"No Sense of Crime" (Van Hunt)

I generally stand by the statement that "an original is better than a remake."  But there are exceptions to every rule.  

More on that in a second.

Back in 1975, Iggy Pop cut some demos with former Stooges guitarist James Williamson in hopes of landing a record deal.  Story goes, in the wake of The Stooges' disintegration due to—what else?—drug problems, a depressed, self-destructive Iggy checked himself into the psychiatric ward at UCLA to kick his heroin addiction.  In order to record with Williamson, Iggy had to get permission to leave the hospital for a day.

The handful of demos they recorded were ignored by record execs, and the tunes sat, unreleased, for almost two years.  That is, until Iggy made a comeback (with David Bowie's help) via the ambitious art rock album The Idiot (1977).  To capitalize on his newfound renown, the 1975 tracks were quickly assembled for the album Kill City (1977), an immaculately ragged collection of music that is at once rocking and vulnerable.  Case in point: sitting in the middle of Side Two is a track called "No Sense of Crime."  It's a ballad at its heart; but it's a ballad that only Iggy could create, filled with self-destruction, regret, and ambivalence.  It has a bit of bucolic country jangle to it, yet it can't escape its "Sunset Strip at 4 am" urban desolation.  In fact, it feels like something that Jagger/Richards might have started for Exile on Main St. and Iggy/Williamson picked up and finished.  

Now, about my song of the day...

I never would have thought that "No Sense of Crime" could be recast as a Sly Stone-esque/There's A Riot Goin' On-influenced R&B number.  (Actually, it's kind of genius, considering that Stone's own career ebbs and flows have been largely related to his drug use, not unlike Iggy Pop.)  But the inimitable Van Hunt pulled it off on his album On the Jungle Floor (2006): Mellotron flutes and thumping percussion replace the lonesome guitars, and Hunt stands in for the Iggster, belting out the lyrics with no less passion, pain, and vigor.

And if there's any doubt in your mind whether or not Hunt can "own" this song, take a listen to the intro.  His narration kills me every time.  ("You may call in and request any song that you want, as long as it's one of mine...")

It's the most honest, inventive Iggy Pop cover I've ever heard.

And that includes David Bowie's reworking of "Sister Midnight" from The Idiot as "Red Money" on Lodger.

"Under the Bridge" (Red Hot Chili Peppers)

“Under the Bridge” from Blood Sugar Sex Magik (1991) remains one of my favorite Red Hot Chili Peppers tracks.  From the moment I heard it on MTV years ago, I immediately loved John Frusciante's delicate but funky playing.  It ripples like water over Flea's melodic and tasteful bass groove.  It always reminded me of a Curtis Mayfield tune in the way its complex, jazzy melody unfolds; Anthony Kiedis's confessional lyrics about junkie life in inner city L.A. also make it feel a bit like a lost track from Super Fly.
For as many times as I've listened to the song, the sudden key change at the climax—when Chad Smith's drums kick in and the band shifts gears for the dramatic conclusion, never fails to sneak up on me.  It's an unexpected move to go from a major to a minor key at the end of a song; the natural tendency is to ascend as you reach the denouement.  But that's what pulls at the ear and creates intrigue.  It's also quite simply an intelligent bit of musical composition that underscores the shift in emotion from bittersweet melancholy to outright regret in Kiedis's lyrics.  (That final 1:30 signaled to me there was more going on in the hearts and heads of these guys than just "Yertle the Turtle.")
In his 2004 autobiography Scar Tissue, Kiedis discusses the composition of the song.  He recounts that he'd kicked his years-long addiction to heroin and was dedicated to staying away from any kind of drugs, which caused an unintentional rift between him and Frusciante, who (along with Flea) was a proponent of smoking weed as part of the writing/recording process.  Kiedis says he felt shut out by his bandmates, which brought up old emotions about his painful breakup with actress Ione Skye—the result of his drug use spiraling out of control.
Channeling his emotions, he wrote a poem in his notebook that simultaneously addressed his feelings of regret for letting drugs ruin his relationship and expressed gratitude to the spirit of L.A. for watching over him like a guardian in his darkest times.

"I felt I had thrown away so much in my life, but I also felt an unspoken bond between me and my city.  I'd spent so much time wandering the streets of L.A. and hiking through the Hollywood Hills that I sensed there was a nonhuman entity, maybe the spirit of the hills and the city, who had me in her sights and was looking after me.  Even if I was a loner in my own band, at least I still felt the presence of the city I lived in."

Kiedis never intended for the poem to be song lyrics, feeling that the tone was much too soft and somber for the band.  It ultimately took producer Rick Rubin stumbling upon the poem in Kiedis's notebook and urging him to take it to his bandmates to spark the composition of one of the most honest, cathartic songs of the 1990s.

"Been Caught Stealing" (Jane's Addiction)

Jane's Addiction was a drug-addled mess in 1990.  Frontman Perry Farrell was smoking crack before going on stage at shows, and guitarist Dave Navarro was shooting up incessantly.  (They pull no punches about this period of time in interviews.)
So it's amazing to me that they held together as a unit for as long as they did, much less were able to produce an album that was as consistent as Ritual de lo Habitual.  For the most part, when Farrell isn't full-on channeling Jim Morrison to unintentionally comical effect, the album burns with a rare flame.  The blend of hard rock, punk, funk, and even jazz is electrifying.
And while the sense of morality (or lack thereof) expressed in the album is a borderline rock & roll cliché of wine, women, and song, I have to admit, it was/is refreshing to listen to an album that isn't trying to sell any of those things to the listener.  It just puts things out there, and you can either take or leave them.  It's the antithesis of 80s hair metal, where every song is like some beer commercial.
In fact, the band kind of reminds me of The Velvet Underground in that way.  Lou Reed wasn't really beckoning listeners to shoot up or hang out with transvestite hookers; he was just writing songs about his own life and experiences.  If you wanted to sit in the peanut gallery and observe, then step right up.  But it wasn't really an invitation to join in.
Which brings me to the big hit and my favorite track from Ritual de lo Habitual, "Been Caught Stealing."
Farrell isn't specifically advocating going to the store and stuffing a dozen frozen Swanson dinners under your muumuu (although, I once witnessed a very large woman get busted for doing exactly that at a Wal-Mart Supercenter in suburban Charlotte).  He's simply using shoplifting as a metaphor for human desire.  In other words, some people do what they do (be it shoplifting, drugs, etc.) because it fulfills some primal, reptilian urge.
Anyway, the song features a wickedly clever lyric over a strutting groove.  Eric Avery's bass grunts like some kind of wild boar throughout.  Drummer Stephen Perkins channels the funk of Clyde Stubblefield.  And Navarro demonstrates what a virtuoso he is by alternating between syncopated, jazzy rhythm guitar and screaming, distorted solos.  
And I can't forget Farrell's expressive, Technicolor tenor, which simply makes me smile every time I hear it.  His is one of the best voices in rock of the past 25 years.
And, sweet fancy Moses, that video:

