20 Artists, 20 Songs
 

So I recently got a car with Sirius XM Radio. I'm really liking it -- there's a lot of stations, no commercials, and enough decent stations that I can usually find something on. But the feature that got me really geeked was the alerts. When a song comes up, you can hit a button to tell the stereo to alert you whenever that artist or song is about to be played, on any station, and gives you the option to go to that station with one button. That really helped me relax and just enjoy whatever I was listening to, since I didn't have to feel like "yeah, this song is pretty good, but there might be something better on one of these other stations" which can lead to a lot of flipping around. However, I was pretty bummed when I found out that the limit is 20 of each, and after that, if you want to add something, you have to replace an old one.

Anyway, since this forum is a place that likes its lists and likes its music, I figured it would make a good thread here. You've got slots for 20 artists and 20 songs, how do you use them? This should be something a little different from "tell us your 20 favorite artists then your 20 favorite songs" -- it's a little different in that you'd have to expect to hear these songs on the radio (in fact, since you can't search for stuff on my stereo, I can't add anything until it gets played). For those who listen to a lot of radio, this shouldn't be a problem -- but those who don't might have to come up with an idea of what their "radio experience" would be like before tackling this. The same with people who listen to just one station -- in your radio experience, you don't need any notifications, since you're not switching back and forth ever, so you'll have to imagine a radio experience where you are switching.

That said, choosing artists is probably a function of not just how much you like them, but how often they get played on the radio. If an artist gets played a lot, you'll get alerted a lot. This is for the most part a good thing -- if you like the artist, it's nice to get notified a lot that they're playing. On the other hand, if they get played a lot anyway, you might feel like you don't even need to be alerted, since you'll hear them a lot just by flipping around. And if an artist doesn't get played very often, it might be a waste of an alert, because it will hardly ever pop up. On the other hand, if they're played so rarely, do you really want to miss the few times they do get played?

Choosing songs is a little more detailed, IMO. Obviously, if you have that artist added, you don't need the song. Although, covers might be an exception -- as far as I can tell, the only thing that gets stored is the song title, so if you add "I Think We're Alone Now" I think you'd get the version by Tommy James and the Shondells as well as Tiffany -- however, you can't get "I Saw Her Standing There" by the Beatles and "I Saw Him Standing There" by Tiffany with one song, since the titles are different. I'm not sure about how this works, so I'll let you guys make your own assumptions here if you want. Anyway, I would think that the song slots should be taken by artists who have only one song that you're really interested in hearing. But some people may think that's a mistake, or that it's worth it to use up two songs slots for one artist, because it would save an artist slot.

Okay, I've pontificated about this enough. I'll post my list next.

Artists

Songs

Interesting concept for an FOFC lister, I'll try to play along but honestly I probably have to do a partial list & then fill it out to the max later. But if I were sitting down to program these lists, that's very likely what I'd end up doing anyway. The problem I see here, for me anyway, is that pretty much everything on my artist list is going to appear on a max of 2 or 3 channels that I'd be listening to anyway, so the alerts become pretty redundant.

Groups
Iron Maiden
Dio
Triumph
Scorpions
Dokken
Metallica
Ratt
Airbourne
Pantera
Judas Priest
Rainbow
Great White
Megadeth
Rock Sugar

Songs
Children of the Sun
Fantasy (Aldo Nova)
Never Been Any Reason
Radar Love
Barracuda
Jane

Artists
Cheap Trick
Queen
Ramones
TLC
Motorhead
Warren Zevon
Rhiana
Cinderella
Boston
Nazareth
Ciara
Van Halen
Ratt
Guns N Roses
Billy Joel
Foghat
The Cars
Sweet
Scorpions
Faith No More

Edit to add songs
More than a Feeling
The Flame
Ace of Spades
Freebird
Shut up and Drive
Unpretty
No one like you
Balls to the Wall
Dreams in the Dark
Surrender
Blitzkreig Bop
Love Hurts
Piece of my Heart (Janis, Nazareth and Erma Franklin's versions all good)
Amanda
Welcome to the Jungle
November Rain
Don't stop the Sandman
Heartbreak Station
Ashes to Ashes
The Show must go on

Wow, Pass, Kirsty MacColl? I'm impressed.

hells yeah! That's one of those that could be considered a waste of a slot, though. I heard "A New England" once, and haven't heard anything by her since. In fact, I was surprised I heard anything by her even the one time.

