knightni

Hell of an artist. some are NSFW Here's one we might all recognize: http://rkullman.blogspot.com/2008/07/joy-of-white-sox.html This one is safe. He has Bears and multiple Blackhawks babes too.

wikipedia mostly.

BLAZE or justBLAZE?

QUOTE (lostfan @ Nov 17, 2009 -> 07:25 PM) Generally I hate the tendency of baseball fans to nickname players "first initial, first 3 letters of last name" K Sow

The next five will start early-ish tomorrow. Hopefully, they'll get done in time before work.

You "old" guys are really going to be upset with the next five.

36. Bruce Springsteen / E Street Band 4 of 24 lists - 41 points - #6 Milkman delivers Bruce Frederick Joseph Springsteen (born September 23, 1949), nicknamed "The Boss", is an American singer-songwriter. He records and tours with the E Street Band. Springsteen is widely known for his brand of heartland rock infused with pop hooks, poetic lyrics, and Americana sentiments centered on his native New Jersey. Springsteen's recordings have tended to alternate between commercially accessible rock albums and somber folk-oriented works. Much of his status stems from the concerts and marathon shows in which he and the E Street Band perform intense ballads, rousing anthems, and party rock and roll songs, amongst which he intersperses whimsical or deeply emotional stories. His most successful studio albums, Born to Run and Born in the U.S.A., epitomize his penchant for finding grandeur in the struggles of daily life in America, and the latter album made him one of the most recognized artists of the 1980s within the United States. Because of his support for the presidential campaigns of Senator John Kerry and Senator Barack Obama, Springsteen has gradually become identified with liberal politics. He is also noted for his support of various relief and rebuilding efforts in New Jersey and elsewhere, and for his response to the September 11th attacks, on which his album The Rising reflects. He has earned numerous awards for his work, including nineteen Grammy Awards, two Golden Globes and an Academy Award, and continues to have a strong global fan base. He has sold more than 65 million albums in the United States and 120 million worldwide. Springsteen signed a record deal with Columbia Records in 1972, with the help of John Hammond, who had signed Bob Dylan to the same label a decade earlier. Springsteen brought many of his New Jersey-based colleagues into the studio with him, thus forming the E Street Band (although it would not be formally named as such for a couple more years). His debut album, Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J., released in January 1973, established him as a critical favorite, though sales were slow. Because of Springsteen's lyrical poeticism and folk rock-rooted music exemplified on tracks like "Blinded by the Light" and "For You", amongst others, as well as the Columbia and Hammond connections, critics initially compared Springsteen to Bob Dylan. "He sings with a freshness and urgency I haven't heard since I was rocked by 'Like a Rolling Stone'," wrote Crawdaddy magazine editor Peter Knobler in Springsteen's first interview/profile, in March 1973. Crawdaddy "discovered" Springsteen in the rock press and was his earliest champion. Famed music critic Lester Bangs wrote in Creem, 1975, that when Springsteen's first album was released....."many of us dismissed it: he wrote like Bob Dylan and Van Morrison, sang like Van Morrison and Robbie Robertson, and led a band that sounded like Van Morrison's." The track "Spirit in the Night" especially showed Morrison's influence, while "Lost in the Flood" was the first of many portraits of Vietnam veterans and "Growin' Up" his first take on the recurring theme of adolescence. In September 1973 his second album, The Wild, the Innocent & the E Street Shuffle, was released, again to critical acclaim but no commercial success. Springsteen's songs became grander in form and scope, with the E Street Band providing a less folky, more R&B vibe and the lyrics often romanticizing teenage street life. "4th of July, Asbury Park (Sandy)" and "Incident on 57th Street" would become fan favorites, and the long, rousing "Rosalita (Come Out Tonight)" continues to rank among Springsteen's most beloved concert numbers. In the May 22, 1974, issue of Boston's The Real Paper, music critic Jon Landau wrote after seeing a performance at the Harvard Square Theater, "I saw rock and roll future, and its name is Bruce Springsteen. And on a night when I needed to feel young, he made me feel like I was hearing music for the very first time." Landau subsequently became Springsteen's manager and producer, helping to finish the epic new album, Born to Run. Given an enormous budget in a last-ditch effort at a commercially viable record, Springsteen became bogged down in the recording process while striving for a wall of sound production. But, fed by the release of an early mix of "Born to Run" to progressive rock radio, anticipation built toward the album's release. All in all the album took more than 14 months to record, with six months alone spent on the song "Born To Run." During this time Springsteen battled with anger and frustration over the album, saying he heard "sounds in [his] head" that he could not explain to the others in the studio. It was during these recording sessions that "Miami" Steve Van Zandt would stumble into the studio just in time to help Springsteen organize the horn section on "Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out" (it is his only written contribution to the album), and eventually led to his joining the E Street Band. Van Zandt had been a long-time friend of Springsteen, as well as a collaborator on earlier musical projects, and understood where he was coming from, which helped him to translate some of the sounds Springsteen was hearing. Still, by the end of the grueling recording sessions, Springsteen was not satisfied, and, upon first hearing the finished album, threw the record into the alley and told Jon Landau he would rather just cut the album live at The Bottom Line, a place he often played. On August 13, 1975, Springsteen and the E Street Band began a five-night, 10-show stand at New York's Bottom Line club; it attracted major media attention, was broadcast live on WNEW-FM, and convinced many skeptics that Springsteen was for real. (Decades later, Rolling Stone Magazine would name the stand as one of the 50 Moments That Changed Rock and Roll.) With the release of Born to Run on August 25, 1975, Springsteen finally found success: while there were no real hit singles, "Born to Run", "Thunder Road", "Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out", and "Jungleland" all received massive album-oriented rock airplay and remain perennial favorites on many classic rock stations to this day. With its panoramic imagery, thundering production, and desperate optimism, some fans consider this among the best rock and roll albums of all time and Springsteen's finest work. It established him as a sincere and dynamic rock and roll personality who spoke for and in the voice of a large part of the rock audience. To cap off the triumph, Springsteen appeared on the covers of both Time and Newsweek in the same week, on October 27 of that year. So great did the wave of publicity become that Springsteen eventually rebelled against it during his first venture overseas, tearing down promotional posters before a concert appearance in London. A legal battle with