CLASSIC ROCK TRACKS POLL voting thread -- deadline July 15 -- VOTING CLOSED

F BTO tho

feel like there's a solid "quien es mas classic rock" side poll of bands in here. i mean i don't even like the guess who but damn if they won't have three tracks on my ballot because they are so damn classic rock.

"don't bring me down" is high on my ballot xp

ugh it really fuckin hurt to cut burdon & war, but as long as burdon is somewhere in my ballot, i think I'm okay.

I'm justifying most of my cuts as 'okay well see this one song I'm keeping is going to be representative of these 5 other songs that I've cut, yeah that'll work'

but it's getting down to 'fuck this song, it's too goddamn repetitive' THAT MEANS YOU DAVID ESSEX

LOW

RIDE

ER

ok I'm done

someone hold me

I got you. it really is exhausting. the "one song I'm keeping is going to be representative of these 5 other songs" principle is the only way to do it without going completely insane imo. the two exceptions were Rod Stewart and the Stones cause they are simply above the rest imo

yes, I'm very opinionated

KEEP ON ROLLIN

KEEP ON ROLLIN

WOOO

OOOO

OOO

Found this "gem" combing through my Random CanCon shelves trawling for obscurities to DJ on Canada Day. Can't quite tell if it's a semi-loving coke-fuelled tribute to or a full-on coke-fuelled pisstake of his former bandmate. Cummings did have a fantastic voice, though.

http://youtu.be/dEjwrDBrlzU

lol gr80

Down to 150 ... nothing but muscle and bone left and still I've got to cut. Cruel cruel cruel.

Jane has been my biggest "ohhhh THAT song!" so far

Yes, it's the song that opens Wet Hot American Summer iirc

Also on the list from WHAS is Love Is Alright Tonite by Rick Springfield, which is a total fucking jam.

It's a shame Ridin' the Storm Out didn't make the list. pre-Cronin REO is definitely more "classic rock" classic rock.

Yeah, but the version of "Ridin'" heard on cr radio is the live version with Cronin singing. Poor pre-Cronin dude couldn't catch a break.

I actually looked up REO's bio yesterday. First album had a singer, second album had a new singer (Kevin Cronin), third album had a new singer who wasn't the original dude or Cronin, and then I think Cronin became the permanent singer by the time of the fourth album. Do your auditions before recording and releasing albums, REO!

probably gonna haveta nix "hold your head up"

ha, I was just thinking this morning that that's a likely top 10 for me. Like a lot of what I'll be voting for, it's a song that to me exists only and entirely within the confines of Classic Rock. An indigenous species. I think I'll end up cutting lots of things that I love but that to me have their own separate lives outside of CR -- like, I won't vote for much Stones, but I will vote for lots of Zep.

Was Mr. Blue Sky disallowed for any reason?

― Jeff, Tuesday, July 1, 2014 4:49 PM (2 days ago)

Mr Blue Sky is a classic rock staple

not gonna vote for it but

― Euler, Tuesday, July 1, 2014 6:21 PM (2 days ago)

i never heard "Mr. Blue Sky" on the radio before it appeared in a bunch of commercials and movie trailers about a decade ago and only a few times since then

― some dude, Tuesday, July 1, 2014 6:22 PM (2 days ago)

Does this mean it remains disallowed? That would've been my most-obvious ELO pick.

I remember when "Take It On the Run" appeared in the top 40 and Casey Kasem said that REO were a band that young people lo9ved but if you were over 25 you'd probably never heard of them.

No, you can vote off-list. xp

I cut my list down to 100, haven't ranked them yet. First cut was "Do I even like this song?", second cut was "Have I heard this song on the radio?", third cut was "OK, how excited am I when I hear this song on the radio?" and when that still wasn't enough I had to limit myself to two songs per artist.

Oh and I wasn't gonna vote for "Breakin' the Law," but then I remembered Beavis and Butthead.

a song that to me exists only and entirely within the confines of Classic Rock. An indigenous species

yes!!! this is the most classic rock of all classic rock species. "hold your head up" is a perfect example of this. also, the collected works of foghat, rainbow, uriah heep and iron butterfly.

The first several million times I heard Hold Your Head Up, it was in the context of Phish, as the intro music to the part of their set where the drummer comes to the front of the stage and did various cheeky, horribly-rendered cover songs (Syd Barrett's Terrapin, Purple Rain, and Sexual Healing were common). I finally heard the original version years later on classic rock radio in a van on a field trip to Calvert Cliffs Nuclear Power Plant in college. To be honest, I've only recently started to get over the Phish stigma attached to this song.

