I got this idea from Elleroy; and the original idea came from Rolling Stone magazine in an article that had a number of musicians listing the songs that influenced them most. Since music is such a huge part of so many of our lives, I thought I'd do my own. And instead of tagging just a few bloggers to make their own lists, I'm tagging all of you.
The first one is first because it is the most important. After that I'm going to try and go in chronological order.......
1. Wovenhand - "The Good Hand"
Those of you who have been with me for a while may recall the intense bout of depression I went through a couple years ago. There was much drinking and opiate abuse to dull the noise in my head, and there was also a suicide attempt (that artery in your thigh is kind of far away from the surface just fyi). I was gearing up to try again when I happened to listen to a CD that someone sent me a while back. That CD was one of the compilations John Connolly put together to go with his books, and "The Good Hand" was track 8.
The friend who sent me that CD--Jeanne--deserves a massive thank you. You quite literally saved my life, because David Edwards' music and all the music I discovered through him could never have dragged me out of that depression if you hadn't sent me that CD. <3
2. Queen - "The Prophet's Song"
This is the song that started it all. My father has always loved music. When I was about 5 years old, I heard him listening to Queen and was like WHAT IS THIS GLORIOUS NOISE and thus I acquired my first rock album, on cassette. In the way of all very small children, I played it over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over until eventually the tape got so worn out it wouldn't play anymore. Dad got me another one. I killed that one as well, and also the first CD. The Prophets Song is Queen's greatest song ever and I will never entertain arguments to the contrary.
3. Marilyn Manson - "Dope Hat"
I listened to grunge like pretty much everyone else in the 1990's. And then, when I was in 8th grade, I saw the video for this song in the middle of the night on that Canadian music channel (don't remember what it was called, I think it's gone now) and was like WHAT IS THIS GLORIOUS NOISE, and so the next day I marched myself to the nearest music shop and purchased Marilyn Manson's first album. It was all downhill from there.
4. Ludwig van Beethoven - Symphony No. 9 in D minor (that one is super long, so y'all just get the link.)
I had always liked classical music, but never actively listened to it until Dad got me a box set of all of Beethoven's symphonies. After that, classical music was like crack to me. I gobbled up all the big names everyone knows (or should know)--Mozart, Bach, Handel, Haydn, Mendelssohn, etc., etc. I blasted it on my mother's massive surround sound system until the neighbours complained. And then about a year later, I saw the movie Battle Royale, which led directly to
5. Giuseppe Verdi - Requiem
Battle Royale opens with this:
and I promptly lost interest in the film because I was like WHAT IS THIS GLORIOUS NOISE I must have more of it!! My classical collection then doubled as I added a ton of chorus and opera music to it. I went through composers faster than most people go through toilet paper, which is how I arrived at my mother's least favourite phase.
6. Gregorio Allegri - Miserere Mei Deus
I went through a period of about six months wherein I listened to nothing but medieval and Renaissance church music.
7. KMFDM - "World War Three"
Not the whole song, just the guitar and banjo part at the very beginning. This one is out of chronological order, because I do not remember exactly when I first heard it. At the time, I wasn't crazy about country music outside of the songs I liked by Johnnie Cash, Kris Kristofferson, and Willie Nelson. Since I knew pretty much nothing about country music, I could not properly identify the beginning of the song's true genre--all I knew was that it sounded vaguely like country, except like no country music I had ever heard before. And I was like WHAT IS THIS GLORIOUS NOISE I must have more of it! But I could not find more, because I could never properly identify it.
I spent the next 10 years trying to hunt down this music, or anything remotely like it. I came up with nothing. As more years went by, I grew less and less enthusiastic in my search. Until I got some more CDs in the mail--Jeanne strikes again!!--and in looking up more music by some of the artists on those CD's, and in Spotify suggesting that I listen to similar artists
I FOUND IT
8. Hillstomp - "Going Down South"
No one can really agree on one name for the genre--gothic country, southern gothic, alternative country, americana, etc. This is the music that got me playing the bass again. This is the music that got me interested in going out and doing things again when the depression still tried to keep me living the life of a hermit.
And now my friends, please tell me about your music!