former manager Mike Appel kept Springsteen out of the studio for over two years, during which time he kept the E Street Band together through extensive touring across the U.S. Despite the optimistic fervor with which he often performed, the new songs he was writing and often debuting on stage had taken a more somber tone than much of his previous work. Reaching settlement with Appel in 1977, Springsteen finally returned to the studio, and the subsequent sessions produced Darkness on the Edge of Town (1978). Musically, this album was a turning point of Springsteen's career. Gone were the rapid-fire lyrics, outsized characters, and long, multi-part musical compositions of the first three albums; now the songs were leaner and more carefully drawn and began to reflect Springsteen's growing intellectual and political awareness. Some fans consider Darkness Springsteen's best and most consistent record; tracks such as "Badlands" and "The Promised Land" became concert staples for decades to come, while the track "Prove It All Night" received a significant amount of album rock radio airplay. Other fans would prefer the work of the adventurous early Springsteen. The cross-country 1978 tour to promote the album would become legendary for the intensity, and length, of its shows. By the late 1970s, Springsteen had earned a reputation in the pop world as a songwriter whose material could provide hits for other bands. Manfred Mann's Earth Band had achieved a U.S. number one pop hit with a heavily rearranged version of "For You" and Greetings' "Blinded by the Light" in early 1977. Patti Smith reached number 13 with her take on Springsteen's unreleased "Because the Night" (which Smith co-wrote) in 1978, while The Pointer Sisters hit number two in 1979 with Springsteen's also-unreleased "Fire". In September 1979, Springsteen and the E Street Band joined the Musicians United for Safe Energy anti-nuclear power collective at Madison Square Garden for two nights, playing an abbreviated setlist while premiering two songs from his upcoming album. The subsequent No Nukes live album, as well as the following summer's No Nukes documentary film, represented the first official recordings and filmings of Springsteen's fabled live act, as well as Springsteen's first tentative dip into political involvement. Springsteen continued to consolidate his thematic focus on working-class life with the 20-song double album The River in 1980, which finally yielded his first hit Top Ten single as a performer, "Hungry Heart", but also included an intentionally paradoxical range of material from good-time party rockers to emotionally intense ballads. The album sold well, and a long tour in 1980 and 1981 followed, featuring Springsteen's first extended playing of Europe and ending with a series of multi-night arena stands in major cities in the U.S. The River was followed in 1982 by the stark solo acoustic Nebraska. According to the Marsh biographies, Springsteen was in a depressed state when he wrote this material, and the result is a brutal depiction of American life. The title track on this album is about the murder spree of Charles Starkweather. The album actually started (according to Marsh) as a demo tape for new songs to be played with the E Street Band, but, during the recording process, Springsteen and producer Landau realized they worked better as solo acoustic numbers; several attempts at re-recording the songs in the studio with the E Street Band led them to realize that the original recording, made on a simple, low-tech four-track tape deck in Springsteen's home, were the best versions they were going to get. However, the sessions with the E Street Band were not all for naught, as the band recorded several new songs that Springsteen had written in addition to the Nebraska material, including "Born in the U.S.A." and "Glory Days". These new songs would not see release until two years later, forming the basis of Springsteen's next album. While Nebraska did not sell especially well, it garnered widespread critical praise (including being named "Album of the Year" by Rolling Stone magazine's critics) and influenced later significant works by other major artists, including U2's album The Joshua Tree. It helped inspire the musical genre known as lo-fi music, becoming a cult favorite among indie-rockers. Springsteen did not tour in conjunction with Nebraska's release. Springsteen probably is best known for his album Born in the U.S.A. (1984), which sold 15 million copies in the U.S. alone and became one of the best-selling albums of all time with seven singles hitting the top 10, and the massively successful world tour that followed it. The title track was a bitter commentary on the treatment of Vietnam veterans, some of whom were Springsteen's friends and bandmates. The song was widely misinterpreted as jingoistic, and in connection with the 1984 presidential campaign became the subject of considerable folklore. Springsteen also turned down several million dollars offered by Chrysler Corporation for using the song in a car commercial. (In later years, Springsteen performed the song accompanied only with acoustic guitar to make the song's original meaning more explicitly clear. An acoustic version also appeared on Tracks, a later album.) "Dancing in the Dark" was the biggest of seven hit singles from Born in the U.S.A., peaking at No. 2 on the Billboard music charts. The music video for the song featured a young Courteney Cox dancing on stage with Springsteen, an appearance which helped kickstart the actress's career. The song "Cover Me" was written by Springsteen for Donna Summer, but his record company persuaded him to keep it for the new album. A big fan of Summer's work, Springsteen wrote another one for her, "Protection". A number of the videos for the album were made by noted film directors Brian De Palma or John Sayles. He was featured on the "We Are the World" song and album in 1985. After this commercial peak, Springsteen released the much more sedate and contemplative Tunnel of Love (1987), a mature reflection on the many faces of love found, lost and squandered, which only selectively used the E Street Band. In 1989 Springsteen informed the E Street Band members that he would not be using their services for the foreseeable future. He had already recorded one completely solo album, Nebraska. The last full band activity had been autumn 1988's Human Rights Now! Tour. Band members started to go their separate ways and onto separate projects — Tallent to Nashville to work on record production, Federici to California, Clemons to Florida, Lofgren to Maryland to resume his long-time solo activities. Weinberg, besides an abortive try at law school, was putting together the band Killer Joe and recording an album. Scene Of The Crime included a guest appearance from Little Steven, playing guitar on the Springsteen written instrumental "Summer On Signal Hill." In 1993, Weinberg became the band leader on Late Night with Conan O'Brien and remained such for its entire run. When O'Brien moved to The Tonight Show in 2009, Weinberg reprised his role as bandleader, and the show's house band - formerly called the Max Weinberg 7 - was redubbed Max Weinberg and the Tonight Show Band. In 1992, after risking charges of "going Hollywood" by moving to Los Angeles (a radical move for someone so linked to the blue-collar life of the Jersey Shore) and working with session musicians, Springsteen released two albums at once. Human Touch and