I first heard it through Girl Talk if that makes you feel better...

first cut 483!
i'm feeling compelled to make sure i have enough tempo variety in my list -- if every song is "smoke on the water" then the jams don't sound quite as sweet

Almost! xp

i had never heard the argent version til this poll

only version I knew was by aussie rock 'supergroup' The Party Boys :D

argent's other big moment, a one-time rock staple that apparently didn't survive the transition to classic rock: "god gave rock n roll to you."

^^ Unrest do a great cover of that

emil.y, join me in the voting for Mr. Blue Sky club. I'll also support Blue Sky those those affected by that injustice.

It might get a vote from me too. I don't think I've ever heard it on the radio but it epitomizes some elements of classic rock for me (fussy arrangement, Wurlitzer (I think), laidback guitar solo)

I think I've decided to vote in this, even though I don't know anything about classic rock. Apologies in advance.

First serious attempt at winnowing the list gets me to...194 songs. Ugh. Next step I guess is really seriously purging stuff that I like but don't 100% consider part of this radio format - the new wavier entries, the more overproduced 80s things, and the few mid-60s hangers-on that I let slip through. Still, this is going to get ugly soon. Ironically, I'm reproducing the very narrowness of concept and playlist by which these stations rankle! But I had always imagined this poll was basically going to be ranking the top 100 songs that they play into the ground anyway, so I'm fine with that.

Jeff, I'm with you! I guess it's also quite pop, but it definitely fits with some of the other stuff nominated here, and is *the classic* ELO song.

I'm thinking about doing a very short ballot and ordering it as I would my own imaginary rock radio show.

Like a lot of what I'll be voting for, it's a song that to me exists only and entirely within the confines of Classic Rock. An indigenous species. I think I'll end up cutting lots of things that I love but that to me have their own separate lives outside of CR...

― something of an astrological coup (tipsy mothra), Thursday, July 3, 2014

i'm 100% on board with this approach btw. i just see myself putting more wood behind "lunatic fringe" when the tough cuts come.

If I include two 38 Special songs on my ballot, I think the second one will be Rockin' Into the Night. I love that "Waitin'...Anticipatin'..." part so much.

when I got down to 105 I considered handing Mr Veg my ballot and getting him to do the cuts for me.

Like a lot of what I'll be voting for, it's a song that to me exists only and entirely within the confines of Classic Rock. An indigenous species. I think I'll end up cutting lots of things that I love but that to me have their own separate lives outside of CR...

― something of an astrological coup (tipsy mothra), Thursday, July 3, 2014

And that's why I didn't include any Beatles

when I got down to 105 I considered handing Mr Veg my ballot and getting him to do the cuts for me.

― set the controls for the heart of the sun (VegemiteGrrl), Thursday, July 3, 2014

^^
AND WE WERE
VOTIN
VOTIN
INTO THE NIIIIIGHT

BALLOT SENT

I included a couple of Beatles songs, but really kept them to a minimum. Ditto, to a slightly lesser degree, the Rolling Stones, Led Zeppelin, the Who, Bob Dylan, and Neil Young. Like a lot of voters, I'm sure, that would easily be 100 first-tier songs right there. They probably accounted for 20 on my final list.

life was easier when I decided that Elvis, the Beatles, Dylan, Sly, the MG's and Archie Drell won't fit with the rest of my list and should therefore be excluded. but yeah, I shamelessly voted for the Boz and Stones disco tracks cause I love them to death and it FELT GOOD!

2 Zeppelin (didn't want to vote for them but hey, what can you do)
1 Beatles
1 Neil Young
0 Stones
0 Who
0 Dylan

Actually jumped at the chance to vote for Sly. I think he gets some play on the classic-rock station here, not a lot, but my favourite songs were a very manageable three, all from the nomination list. (Realize now I could have added a fourth in "Everybody Is a Star.")

But yeah, Archie Bell didn't seem to fit.

Will totally join the Mr. Blue Sky write-in campaign.

i have no Who, no Def Lep, i don't know how to feel

I have to vote for the Who/Stones/NY songs I heard on CR radio because otherwise I wouldn't have pursued those artists any further because i wouldn't have heard them*. I did, and I'm glad i did thanks to CR radio. I can live without Low Rider, tbh. I cannot live without Heart of Gold. I did cut a bunch of stuff that I really like but basically feels 80s to me rather than classic rock.

*my parents had some records, and i bought records and tapes from the age of 6 or so, but there was a point where i was trying to figure out what kind of sounds i liked (hence all the turtles/raspberries/zombies confusion and lord knows what else). i had no one to play sabbath/skynrd/iron maiden songs for me, and i don't think they had them at my local library. if not for classic rock radio, my musical diet would have been severely limited and frankly i prefer it this way!

otm re cutting stuff that feels 80's vs classic rock, I'm totally the same way

xxp ha! those are the two omissions from my own list to baffle me the most too. must be that I prefer the Hysteria singles and the Who's sixties period (which felt out of place here even if it was nominated)