"Here Comes Your Man" (Pixies)

Even though the Pixies had been around since 1986, I first learned of the band in 1993, around the time "Cannonball" by The Breeders started getting major airplay.  Someone from MTV News had shoved a microphone in Kim Deal's face and asked her if The Breeders' blossoming success meant the Pixies were kaput.  And then I heard Kurt Loder mention that Kurt Cobain had cited Pixies as an influence.  So I began wondering what the heck the band sounded like.
It was 3 more years before I actually heard a Pixies song.  It was on WXYC campus radio at UNC, and it was the track "Here Comes Your Man" from 1989's Doolittle—probably the most poppy, accessible song in the band's catalog.
That's not to say that the song is straight-ahead pop-rock, though.
As with other Pixies songs, it's not obvious what "Here Comes Your Man" is about.  Frontman Charles Thompson IV (a.k.a. Black Francis, a.k.a. Frank Black) is often poetically if not intentionally obscure in his lyrics.  In other words, you can rarely approach a Pixies song like: "This is a song about _____ (love, politics, war, a ham sandwich, etc.)."  The subject matter is generally much quirkier that that.
In a 1989 article from New Musical Express magazine, Black said he wrote the words to "Here Comes Your Man" at age 15 about hobos getting crushed to death when the so-called "big one" hits California.
The only real hint that the song has anything to do with hobos is his use of the word "boxcar."  (Outside there's a boxcar waiting...)  But it's such a smart, vivid word choice; it automatically generates Steinbeckian images of George and Lennie riding the rails.  And then there are vague allusions to the ground shaking and things falling apart, which adds an odd, sci-fi twist to the familiar Dust Bowl-era imagery.  (Definitely not your typical fare for a pop song.)
Regardless of what it's about, the song has a rock-solid groove.  Lead guitarist Joey Santiago's sunny, brain-invading riff paired with Deal's thumping bass and David Lovering's punchy drums provide an upbeat backdrop for Black's distinctive, adenoidal vocals.  
The arrangement reminds me of another favorite track on my list, "You Were on My Mind" by the band We Five.  There's that breezy, California pop feel, but it's undercut by this sense of impending doom in the lyrics.  Personally, I find that sense of tension filtered through pop sensibilities compelling.  It creates intrigue, and it makes me want to revisit these songs, over and over, just to see if anything new unveils itself.

"Cannonball" (The Breeders)

Back in the 90s, I was either hot or cold about alt rock.  There was no in between.  If you'd asked me as a teenager why I didn't care for bands like Pearl Jam, Soundgarden, or Alice in Chains, I probably would have said something along the lines of: "They're boring."  And that still rings true; those bands truly did (and do) bore me.  It was if they were trying so hard to be the antithesis of all the booze-n'-floozies-themed hair metal from the previous decade that even their more rocking tunes sank under the weight of their own gloom and dourness.

Apart from that, what I've come to realize in the years since—having had the time and an internet connection to explore rock's back pages—is that those aforementioned bands have/had no sense of groove.  In my humble opinion, the best, most enduring rock & roll takes its cues from the strong melodic and rhythmic roots of the blues, jazz, gospel, and traditional country music. 

The Beatles and the Stones understood that.  So did Jimmy Page.  Kurt Cobain, too.  (His inclusion of Lead Belly's "Where Did You Sleep Last Night" in Nirvana's Unplugged set is pretty striking evidence of that.)  And that's why I like their music.

And that's why I liked The Breeders back in the day, too.  Kim Deal's side project from Pixies (and eventual full-time venture when the Pixies went on hiatus) knew how to groove.  All it takes is listening to the band's second full-length, Last Splash (1993), and you can feel that sense of rhythm and melody; it's almost like a punk band playing R&B.
And while the entire album is solid (I'd highly recommend checking out lesser known tracks like the bass-heavy, surf rock-tinged "Divine Hammer"), I have a special place in my heart for the album's big hit: "Cannonball."

Not only does "Cannonball" have the kind of tasty mellow-mayhem-mellow dynamics that characterized a lot of Pixies tracks, what with Deal crooning alongside twin sister Kelley on the verses and then screaming into a bullet mic on the refrains, but it has this big, bouncy rhythm section, anchored by Josephine Wiggs on bass and Jim MacPherson on drums.

Speaking of Wiggs, I came across an interview with her from 2013 on Consequence of Sound, and she shed a bit of light on the song's distinctive intro.  

Basically, that little solo bass riff that comes in after the distorted ooo-ooo-ooo vocals was a mistake that stuck.  Wiggs says that, when the band first started practicing the song, she kept coming in a semi-tone flat, every single time.  Only when the guitars kicked in would she realize her mistake and slide up another fret.

"We all just thought it was hilarious and thought it sounded really great.  It kind of sets up a certain expectation, and then your expectation is changed because all of a sudden it's in a different key.  It was clear to us at that moment that that was the right thing to do, to keep the wrong note in there."

"Army of Me" (Björk)

I recently stumbled upon an old interview with Björk from 1995 via The Quietus website.  In it, the artist discussed her album Post (1995) and the song "Army of Me" with music journalist Jon Savage.  I had always liked the track's driving, electronic funk (which is built upon a tasty sample of John Bonham's thunderous drums from "When the Levee Breaks").  But reading her explanation of what the song is about made me love it even more:

"The lyric is about people who feel sorry for themselves all the time and don't get their shit together.  You come to a point with people like that where you've done everything you can do for them, and the only thing that's going to sort them out is themselves.  It's time to get things done."