Lucky Town were even more introspective than any of his previous work. Also different about these albums was the confidence he displayed. As opposed to his first two albums, which dreamed of happiness, and his next four, which showed him growing to fear it, at points during the Lucky Town album, Springsteen actually claims happiness for himself. Some E Street Band fans voiced (and continue to voice) a low opinion of these albums, (especially Human Touch), and did not follow the subsequent "Other Band" Tour. For other fans, however, who had only come to know Springsteen after the 1975 consolidation of the E Street Band, the "Other Band" Tour was an exciting opportunity to see Springsteen develop a working onstage relationship with a different group of musicians, and to see him explore the Asbury Park soul-and-gospel base in some of his classic material. In 1995, after temporarily re-organizing the E Street Band for a few new songs recorded for his first Greatest Hits album (a recording session that was chronicled in the documentary Blood Brothers), he released his second (mostly) solo guitar album, The Ghost of Tom Joad, inspired by Journey to Nowhere: The Saga of the New Underclass, a book by Pulitzer Prize-winners author Dale Maharidge and photographer Michael Williamson. This was generally less well-received than the similar Nebraska, due to the minimal melody, twangy vocals, and political nature of most of the songs, although some praised it for giving voice to immigrants and others who rarely have one in American culture. The lengthy, worldwide, small-venue solo acoustic Ghost of Tom Joad Tour that followed successfully featured many of his older songs in drastically reshaped acoustic form, although Springsteen had to explicitly remind his audiences to be quiet and not to clap during the performances. Following the tour, Springsteen moved back to New Jersey with his family. In 1998, Springsteen released the sprawling, four-disc box set of out-takes, Tracks. Subsequently, Springsteen would acknowledge that the 1990s were a "lost period" for him: "I didn't do a lot of work. Some people would say I didn't do my best work." In 1999, Springsteen and the E Street Band officially came together again and went on the extensive Reunion Tour, lasting over a year. Highlights included a record sold-out, 15-show run at Continental Airlines Arena in East Rutherford, New Jersey to kick off the American leg of the tour. Springsteen's Reunion Tour with the E Street Band ended with a triumphant ten-night, sold-out engagement at New York City's Madison Square Garden in mid-2000 and controversy over a new song, "American Skin (41 Shots)", about the police shooting of Amadou Diallo. The final shows at Madison Square Garden were recorded and resulted in an HBO Concert, with corresponding DVD and album releases as Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band: Live in New York City. In 2002, Springsteen released his first studio effort with the full band in 18 years, The Rising, produced by Brendan O'Brien. The album, mostly a reflection on the September 11 attacks, was a critical and popular success. (Many of the songs were influenced by phone conversations Springsteen had with family members of victims of the attacks, who in their obituary, it was mentioned how his music touched their life.) The title track gained airplay in several radio formats, and the record became Springsteen's best-selling album of new material in 15 years. Kicked off by an early-morning Asbury Park appearance on The Today Show, The Rising Tour commenced, barnstorming through a series of single-night arena stands in the U.S. and Europe to promote the album in 2002, then returning for large-scale, multiple-night stadium shows in 2003. While Springsteen had maintained a loyal hardcore fan base everywhere (and particularly in Europe), his general popularity had dipped over the years in some southern and midwestern regions of the U.S. But it was still strong in Europe and along the U.S. coasts, and he played an unprecedented 10 nights in Giants Stadium in New Jersey, a ticket-selling feat to which no other musical act has come close. During these shows Springsteen thanked those fans who were attending multiple shows and those who were coming from long distances or another country; the advent of robust Bruce-oriented online communities had made such practices more common. The Rising Tour came to a final conclusion with three nights in Shea Stadium, highlighted by renewed controversy over "American Skin" and a guest appearance by Bob Dylan. Devils & Dust was released on April 26, 2005, and was recorded without the E Street Band. It is a low-key, mostly acoustic album, in the same vein as Nebraska and The Ghost of Tom Joad although with a little more instrumentation. Some of the material was written almost 10 years earlier during, or shortly after, the Ghost of Tom Joad Tour, a couple of them being performed then but never released. The title track concerns an ordinary soldier's feelings and fears during the Iraq War. Springsteen's next album, titled Magic, was released on October 2, 2007. Recorded with the E Street Band, it featured 10 new Springsteen songs plus "Long Walk Home," performed once with the Sessions band, and a hidden track (the first included on a Springsteen studio release), "Terry's Song," a tribute to Springsteen's long-time assistant Terry Magovern who died on July 30, 2007. The first single, "Radio Nowhere," was made available for a free download on August 28. Bruce Springsteen/E Street Band discography 1975 "Born to Run" - US Hot 100 #23 - Cashbox #17 1976 "Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out" - #83 - #63 1978 "Prove It All Night" - #33 - #53 1978 "Badlands" - #42 - #52 1980 "Hungry Heart" - #5 - #6 1981 "Fade Away" - US Hot 100 #20 - Cashbox #20 - US Mainstream Rock #14 1981 "Cadillac Ranch" - US Main #48 1982 "Atlantic City" - US Main #10 1982 "Open All Night" - US Main #22 1984 "Dancing in the Dark" - Hot 100 #2 - CB #1 - Main #1 1984 "Cover Me" - Hot 100 #7 - CB #10 - Main #2 1984 "Born in the U.S.A." - Hot 100 #9 - CB #9 - Main #8 1984 "I'm on Fire" - Hot 100 #6 - CB #8 - Main #4 - US Hot Adult Contemporary #6 1985 "Glory Days" - #5 - #9 - #3 1985 "I'm Goin' Down" - #9 - #9 - #9 1985 "My Hometown" - #6 - #7 - #6 - #1 1986 "War" - #8 - #9 - #4 1987 "Fire" - #46 - #45 - #14 1987 "Brilliant Disguise" - #5 - #4 - #1 - #5 1987 "Tunnel of Love" - #9 - #12 - #1 1988 "One Step Up" - #13 - #17 - #2 1988 "Spare Parts" - Main #28 1992 "Human Touch" - #16 - #13 - #1 - #8 1992 "57 Channels (And Nothin' On)" - #68 - #62 - #6 1992 "Better Days" - #16 - #13 - #2 1992 "Leap of Faith" - Main #28 1994 "Streets of Philadelphia" - #9 - #6 - #25 - #3 1995 "Murder Incorporated" - Main #14 1997 "Secret Garden" - Hot 100 #19 - US AC #5 2002 "The Rising" - Hot 100 #52 - Main #24- AC #26 2005 "Devils & Dust" - Hot 100 #72 2007 "Radio Nowhere" - Hot 100 #102 2007 "Girls in Their Summer Clothes" - Hot 100 #95 - Main #27 2008 "Working on a Dream" - Hot 100 #95 - Main #35 2008 "My Lucky Day" - Main #37 2008 "The Wrestler" - US Hot 100 - #120 Factoid: Nineteen-year-old Jay Weinberg has filled in at drums for his father, Max, during portions of shows or for some full shows on the 2009 Working on a Dream Tour, due to the elder Weinberg's obligations for the debuting Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien. The 49-year age difference between the younger Weinberg and 67-year-old bandmate Clarence Clemons is one of the largest within any current popular musical act. "Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out" http://media-convert.com/convert/?xid=7-dleenqhd