Isn't that the woman from the "Fairytale of New York" song?

I've never had satellite radio but from what I gather one of the main benefits is being able to find much more obscure stuff than the 25 or so songs they always play on regular radio.

I know MacColl's career was cut short by her tragic death so I don't know much of her work either. I'm actually more familiar with her brother, Neil MacColl, both for his work with David Gray and his popular work with Kathryn Williams.

Yes, that's her.

I wouldn't say much more obscure stuff. Maybe it's due to my listening habits, but it seems like a lot of the stations are very similar in format, so several stations are equally likely to play the same stuff, which doesn't leave much room for very obscure stuff. There's exceptions, and maybe I'm spoiled from listening to my ipod, but it's not like you're hearing some new crazy thing after another (although if anyone else has it and disagrees, I'd love to hear about it)!

I have an album by Kathryn Williams and Neill MacColl, but it never occured to me there was be a connection.

There are very few artists where I like the majority of their songs. So I'd get annoyed pretty quickly if everytime ANY song of theirs was played, I'd be alerted. So this is a very short list:
Artists
The Beatles
Paul Simon
U2
REM

For the songs, these would be ones that I would stop scanning if I came across them on the dial. This list would be pretty dynamic, so this is simply a snaphot in time:
Songs
Only Wanna Be With You - Hootie and the Blowfish
The Breakup Song - Greg Kihn Band
One - U2
I Walk The Line - Johnny Cash
Babe I'm Gonna Leave You - Led Zepplin
Go Your Own Way - Fleetwood Mac
Friend of the Devil - Grateful Dead
Crazy on You - Heart
All the Single Ladies (Put a ring on it) - Beyonce
Sweet Jane - The Cowboy Junkies
Don't Stop Believing - Journey
Wrong Way - Sublime
With or Without You - U2
Heartbreaker - The Rolling Stones
Won't Get Fooled Again - The Who
Stan - Eminem
Paranoid - Black Sabbath
Whenever, Wherever - Shakira
Hands Clean - Alanis Morissette
Bizzare Love Triangle - New Order

Artists
Very very hard to cut a list down to 20 ... but probably ...

REM
The Beatles
10cc
Keane
Blur
The Cranberries
Big Country
The Alarm
Aerosmith
Foo Fighters
The Fray
Fleetwood Mac
Green Day
Lloyd Cole and the Commotions
Gorillaz
The Killers
Robbie Williams
Simple Minds
Savage Garden
Supertramp

Thats probably as varied a list as you'll ever see .... also nearly making the cut amongst others was Toby Keith who I like a lot .... what can I say 3 years over here and I'm turning into a country boy :D

Thats a great list - makes a note to download some Aztec Camera ....

If you haven't already give the Pogues a listen (they're the band who did that song with her) - they're fantastic ... presuming of course you like traditional Irish music (I'm half Irish so its kinda compulsory for me ;) ).

Artists
The Doors
Pink Floyd
Led Zeppelin
REM
Pearl Jam
Nirvana
Stone Temple Pilots
Audioslave
Soundgarden
Run DMC
Eminem
Lil Wayne
Busta Rhymes
Pantera
Johnny Cash
Linkin Park
Jay-Z
The Fray
Seether
Guns n Roses

Songs
Mad World by Michael Andrews
Bleed it Out by Linkin Park
99 Problems by Jay-Z/Linkin Park
In the End by Linkin Park
5 to 1 by The Doors
Comfortably Numb by Pink Floyd
Lose Yourself by Eminem
How to Save a Life by The Fray
You Found Me by The Fray
Madagascar by Guns 'n' Roses
Queen of the Highway by The Doors
Cemetary Gates by Pantera
Stairway to Heaven by Led Zeppelin
Freebird by Lynyrd Skynyrd
Sweet Home Alabama by Lynyrd Skynyrd
Hotel California by The Eagles
Fine Again by Seether
Hurt by NIN
Hurt by Johnny Cash
Like a Stone by Audioslave

Artists
Blink-182
Kanye West
Jay-Z
The Killers
Jack's Mannequin
Something Corporate
Say Anything
Brand New
Taking back Sunday
Mike Posner
Drake
Hollywood Undead
3OH!3
Cobra Starship
Manchester Orchestra
Lil' Wayne
Death Cab for Cutie
Panic at the Disco
Coldplay
Snow Patrol