She expanded on that a bit in another interview with Stereogum's Scott Lapatine in 2008, noting that the song was directed at her baby brother, who apparently was acting like a self-destructive jerk back in the mid-90s.  
"It's sort of a big sister telling a little brother off song."
Björk's pixie-with-a-flame-thrower delivery and that unstoppable, grinding groove make "Army of Me" one of her more immediate, most accessible tunes.  And few songs make me want to get off my butt and get moving quite like this track.

"Sabotage" (Beastie Boys)

"Sabotage" from Ill Communication (1994) embodies why the Beastie Boys were/are pop culture icons.  Not only did they take elements of hardcore and rap and meld them into something completely vital and fresh, but they also dreamed up the premise for the track's iconic video, which gives props to 70s cop show cheesiness in all its low-budget glory.
I can't listen to this track without immediately thinking to myself: "Starring Nathan Wind as Cochese."
A bit of history: "Sabotage" began its life as an instrumental jam.  As producer Mario Caldato, Jr., reminisced to Sound on Sound in August 2013, Adam "MCA" Yauch (R.I.P.) was fooling around with his Superfuzz effects pedal when he came up with the song's bass riff.  Long story short, the rest of the band (including percussionist Eric Bobo and keyboardist Mark "Money Mark" Nishita) heard what MCA was putting down and joined him in jamming.  After they'd gotten the hang of the groove and did some quick arranging, they committed the song to tape.
But as Caldato points out, the Beasties were wary of the track at first.
"When we first played it back, the guys were saying, 'It sounds too rock. We don't really want to go down that route'."
After all, they'd spent 7 years trying to distance themselves from the frat boy rap-rock of 1987's Licensed to Ill.
So the track sat around for awhile and almost got shelved, until Adam "Ad Rock" Horovitz called up Caldato one day, saying that he had an idea for lyrics.
Caldato recalled that Horovitz came over to his house in L.A. and cut his vocals in a single afternoon using a handheld mic.
"It was perfect.  He had done his homework, and he was screaming it with the exact amount of energy and attitude needed."

"With a Little Help from My Friends" (Joe Cocker)

So as I began writing this blog entry over lunch on 12/22/14, word came across social media that Joe Cocker had passed away at age 70 after battling lung cancer.  (As I've said before, I put this song list together quite some time ago; the track just happened to come up in the queue at this moment.)
What I'd planned to say in this post still rings true: no one could interpret a song quite like Cocker.  Whether he was covering "The Letter" by The Box Tops, "Feelin' Alright" by Traffic, or "She Came in Through the Bathroom Window" by the Beatles, he did so with such finesse, that each song felt like his own.  
But it's his 1968 breakthrough single, his cover of Lennon-McCartney's "[With] A Little Help from My Friends," that remains the pinnacle of his interpretive powers for me.  To be able to take a well-known song from arguably the most famous rock album of all time and transform it into singular gospel-tinged rave-up is beyond imagination.
In fact, for all the times that I watched the opening credits of my favorite 80s T.V. show The Wonder Years, it wasn't until the third season that it dawned on me: this is the same song as the bouncy boogie-woogie number that Ringo Starr sings on Sgt. Pepper's.  It blew my pre-teen mind.
Not only does Cocker's voice sound fantastic on the track—kind of like a combination of Ray Charles and jazz/blues great Jimmy Rushing, rolled into one—but he also has one helluva backing band: BJ Wilson from the band Procol Harum on drums, session musician Tommy Eyre on organ, session bassist Chris Stainton, and an up-and-coming session guitarist by the name of Jimmy Page.  
From the moment Eyre's churchy organ fades up and the rhythm section suddenly drops in with a thunderous thud, you can feel the electricity on this track.  And that electricity is kicked up 1,000 volts when Page's guitar wails in.  It's epic and thrilling, and this is all before Cocker and his backing singers even open their mouths!
But, oh, when they do begin to sing...  It's pure, sweet soul.  And it's life-affirming.
(R.I.P., Joe Cocker.  You were one of a kind.)

"You Never Give Me Your Money" (The Beatles)

When it comes to The Beatles and songwriting, I've always been more of a John Lennon fan.  But it was never really a conscious "Lennon vs. Paul McCartney vs. George Harrison" kind of thing.  I just always liked the quirkier, snarkier, R&B-tinged numbers on my mom's Beatles records, and 90% of those songs just happened to be written primarily by Lennon.
McCartney's "You Never Give Me Your Money" from Abbey Road (1969) is one of a few exceptions, though.
If you're familiar with the album, you know the track is the starting point for the lengthy 8-song medley that comprises most of the album's second side.  But it's more than just a transition piece or bookend for the medley; it's a smart, funky mini-suite featuring one of McCartney's best-ever hooks that concisely summarizes the history of the Beatles up to that point.
Despite public perception that The Beatles were wealthy beyond belief, they actually were bleeding cash following the death of their original manager, Brian Epstein, in 1967.  So they brought on a new financial manager, Allen Klein—a hard-nosed American businessman who also managed The Rolling Stones in the 60s (and screwed Mick & Keef out of the rights to their back catalog).  McCartney wasn't a fan of Klein from the start and felt that his tactics were a little too smoke and mirrors.  
In short, the song opens with McCartney expressing his frustration with Klein always presenting them with vague financial statements on paper instead of actually showing them where the money was.  Hence the line: You never give me your money / You only give me your funny paper.
From there, he reminisces about "the good ol' days" when they were just getting started—no money, no obligations, and no managers, and then shuttles back to the present through a dizzying series of key changes, essentially thanking his new wife Linda for extricating him from the hell of business meetings and whisking him away to the countryside (Step on the gas and wipe that tear away).
Apart from it being a strong track lyrically, the song is one of the tightest final performances of the entire band together.  McCartney treats us to some damn fine boogie-woogie piano and his baritone "Elvis voice," à la "Lady Madonna," not to mention his inimitable melodic/rhythmic bass playing (especially on the 1-2-3-4-5-6-7 / All good children go to heaven coda).  But then there's also Lennon's raunchy distorted guitar, Harrison's bell-like guitar (fed through a rotating Leslie speaker), and Ringo Starr's simple but effective drumming, which punches and punctuates at all the right times.
Most bands don't sound this good when they're at the peak of their powers, much less when they're imploding.