QUOTE (Chisoxfn @ Nov 17, 2009 -> 06:12 PM) What is the Score phone number and how long does there show go till. I'd be happy to set something up and talk briefly about our site, etc. In no way shape or form am I claiming to know more than the beat writers do. They have far more access to news and info but there are times that they might not know something that someone else does. Everything is unique. (312) 644-6767

37. Tom Petty / Heartbreakers 4 of 24 lists - 41 points - highest ranking #8 TheGooch Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers are a Heartland rock band, most of whose members are from the United States of America. They were formed in 1976 by Tom Petty, Mike Campbell, and Benmont Tench, all of whom had been members of Mudcrutch. Petty and the Heartbreakers are known for hit singles such as "American Girl", "Breakdown", "The Waiting", "Learning to Fly", "Refugee" and "Mary Jane's Last Dance." The Heartbreakers still tour regularly and continue to make and record albums. They have gone through numerous line up changes between 1982 and 2002, with Tench, Petty and Campbell being the only members consistently in the band from when it first started. Petty has fought against his record company on more than one occasion, first in 1976 over transference to another label and then again in 1981 over the price of his record, which was (at that time) considered expensive. He is also outspoken on the current state of the music industry and modern radio stations. On his 2002 album, The Last DJ Petty sang about that and other issues and talked about them on the bonus DVD that came with the limited edition album. Although most of what they do is together as The Heartbreakers, they have also participated in outside projects, with Petty himself releasing solo albums, the most successful being 1989s Full Moon Fever. Although Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers have not released an album since 2002, the three founding members, along with Randall Marsh and Tom Leadon recorded an album by Mudcrutch. This was the band's first album, made more significant by the fact that they had not recorded together since 1974. The Heartbreakers began their recording career with a self titled album. Initially, the Heartbreakers did not gain much traction in America, although they achieved success in the UK playing "Anything That's Rock 'n' Roll" on Top of the Pops. Early singles included "Breakdown" and "American Girl". "Breakdown" was re-released in the USA and became a Top 40 hit in 1978, after word filtered back to the States that the band was creating a firestorm in the UK. Their 1978 second album You're Gonna Get It! marked the band's first gold album, and featured the singles "I Need to Know" and "Listen To Her Heart". In 1979, the band was dragged into a legal dispute when ABC Records was sold to MCA Records. Petty refused to simply be transferred to another record label without his consent. He held fast to his principles, which led to him filing for bankruptcy. After the dispute was settled, the Heartbreakers released their third album Damn the Torpedoes (1979) which rapidly went triple-platinum. It included "Don't Do Me Like That" (#10 U.S., the group's first Top Ten single ) and "Refugee" (#15 U.S.), their U.S. breakthrough singles. Though he was already extremely successful, Petty ran into record company trouble again when he and the Heartbreakers prepared to release Hard Promises (1981), the follow-up album to Damn the Torpedoes. MCA wanted to release the record at the list price of $9.98, which was considered a high price for a record album at the time. This so-called "superstar pricing" was $1.00 more than the usual list price of $8.98. Petty voiced his objections to the price hike in the press, and the issue became a popular cause among music fans. Non-delivery of the album or naming it Eight Ninety-Eight were considered, but eventually MCA decided against the price increase. The album became a Top Ten hit, going platinum and spawning the hit single "The Waiting" (#19 U.S.). The album also included the duet "Insider", with Stevie Nicks. On their fifth album, Long After Dark (1982), bass player Ron Blair was replaced by Howie Epstein (formerly of Del Shannon's backing band), giving the Heartbreakers their line-up until 1991. Long After Dark features the hits "You Got Lucky" (U.S. #20) and "Change of Heart" (U.S. #21), and was to feature a track called "Keeping Me Alive", but producer Jimmy Iovine vetoed it from the album. Petty has expressed that he feels the album would have turned out better if the song had been included on the album. On the next album, Southern Accents (1985), the Heartbreakers picked up where they had left off.[clarification needed] The recording was not without problems; Petty became frustrated during the mixing process and broke his left hand after punching a wall. The album includes the psychedelic-sounding hit single "Don't Come Around Here No More" (#13 U.S.), which was produced by and co-written with Dave Stewart. The video for the single, which starred Stewart featured Petty dressed as the Mad Hatter, mocking and chasing Alice from the book Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, then cutting and eating her as if she were a cake. This caused minor controversy after it was criticized by feminist groups, but the video did win an MTV Video Music Award. A successful concert tour led to the live album Pack Up the Plantation: Live! (1985). The band's live capabilities were also showcased when Bob Dylan invited the Heartbreakers to join him on his True Confessions tour through Australia, Japan and the U.S. (1986) and Europe (1987). Petty praised Dylan, saying "I don't think there is anyone we admire more." Also in 1987, the group released Let Me Up (I've Had Enough), a studio album made to sound like a live recording, using a technique they borrowed from Bob Dylan. It includes "Jammin' Me", which Petty wrote with Dylan and Campbell. Dylan recorded an edited version of the early Petty composition, Got My Mind made up, on his album, Knocked Out Loaded. Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers' 1989 tour featured college rock band The Replacements opening every show. Petty eventually borrowed Paul Westerberg's line "rebel without a clue" from "I'll Be You" for the title track of the Into the Great Wide Open album. In 1991 the band released Into the Great Wide Open, produced by Jeff Lynne who had worked with Petty in Traveling Wilburys. Songs included the title track itself and "Learning to Fly". By this time, multi-instrumentalist Scott Thurston had joined the band. In 1993, Petty released Greatest Hits which included hit single "Mary Jane's Last Dance". In 1994 Lynch was fired from the band and replaced by Steve Ferrone who had worked with Tom, Benmont, Mike and Howie on Petty's 'solo' album, Wildflowers In 1995, a six CD box-set entitled Playback was released. Approximately half of the tracks were previously available on albums, and the rest were B-sides, demos and live tracks. Two notable tracks are a solo version of Tom's 1981 duet with Stevie Nicks, "Stop Draggin' My Heart Around", and the song "Waiting For Tonight", which features vocals from The Bangles. The latter song also appeared on the two CD anthology released in 2000, Anthology: Through the Years. In 1996, Petty "reunited" with the Heartbreakers and released a soundtrack to the movie She's the One starring Cameron Diaz and Jennifer Aniston (see Songs and Music from "She's the One"). Three songs charted from this album; these were "Walls (Circus)" (featuring Lindsey Buckingham); "Climb that Hill"; and a song written by Lucinda Williams, "Change the Locks". The album also included a cover of a song by Beck, "Asshole". In 1999, Petty and the Heartbreakers released the album Echo with producer Rick Rubin at the helm. The album reached number 10 in the U.S. album charts and featured, amongst other singles, Room at the top In 2002, Petty and the Heartbreakers released The Last DJ. Many of the tracks' lyrics contain stinging attacks on the music industry and major record companies. The album reached number 9 in the U.S. charts. Ron Blair played on three of the tracks. He also replaced the man who had previously been his replacement, Howie Epstein on the band's 2002 tour as a result of Epstein's deepening personal problems and drug abuse. Epstein died in 2003 at the age of 48. Tench described him as "the coolest guy in the band." In 2008, the Heartbreakers were also featured as the Super Bowl XLII Halftime Show. In april that year, the members of Petty's prior band, Mudcrutch, including Heartbreakers Petty, Benmont Tench and Mike Campbell, along with Randall Marsh and Tom Leadon, got together to record a Mudcrutch album. In late 2008 a live album featuring Mudcrutch was released. A collection of live recordings will be released on November 23. Solo Albums Petty has released critically acclaimed solo albums, the first of which was 1989's Full Moon Fever which included his signature tune, "Free Fallin'" as well as "I Won't Back Down", covered by Johnny Cash, and "Runnin' Down a Dream". The Heartbreakers were dismayed by Petty's decision to go solo; despite this Campbell plays on every track, Tench contributed to the album, and Howie was invited to do but declined due to his disliking of the song. Tom's second solo album, Wildflowers was, to all intents and purposes, a Heartbreakers record as it included all members except for Stan. The album, which featured Steve Ferrone on drums, produced the single "You Don't Know How It Feels". Petty's most recent solo album was Highway Companion. Tom Petty/Heartbreakers discography 1977 "Breakdown" - US Hot 100 #40 1978 "I Need to Know" - #41 1978 "Listen to Her Heart" - #59 1979 "Don't Do Me Like That" - #10 1980 "Refugee" - #15 1980 "Here Comes My Girl" - #59 1981 "The Waiting" - Hot 100 #19 - Mainstream Rock #1 1981 "A Woman in Love (It's Not Me)" - #79 - #5 1981 "Nightwatchman" - Main #21 1982 "You Got Lucky" - #20 - #1 1982 "We Stand a Chance" - Main #37 1982 "A One Story Town" - Main #15 1982 "Between Two Worlds" - Main #35 1983 "Change of Heart" - #21 - #10 1985 "Don't Come Around Here No More" - #13 - #2 1985 "Make It Better (Forget About Me)" - #54 - #12 1985 "Rebels" - #74 - #5 1986 "Needles and Pins" - #37 - #17 1986 "So You Want to Be a Rock 'n' Roll Star" - Main #9 1987 "Jammin' Me" - #18 - #1 1987 "Runaway Trains" - Main #6 1987 "Think About Me" - Main #36 1987 "All Mixed Up" - Main #19 1989 "I Won't Back Down" - #12 - #1 1989 "Runnin' Down a Dream" - #23 - #1 1989 "Free Fallin'" - #7 - #1 1989 "I’ll Feel a Whole Lot Better" - Main #18 1989 "Love Is a Long Road" - Main #7 1990 "A Face in the Crowd" - #46 - #5 1990 "Yer So Bad" - Main #5 1991 "Learning to Fly" - #28 - #1 1991 "Out in the Cold" - Main #1 1991 "Into the Great Wide Open" - #92 - #4 1992 "Kings Highway" - Main #4 1992 "Makin' Some Noise" - Main #30 1994 "Something in the Air" - Main #19 1994 "American Girl" - US Hot 100 #109 1994 "You Don't Know How It Feels" - #13 - #1 1995 "You Wreck Me" - Main #2 1995 "It's Good to Be King" - #68 - #6 1995 "A Higher Place" - Main #12 1995 "Cabin Down Below" - Main #29 1995 "Waiting for Tonight" - Main #6 1996 "Walls (Circus)" - #69 - #6 1996 "Climb That Hill" - Main #6 1997 "Change the Locks" - Main #20 1999 "Free Girl Now" - #120 - #5 1999 "Room at the Top" - Main #19 1999 "Swingin'" - Main #17 2002 "The Last DJ" - Main #22 2006 "Saving Grace" - #100 - #26 Factoid: Petty was in a Supergroup in the late 80s called The Traveling Wilburys. Members included ex-Beatle George Harrison, ELO lead singer Jeff Lynne, Roy Orbison, and Bob Dylan. "Runnin' Down A Dream" http://media-convert.com/convert/?xid=7-nnuuxzec

Are people downloading the mp3s? Speak up f***as.

38. Rise Against 3 of 24 lists - 41 points - highest ranking #7 2nd_city_saint787 Rise Against is an American punk rock band from Chicago, Illinois, formed in 1999. Their current lineup consists of Tim McIlrath (vocals, guitar), Joe Principe (bass guitar), Brandon Barnes (drums), and Zach Blair (guitar), all of whom are straight edge (excluding Barnes) PETA supporters and strict vegetarians/vegans. The band is currently signed to Geffen, a record label owned by Universal Music Group. As of 2009, Rise Against has released five studio albums, two EPs, and one DVD. Rise Against spent its first five years signed to the independent record label Fat Wreck Chords, on which it released two studio albums. The band gained mainstream popularity with its first two releases on Geffen, Siren Song of the Counter Culture (2004) and The Sufferer & the Witness (2006), which produced several high-charting singles, including "Swing Life Away", "Prayer of the Refugee", and "The Good Left Undone". Their most recent studio album, Appeal to Reason, was released in North America on October 7, 2008, peaking at number three on the U.S. Billboard 200 and producing the singles, "Re-Education (Through Labor)", "Audience of One", and "Savior". Rise Against was formed under the name Transistor Revolt in 1999 by former members of the bands 88 Fingers Louie and Baxter. The first lineup consisted of Tim McIlrath (vocals), Joe Principe (bass and vocals), Toni Tintari (drums), and Mr. Precision (guitar and vocals). Though the band never performed live with this lineup, it released a self-produced demo/EP entitled Transistor Revolt in 2000, a year before signing with Fat Wreck Chords. Tintari left shortly after recording Transistor Revolt, and was replaced by Brandon Barnes, after a short time with Dan Lumley of Screeching Weasel and Squirtgun as the drummer. The band changed its name to Rise Against in 2001 and released its first album, The Unraveling (produced by veteran punk producer Mass Giorgini) on Fat Wreck Chords that same year. Mr. Precision left the band in 2001, and was replaced by Todd Mohney before the band began writing their second full-length album. After touring in support of The Unraveling, the band returned to the studio in December 2002 to work on their second full-length, Revolutions per Minute (produced by Bill Stevenson and Jason Livermore at The Blasting Room), which was released in 2003. The band toured extensively in support of its first two records, performing in supporting roles for Sick of It All, NOFX, Agnostic Front, No Use for a Name, AFI, and Strung Out. In addition, Rise Against participated in the 2003 Warped Tour. Rise Against signed onto Dreamworks Records in December 2003 and recorded their third album, Siren Song of the Counter Culture, in 2004. Dreamworks was shortly absorbed by the Universal Music Group, and Rise Against found itself with Geffen Records, a Universal Music Group subsidiary. Shortly after the band signed with Geffen, Mohney left and was