By Siddharth Jejurikar ’16, Entertainment Editor
In my two year tenure on The Scroll, I have had a wonderful time writing about, reviewing, and analyzing some great music, film, and television. This will be my last rotation as Entertainment Editor for The Scroll and I wish the new staff luck with what I am sure will be fantastic next year. In order to leave The Scroll feeling as if I had truly put myself on the page, so to speak, I decided to conclude my editorship with my personal top ten tracks of all-time list. These songs are ones that have been especially impactful to me in some way, whether its lyrically, emotionally, musically, or in my preference for certain genres.
- “Storm” from Lift Your Skinny Fists Like Antennas to Heaven by Godspeed You! Black Emperor
This 22 minute post-rock piece beautifully melds ambient noise-rock influences with big-band type rock instrumentals that mirror classical stylings. “Storm” takes the listener on an emotional journey completely without the use of sung lyrics. Whether the listener focuses on the static voice recordings towards the end, the descent into chaotic instrumentals begins at the 12:00 minute mark, or the subtle rise of stringed instruments at the start of the song, they will see beauty and detail in every moment. The ambition, grandiosity, and breadth of “Storm” only complement its greatest feature—its fluidity. Where I saw the song as representing the rise and fall of humanity, another listener may see the single lifetime of an individual expressed, or a historical event condensed into music. “Storm” is long and dense, but ultimately worth the journey, as it can change your perspective on the power non-lyrical music can hold.
- “Cold World ” from Liquid Swords by GZA
Liquid Swords, an album frequently referred to as one of the most influential hip hop records of all time, seeks to meld the harsh realities of inner-city life that rappers like GZA grew up around with a sense of legend, mystery, and story associated with East Asian culture. The similarities run from a warrior’s brutality to his victims to a samurai’s code of honor. “Cold World” is one the seminal tracks from this album which perfectly demonstrates the album’s key themes. Songs like “Cold World” and “N.Y. State of Mind” by Nas do nothing in the way of political activism, they merely paint a realistic picture of poverty’s affects. By using clever wordplay and frequent connections to Edo-period japan and Warring-States era China, GZA does this in a unique and beautiful way. This song, and the album it comes from, showed me the power that hip hop as a genre of music can have.
- Beethoven’s 7th Symphony, Second Movement
The first time I heard this classical piece was in the film “The Fall,” where it was not only chosen incredibly well, but melded with the visuals and plot of the film to create a truly emotional scene. Because of this, the second movement of Beethoven’s 7th has stuck with me for several years. The epic and grand sounds of this piece do not take away from its emotional impact. The major theme of this movement, a melodic rise and fall, is repeated, replicated, and transformed throughout the piece in a creative way that focuses in on some key human element and explores it with deep vigor.
4. “Conversation 16” from High Violet by The National
While The National has produced a number of songs that have been more impactful on my musical tastes such as “Fake Empire” and have affected me emotionally to me such as “Demons”, “Conversation 16” is the song that introduced me to this band and its Country Day alumni guitarists. “Conversation 16” is a beautiful demonstration many of The National’s signature tones, from Matt Berninger’s solemn baritone vocals to the Dessner and Devendorf brothers’ ethereal instrumentals. The song tells the story of a married couple slowly drifting apart, following the theme of failed relationships that appears frequently on albums like High Violet and Sad Songs for Dirty Lovers, a story that is told in an especially effective way by Berninger’s clever lyrics. The way this song introduced me to The National has had a significant influence on my musical tastes, and for that reason it is on this list.
- “Maggot Brain” from Maggot Brain by Funkadelic
All it took was two effects puzzles, a guitar, an amp, and the quote, “play your guitar as if you just found out your mother had died,” to produce one of the greatest guitar solos of all time. The quote, coming from George Clinton—funk pioneer and founder of Funkadelic—was told to guitarist Eddie Hazel during a recording session and led to his ten minute contribution to the anthology of greatest guitar solos. Hazel’s guitar, with its wah-wah and delay affects, creates an amazing, almost weeping-like sound that cuts into the listener’s heart while a simple arpeggiated pentatonic scale plays in the background.
