5 for 5: Another music thread

Misunderstood is awesome live ... I can't believe I didn't have a place for Jesus, etc. Needs to be a top 10 for Wilco. Ha.

 

Jesus, etc. is great, but I think it suffers from the same thing as Outfit.

 

Big, why do you hate Patterson Hood?

 

Yeah, you're probably right. Saw Wilco in Durham once and Jeff just held the mic out and let the crowd sing the first couple of verses of that song. Great memory.

 

Yeah, I realize there is a trend to my list. It's no hate for Pat - if you'd made it 10 for 10 I'd have a few of his songs in there (Two Daughters, Thanksgiving Filter, Flying Wallendas, etc.) It's more of an enduring, borderline creepy Cooley love than anything else. His songs just hit that sweet spot for me. And if "Back of a Bible" had gone on a Truckers album and not a Hood solo album, I'd have that one in the top 10.

As for Wilco, Cosmo's post reminded me of the shows I've seen and made me feel bad for leaving off California Stars. What a great, great live song (and it's damn good on Mermaid Avenue, too).

 

I could make an entirely different list for just live Wilco songs.

Spiders (Kidsmoke) for instance. Not all that into it as a track, but live it's fucking amazing.

 

You could have just started "What are your 25 favorite alt-country songs?"

 

Patterson was always my least favorite of the three. Never disliked him. Not at all. But he would always come in third. I get that the Truckers basically wouldn't be the Truckers if he wasn't the guy cobbling together the whole spooky Southern mystique. And I always liked a lot of his stuff. Nine Bullets. Company I Keep. Let There Be Rock. Dead, Drunk and Naked. Lookout Mountain. All of them are among my favorites. I just wasn't in awe of him like I was Cooley and Isbell.

But Righteous Path changed the whole way I look at him. I don't know why, exactly. Sometimes a song connects with you for reasons that are difficult to explain. I just think it perfectly captures the angst of modern living, what I feels like drown slowly in the worries of life, and it has so many wonderful lines. Got a grill in the backyard and case of beer. Got a boat that ain't seen the water in years... might be one of my all-time favs, because I can picture it so perfectly.

I feel like that song made me reexamine all of Patterson's stuff. Obviously he's always written about big themes, but that one finally spoke to me the same way Zip City and Streetlights did.

 

Patterson doesn't have the natural talent and flair of Isbell or Cooley, but he's a guy who has earned everything he's achieved. To me, that comes through in his songs, and I have a soft spot in my heart for people who achieve success through putting their head down and working their ass off.

I was shocked at how shy he was when I met him briefly a few years ago. He's not a natural showman, but he has dragged that band -- through all it's various lineups -- to heights I think only he believed possible.

Patterson Hood is the real Bruce Springsteen.

 

First Five:

Grateful Dead
Box of Rain
Candyman
Wharf Rat
Black Peter
Morning Dew

The Who
My Generation
Pictures of Lily
Won't Get Fooled Again
I Can See For Miles & Miles
The Real Me

Jimi Hendrix
All Along the Watchtower
Purple Haze
Machine Gun
The Wind Cries Mary
Hey Joe

Neil Young
Cortez the Killer
Cinnamon Girl
Lookout Joe
Powderfinger
Rockin' In the Free World

The Doors
Roadhouse Blues
The End
Love Me Two Times
Light My Fire
Moonlight Drive

My second five will be coming shortly (LOL)

 

All this Wilco got me interested in checking out the rest of their catalog.

I only own Summerteeth and YHF, so I just bought used CDs (yes, CDs) of A Ghost Is Born, Sky Blue Sky, Being There, Wilco A.M. and the live album in Chicago. Looking forward to it.

 

YGBFKM-as-a-17-year-old's list

Doors
L'America
Horse Latitudes
The Soft Parade
Wishful Sinful
Maggie M'Gill

Zeppelin
Since I've Been Loving You
Down by the Seaside
When the Levee Breaks
Gallows Pole
In The Evening

Metallica
Leper Messiah
Blitzkreig
Fade to Black
Shortest Straw
Dyer's Eve

R.E.M.
Superman
Begin the Begin
Swan Swan H
Driver 8
Fall on Me

Frank Zappa
Cosmik Debris
Nanook Rubs It
St. Alphonso's Pancake Breakfast
Joe's Garage
Crew Slut