replaced by guitarist Chris Chasse. Rise Against released Siren Song of the Counter Culture in August 2004 on Geffen Records. The album, in addition to being the band's first on a major record label, was their first to reach the Billboard 200 chart and to be certified gold by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). The album received generally slightly positive ratings from critics. It was mainly criticized for its accessibility and melodious sound compared to previous Rise Against works. In giving the album 3 out of 5 stars, Johnny Loftus of Allmusic said that Siren Song of the Counter Culture sometimes "gets carried away with its own melodic urgency." However, he goes on to say that because of the album being the band's major-label debut, "maybe the fuller sound and occasional forays into acoustic guitars and cello overdubs...are OK." Rise Against toured North America, Europe, Australia, and Japan in support of Siren Song of the Counter Culture. Some of the most notable mentions include performances on the first international Taste of Chaos tour in 2005 (with Funeral for a Friend, Story of the Year, The Used, and Killswitch Engage), a worldwide tour to the UK, Germany, Australia, and Japan, the Give It a Name tour in the UK, the Reading Festival and Leeds Festival in the UK, a US tour with Alkaline Trio, and the Warped Tour in North America. In January 2006, after touring in support of Siren Song of the Counter Culture, Rise Against recorded their fourth studio album at the Blasting Room studio in Fort Collins, Colorado with producers Bill Stevenson and Jason Livermore. Mixed by Chris Lord-Alge at Resonate Sound in Burbank, California, The Sufferer & the Witness was released on July 4, 2006. The album peaked at number 10 on the U.S. Billboard 200 chart, selling 48,397 copies in its first week of release; it was eventually certified gold by the RIAA in 2008. The Age newspaper said that with The Sufferer & the Witness, the band "returns to their punk roots." In addition to earning Rise Against its best chart and sales numbers at the time, the album was generally well-received by critics. Corey Apar of Allmusic, in giving the album 4 out of 5 stars, said of it, "the band's inner grit is aptly drawn out amid all the pit-ready choruses and fist-in-the-air, stirring lyrics." She goes on to say, "Rise Against continue to muscularly confront political and personal grievances to the tune of swirling guitars, assertive rhythms, and Tim McIlrath's sandpapered vocals." Contrastingly, Christine Leonard of Fast Forward Weekly says of the band, "Returning to their old school form with the ballistic intensity of "Bricks," they just as quickly lose focus with questionable efforts such as 'Worth Dying For' and the oh-so-weary 'Prayer of the Refugee.'" A DVD titled Generation Lost was released on December 5, 2006 to promote the band and their new album. It contains a documentary of the careers of the band members, as well as live performance videos and making-of clips. Rise Against toured in support of The Sufferer & the Witness throughout the second half of 2006 and all of 2007. The band was a headliner in the 2006 Warped Tour. In late 2006, the band co-headlined a tour with Thursday that included the bands Circa Survive and Billy Talent. In early 2007, the band supported My Chemical Romance as openers on the first half of their arena tour. On February 23, 2007, Rise Against announced the departure of guitarist Chris Chasse on the band's official website. Chasse was replaced by longtime friend Zach Blair from Only Crime. On June 15, 2007, the band began their first official headlining tour in support of The Sufferer & the Witness; it was a North American tour that lasted throughout the summer months. During this tour, on July 3, 2007, Rise Against released an EP in Canada titled This Is Noise, which was subsequently released in the United States on January 15, 2008. To support the upcoming album, Rise Against played at the sixteenth annual KROQ Weenie Roast on May 17 in Irvine, California, and at the sixth annual Download Festival on June 13 at Donington Park, England. They also played at Switzerland's Greenfield Festival as well as Germany's Hurricane Festival and Southside Festival. Like several previous years, the band participated in the Vans Warped Tour, although they decided only to perform on the tour's west coast swing from August 6 to August 17. Rise Against's fifth studio album Appeal to Reason was released on October 4 in Australia, October 6 across Europe, and October 7 in the United States. The album sold 64,700 copies in its first week and peaked at number three on the U.S. Billboard 200, making it Rise Against's highest charting album to date. Appeal to Reason was met with generally positive reviews. However, critics did not rate it as highly as The Sufferer & the Witness, mostly blaming the movement toward the mainstream and away from faster hardcore punk. Giving the album a C+ rating, Marc Weingarten of Entertainment Weekly says the album is filled with "protest anthems that lean closer to the burnished angst of such bands as New Found Glory and Fall Out Boy than the genuine outrage of brainy Green Day" and songs that are "peppy but pretty empty, power-chord downers with little bark or bite." Kyle Anderson of Rolling Stone states that the songs on Appeal to Reason "are driven by an ever-sharpening pop sensibility." He concludes by saying, "Rise Against may be nervous about leaving the underground behind, but with sharp songs like these, they're ready for the rest of the world." Rise Against embarked on a North American tour with fellow bands Rancid, Billy Talent, Killswitch Engage, and Riverboat Gamblers in June and July 2009. They will be on a short tour of the UK in November, which is supported by the bands Thursday and Poison the Well. The band will release a split record with Face to Face, although no date has been announced. After completing a European tour from October to November 2009 and an Australian tour in January and February 2010, Rise Against will begin working on a new album. Rise Against's musical style throughout the band's career has been described by most critics as hardcore punk, melodic hardcore, or punk rock. The band has cited numerous punk and hardcore bands as influences to its music. In 2004, drummer Brandon Barnes stated: "I think we have a lot of different influences from hardcore like old Cave In, to a lot of punk like Face to Face, Screeching Weasel, and Down By Law." In 2006, Tim McIlrath stated of the band's style: "We’re emulating Minor Threat and Black Flag. Who knows, maybe if Ian MacKaye was wearing eyeliner then I would be." Other bands that have influenced Rise Against include Descendents, Dead Kennedys, and Bad Religion. Rise Against discography 2004 "Give It All" - US Modern Rock #37 2005 "Swing Life Away" - US Hot 100 #117 - US Pop #95 - US Mod #12 2005 "Life Less Frightening" - US Mod #33 2006 "Ready to Fall" - US Mod #13 2006 "Prayer of the Refugee" - US Mod #7 2007 "The Good Left Undone" - US Mod #6 2008 "Re-Education (Through Labor)" - Hot 100 #112 - US Mod #3 - US Mainstream Rock #22 2009 "Audience of One" - US Mod #4 - US Rock #16 2009 "Savior" - Hot 10 #109 - US Mod #4 - US Main #27 - US Rock #9 Factoid: All of the group's members are vegetarians/vegans and active supporters of PETA, an animal rights organization. "Give It All" http://media-convert.com/convert/?xid=7-xgpmdeuw

If anyone wants their list, they can PM me.

