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marcfagel.bsky.social
Obsessive music fan, retired securities lawyer, and author of the love letter to rock & roll 𝙅𝙞𝙩𝙩𝙚𝙧𝙮 𝙒𝙝𝙞𝙩𝙚 𝙂𝙪𝙮 𝙈𝙪𝙨𝙞𝙘, available on Amazon (http://bit.ly/Jittery).
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While it's been a fun labor of love compiling a running Spotify playlist of my 1000 favorite songs, even more fun is compiling the parallel list of covers of these songs (to the extent they exist)--some of which are wonderful, some of which are... not. Here's the latest update:

submitted 18 hours ago • 1 comment

1000 Great Songs #901: New York Groove. Mid-70s single by lesser-known UK pop-glam act Hello, probably would've been lost to history but for an inspired Kiss-adjacent cover. Saved from the Guilty Pleasures bin by virtue of being awesome.

submitted 20 hours ago • 3 comments

I've made it through 900 of these... just 100 more to go! And if you need a little something to listen today, here's the Spotify playlist for songs #801-900. open.spotify.com/playlist/2ze...

submitted 1 day ago • 2 comments

Momma's 2002 LP Household Name was one of my favorite records of the past decade (www.jitterywhiteguymusic.com/2022/09/momm...), so I'm pretty psyched their follow-up is due soon. New single/video just dropped this morning.

submitted 1 day ago • 0 comments

1000 Great Songs #900: Sleepless. The 80s version of 70s proggers King Crimson manage an actual radio-friendly song (hell, you can almost dance to it!), Tony Levin helpfully offering the definitive slap-bass master-class.

submitted 1 day ago • 3 comments

1000 Great Songs #899: (Don't Fear) The Reaper. Sorry, it's totally boring to talk about overplayed classic rock chestnuts on this list. But the songs that make a big impression on you when you're 10 never really go away. And SNL skit be damned, if this comes on the radio, I'm listening til the end.

submitted 2 days ago • 5 comments

1000 Great Songs #898: Hectified. Jason Falkner's skewed power pop chops on full display--a little too skronky for straight pop, but a little too poppy for 90s alt.rock. So, it's just right.

submitted 3 days ago • 1 comment

A few years back I combined Flaming Lips' Soft Bulletin & Mercury Rev's Deserter's Songs into an epic, unified album. Decided it was finally time to create the sequel: Flaming Mercury's All Is Pink. Enjoy!

submitted 3 days ago • 0 comments

1000 Great Songs #897: 100,000 Fireflies. @themagfields.bsky.social match Christmas-y toy keyboards with devastating lyrics, a song both dark & alluring yet strangely heartwarming; later turned into rousing punk-pop by @superchunk.bsky.social. Amazing in either variety.

submitted 4 days ago • 1 comment

1000 Great Songs #896: I Won't Hurt You. Under-appreciated psychedelic pioneers West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band could be terribly strange and creepy, but they also had a few legit great psych tracks, like this quiet, heartbeat-driven little gem.

submitted 5 days ago • 1 comment

1000 Great Songs #894: Gates Of Steel. Probably the closest Devo came to a straightforward guitar-driven rock & roll song, yet still distinctively Devo. One of those things I saw on late-night tv as a teenager that convinced me there was a lot of cool music happening that wasn't on the radio.

submitted 6 days ago • 2 comments

1000 Great Songs #894: Kids. One of the rare occasions over the past quarter century when a popular hit single has won me over, and my kids & I were actually listening to the same music. MGMT conjure the killer hook, evocative lyrics... and it still slams.

submitted 7 days ago • 1 comment

I rarely listen to any pre-Revolver Beatles LPs. For me, that's the demarcation point when they became the Greatest Band Ever. Rubber Soul has always been a wobbler--still more a collection of songs, plus some real duds. So I tried to tweak it, to see if I could make it more interesting. Success?

submitted 8 days ago • 1 comment

It’s 2025, which means roughly 40 years of not really enjoying The Smiths.

submitted 8 days ago • 3 comments

1000 Great Songs #893: Under The Old Lightbulb. The Fastbacks were making giddy punk-pop earlier, and better, than most bands, and this 90-second burst of deceptively sunny energy was a fail-safe way to kick off my morning commute back in the 90s.

submitted 8 days ago • 2 comments

1000 Great Songs #892: Other 99. Big Audio Dynamite deploy the perky pop chops of Mick Jones' finest Clash singles, a cheery everyman shoulda-been anthem that sounded like a surefire hit but, like much of BAD's great work, never got the recognition it deserved.

submitted 9 days ago • 1 comment

1000 Great Songs #891: Cadence And Cascade. Arguably the single prettiest song ever recorded by King Crimson (or any prog band, for that matter), still warms my heart and lulls me into gentler spaces.

submitted 10 days ago • 1 comment

Recently came across British indie songwriter/musician Nick Frater, and I'm greatly enjoying his mock-Rutles (and I guess mock-mock-Beatles?) album, Rebutles 1967-1970. If you enjoy McCartney's lighter piano pop from late-period Beatles, with a slight twist, you'll dig it.

submitted 11 days ago • 2 comments

1000 Great Songs #890: 88 Lines About 44 Women. Yes, I'm going to blow one of my 1000 slots on a one-hit-wonder new-wave-era probably-kinda-offensive novelty song. You probably had to be there.

submitted 11 days ago • 3 comments