Songs
"The Funeral" (Band of Horses)
"About Rain" (Sequoyah Prep School)
"Summer of '98" (Secret Handshake)
"Sometime Around Midnight" (Airborne Toxic Event)
"Chicago" (Sufjan Stevens)
"Miss Misery" (Elliott Smith)
"There is a Light That Never Goes Out" (Smiths)
"Goods" (Mates of State)
"Maps" (Yeah Yeah Yeahs)
"Thrash Unreal" (Against Me)
"Private Eye" (Alkaline Trio)
"Drop it Low" (Ester Dean)
"The Letdown" (White Tie Affair)
"The Freshman" (Verve Pipe)
"Only Fools Rush In" (UB40)
"Hey, Soul Sister" (Train)
"Kids" (MGMT)
"Bleed American" (Jimmy Eat World)
"Work" (Hockey)
"Banquet" (Bloc Party)

Seriously. I should too, actually. I had never heard of them until a couple years ago or so, when I downloaded High Land, Hard Rain (though I forget where I eventually did hear of them). It's really good, and I should get some more.

Dude.

I was going to say that the notification is not too crazy -- a short little "bloop" that doesn't mess with the music you're currently listening to that much. Although, if it's alerting you about an artist, it doesn't tell you the song (and on the B-side, if it's alerting you about a song, it doesn't tell you the artist). So you have to change the channel to find out. It can get pretty annoying, since there is significant lag in changing the channel, and the radio says the name of the station out loud before it starts playing music (which seems like the most braindead decision in the world IMO). But yeah, bands like U2 and REM, I don't think I could ever add, cuz they get played on so many stations so often, you'd get notified a LOT, and hear them pretty often anyway (at least with the stations I listen to).

I didn't try to do the artists thing, I just did 20 songs:

Bob Dylan - Meet Me In The Morning
Tom Waits - Lie To Me
Grizzly Bear - On A Neck, On A Spit
Kings of Leon - Revelry
The New Pornographers - Sweet Talk, Sweet Talk
Animal Collective - Did You See The Words
Mount Carmel - Livin Like I Wanna
Mirah - Lone Star
The xx - Do You Mind?
Yo La Tengo - Let's Save Tony Orlando's House
Ximena Sarinana - Mediocre
No Kids - The Beaches All Closed
The Dears - Ballad of Human Kindness
The Polyphonic Spree - Section 28: Guaranteed Nightlife
Talib Kweli & Hi-Tek - Midnight Hour (feat. Estelle)
Janelle Monae - Make The Bus (feat. Of Montreal)
The Dead Weather - Blue Blood Blues
Blair - Paris
Joy Kills Sorrow - All The Buildings
Richard Swift - The Songs of National Freedom

You can listen to the entire playlist here, though I think 8tracks makes it random because of the way their license works. Anyway...

I had never heard of this band until I got satellite radio (because I am old and uncool). They're great, and they'd also be perfect for alerts since most of their stuff is great for the car.

Do I belt out the "oh oh oh oh-oh-oh-oh" part in "I've Got Friends" when I'm alone in the car? Yes. Yes I certainly do.

Edit: Snow Patrol is good too, but I couldn't add them because that song about chasing cars makes me cry like a little bitch.

Great choice. It's a shame this will never be a single because Axl Rose decided to sulk instead of doing any promotion for the album, but the second half of this song kicks ass.

"Hey Axl, why are you mashing up MLK speeches with Michael J. Fox clips?"
"Bllleaargghhh!"
"OK, I'm just going to back slowly out of the studio, just slide the finished CD under the door when you're done."

I love them. You need to hear this song from their first studio album. The build up is incredible.

Yeah. I'm leaving artists like Elvis (has his own STATION), Led Zeppelin, The Beatles, Rolling Stones off my list - they're so ubiquitous that you don't really need to search for them. A song or two I left off of my list because I really doubt they'd get played, even on XM (Clap! Shake! Jump!). So really my list is a list of artists who have a handful of songs that I know I like that I am fairly sure they play, or songs that I like and am pretty sure they've played (often by multiple artists). I'm sure I'm leaving off something, but generally this will cover me pretty well.

