The 11 Best Songs By Ted Leo & The Pharmacists

This week the epic health care bill passed. Will it work? Will it save millions of uninsured Americans from deciding between their health and bankruptcy? I have no idea. I hope it works. But I'm not a soothsayer. What I have a problem with are the "end of the world" scenarios that we've heard over the past few days. That the Health Care bill is the worst bill to ever be passed in the history of the United States. Really? Worse than slave laws? Come on. We're one of the only first world countries that doesn't have universal health care. We're not going down the road to ruin...we're actually running to catch-up with everyone else.

The truth is...the insurance companies screwed this system up. Want to blame anyone...blame them. Maybe the Health Care Bill won't solve anything...but the bill would have never come to pass if the insurance companies weren't so gluttonous. This is what happens in any business when the corporations get too greedy. Look at the music industry...they started charging $20 a CD and the people said..."no!" and found another way to get their music. This time for free.

Here are the 11 Best Songs By Ted Leo:

1. St. John The Divine (The Tyranny of Distance)

2. Little Dawn (Shake The Sheets)

3. Parrellel or Together? (The Tyranny of Distance)

4. Hearts of Oak (Hearts of Oak)

5. Me and Mia (Shake The Sheets)

6. Bleeding Powers (Shake The Sheets)

7. Under The Hedge (The Tyranny of Distance)

8. The Lost Brigade (Living With The Living)

9. The One Who Got Us Out (Shake The Sheets)

10. Tell Balgeary, Balgury Is Dead (Hearts of Oak)

11. Loyal To My Sorrowful Country (Sharkbite Sessions)

Buy Ted Leo's new album, The Brutalist Bricks now!

The 11 Best Songs By Hall & Oates

It's so easy to point fingers. Every list I do...I get some jackass pointing out which song I forgot to include on my list. What these obvious musical genius neglect to say is which song I should remove from my list...or provide their Top 11 instead. What these turkeys don't take into account is that almost every band I do a list for has tons of songs left off the Top 11 that could be arguably included. In fact many people who have tried submit their own lists have right out admitted that it was way harder than they imagined. I don't care if you disagree with my lists...in fact, I encourage it. But the one thing I ask...if you don't like my list...don't tell me which songs should be on the list...give me your top 11. I challenge you.

Here are the 11 Best Songs By Hall & Oates:

1. I Can't Go For That (Private Eyes)
2. You Make My Dreams (Voices)
3. Maneater (H20)
4. Rich Girl (Bigger Than Both of Us)
5. Private Eyes (Private Eyes)
6. Out of Touch (Big Bam Boom)
7. Kiss on My List (Voices)
8. Lady Rain (Abandonned Luncheonette)
9. United State (Voices)
10. It's a Laugh (Along The Red Ledge)
11. She's Gone (Abandonned Luncheonette)

Buy the Bird and the Bee's new Hall & Oates cover album, Interpreting the Masters.

The 11 Best Songs By Zooey Deschanel

Yesterday, William Shatner turned 79. Now, though many know him as a sci-fi icon, a 80s action star, and smart ass old lawyer...he is actually a trailblazer for something bigger and greater. Shatner was one of the first actors turned pop star. At first it was a novelty for fellow actors of his generation like Telly Savalas and crew member, Leonard Nimoy. But as we went through the 80s into the 90s, it started to become more respectable with Bruce Willis and Eddie Murphy scoring big hits...and Keenu Reeves' Dogstar and Johnny Depp's P getting some indie street cred. But now this decade, actor-turned-pop stars aren't just blip on the sonic radar, they are now full-fledged rock icons. With Jenny Lewis' Rilo Kiley, Scarlett Johansson & Pete Yorn, Jason Schwartzman's Phantom Planet, and Zooey Deschanel's She & Him...becoming a rock star may not be as easy as knowing how to string a bass...you may need some acting chops, too.

