Who Are Your One Track Heroes?
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Artist:
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Album:Live at Austin City Limits Music Festival 2006: Rocky Votolato
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Track:
Other than this song, well, I'm pretty sure that Rocky's a little too boy band for me. Yeah, he's got one of those pretty boy voices. Not my style. I like it a little rough around the edges. The kind where you can hear real emotion, not some studio fabricated pain...the real kind; however, this song seems to hit the spot at times...like now.
Anyone out there have any Rocky V history? Maybe I'm not being fair. I mean he is from Seattle...there may be hope. But I'm doubting it. I'm okay with the fact that he may be a one hit wonder, for my liking at least.
I have a number of one track heroes who serve a sole purpose of fitting my here-and-now needs; for example, there's the one trackers I have for my iPod "Training" playlist, e.g., The Pussycat Dolls, Soulja Boy Tell 'Em, and Kanye West (when I was training for a 1/2 marathon).
This one would happen to fall into my "I want to crawl in a hole" playlist. What special playlists do you have? And who are your one track heroes?
Comments (7)
Great post! I'd love to hear more of your 1-hit-heroes...
I decided to add a little love to some 1-hit-heroes from my past so I went with songs from the 80s & 90s. There are a lot of artists that I only own 1 song from, but I like more of their music I just don't own more of it for one reason or another. However, growing up there were a lot of bands that I only liked their 1 hit song--& I would play it over & over, here's a few that I can think of (some of them are all too obvious, don't crucify me for it):
Dexy's Midnight Runners - Come on Eileen
Sinead O'Conner - Nothing Compares 2U
Nena - 99 Luftballoons
I'm Gonna Be - The Proclaimers
867-5309 - Tommy Tutone (I hope this gets stuck in everyone's head bwahahaha...god we used to annoy my mother with this song!)
Pepper - Butthole Surfers
Counting Blue Cars - Dishwalla
Standing Outside a Broken Phone Booth with Money In My Hand - Primative Radio Gods (I still love this song, especially the part with BB King! Maybe it's just me, but it never fails to make me feel something, you know? It's a rare commodity.)
There are a LOT of one-hit-wonders in rock. Maybe more than there are more-than-one-hit-wonders; I haven't done a survey yet. If you're interested, you may be curious to look at my own recent post which touches on this subject, on my MOG -- http://mog.com/zarpex/blog/184660
Some of my personal one-hit heroes are (in iTunes order, which -- unavoidably, I suppose -- alphabetizes solo artists by their first names):
- "Take On Me" -- a-ha
- "More, More, More (Part 1)" -- Andrea True
- "Sugar Sugar" -- The Archies
- "Oblivious" -- Aztec Camera
- "Come and Get It" -- Badfinger
- "Livin' It Up" -- Bell & James
- "Chantilly Lace" -- The Big Bopper
- "Jim Dandy" -- Black Oak Arkansas
- "Hooked on a Feeling" -- Blue Swede
- "Ride Captain Ride" -- Blues Image
- "Onion Skin" -- Boom Crash Opera
- "Smokin' in the Boy's Room" -- Brownsville Station
- "Kung Fu Fighting" -- Carl Douglas
- "Tubthumping" -- Chumbawamba
- "Substitute" -- Clout
- "Matrimonial Fears" -- The Cymbaline
- "Beautiful Sunday" -- Daniel Boone
- "Believe" -- Dig
- "Ah! Leah!" -- Donnie Iris
- "Love Grows (Where My Rosemary Goes)" -- Edison Lighthouse
- "War" -- Edwin Starr
- "Connection" -- Elastica
- "Kiss You All Over" -- Exile
- "The Way" -- Fastball
- "Beach Baby" -- The First Class
- "Sea Cruise" -- Frankie Ford
- "Keep Your Hands to Yourself" -- Georgia Satellites
- "Alone Again (Naturally) -- Gilbert O'Sullivan
- "Birth, School, Work, Death" -- The Godfathers
- "Better Days" -- Gun
- "MMMBop" -- Hanson
- "Happy Hour" -- The Housemartins
- "This Is How It Feels" -- Inspiral Carpets