"Fair" (Ben Folds Five)

"Fair" from the album Whatever and Ever, Amen (1997) was the first track that introduced me to Ben Folds Five.
But before we get to that, I'll start by saying that I tended to avoid anything that was lumped into the category of "indie rock" back in the 1990s.  My general take on indie rock was that it was a convenient marketing label for groups that were too shitty/high to make it to the mainstream.  
"You only know three chords, and you don't play those all that well?  Great!  You're an indie band!"
And in 1997, Chapel Hill, NC, was awash with indie rock bands.  I'd walk down Franklin Street past bars and see names of the bands performing, and I'd immediately want to throw something through a plate glass window.  
Archers of Loaf?  Polvo?  Zen Frisbee?  
The names screamed faux-disaffected, tone-deaf white kids from Wonder Bread suburbia.
I even got dragged to a couple of shows.  I'd give in to some friend's enthusiastic pleading ("Mike, man, you've gotta check out The Virginal Urinal Cakes; they're the best band ever!"), and I'd stand there at some dank venue on a Wednesday evening, listening to some dude in a beat-up "Just Say No" t-shirt, who looked like he'd failed to take his own advice, mumbling random lyrics into the mic over distorted, go-nowhere chords for the duration of a bottle of ill-gotten beer (because you didn't dare order any booze in a glass at those places unless you wanted a flaming case of Hep A).  Once I'd had enough, I'd suddenly remember that I had an exam for my "Ethics in 15th Century Animal Husbandry" class the next day, and I'd simultaneously make my excuses and way for the door.
Then one afternoon, I see this poster in the window of my favorite record store for this outfit called Ben Folds Five, but there are three dorky-looking guys in t-shirts in the photo, staring blankly at the camera.  There's a handwritten sign beneath it that says, "New album recorded in Chapel Hill." 
My immediate thought was, "UGH.  More indie dreck."  
I wanted to burn the place to the ground.
A couple of days later, I'm hanging out with folks from the campus literary magazine, trying to lay out that quarter's issue.  We're sitting around, debating whether or not to fill some empty space with original "artwork" from Microsoft Paint or a reject pile-poem, in which the author had misspelled the same word so many times, so many different ways, that none of us were sure if he meant "heaven," "heaving," or "heathen."  (We ultimately went with our editor's drawing.)  Anyway, one of the other assistant editors put on some music as motivation to get the layout done, and I instantly liked it.  
Big, bold piano, fuzz bass, and booming drums.  Great harmony vocals.  And a wickedly clever lyric about an epic breakup, replete with broken plates and a traffic fatality.
"What is this?" I asked.
"Oh, it's Ben Folds Five.  It's called 'Fair.'  It's off their new album."
I instantly felt bad about wanting to burn down the record store.  I kind of wondered if Hallmark made a greeting card for that: "Sorry I was considering arson.  Let's be pals!"
"Fair" is still my favorite track from Whatever and Ever, Amen.  Robert Sledge's howls of distorted bass provide a perfect, punky counterpoint to the 70s singer/songwriter sunniness of Ben Folds's piano melody.  And for some reason, that indelible ba-ba-ba hook always brings to mind the guilty disco pleasure/one-hit-wonder "More, More, More" by Andrea True Connection.  (It pains me that I even know that song.)
It's just a perfect example of how the band's "take us or leave us" aesthetic combined with Folds's penchant for pop tunesmithery and affection for early Elton John created something fresh and authentic in the wasteland of late 90s rock.

"Somebody to Love" (Queen)

For the first 14 years of my life, I never paid Queen much attention.  I was aware of songs like "Another One Bites the Dust," which pop radio played into oblivion when I was a little kid.  But, unfortunately, it wasn't until after frontman Freddie Mercury passed in 1991, when I began hearing other musicians' tributes to Mercury/the band, that I started to realize just how talented Queen was.  To have not just one, but four individuals who were strong songwriters in one band is pretty remarkable.  But also having one of them be a consummate showman who could control a crowd just by walking on stage?  That is a once-in-a-lifetime kind of group.
What cinched it for me was watching We Will Rock You, the 1982 concert film documenting the band's November 1981 performance at the old Montreal Forum, on late night television circa 1992.  (The film was remastered, re-edited, and re-released as Queen Rock Montreal in 2007; I caught it again on cable a few months ago.)  
I remember watching them burn through a blistering, punkish reworking of "We Will Rock You" and thinking that they sounded way grittier and more rocking than on the studio recording.  Three mind blowing songs later when Mercury sat down at the piano and launched into an extended, electrifying version of the gospel-tinged "Somebody to Love," I was a fan.
The version of "Somebody to Love" from 1976's A Day at the Races has become one of my favorite Mercury studio performances.  He delivers every word with a ton of soul.  And just when you think you've reached the climax, suddenly he soars into this angelic falsetto on the a cappella breakdown.  I get a lump in my throat every single time.
According to guitarist Brian May in a 2011 interview with AbsoluteRadio, Mercury wrote the song as an homage to Aretha Franklin—hence the gospel feel of the tune.  May notes that they took a similar approach as on the theatrical "Bohemian Rhapsody," layering in the multiple vocal harmonies that Mercury had dreamed up to create the epic feel of the track; however, the distinction is that they were trying to sound like a gospel choir instead of a classical concert choir.
Said May, "I always remember thinking that, yeah, this is going to be something great."