Here are the 11 Best Songs By Zooey Deschanel:

1. This is Not A Test (She & Him - Volume 1)
2. I Thought I Saw Your Face Today (She & Him - Volume 1)
3. Please, Please, Please, Let Me Get What I Want (500 Days of Summer)
4. Why Do You Let Me Stay Here (She & Him - Volume 1)
5. Fabric of My Life (Cotton)
6. Sugar Town (500 Says of Summer)
7. Baby It's Cold Outside (Elf)
8. Sweet Darlin' (She & Him - Volume 1)
9. Never Had Nobody Like You (M. Ward - Hold Time)
10. Yes Man (Yes Man Soundtrack)
11. I Was Made For You (She & Him - Volume 1)

Buy the new album by She & Him, Volume 2, only $4.99 for a limited time.

The 11 Best Songs By The Drive-By Truckers

I spent the week in Vegas for March Madness. When I went in college, I was always blown away by the might and awe of Vegas. Anything was possible in Vegas. They built a mini-New York in Vegas...with a freaking roller coaster. But now that I'm older and more skeptical, Vegas has lost a lot of its polish. It seems that Vegas is frequented by one of three types of people: college students, seniors, and white trash. I'm not in college, I'm not old enough for social security, and I don't live in a trailer park. What happened to all the glamour and the glitz in Vegas? Where did all the beautiful people go? And it's not just the tourists...it's the dealers. I remember dealers used to be young, hip people...kids taking a year off school. Or really hot girls. Now...most of the dealers are pudgy old men, with thinning hair, missing a percentage of teeth, covered in tattoos...and more than likely a registered sex offender. And you can't find a table for less than $25. I don't mind betting $25 per hand...but when I'm more afraid of the dealer than losing, then something needs to change. But maybe Vegas was always like this. Maybe I'm just older and wiser. I still lost $200...so maybe I'm not that much wiser.

Here are the 11 Best Songs By The Drive-By Truckers:

1. My Sweet Annette (Decoration Day)

2. The Day John Henry Died (The Dirty South)

3. The Sands of Iwo Jima (The Dirty South)

4. Sounds Better In The Song (Decoration Day)

5. The Righteous Path (Brighter Than Creation's Dark)

6. Margo and Harold (Pizza Deliverance)

7. The Boys From Alabama (The Dirty South)

8. The Buford Stick (The Dirty South)

9. Ronnie And Neil (Southern Rock Opera)

10. Puttin' People on the Moon (The Dirty South)

11. Where The Devil Don't Stay (The Dirty South)

Buy The Drive-By Truckers, The Big to Do, now!

Here are the 11 Best Songs By The Black Rebel Motorcycle Club

March Madness starts this week. And though the actual tournament doesn't begin until next week, the conference tournaments serve as a filling yet enticing appetizer to the main event. What makes March Madness so exciting to watch is the unpredictability. Anything can happen. Anyone can win. And anyone can lose.

Teams that have been picked to win it all have lost as early as the first game. And teams that no one picks to make it past the first game have made it to the Final Four. And some...have won it all.

The BRMC are a band of unpredictability. Thought of at one time as the murky saviors of rock n roll...the band has done everything in its power to do the exact opposite. Sometimes it works...sometimes it fails. Other times they flirt with brilliance as if only to tease their audience about they could be...if they wanted to.

Here are the 11 Best Songs By The Black Rebel Motorcycle Club:

1. What Ever Happened To My Rock n Roll (BRMC)

2. We're All In Love (Take Them On, On Your Own)

3. As Sure As the Sun (BRMC)

4. Rifles (BRMC)

5. Stop (Take Them On, On Your Own)

6. Rise or Fall (Take Them On, On Your Own)

7. Weight of the World (Howl)

8. Mercy (Howl Sessions 2)

9. Love Burns (BRMC)

10. Not What You Wanted (Baby 81)

11. Done All Wrong (Twilight New Moon)

Buy B.R.M.C.'s new album, Beat The Devil's Tatto...now!!

The 11 Best Songs By Gorillaz

Right now we're selling our place. So for the next few weeks we have to live in a false existence of cleanliness. Anyone who has kids knows this is a near impossibility. But we need to impress all the prospective buyers by giving them a vision of what the place "could" look like if one decides to come a buddhist monk and shed all their worldly possessions.

Isn't it better to show what the place looks like when it's lived in? Isn't that what everyone's going to do when they do move here? Don't you want to see how the place fares in day-to-day situations?

I guess we all want to have that illusion of a fresh start. That our life could be as clean and as prisitine if we lived in fantasy land.

