A perfect song? What are your choices?


Can there be such a thing as a perfect song? I have a suggestion, what are yours? Here is a thought...

 

 

 

 

128x128falconquest

@serjio 

Waterloo Sunset has little to do with the battle of Waterloo, what some have called the most important few hours of the 19th century.

It's more to do with life in the district of Waterloo, not far from Charing Cross and Waterloo Station.

As much as I like the original, I have come to prefer the rendition at the closing ceremony of the 2012 London Olympics.

 

 

Can’t tell if you are being facetious but Waterloo Sunset is about an area in London near a train station called Waterloo Underground.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waterloo_Sunset

I mixed up the song))) ... I don’t listen to such music at all - the consonant name misled ... there was some other one - about the war ...
but this one - I don’t like this one either (especially after I introduced it - the Thames, the bridge, a couple in love, the station, obviously nearby are fields fertilized with human bones))) ..... )

something funny is better ... youth is the sun (oh - I caught myself thinking that this film also featured a fertilizer plant))) ... )

 

"Waterloo Sunset" just may be my favorite song written and recorded by any UK band. In it I hear the same sense of wistful melancholy as I do from Brian Wilson's "God Only Knows". Very distinguished company to keep.

I consider The Kinks' 4-album run of Face To Face, Something Else, The Village Green Preservation Society, and Arthur as the high water mark of British Pop music, far better to my musical taste and sensibilities than that of The Beatles during the same period. 

Stephen Sondheim's "Send in the Clowns." Simple, elegant melody and poetic, insightful lyrics are matched beautifully.

@bdp24,

I am a big fan of the Kinks and Ray Davies brilliant writing, and completely agree with you. I love Waterloo Sunset and would also nominate Big Sky as one of his great compositions.

For another "perfect song" I would nominate November Spawned a Monster by Morrissey.

@bdp24 

For another "perfect song" I would nominate November Spawned a Monster by Morrissey.

 

 

It's quite amazing just how many great songs Morrissey has recorded in his post Smiths career.

For me, he's up there alone with Dylan when it comes to the sheer number of great songs recorded over all the decades and their unique point of view.

Here's just 2 that immediately come to mind.

 

 

@bdp24 

I'm with you on the Kinks except I would add Lola Versus Powerman and the Moneygoround, Part One and Muswell Hillbillies to make a great 6 record run.  

@bdp24 

i was going through this thread today and saw your mention of ‘Lies’ by the Knickerbockers.  I had forgotten about this song but streamed today and remembered how much I really like this song.  Will add to my playlist.  Thanks!

Jazz Here....

Lenny Breau "Mercy Mercy Mercy" Anything by him but the deconstruction is great on The Velvet Touch of Lenny Breau

"Tenderly" on Standard Brands again by Lenny Breau

"Duo Blues" Art Pepper and " Patricia" and party much all things by him

"Cleveland Blues" Sonny Still OMG! 

 

 

 

 

and here (the song is called "wedding with death" - the last hours of a person's life)

 

this is something opposite of "Bensonhurst blues" ... a dream - a city that does not exist - there they always love, believe and wait for it ... the hearth burns

Personally, I prefer songs with thoughtful lyrics. Such as "Supermarket Flowers" by Ed Sheeran or "To Ramona" by Bob Dylan. In rare cases light music that helps me studying as I`m a student :)

Truly I tell you - before the grass was greener, the trees were big ... it was more fun to live ... people read books, dreamed, thought ... good company, a beloved girl, a little alcohol and a starry sky on a summer night to the music of the eighties (plus minus) - what could be better?

Today we turn to popular music and even a little to the rock of those years ... (do not remind me of disco - otherwise I will be upset) ...

But let's start even earlier - 1966 ..

 

Scorpions не совсем 80 е годы , но очень вписывается ... (у них было несколько хитов в то время)

Almost everything on Steely Dan's album Aja. Tool's The Pot and the list goes on...

A perfect song from R&B might be Shout by the Isley Brothers.

And another vote for the Kinks, with their debut that ROCKED: You Really Got Me

And another for a rocker, the Jefferson Airplane's Somebody to Love.

 

Wouldn't anyone's definition of "perfection" be subjective?

Hmm,,,,,The absolute critiquing using subjective criteria of an incorporeal phenomenon??????????????? illogical,,,,,illogical !

When it comes to perfection, well here's another one by Donovan that gets as close as anything I've ever heard.

 

 

@grislybutter

I’m not at all surprised. He’d seen it all in the 60s, rubbing shoulders with the likes of Baez and Dylan, the Beatles and the Beach Boys etc.

It’s true his career nosedived somewhat in the 70s once his association with Mickie Most came to an end. His unwillingness to jump on the coming glam bandwagon alongside the likes of Bowie and Bolan don’t help his career either, but he never stopped making good music.

In a way he remained true to himself. He wasn’t playing at being Donovan, he was Donovan.

 

Stevie Wonder has written a bunch of them... but my pick is "All In Love Is Fair"

 

 

In the lead by a long mile: Ella Fitzgerald singing Every time we say goodbye

 (1) Ella Fitzgerald Ev'ry time we say goodbye (with lyrics) - YouTube

Honourable seconds:

Emmylou Harris, Boulder to Birmingham

Tom Waits, (Looking for) the Heart of Saturday Night - the song Bruce Springsteen would have sold his soul to have written.

Dolly Parton, I Will Always Love You - ONLY in Dolly's original version; this, like Ella's Every Time demonstrates how when something's perfect you don't need to "make it better" with vocal fireworks.

 

 

Ave Maria

Camptown Races

Oh Susanna

Old Kentucky Home

Oh Holy Night

Londonderry Air (Danny Boy)

"there used to be a lot of real art - 21st century - humanity is flying into the abyss"

Oh please, get off the cross! Nobody seems to recall what real hard times are these days. We're not at war, everyone reading these words is probably well fed and has good shelter, so where's the abyss Serjio?

abyss? - it is inside most people ... this is the place where there was a difference between a Human and an animal ... vices broke free and are presented as the norm ... In addition to smartphones, everything has definitely become worse ... education and the general level of culture of the masses, food , clothes , architecture , cars ... No war ? - if you don’t see it, it doesn’t mean that it doesn’t exist ... rich people have turned into super-rich (funds, corporations, pools, banks ...) - the main part of humanity interferes with them and they destroy it ... digitalization has greatly accelerated this process . Only those who can compare can understand this ...

@serjio

Don’t let the human condition get you down too much.

Most of them having been fighting and killing for resources for hundreds of centuries.

There’s nothing any different now, except they’re better at hiding their real intentions if you’re prone to believing the electronic and print media.

Anyway, life today remains as valuable and precious as it ever did.

Perhaps even moreso if you’re wiring is good.

These are the days of miracles and wonder, aren’t they?

Yes, we know life is a losing game, but nothing should stop up from losing it beautifully, should it?

There is exactly one answer to this question.

 

Without a doubt is is Gordon Lightfoot's Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald.

 

All other answers are provably incorrect.