39. David Bowie 3 of 24 lists - 41 points - highest ranking #8 RibbieRubarb David Bowie (pronounced /ˈboʊ.iː/; born David Robert Jones; 8 January 1947) is an English musician, actor, record producer and arranger. Active in five decades of popular music and frequently reinventing his music and image, Bowie is widely regarded as an innovator, particularly for his work in the 1970s. He has been cited as an influence by many musicians and is known for his distinctive voice and the intellectual depth of his work. Although he released an album (David Bowie) and several singles earlier, David Bowie first caught the eye and ear of the public in the autumn of 1969, when the song "Space Oddity" reached the top five of the UK singles chart. After a three-year period of experimentation he re-emerged in 1972 during the glam rock era as the flamboyant, androgynous alter ego Ziggy Stardust, spearheaded by the hit single "Starman" and the album The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars. The relatively short-lived Ziggy persona epitomised a career often marked by musical innovation, reinvention and striking visual presentation. In 1975, Bowie achieved his first major American crossover success with the number-one single "Fame", co-written with John Lennon, and the hit album Young Americans, which the singer identified as "plastic soul". The sound constituted a radical shift in style that initially alienated many of his UK devotees. He then confounded the expectations of both his record label and his American audiences by recording the minimalist album Low (1977)—the first of three collaborations with Brian Eno over the next two years. The so-called "Berlin Trilogy" albums all reached the UK Top Five and garnered lasting critical praise. After uneven commercial success in the late 1970s, Bowie had UK number ones with the 1980 single "Ashes to Ashes" and its parent album, Scary Monsters (and Super Creeps). He paired with Queen for the 1981 UK chart-topping single "Under Pressure", but reached a commercial peak in 1983 with the album Let's Dance, which yielded the hit singles "Let's Dance", "China Girl", and "Modern Love". Throughout the 1990s and 2000s, Bowie continued to experiment with musical styles, including blue-eyed soul, industrial, adult contemporary, and jungle. His last recorded album was Reality (2003), which was supported by the 2003-2004 Reality Tour. In the BBC's 2002 poll of the 100 Greatest Britons, Bowie ranked 29. Throughout his career he has sold an estimated 136 million albums, and ranks among the ten best-selling acts in UK pop history. In 2004, Rolling Stone magazine ranked him 39th on their list of the 100 Greatest Rock Artists of All Time. Bowie's interest in music was sparked at the age of nine when his father brought home a collection of American 45s, including Fats Domino, Chuck Berry and, most significantly, Little Richard. Upon listening to "Tutti Frutti", Bowie would later say, "I had heard God". His half-brother Terry introduced him to modern jazz and Bowie's enthusiasm for players like Charles Mingus and John Coltrane led his mother to give him a plastic saxophone for Christmas in 1959. Graduating to a real instrument, he formed his first band in 1962, the Konrads. He then played and sang in various blues/beat groups, such as The King Bees, The Manish Boys (cf. "Mannish Boy"), The Lower Third and The Riot Squad in the mid-1960s, releasing his first record, the single "Liza Jane", with the King Bees in 1964. His early work shifted through the blues and Elvis-inspired music while working with many British pop styles. During the early 1960s, Bowie was performing either under his own name or the stage name "Davie Jones", and briefly even as "Davy Jones", creating confusion with Davy Jones of The Monkees. To avoid this, in 1966 he chose "Bowie" for his stage name, after the Alamo hero Jim Bowie and his famous Bowie knife. During this time, he recorded singles for Parlophone under the name of The Manish Boys and Davy Jones and for Pye under the name David Bowie (and The Lower Third), all without success. Bowie released his first album in 1967 for the Decca Records offshoot Deram, simply called David Bowie. It was an amalgam of pop, psychedelia, and music hall. Around the same time he issued a novelty single, "The Laughing Gnome", which utilized sped-up Chipmunk-style vocals. None of these releases managed to chart, and he would not cut another record for two years. His Deram material from the album and various singles was later recycled in a multitude of compilations. Influenced by the dramatic arts, he studied with Lindsay Kemp—from avant-garde theater and mime to Commedia dell'arte—and much of his work would involve the creation of characters or personae to present to the world. During 1967, Bowie sold his first song to another artist, "Oscar" (an early stage name of actor-musician Paul Nicholas). Bowie wrote Oscar's third single, "Over the Wall We Go", which satirized life in a British prison. In late 1968, his then-manager, Kenneth Pitt, produced a half-hour promotional film called Love You Till Tuesday featuring Bowie performing a number of songs, but it went unreleased until 1984. Bowie's first flirtation with fame came in 1969 with his single "Space Oddity," written the previous year but recorded and released to coincide with the first moon landing. This ballad told the story of Major Tom, an astronaut who becomes lost in space, though it has also been interpreted as an allegory for taking drugs. It became a Top 5 UK hit. Bowie put the finishing touches to the track while living with Mary Finnigan as her lodger. Finnigan and Bowie joined forces with Christina Ostrom and the late Barrie Jackson to run a Folk Club on Sunday nights at The Three Tuns pub in Beckenham High Street, south London. This soon morphed into the Beckenham Arts Lab and became extremely popular. In August 1969, The Arts Lab hosted a Free Festival in a local park, later immortalised by Bowie in his song "Memory of a Free Festival".[26] In 1969 and 1970, "Space Oddity" was used by the BBC during both its Apollo 11 moon landing coverage and its coverage of Apollo 13. The corresponding album, his second, was released in November 1969 and originally titled David Bowie, which caused some confusion as both of Bowie's first and second albums were released with that name in the UK. In the US the same album originally bore the title Man of Words, Man of Music to overcome that confusion. In 1972, the album was re-released on both sides of the Atlantic by RCA Records as Space Oddity, a title it has kept until today. In 1970, Bowie released his third album, The Man Who Sold the World, rejecting the acoustic guitar sound of the previous album and replacing it with the heavy rock backing provided by Mick Ronson, who would be a major collaborator through to 1973. Much of the album resembles British heavy metal music of the period, but the album provided some unusual musical detours, such as the title track's use of Latin sounds and rhythms. The original UK cover of the album showed Bowie in a dress, an early example of his androgynous appearance. In the US, the album was originally released in a cartoonish cover that did not feature Bowie. His next record, Hunky Dory in 1971, saw the partial return of the fey pop singer of "Space Oddity", with light fare such as the droll "Kooks". Elsewhere, the