- “Sing About Me, I’m Dying of Thirst” from Good Kid, M.A.A.D City by Kendrick Lamar
This 12:00 minute song is the longest from Kendrick Lamar’s 2012 album, and one of the most emotional. While Kendrick Lamar has always stunned me with his jazz-inspired rapping and excellent lyricism, “Sing About Me, I’m Dying of Thirst” is one of the best examples of his skill. In the song, he delves into a personal fear of his that is immensely humanistic—the fear of failure. The relatability of the song’s theme is matched by important themes that are less relatable. As with much of Kendrick Lamar’s music he delves into the realities of his life and childhood in Compton in the song. While most people around him didn’t see themselves living past the age of 25, Kendrick found a determination to make his name known before he left the earth, “When the lights shut off/ and it’s my turn to settle down/ my main concern/ promise that you will sing about me.” I think anyone who’s been even slightly in touch with the music industry in the past 3 years can say that he was certainly successful.
- “Achilles Last Stand” from Presence by Led Zeppelin
What makes the meticulously arranged “Achilles Last Stand” significant is how it shows all the members of Led Zeppelin at their best. The band itself is one that has massively impacted my musical preferences. From when my older brother started playing guitar in the eighth grade to his coming idolization of Jimmy Page, my most formative musical memories are of him shredding out Zeppelin songs one after the other. In “Achilles Last Stand”, both my brother and my favorite Led Zeppelin song, Jimmy Page layers twelve different guitar lines on top of each other to create a beautiful cacophony that sounds oddly melodious while Robert Plants sings ethereal and mythical lyrics with his signature voice. In the background, John Bonham displays some of his best and most powerful drumming while John Paul Jones plays an inventive galloping bass line. All the intricate pieces of this song come together beautifully in a way I can’t describe, all I can do is highly recommend this song to anyone with interest in rock music.
- “On GP” from Powers That B by Death Grips
The experimental hip hop group Death Grips are widely known for their incredibly abrasive and inaccessible music, a style that has been frequently criticized. The thesis of all DG works are deeply rooted in the post-modern movement, where vocalist MC Ride and drummer Zack Hill seek to demonstrate the strength and importance of free artistic expression. This has resulted in famous songs like “Guillotine” and “No Love” with harsh synthesizer cuts and down-tuned primal drums. But at the same time, both artists have revealed very little of their personal lives in their music, until “On GP”. In this track from their most recent album, MC Ride uses his real name for the only time ever with the line, “Use at your discretion, it’s been a pleasure, Stefan”, spoken by the reaper. The song explores the concept of suicide and death and MC Ride’s own struggles with the two. This genuine representation of MC Ride’s deepest emotions and fears is unique and powerful as he utters lines like, “My friends and family won’t understand/ So I stay in the end, don’t make none to me/ If it wasn’t for them, I’d make that decision on GP/ Had to do it all again, /I’d make that decision on GP”. It’s hard to come to terms with that part of the human psyche but Death Grips blatantly demonstrate its importance to them in this song in a very powerful way.
9. “Street Spirit (Fade Out)” from The Bends by Radiohead
Radiohead is one of those bands that has reached a near infallible place in my mind. Given the shear quality and musical inventiveness that Radiohead continues to show, I personally believe that Radiohead will always be remembered as a legendary band. “Street Spirit” is the conclusion to The Bends, Radiohead’s second album and works perfectly to foreshadow their evolution as band. The dark tones of Johnny Greenwood’s guitar matches Thom Yorke’s ominous, ambient vocals lyrics in this piece in way that conveys a foreboding feeling. This style is indicative of much of Radiohead’s music, despite the massive instrumental variation between albums. I chose “Street Spirit” because of how to encapsulates so much of Radiohead’s variable discography.
- “Chicago” from Illinoise by Sufjan Stevens
With his typical soft-spoken voice and gentle music, Sufjan Stevens explores the qualities of youth in the song “Chicago”. While many of Sufjan Stevens songs have been immensely emotional for me, most notably “Fourth of July” from Carrie and Lowell, the relatability of “Chicago” deeply touched me. The narrator’s story is almost Into the Wild-esque, as he abandons materialism and basic struggles of day-to-day life in exchange for a careless existence. Using repetition of key phrases such as, “I made a lot of mistakes,” to the conversion of the line “all things go” to “all things grow,” Sufjan Stevens does a fantastic job lyrically demonstrating the endearing qualities of a simple and unattached existence.
While this list is certainly not exhaustive of my musical favorites, and I had an incredibly hard time choosing most of these tracks, it does decent job summarizing my tastes. Some honorable mentions go to “Take Five” by Dave Brubeck, “One More Cup of Coffee” by Bob Dylan, “Gosh” by Jamie xx, and a host of other songs by Kendrick Lamar, Radiohead, and The National. Thank you for making it this far, I hope this may have given you some new artists or songs to listen to and if not, has at least been entertaining.
Image Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lift_Your_Skinny_Fists_Like_Antennas_to_Heaven