- "Jilted John" -- Jilted John
- "Spiders and Snakes" -- Jim Stafford
- "World Shut Your Mouth" -- Julian Cope
- "Pretend We're Dead" -- L7
- "So Alive" -- Love and Rockets
- "I Try" -- Macy Gray
- "How Do You Do?" -- Mouth & MacNeal
- "You Get What You Give" -- New Radicals
- "How Bizarre" -- OMC
- "Images of Heaven" -- Peter Godwin
- "Magic" -- Pilot
- "Twiggy Twiggy/Twiggy vs. James Bond" -- Pizzicato Five
- "Crash" -- The Primitives
- "Round and Round" -- Ratt
- "Rock and Roll, Hoochie Koo" -- Rick Derringer
- "I'm Too Sexy" -- Right Said Fred
- "Tie Me Kangaroo Down, Sport" -- Rolf Harris
- "Never Say Never" -- Romeo Void
- "Smoke from a Distant Fire" -- Sanford & Townsend
- "Goodbye to You" -- Scandal
- "3 Strange Days" -- School of Fish
- "Lullaby" -- Shawn Mullins
- "Venus" -- Shocking Blue
- "Driver's Seat" -- Sniff'n the Tears
- "Stuck in the Middle" -- Stealers Wheel
- "Voices Carry" -- 'Til Tuesday
- "Life Is a Highway" -- Tom Cochrane
- "Don't Walk Away" -- Toni Childs
- "Love Is the Answer" -- Utopia
- "Bittersweet Symphony" -- The Verve
- "Ride" -- The Vines
- "Smile" -- Vitamin C
- "Mexican Radio" -- Wall of Voodoo
- "Play That Funky Music" -- Wild Cherry
- "Whole Wide World" -- Wreckless Eric
- "Maps" -- Yeah Yeah Yeahs
Interesting subject, dude.It's a rare site to see one song sitting in my library by one artist. The # 1 rule has got to be that it's got to be the only song you have of theirs (or something like that. Back in the day, you'd buy the single or maybe even the complete album. It's a lot easier now not to. I guess Journey "Don't Stop Believin'" fits that category (although they had others). In my opinion The Wombats will dance into obscurity and let "Let's Dance to Joy Division" be their only real contribution to the world.
As for playlists? So many playlists. I too, have a work out mix, comprised mostly of high speed and fast punk and rock songs. It's gotta be the right song if I'm going to run to it. Beats or dancy type music just doesn't do it for me.
I have a mash up playlist, a short attention span playlist, a playlist for each month (of all the songs I'm listening to at the moment). For August, I've got The Acorn (thanks!), Birdmonster, Damien Jurado, Evermore, Frank Black, The Stills and Sonic Youth. I also have an altered songs playlist and a forgotten faces list of bands I hardly ever listen to (except when I select those 15 letters, in that order).
broken girl-haha That is awesome...I'm just getting a chance to spend some time reading through the comments...that video is priceless! It recalled a bunch of songs from my past, like "Breakfast at Tiffany's" by Deep Blue Something and The Verve Pipe's "The Freshman"-yikes! haha I love how songs have the power to fling you right back to a particular time in your life. I'm so there with you on all the songs you listed. Now I've got one for you...what about Suzanne Vega's "Luka"? Ohhh yay! haha
Eric5776-I am so very impressed with your playlists! You really make me want to utilize the playlist option so much more; bring it to a whooole neva levvvel! haha The "short attention span" and "forgotten faces" playlists got a chuckle out of me-thanks! BTW-what exactly IS on the "short attention span" playlist??
Hey thanks. My short attention span playlist consists of songs 1:30 or less. I currently have 300+ songs on it which includes a lot of punk bands but also Spoon (Car Radio is one of my favs), Guided by Voices, Lake Trout, and The Pixies. The Beatles have a :23 song off Abbey Road - "Hey MajestyDo you know how to use the smart playlist option? You can categorize all of your 90 seconds or less songs into one playlist. I compiled some helpful iTunes tips a few months back on this one - http://mog.com/Eric5776/blog/172058
Niiice! 1.) I've got to check out some of your tunes and 2.) Great iTues info. I've never explored the option to its fullest, but I will be now! Thanks E =) ~Nel