Here are the 11 Best Songs By The Gorillaz:

1. Feel Good, Inc. (Demon Days)

2. Sound Check Gravity (Gorillaz)

3. Every Planet We Reach Is Dead (Demon Days)

4. Dare (Demon Days)

5. Hong Kong (D-Sides)

6. Clint Eastwood (Gorillaz)

7. Rock The House (Gorillaz)

8. People (D-Sides)

9. El Manana (Demon Days)

10. Stop The Dams (D-Sides)

11. 19-2000 (Gorillaz)

Buy The Gorillaz new album, Plastic Beach, now!!

If you haven't checked it out yet...be sure to go to our $5 store for tons of great discounted albums, featuring Sleater-Kinney, Frightened Rabbit, Hold Steady, Alkaline Trio and more.

The 11 Best Albums By Danger Mouse

I love Netflix. As all of you know, I love making lists. Netflix allows me to make a list of all the movies I want to see. And then sends them to me in the mail to watch for as long as I want. What could be bad about that? Well...I'll tell you...it's everything if you're Warner Bros.

Warner Bros just struck a deal with Netflix to delay all WB titles for 28 days before making them available to rent. This has to be one of the most ass-backwards business decision I've ever heard. Supposedly, this is being done in an effort to influence people to buy more DVDs. How? People on Netflix are renting movies...because they don't want to buy them. And most of the time...probably 99.9% of the time...people are renting movies they've never seen. People don't buy movies they've never seen. And if I didn't bother to go see a movie in the theater...I'm not going to spend MORE money on a DVD for a weaker movie-going experience. Seriously, get your heads out of your asses.

It's not like Warner Bros has been shitting out golden turds either. The Box got terrible reviews and tanked. You're right...that just screams..."Buy me, buy me."

It always boggles my mind how big corps are so resistant technological advances. Don't they know by now...it's those who embrace the future are the ones who last to exist in the future?

Here are the 11 Best albums by Danger Mouse:

1. Gnarls Barkley - St. Elsewhere

2. Beck - Modern Guilt

3. Danger Mouse and Jemini - Ghetto Pop Life

(The Only One)

4. Jay-z/The Beatles - The Grey Album

5. Gorillaz - Demon Days

6. Sparklehorse and Danger Mouse - Dark Night of the Soul

(Just War)

7. Martina Topley-Bird - The Blue God

8. The Good, The Bad, & The Queen - The Good, The Bad, and the Queen

9. Gnarls Barkley - The Odd Couple

10. The Black Keys - Attack and Release

11. Danger Doom - The Mouse and the Mask

Buy Danger Mouse's newest collaboration with Shins' lead singer James Mercer (Broken Bells) now!!

The 11 Best Jimi Hendrix Songs

I don't think that any musical artist has been more prolific after their death than Hendrix and Tupac. In fact, I hear later this year, there's a Hendrix/Tupac duets album that is coming out. They cover a White Stripes song...so that should be good.

Valleys of Neptune becomes the (approx.) 14th studio album released after Jimi's death. Yes, that's right 14 albums...after he died. Now as amazing as it seems...there's a little cheating going on. Some of the early albums featured as few as 5-8 tracks. And lots of the tracks crossover onto multiple albums, with each new song only being an "alternate" version of a previously released track. While other songs are the exact same track that was from a previous release. Then there's a box set...tons of live albums...and shitloads of demos that Courtney Love has been hoarding. So how the hell do you know what to own?

Let's make it easy. Start with the big three: Axis, Are You Experienced?, and Electric Ladyland. From there ignore the immediate follow-ups: Cry of Love, Rainbow Bridge, and War Heroes. Most of the tracks were compiled to contruct the proper 4th LP, The First Rays of the New Rising Sun. So get that. Which means you can also ignore Voodoo Soup, which is pretty much the same thing...but with poor mastering. Then you've got Loose Ends, Crashing Landing, Midnight Lightning, Nine To The Universe. Forget these. The producer added new musicians to the mixes, creating his own version of Jimi's rough outtakes. So they're not official. Pick up South Saturn Delta. It compiles most of the better outtakes, making these previous releases mostly obsolete. This means you can also ignore Blues...which like Voodoo Soup...is very similar...but not equal in production quality or track choice. The only other outstanding releases worth getting are the JHE box set, which features the best of the rest and many alternate takes of big songs, and the BBC sessions, which features live versions of his popular songs along with a plethera of covers.

