Best Live Albums #2-5

Facebook has this cool feature where you can pick what you think is the 5 greatest albums of all-time. Mine were: Everclear's Songs From An American Movie, AFI's Sing The Sorrow, Pink Floyd's The Wall, Billy Idol's Cyberpunk, and UFO's Strangers In The Night. Those were probably the 5 you were thinking of, right? No? I'd be very* interested in hearing what your top 5 are. Anyways, the Facebook thing is cool and all, but what about the 5 Best Live Albums?


Let's start with what a great live album actually is. First off, it needs to be a double album. If you don't have 2 albums worth of really good songs, wait until you do. Unfortunately, this rule eliminates Motorhead's No Sleep 'Til Hammersmith and Ian Hunter's Welcome To The Club since it really only has 3 sides live. A great live album should also have improved upon versions of the band's songs. That is, you should want to hear the live version over the original studio version. Got it?


While I may get arguments for some of these choices, let's be clear. We're really only talking about slots 2 through 5 because there is only one album that merits being called the greatest of all time. Up-bup: no discussion necessary. Don't argue, you'll only make yourself look bad.


#1 'Nuff said.




#2 - Kiss' Alive** OK, this is an oldie, but it is excellent from beginning to end. It is a perfect example of a great live album in that it chonicles the bands music of their first 4 albums and contains versions better than the originals. I defy you to put it on and tell me it's dated.

#3 Lynryd Skynryd's One More From The Road This one has one classic after another, better than the originals, culminating in a version of Freebird that is an all-time great. I'm not a country rock fan, and my liking this one so much speaks volumes for how good it really is.


#4 Nightwish's End Of An Era Hey, I know, lets take a heavy metal band from Finland and put a female opera singer in for the lead singer. Nah, that would never work, would it? It most definitely would! Of course, I'll probably take a hit or two for making it #4. Don't knock it until you hear it.

#5 Thin Lizzy's Live and Dangerous This one may be kind of a surprise, but it absolutely meets the definition of a great live album. I think I wore the grooves out on my copy back in the 10th grade.

*couldn't be less interested in hearing about your wrong 5 albums.

**WTF? Why does Blogger always do this to me? Why is it publishing the wrong font size? I hate this shit!

The Best Of The Best

I was listening to the greatest album ever made over the weekend: Everclear's Songs From An American Movie. Up-bup: before you argue Everclear's Slow Motion Daydream is the greatest album of all-time, I got 2 songs for ya: Now That It's Over with its When the Levee Breaks drums, its Wall-Of-Sound-esque sound, and its scathing lyrics that make Rassles' rants on Bonnie Bodelia sound like lovefests and Out Of My Depth with lyrics dedicated to a different dysfunctionality. I toyed with making available 6 or 7 songs from this album, but decided to limit it to 2. I'm lazy, ok? Enjoy!

BTW: Everclear's first 4 albums are the best "First 4" of any band, but Van Halen and the White Stripes are close runner-ups in case you were wondering. Everclear's 5th album stunk, though, and their 6th was fairly mediocre as well.

These "T.E.A." tax morons remind me of a half-way decent posting by a half-way decent blogger (almost as good as me) back in the day. Hey, righties, get over it. You lost. Reprinted without permission is Falwless' Election Day posting.

So I celebrated the election results tonight with friends and I was so motherfucking proud, for the very first time, to see MY state, Carolina of the North (also known as "The Awesome Carolina") too close to even call in the presidential race. Even now as I type this so late in the evening, CNN won't choose a color for us.

But fuck it, I'm calling it. CNN - listen up!


NORTH CAROLINA IS

OFFICIALLY A BLUE STATE!

 

Awwwww yeaaahhhhh. Tarheel blue, baby. Beautiful Carolina blue.

And, just in case things didn't go my way tonight, here was a nice little note to the red states from the blue states, which was originally written sometime during the 2004 election cycle. But it rings true even now. I couldn't have said it better.

Dear Red States,

If you manage to steal this election, too, we've decided we're leaving.  We intend to form our own country, and we're taking the other Blue States with us. In case you aren't aware, that includes Hawaii, Oregon,Washington, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, Illinois and all the Northeast. We believe this split will be beneficial to the nation, and especially to the people of the new country of New California.

To sum up briefly:

You get Texas, Oklahoma and all the slave states. We get stem cell research and the best beaches.

We get the Statue of Liberty. You get Dollywood.

We get Intel and Microsoft. You get WalMart.

We get Harvard. You get Ole' Miss.

We get 85 percent of America's venture capital and entrepreneurs. You get Alabama.

We get two-thirds of the tax revenue. You get to make the red states pay their fair share.

Since our aggregate divorce rate is 22 percent lower than the Christian Coalition's, we get a bunch of happy families. You get a bunch of single moms.

Please be aware that Nuevo California will be pro-choice and anti-war, and we're going to want all our citizens back from Iraq at once. If you need people to fight, ask your evangelicals. They have kids they're apparently willing to send to their deaths for no purpose, and they don't care if you don't show pictures of their children's caskets coming home. We do wish you success in Iraq, and hope that the WMDs turn up, but we're not willing to spend our resources in Bush's Quagmire.

With the Blue States in hand, we will have firm control of 80 percent of the country's fresh water, more than 90 percent of the pineapple and lettuce, 92 percent of the nation's fresh fruit, 95 percent of America's quality wines (you can serve French wines at state dinners), 90 percent of all cheese, 90 percent of the high tech industry, most of the U.S. low-sulfur coal, all living redwoods, sequoias and condors, all the Ivy and Seven Sister schools, plus Harvard, Yale, Stanford, Cal Tech and MIT.

With the Red States, on the other hand, you will have to cope with 88 percent of all obese Americans (and their projected health care costs), 92 percent of all U.S. mosquitoes, nearly 100 percent of the tornadoes, 90 percent of the hurricanes, 99 percent of all Southern Baptists, virtually 100 percent of all televangelists, Rush Limbaugh, Bob Jones University, Clemson and the University of Georgia.

We get Hollywood and Yosemite, thank you.

Additionally, 38 percent of those in the Red states believe Jonah was actually swallowed by a whale, 62 percent believe life is sacred unless we're discussing the death penalty or gun laws, 44 percent say that evolution is only a theory, 53 percent that Saddam was involved in 9/11 and 61 percent of you crazy bastards believe you are people with higher morals then we lefties.

By the way, we're taking the good pot, too. You can have that dirt weed they grow in Mexico.

Peace out,

Blue States

I, for one, am fucking elated we don't have to carry through with this threat now...

 

GO BLUE!

Worth Breaking The Silence

If you haven't been watching American Idol, something amazing is going on there - an honest-to-God musician/artist is performing on a level the likes of which the show has never seen. Adam Lambert aka "Madame Glambert" (Beckeye's name) is a man among boys, no pun intended. If the show's producers don't screw up their dealings with him, he will legitimize the AI brand. I defy you to disagree with me so we can come back in a couple years and laugh at your ridiculous contrary comments!