"Hold Me" (Fleetwood Mac)

When it comes to Fleetwood Mac, I don't normally go for Christine McVie's songs.  If you've been reading any of my blog entries for a substantial amount of time, you'll know that I'm a bigger fan of Lindsey Buckingham and (to a lesser degree) Stevie Nicks.  McVie's tracks tend to be too wan and toothless for my taste.  (Give me the pulsing weirdness of "What Makes You Think You're the One" or the lush dreaminess of "Sara" any day over the poppy-yet-plodding "Little Lies.")
But the song "Hold Me" from 1982's Mirage is my one McVie exception.  Its crisp, New Wave vibe—which owes a lot to Lindsey Buckingham's arranging/producing—always felt a little more like Talking Heads or Pretenders to me than Fleetwood Mac.  In fact, for many years, I didn't realize the song was a Fleetwood Mac tune until my parents bought the band's 1988 Greatest Hits album.  (Side 1, track 4.)
From what I've read over the years, McVie co-wrote the song with British musician Robbie Patton about her fling with the late Dennis Wilson of The Beach Boys.  Which sheds light on the arrangement of the song, particularly its distinctive chorus: the harmonized call-and-response vocals singing Hold me (hold me) hold me (hold me) bear a striking resemblance to The Beach Boys' sunny, multi-layered harmonies.  What's more, those oddly compressed Come on and's (which sound like they were recorded in a shipping container) kind of bring to mind Mike Love's bow-bow-bow-bow accent vocals on the chorus of "Help Me Rhonda."  
But if there's one thing that makes this song for me it's Buckingham's guitar.  It takes on the unlikely role of percussion instrument, sounding almost like a cow bell for most of the track, until he launches into his simple-but-effective guitar solo, which wails with just a tinge of Eastern flair.

"Bennie and the Jets" (Elton John)

"Bennie and the Jets" from the classic album Goodbye Yellow Brick Road (1973) might be the weirdest song Elton John ever recorded.  The Frankie Valli-esque falsetto.  The sci-fi/glam imagery over plastic funk.  The crowd noises and on-the-beat clapping.  Totally bizarre, and totally infectious.
It was a huge favorite of mine as a little kid.  (And not just because he'd performed the song on The Muppet Show.)  My mother owned his Greatest Hits album (the one from 1974), and she played it constantly.  Every time it was on the turntable, I'd impatiently wait for "Bennie" to come on and then go crazy when he hit that first block chord on piano—mainly because I knew that easy singalong hook was imminent: Bennie!  Bennie!  Bennie!  Bennie and the Jets!  I drove my mom nuts more than once, screeching that line ad nauseam.
Basically, the song is about a fictitious band of android musicians that John's lyricist Bernie Taupin dreamed up.
As Taupin told Rolling Stone in March 2014, "I saw Bennie and the Jets as a sort of proto-sci-fi punk band, fronted by an androgynous woman, who looks like something out of a Helmut Newton photograph."

As for the sound of the track, John's producer Gus Dudgeon was the mastermind behind making it a "live" recording.  Truth is, it's a studio recording.  But when Dudgeon was at the mixing board and heard that opening splash of notes on piano, it immediately brought to mind a musician on stage, cueing up a band.

So he added copious amounts of reverb and overdubbed some crowd noise from one of John's concerts along with audio from Jimi Hendrix's 1970 show at the Isle of Wight Festival.  Then to really cinch it, he beefed up the ambient crowd noise by recording himself, engineer David Hentschel, and an assistant, whistling, clapping, and stomping "onto the wrong beat to simulate a British audience," as Dudgeon put it to Sound on Sound online.  

In the end, Dudgeon transformed John and Taupin's odd R&B number about rocking robots in mohair suits into a full-on concert spectacle.  (That huge cheer that erupts just before John launches into his falsetto immediately conjures the image that he's doing/wearing something outlandish for the grand finale of the song.  It creates intrigue.  In fact, my guess is that the single wouldn't have been half as successful without the guise of it being a "live" performance.)

"Samba Pa Ti" (Santana)

For as much as I enjoy Santana's rendition of Tito Puente's "Oye Como Va" (as well as the band's famous covers of Willie Bobo's "Evil Ways" and Fleetwood Mac's "Black Magic Woman"), my favorite Santana track is Carlos Santana's own composition "Samba Pa Ti" ("Samba for You") from the album Abraxas (1970).  

Based on the various interviews with Santana that I've read/seen over the years, the instrumental holds a special place for him, too, as the first composition of his own that got substantial airplay back in the day.  The sentiment he often expresses about the song is one of liberation.  Basically, it's the song where he finally felt like he was coming into his own as an artist and could successfully express himself in a way that wasn't consciously trying to emulate any other guitarist's sound or technique.

To me, "Samba Pa Ti" perfectly captures the warmth of Santana's signature tone and the fluidity/soulfulness of his soloing.  It's a showcase for his skills without being showy.  There's even a sweetness and humble majesty to the track that I feel pays homage to his modest upbringing as the son of a classically-trained violinist who basically traded performing in orchestras in Mexico for playing in mariachi bands in California so that Carlos and his five siblings could ultimately have a better life in the States.

He pretty much confirmed this in a December 3, 2014, interview with veteran rock journalist Ben Fong-Torres at San Francisco's Castro Theatre.  Journalist Steve Roby's article for BAM magazine online chronicled Santana's response to Fong-Torres's question about what "Samba Pa Ti" means to him.

"(Through that song) I represent all of the people that pick up your food, clean the sheets at every hotel from here to New York...clean the toilets, babysit, gardeners...I am the dreams and aspirations of these invisible people."

A beautiful sentiment for a beautiful song.

"Do It Again" (Steely Dan)

It's still amazing to me that Steely Dan pulled off the feat of having a hit album its first time out of the gate with Can't Buy a Thrill (1972).  And had an instant #6 hit song with "Do It Again."  Not that the album or the single aren't great; they are.  It's just that, for a band named after a sex toy in the William S. Burroughs novel Naked Lunch and a quirky debut single that tells an odd tale of some junkie gambler who shoots a guy and then ends up on a debauched spree in Vegas, I'm surprised it fared as well as it did in the bubblegum musical landscape of 1972.  After all, we're talking a period of time when a pubescent Donny Osmond was ruling the charts.
Anyway, "Do It Again" is a surprisingly strong single for a band that essentially was just getting started.  Its undulating Latin funk makes it easy to mistake for a Santana song; even Denny Dias's fluid, surprisingly effective solo momentarily makes one wonder if Carlos Santana decided to pick up an electric sitar for s's and g's.  But it's Donald Fagen's distinctive jazz-tinged vocals that really let you know it's Steely Dan and no one else.  (Funny to think that Fagen initially was reluctant to be the band's lead singer.  I can't picture what albums like Countdown to Ecstasy or Aja would have sounded like without his "yeah, I'm from South Jersey; what of it?" vocals.)