With that taken care of...Valleys of Neptune should be the next to fit right in with the others.

Here are the 11 best Jimi Hendrix songs:

1. All Along the Watchtower (Electric Ladyland)

2. May This Be Love (Are You Experienced?)

3. 1983...(A Merman I Should Turn To Be) - (Electric Ladyland)

4. Bold As Love (Axis: Bold As Love)

5. Little Wing (Axis: Bold As Love)

6. Hey Baby (First Rays of the New Rising Sun)

7. The Wind Cries Mary (Are You Experienced?)

8. Purple Haze (Are You Experienced?)

9. Angel (First Rays of the New Rising Sun)

10. Hey Joe (Are You Experienced?)

11. Voodoo Chile (Electric Ladyland)

Buy Jimi Hendrix's new album, "Valleys of Neptune" now!!

Also, check out the new $5 albums for March, including the new Spoon, early Phoenix, Kid A deluxe edition, the new Citizen Cope, Postal Service, and Lil Wayne's Rebirth.

The 11 Best songs By Peter Gabriel

It was never my intention to do a posting on Peter Gabriel. I like PG. I was a big fan of So. But he lost me recently when he spent a good decade trying to teach monkeys how to play music. I swear.

I had no intention of even getting the new album. Except that an album of covers, including modern takes on Bon Iver and Radiohead, peaked my curiousity. So I "downloaded" the album. I wasn't going to buy it. But I wanted to hear it. And you know what...it's good. It's not comeback worthy...but it's strong enough to remind us why we thought he was great in the first place. Because I liked the album so much, I felt compelled to do a posting for Pete. Not only to look back at his unique career...but to tell people to go out and buy the album. It's worth it. Now, I wasn't planning to buy the album...but if this post gets one person to go out and buy it...then illegal downloading actually just increased his album sales. How do you like them apples? Or in Pete's case, how do you like them bananas?

The 11 Best Songs By Peter Gabriel:

1. In Your Eyes (So)
2. Red Rain (So)
3. Solsbury Hill (Car)
4. Don't Give Up (So)
5. Games Without Frontiers (Melt)
6. Steam (Us)
7. Animal Magic (Scratch)
8. That Voice Again (So)
9. Digging in the Dirt (Us)
10. The Family and the Fishing Net (Security)
11. Sledgehammer (So)


Buy Peter Gabriel's new album of covers, Scratch My Back now!!

The 11 Best Songs By Rogue Wave

It's a sign of the times when living without the internet is as fatal as losing a limb. I came home after a brief road trip to find my modem dead. My 6-month old modem which comes with a 2-year warranty. I called AT&T (the India branch, obviously). They told me that my modem, which has a manufacturing date of 2009 printed right on the side, was actually purchased in 2004...and therefore the warranty is no longer valid. What then followed was an hour long discussion on the physics of time travel and how it was impossible for me to purchase a 2009 model modem 5 years before it was even made. Though the guy on the phone was fascinated with my ability to purchase future items years before they were invented, he could not argue with the cold hard facts that were available on his computer screen: my modem was purchased in 2004...case closed.

It finally took getting to a 3rd tier manager, to get them to look at my actual phone bill to see where I had been charged for a modem just a few months back to get a new sent to me.

Then the icing on the cake. The modem came...2 days late...protected by a password that only AT&T knew and then refused to give me. Gotta love technology.


Here are the 11 Best Songs By Rogue Wave:

1. Chicago X 12 (Asleep At Heaven's Gate)
2. Love's Lost Guarantee (Descended Like Vultures)
3. Publish My Love (Descended Like Vultures)
4. Fantasies (Asleep At Heaven's Gate)
5. Eyes (B-Side)
6. Harmonium (Asleep At Heaven's Gate)
7. Falcon Settles Me (Out of The Shadow)
8. Manna demo (Descended Like Vultures Bonus Track)
9. Endgame (Out of the Shadow)
10. Seconds (B-Side)
11. Wait For It (10:1 EP)

Buy Rogue Wave's new album Permalight...now!