Stevie Wonder	Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy (Andrews Sisters, B. Midler)
Little Richard	I Hear You Knocking (Dave Edmunds)
Thompson Twins	Knock On Wood (Eddie Floyd, Otis Redding & Carla, Amii Stewart, Rachel Stevens)
Billy Preston	Peter Gunn (Mancini, Sarah Vaughan, Art of Noise)
Robert Palmer	Wooly Bully (Sam Sham & The Pharaohs)
The Temptations	Funkytown (Lipps, Inc., Pseudo Echo)
Earth Wind & Fire	Bang a Gong (Get it On) (T. Rex, Power Station)
Booker T. & The MG's	My Sharona (The Knack)
Bill Haley & His Comets	Don't Bring Me Down (Electric Light Orchestra)
Aretha Franklin	Tainted Love/Where Did Our Love Go (Soft Cell)
KC & The Sunshine Band	Don't Leave Me This Way (Harold Melvin & The Bluenotes, Thelma Houston)
Goldfrapp	Telephone Operator (Pete Shelley)
Tom Jones	Machine Gun (The Commodores)
Dave Clark 5	Jam Up and Jelly Tight (Tommy Roe)
Kool & The Gang	She Blinded Me With Science (Thomas Dolby)
Guess Who	Witch Doctor (David Seville)
Bill Withers	I Want Candy (The Strangeloves, Bow Wow Wow)
Fats Domino	Everyday People (Sly & The Family Stone)
Ray Charles	Your Ma Said You Cried In Your Sleep Last Night (Kenny Dino, The Turtles, The Other Four, Robert Plant)
Eurythmics	Hot Stuff (Donna Summer)

I have 17 that likely would be permanent fixtures:
David Bowie
Talking Heads
The Cars
Midnight Oil
Depeche Mode
The Smiths
Rolling Stones
Green Day
Nirvana
Soundgarden
Men at Work
Prince
U2
The Cranberries
Eurythmics
Aretha Franklin
Marvin Gaye

I'd have 3 that would probably switch around a lot, but would currently be:
Coldplay
Paramore
Al Green

Coming up with 20 songs is too much work right now.

I'll give it a shot:

Arctic Monkeys
Band of Horses
Beck
Beth Orton
Camper Van Beethoven
Fiona Apple
The Hold Steady
Jean-Michel Jarre
LCD Soundsystem
Lemon Jelly
Marah
Phoenix
The Shins
Spoon
Thievery Corporation
Titus Andronicus
Uncle Tupelo
Ween
Whiskeytown
White Stripes

Songs:
Shine On You Crazy Diamond - Pink Floyd
Sheep - Pink Floyd
Echoes - Pink Floyd
Fearless - Pink Floyd
Not Gonna Suck Itself - Cracker
Rondo Acapricio - Tosca
Ballad of Human Kindness - Dears
Frontier Psychiatrist - Avalanches
Kissing Families - Silversun Pickups
Pelz Komet - Kingsbury Manx
I Am Trying to Break Your Heart - Wilco

Wow. Tough.

Phish
Deerhoof
Ween
Blackalicious
Gogol Bordello
Descendents
Rush
Frank Zappa
Toots & the Maytals
Distillers
Medeski, Martin & Wood
Zappa Plays Zappa
Beck
Tom Waits
Sebadoh
Allman Brothers Band
Sonic Youth
Hypnotic Clambake
Ben Folds
John McLaughlin

Just feel like songs would be impossible.

ooh, Deerhoof -- there's another band I need to download more of. I have Offend Maggie and love it, and want more.

Artists

AC/DC

Beatles

Bestie Boys

Bon Jovi

Boston

Dave Brubeck

Elton John

Fleetwood Mac

Kid Rock

Led Zepplin

Metallica

Oasis

Pearl Jam

REM

Simon & Garfunkle

Steeley Dan

Steve Miller Band

Styx

Supertramp

The Who

Songs
To Be Determined

Some of the bands I really love seem to blend the beautiful with the ugly in their music, and Deerhoof is no exception.

[Saw Neil Young last night in a solo performance. Talk about blending achingly beautiful, intimate and vulnerable with ragged, distorted grime. It was tremendous.]

Sorry, back to your regularly scheduled thread . . . .