"Mango Meat" (Mandrill)

I became aware of the track "Mango Meat" from the album Just Outside of Town (1973) by Brooklyn-based band Mandrill the same way others of my generation probably first learned about it: through the 1988 hip-hop classic "Straight Out of the Jungle" by New York's Jungle Brothers.
But for many years, I didn't know where the JBs crew had gotten the guitar lick and horn fanfare that punctuate the track.  I'd pretty much figured it was some obscure B-side from James Brown or one of his disciples that only the most seasoned crate diggers knew about.
But then a few years ago, I was poking around the InterWebs late one night, when I stumbled upon this cat named DJ Funktual.  If you're a sample junkie (like me) and you haven't seen his videos on YouTube, you've got to check him out.  He's a DJ out of Fort Lauderdale with this massive library of ol' skool soul and funk, and he has 50+ videos online where he reveals the sources of pretty much every key track in the history of hip-hop.  The guy knows his shtuff and is passionate about conveying his knowledge to others, which is what makes the video series crazily addictive.  (Seriously, don't start watching at 1 am, because you'll suddenly realize it's 5 am.)
Anyway, DJ Funktual pointed out that the sample was from "Mango Meat," and I've been seeking out Mandrill's music ever since.
Mandrill came on the scene in the late 60s, founded by three siblings born in Panama and raised in Bed-Stuy—which sheds some light on the band's unique sound.  Difficult to pigeonhole, Mandrill's music is essentially hard funk; however, there are Afro-Caribbean, Latin, Afrobeat, jazz, and rock influences in the bubbling stew, too.  And those influences come through loud and clear in "Mango Meat."
In fact, what I love about the track is the way each element—the horns, guitar, clav, organ, vibraphone, whistle, etc.—has its own distinct flavor yet blends perfectly in the melting pot.
And I'd be remiss if I didn't also point out the drumming on the song.  Drummer Neftali Santiago lays down an incredibly complex groove.  It twists and turns in unexpected ways yet still flows like hot metal, giving the rest of the band a strong foundation to get down.
It's just the perfect deep cut for funkateers and sample hounds alike.

"I Shot the Sheriff" (Eric Clapton)

This is one of those rare instances when I actually prefer a cover version to the original.  But just by a hair.
"I Shot the Sheriff" was written by Bob Marley for The Wailers and originally recorded for the band's second album, Burnin' (1973).  Eric Clapton was introduced to the song after his  rhythm guitarist George Terry played him Burnin' during the sessions for 461 Ocean Boulevard, the 1974 album that marked Clapton's return to the music industry after kicking a years-long addiction to heroin.  
When Clapton eventually met Marley in the late 70s, Marley hinted that parts of the song were true; although, I seriously doubt that he ever shot anyone.  I've always taken the song as a metaphor for standing up to a bully.  Considering the unrest in Jamaica in the early 70s, when police harassment of poor blacks in Kingston's Trenchtown neighborhood was commonplace, the tale of shooting a corrupt sheriff as an allegory of the disenfranchised overcoming an oppressor seems pretty plausible.
As spirited as the original is, the groove on Clapton's version is what makes it for me.  Specifically, it's drummer Jamie Oldaker.  There's still that slight reggae feel in Oldaker's hi-hat pattern, but he shifts the downbeat ever so slightly, giving it a Latin/funk feel.  
And purely from a recording/production standpoint, the snare sounds amazing: clean, present, and alive.  (In my humble opinion, "I Shot the Sheriff" and the entire 461 Ocean Boulevard album have some of the purest, best-sounding drums of any rock album of the 70s, next to maybe Led Zeppelin's albums.)

"Get Up, Stand Up" (The Wailers)

"Get Up, Stand Up" from The Wailers' 1973 album Burnin' probably was the first true reggae song I ever heard.  It either was around the time of Bob Marley's passing in 1981 or the anniversary of his death in 1982.  But I recall hearing a snippet of the funky "Get Up, Stand Up" on a morning news program.  It was playing under interview footage of a righteously dreadlocked Marley, discussing his music.  Sounds funny to say, but the song's simple refrain reminded me of the "Hokey Pokey"; although, rather than directing you to put your left foot in, it urged you to get up, stand up instead!  It was catchy, easy to repeat, and it stuck in my little brain.
I got to thinking about that years later, listening to the song again on 1984's Legend compilation.  I'm certain that's what Marley and guitarist/vocalist Peter Tosh had in mind: a protest song that was so straightforward even a child could grasp the words; a populist anthem that clearly urged people to stand up for their convictions.
Which is a perfect segue into the song's origins.
I had always thought the melody of "Get Up, Stand Up" shared a striking similarity to War's 1971 single "Slippin' Into Darkness"; there's a little riff that harmonica player Lee Oskar plays in tandem with saxophonist Charles Miller toward the end of the track that exactly matches the notes in the refrain of "Get Up, Stand Up."
Turns out, I was onto something.  
In a 2011 blog piece for Paste online, journalist Denise Sullivan references a long-circulating story that Marley had befriended members of the band War while on tour in the U.S.  As further confirmation of this, I stumbled upon an interview* with former War drummer Harold Brown on YouTube.  In the video, Brown says that Marley was with him and his bandmate/percussionist Papa Dee Allen, walking down the street in downtown Atlanta on their way to a radio interview, when Marley told them he was going to write an homage to War because he saw the band as fellow "street musicians" who played music for the people, just like The Wailers.
Apparently, "Get Up, Stand Up" was that song, and "Slippin' Into Darkness" was the inspiration for it.

(*This guy Calvin Lincoln has a great show called Soul School Television, produced for Vallejo Community Access Television in Vallejo, CA, where he conducts interviews with soul/funk greats from the 60s and 70s and also discusses classic albums and music history.  The production quality is lo-fi, but he really knows his stuff and asks great, insightful questions.  I ended up watching about 20 clips in a row of his on YouTube and probably would have watched even more if my computer's battery hadn't run out of juice.  If you're a fan of classic soul, funk, and R&B, check him out.)

