sister Havana' - Urge Overkill
Labels:

Comments

Poetry Pleases! said…
Dear Todd

Good choice! I couldn't have done much better myself but you forgot to mention Engelbert. It's taken me forty years to realise that the guy has one of the best voices since Roy Orbison. And Lord Bragg agrees with me on that!

Best wishes from Simon
Fri May 25, 12:44:00 pm 2012
Andrew Shields said…
One of my favorites for beautiful hot summer days is "Dancing in the Streets". Given that I'm an old Deadhead, I particularly like live versions by The Grateful Dead: "Summer's here and the time is right for dancing in the streets!"
Fri May 25, 04:39:00 pm 2012
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

IQ AND THE POETS - ARE YOU SMART?

When you open your mouth to speak, are you smart?  A funny question from a great song, but also, a good one, when it comes to poets, and poetry. We tend to have a very ambiguous view of intelligence in poetry, one that I'd say is dysfunctional.  Basically, it goes like this: once you are safely dead, it no longer matters how smart you were.  For instance, Auden was smarter than Yeats , but most would still say Yeats is the finer poet; Eliot is clearly highly intelligent, but how much of Larkin 's work required a high IQ?  Meanwhile, poets while alive tend to be celebrated if they are deemed intelligent: Anne Carson, Geoffrey Hill , and Jorie Graham , are all, clearly, very intelligent people, aside from their work as poets.  But who reads Marianne Moore now, or Robert Lowell , smart poets? Or, Pound ?  How smart could Pound be with his madcap views? Less intelligent poets are often more popular.  John Betjeman was not a very smart poet, per se....
3 comments
Read more

Poetry vs. Literature

Poetry is, of course, a part of literature. But, increasingly, over the 20th century, it has become marginalised - and, famously, has less of an audience than "before". I think that, when one considers the sort of criticism levelled against Seamus Heaney and "mainstream poetry", by poet-critics like Jeffrey Side , one ought to see the wider context for poetry in the "Anglo-Saxon" world. This phrase was used by one of the UK's leading literary cultural figures, in a private conversation recently, when they spoke eloquently about the supremacy of "Anglo-Saxon novels" and their impressive command of narrative. My heart sank as I listened, for what became clear to me, in a flash, is that nothing has changed since Victorian England (for some in the literary establishment). Britain (now allied to America) and the English language with its marvellous fiction machine, still rule the waves. I personally find this an uncomfortable position - but when ...
15 comments
Read more

"I have crossed oceans of time to find you..."

In terms of great films about, and of, love, we have Vertigo, In The Mood for Love , and Casablanca , Doctor Zhivago , An Officer and a Gentleman , at the apex; as well as odder, more troubling versions, such as Sophie's Choice and  Silence of the Lambs .  I think my favourite remains Bram Stoker's Dracula , with the great immortal line "I have crossed oceans of time to find you...".
1 comment
Read more