"Slippin' Into Darkness" (War)

"Slippin' into Darkness" from 1971's All Day Music was War's first hit after the departure of original frontman Eric Burdon, the ex-Animals singer who helped found the multi-ethnic, genre-blurring band in L.A. in 1969.
Lyrically, "Slippin' into Darkness" seems purposely obscure.  There are foggy allusions to alcoholism/drug abuse and even the siren of stardom.  But the general gist is: "don't let yourself slip over the edge"—the "edge" being obsession, addiction, fanaticism, or really any extreme state of mind that can ruin your life and relationships.
What isn't vague is the rhythm section, which is the anchor of the song.  The moment founding band member Harold Ray Brown's drums kick into action after the churchy intro, it's a vivid, syncopated ride to the finish.  
Thing is, if you attempt to count out the rhythm, it's easy to get lost pretty quickly because of the syncopation, even though it's essentially in common time.  The twist is that Brown puts the emphasis on the "and" of 4, which gives the track an almost New Orleans-y, second line kind of feel.  In fact, you kind of have to "feel" your way around the rhythm, letting your gut be your guide rather than your cerebrum.

"Fly Like an Eagle" (Steve Miller Band)

Back in my college days at UNC, I always found it interesting when I'd go to parties and, in the midst of a marathon of Timbaland, Montell Jordan, or Puff Daddy songs, someone would put on Steve Miller Band, and everyone would go nuts.  (Ironically, I remember having to wash Miller Lite out of my shirt after a friend/co-worker pretty much tossed her Solo cup of beer into the air when the "Space Intro" to "Fly Like an Eagle" came floating through the speakers at one particular party.)
What I'm trying to say is, Steve Miller has a surprising amount of staying power compared to many of his pop-rock contemporaries.  You put on the album Fly Like an Eagle (1976) today, and it still sounds remarkably fresh and creative.  Sonically, the album is hard to pin to a certain date because it doesn't exactly scream "1976."  
I think Miller's music holds up well because his roots and influences go deeper than just Elvis, Carl Perkins, or Bill Haley.  In fact, his musical foundation is built upon early 20th century blues, jazz, country, and gospel.  Growing up, Miller was introduced to all sorts of roots music as well as number of influential musicians by his parents, who were both avid jazz/blues fans.  In particular, the Millers were close friends with musician/inventor Les Paul as well as renowned blues musician T-Bone Walker, both of whom would frequently visit the Miller household and teach young Steve licks and riffs on their guitars.
When I hear the opening riff to "Fly Like an Eagle" (which Miller borrowed from his own earlier composition "My Dark Hour"), I can hear that knowledge and love of the blues come through, loud and clear.  But the fact that he bridged that bluesy feel with spacey, futuristic synthesizers and a hard funk beat, which sounds more like something you'd hear on a Stevie Wonder record than a rock record, shows that he wasn't a purist, hemmed in by genre.  Furthermore, he seemed to sense where pop/rock was heading in the decades to come.
In the documentary Fly Like an Eagle: 30 Years Rock'n (2006), Miller says that the song first made its debut around 1973 as an onstage jam with improvised lyrics that centered around the state of America's crumbling inner cities in the Vietnam era.  He then spent the next three years trying to capture the live feel of the song on tape, only to be displeased with the results, time after time.
"I recorded that song three different times.  That means we went into the studio, we spent a lot of money, we spent a lot of time, and we brought a lot of people in, and we recorded it and went, 'Hmmm, no'."
He finally found the right groove on the fourth try with session musicians Gary Mallaber on drums and Lonnie Turner on bass.  But he still felt the track needed something.
"So I'd recorded it, had it all together, and on the last day after it was mixed, I came in with a synth that I had...I hooked it up to my Echoplex (pre-amp), and I said, 'I want to put some effects and some things on this'."
Within a few minutes, Miller had laid down the "Space Intro" and the various sweeping synth lines that give "Fly Like an Eagle" its otherworldly texture.
But when it came time to do another mix down with engineer Jim Gaines, Miller still felt the track was missing its crowning touch.
"So when Gaines and I are mixing it, we had to get another piece of tape.  While we were playing that, we found that the bulk erase tape had a sound on it, and that's the little beep-beep-beep.  And we went, 'That's it!  It's done!'"

"Miss You" (The Rolling Stones)

I remember the first time I saw the music video for The Rolling Stones "Miss You" from the 1978 album Some Girls (the last album where they actually tried to make good music, in my humble opinion).  
I believe Casey Kasem was discussing some factoid about the Stones on his syndicated America's Top 10 T.V. show, and "Miss You" was the clip they chose to show before going to commercial.  I was probably about 3 or 4 years old at the time, and the clip was only about 30 seconds long.  But it made quite an impression on me.  There was something about that groove and Jagger singing his ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh vocals to the camera that clicked with my little brain.  
But it wasn't just, "Oh, that's a great song"; it was more like, "Well, I could do that."  
I spent the rest of the afternoon, strutting around the house and ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh-ing until my parents asked me to stop.
Anyway, I'd always known that "Miss You" was a by-product of Jagger spending many semi-lucid hours at New York's Studio 54, absorbing the sound and attitude of disco.  But I only recently learned that, although Keith Richards is credited with co-writing the song, he really had nothing to do with it.
In a 1995 interview with Rolling Stone magazine's Jann Wenner, Jagger notes that he and multi-instrumentalist Billy Preston came up with the song during rehearsals in Toronto while Richards was awaiting trial on drug charges.
Says Jagger, "Yeah, Billy had shown me the four-on-the-floor bass-drum part, and I would just play the guitar.  I remember playing that in the El Mocambo club when Keith was on trial in Toronto for whatever he was doing.  We were supposed to be there making this live record."
Preston also came up with the song's strutting bassline, which Bill Wyman then reshaped in his own Stonesian image.
And while the bass really is what grabs me, Sugar Blue's harmonica is what puts the track right over the top.  It's a gorgeous, soulful chunk of bluesy grit that keeps the whole affair from getting too glossy and slick.  Kind of a little reminder that, while Studio 54 might have been the height of toot and glam, the real New York of 1978 was a funky, brutalist shit show.

"Le Freak" (Chic)

The members of the band Chic had been invited by artist Grace Jones to join her at the infamous Studio 54 to ring in the New Year, 1978.  So bassist Bernard Edwards and guitarist Nile Rodgers got dressed up in thousand-dollar suits and trudged through the dank Manhattan snow, trying hard not to ruin their finery, only to be told by a bouncer that they weren't getting into the club.  Jones had forgotten to leave their names at the door.

Understandably angry, they headed to Rodgers's apartment nearby and started jamming to vent their frustration.  Within no time, Rodgers came up with a funky guitar riff and Edwards fell in on bass, with the both of them chanting, Awww, f**k off!  F Studio 54 / Awww, f**k off!  F Studio 54.

In an April 2005 interview with Sound on Sound, Rodgers elaborated.

"We were so pissed off at what had happened.  I mean, it was Studio 54, it was New Year's Eve, it was Grace Jones, and we were wearing the most expensive outfits that we had...So 'F**k Off' was a protest song, and we actually thought it was pretty good."

As the song evolved, they kind of came to their senses, realizing that no radio station would ever play a single that featured the F-bomb, over and over.  So "F**k Off" quickly became the less profane "Freak Off," which ultimately became "Freak Out (Le Freak)."

Thing about "Le Freak" (1978), even if you're not a fan of disco (and I'm generally not), it's easy to love this track.  Even for all of its gloss, what with the lush strings and breathy female vocals, it feels rooted in rock and funk.  No other disco group had the gritty-sounding edge of Rodgers's fevered guitar licks and Edwards's larger-than-life bass.  I'd even go so far as to say that the instrumental break in the middle of the song is one of the best grooves of the 70s.  (My thumbs hurt just listening to that bassline!)

"Raspberry Beret" (Prince & The Revolution)

It is so frustrating to write about Prince.  His complete aversion to putting his back catalog and performances online is confounding in this day and age.  I totally get wanting to control your output in a way that doesn't pimp your principles or your art.  But come on.  If people can't find your stuff, they're eventually going to stop looking for your stuff.
I'd bet that there's a growing percentage of people under the age of 20 who've never even heard the track "Raspberry Beret" from Around the World in a Day (1985).  Which is shame, because it's one of the few, true pop masterpieces of the 80s with an arresting melody, tasteful production, and intelligent lyrics to match.
Even though the subject matter is still somewhat "adult" (the song is ostensibly about the Purple One's first time), it has a certain innocence and strong sense of storytelling that made it a bit more accessible to me as a kid.  (Let's just say mom and dad weren't letting me listen too closely to the words of "Little Red Corvette.")  And the narrative is so full of vivid imagery—raindrops on a tin roof, crackling lightning, and the titular hat; it simply was a great song for sparking my 7-year-old pictorial imagination.
My favorite part has always been the way Prince sings the lyric I said now, overcast days never turned me on...  I think it's because the delivery of the line is so bluesy and soulful.  It counterbalances the baroque pop/Sgt. Pepper's feel of the backing track and pulls it back from the brink of being too sunny.

"Mothership Connection (Star Child)" (Parliament)

The entire Mothership Connection album (1975) is a weird, wonderful masterpiece.  It's the album that definitively established Parliament as its own entity with a sound, look, and mythology separate from not only Funkadelic but the whole funk universe.
In fact, George Clinton invented his own universe, filled with sci-fi crusaders guided by Star Child, their messianic leader who railed against all flavors of oppression and repression.  Sensing the turmoil and general unfunkiness on earth, Star Child returned to our planet on the Mothership—his chosen mode of intergalactic funksportation—to shake the shackles of humanity's constipated thinking and get everybody dancing under the Almighty One...
Yes, this was the product of Clinton's chemically-fueled imagination.  But to chalk up the whole Parliament experience to drugs would be to diminish his talent and genius.  Narcotics or no, Clinton invented this elaborate backstory, which was equal parts Narnia and Star Trek, so that he could take his music and its young fans further than either were told they could go.  Galaxies beyond.
In a June 2014 piece for NPR, journalist Allison Keyes discusses with Clinton the Smithsonian's recent acquisition of the massive, metallic Mothership stage prop from Parliament's legendary stage shows.  Clinton comments on the significance of the Mothership and the entire Mothership Connection lore.
"I definitely felt we needed something to be proud of as black people.  We wanted to have a funk opera."

And the track "Mothership Connection (Star Child)" is where that opera really starts to gel.  Any initial "what the?" reactions you might have listening to Clinton's extra-terrestrial DJ ramblings on the disc's opening track start to melt away, and you begin to acclimate to the record's alien funk atmosphere.  Bernie Worrell's jazzy keyboard flourishes over Bootsy Collins's gulping bass provide the perfect backdrop for Clinton to rap about partying in space and reclaiming the pyramids.  It still sounds light years ahead of its time.

My absolute favorite part of the track is the coda.  Clinton makes an announcement like some kind of prophetic flight attendant (When Gabriel's horn blow / You'd better be ready to go); Worrell hits this jazzy chord that sounds like a beam of light coming out of the clouds; and suddenly you're in the middle of this gospel-tinged singalong: Swing down, sweet chariot / Stop and let me ride.

It gets me every time.

"Jingling Baby" (LL Cool J)

So there are two versions of "Jingling Baby": the original from LL Cool J's uneven 1989 album Walking with a Panther and the Marlon Williams (a.k.a. Marley Marl) remix that appeared on 1990's Mama Said Knock You Out.  What's the difference exactly?  For starters, the original feels more like an unfinished demo than a full-fledged song; it's basically just LL rapping over the breakbeat from "Hihache" by the Lafayette Afro Rock Band.  (You might not recognize that sample by name, but you will when you hear it.)  It's also a little less "radio friendly" than the remix because there are a few f-bombs in his flow.
But the remix version is a classic in my book.  Like many of Marley Marl's other productions from the late 80s/early 90s, there's an "everything and the kitchen sink" approach to assembling this groove.  For instance, the shiny synth line that serves as the song's bridge comes from the 1981 post-disco track "Walking into Sunshine" by the London-based band Central Line.  (Kind of a left field choice for a song that's a essentially a diss.)  But the real mind blower to me is that the bass and rhythm lines come from flower-power rock band The Grass Roots, specifically the band's 1967 song "You and Love are the Same."  (Fans of The Office: that's Creed Bratton laying down the bassline on this song.)