album explored more serious themes on tracks such as "Oh! You Pretty Things" (a song taken to UK number twelve by Herman's Hermits' Peter Noone in 1971), the semi-autobiographical "The Bewlay Brothers", and the Buddhist-influenced "Quicksand". Lyrically, the young songwriter also paid unusually direct homage to his influences with "Song for Bob Dylan", "Andy Warhol", and "Queen b****", which Bowie's somewhat cryptic liner notes indicate as a Velvet Underground pastiche. As with the single "Changes", Hunky Dory was not a big hit but it laid the groundwork for the move that would shortly lift Bowie into the first rank of stars, giving him four top-ten albums and eight top ten singles in the UK in eighteen months between 1972 and 1973. Bowie further explored his androgynous persona in June 1972 with the seminal concept album The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars, which presents a world destined to end in five years and tells the story of the ultimate rock star, Ziggy Stardust. The album's sound combined the hard rock elements of The Man Who Sold the World with the lighter experimental rock of Hunky Dory and the fast-paced glam rock pioneered by Marc Bolan's T. Rex. Many of the album's songs have become rock classics, including "Ziggy Stardust," "Moonage Daydream," "Rock & Roll Suicide" and "Suffragette City." The Ziggy Stardust character became the basis for Bowie's first large-scale tour beginning in 1972, where he donned his famous flaming red mullet and wild outfits, designed by Kansai Yamamoto. The tour featured a three-piece band representing The Spiders from Mars: Ronson on guitar, Trevor Bolder on bass, and Mick Woodmansey on drums. This was Bowie’s first tour to visit the US, making his first appearance on 22 September 1972 at Music Hall in Cleveland, Ohio. The album made number five in the UK on the strength of the number ten placing of the single "Starman". Their success made Bowie a star, and soon the six-month-old Hunky Dory eclipsed Ziggy Stardust, when it peaked at number three on the UK chart. At the same time the non-album single "John, I’m Only Dancing" (not released in the US until 1979) peaked at UK number twelve, and "All the Young Dudes", a song he had given to, and produced for, Mott the Hoople, made UK number three. Around the same time Bowie began promoting and producing his rock and roll heroes, two of whom he met at the popular New York hangout Max's Kansas City: former Velvet Underground singer Lou Reed, whose solo breakthrough Transformer was produced by Bowie and Ronson; and Iggy Pop, whose band, The Stooges, signed with Bowie's management, MainMan Productions, to record their third album, Raw Power. Though he was not present for the tracking of the album, Bowie later performed its much-debated mix. Bowie sang back-up vocals on both Reed's Transformer, and Iggy's The Idiot. The Spiders From Mars came together again on Aladdin Sane, released in April 1973 and his first number one album in the UK. Described by Bowie as "Ziggy goes to America", all the new songs were written on ship, bus or trains during the first leg of his US Ziggy Stardust tour. The album's cover, featuring Bowie shirtless with Ziggy hair and a red, black, and blue lightning bolt across his face, has been described as being as "startling as rock covers ever got." Aladdin Sane included the UK number two hit "The Jean Genie", the UK number three hit "Drive-In Saturday", and a rendition of The Rolling Stones' "Let's Spend the Night Together". Mike Garson joined Bowie to play piano on this album, and his solo on the title track has been cited as one of the album's highlights. Bowie's later Ziggy shows, which included songs from both Ziggy Stardust and Aladdin Sane, as well as a few earlier tracks like "Changes" and "The Width of a Circle", were ultra-theatrical affairs filled with shocking stage moments, such as Bowie stripping down to a sumo wrestling loincloth or simulating oral sex with Ronson's guitar. Bowie toured and gave press conferences as Ziggy before a dramatic and abrupt on-stage "retirement" at London's Hammersmith Odeon on 3 July 1973. His announcement—"Of all the shows on this tour, this particular show will remain with us the longest, because not only is it the last show of the tour, but it's the last show that we'll ever do. Thank you."—was preserved in a live recording of the show, filmed by D. A. Pennebaker and belatedly released under the title Ziggy Stardust - The Motion Picture in 1983 after many years circulating as an audio bootleg. Pin Ups, a collection of covers of his 1960s favorites, was released in October 1973, spawning a UK number three hit in "Sorrow" and itself peaking at number one, making David Bowie the best-selling act of 1973 in the UK. By this time, Bowie had broken up the Spiders from Mars and was attempting to move on from his Ziggy persona. Bowie's own back catalog was now highly sought: The Man Who Sold the World had been re-released in 1972 along with the second David Bowie album (Space Oddity). Hunky Dory's "Life on Mars?" was released as a single in 1973 and made number three in the UK, the same year Bowie's novelty record from 1967, "The Laughing Gnome", hit number six. 1974 saw the release of another ambitious album, Diamond Dogs, with a spoken word introduction and a multi-part song suite("Sweet Thing/Candidate/Sweet Thing (reprise)"). Diamond Dogs was the product of two distinct ideas: a musical based on a wild future in a post-apocalyptic city, and setting George Orwell's 1984 to music. Bowie also made plans to develop a Diamond Dogs movie, but didn't get very far. Bowie had originally planned on writing a musical to 1984, but his interest waned after encountering difficulties in licensing the novel. He used some of the songs he had written for the project on Diamond Dogs. The album—and an NBC television special, The 1980 Floor Show, broadcast at around the same time—demonstrated Bowie headed toward the genre of soul/funk music, the track "1984" being a prime example. The album spawned the hits "Rebel Rebel" (UK number five) and "Diamond Dogs" (UK number twenty-one), and itself went to number one in the UK, making him the best-selling act of that country for the second year in a row. In the US, Bowie achieved his first major commercial success as the album went to number five. To follow on the release of the album, Bowie launched a massive Diamond Dogs tour in North America from June to December 1974. Choreographed by Toni Basil, and lavishly produced with theatrical special effects, the high-budget stage production broke with contemporary standard practice for rock concerts by featuring no encores. It was filmed by Alan Yentob for the documentary Cracked Actor. The documentary seemed to confirm the rumors of his cocaine abuse, featuring a pasty and emaciated Bowie nervously sniffing in the backseat of a car and claiming that there was a fly in his milk. Bowie commented that the resulting live album, David Live, ought to have been called "David Bowie Is Alive and Well and Living Only In Theory," presumably in reference to his addled and frenetic psychological state during this period. Nevertheless the album solidified his status as a superstar, going number two in the UK and number eight in the US. It also spawned a UK number ten hit in a cover of "Knock on Wood". After the opening leg of the tour, Bowie mostly jettisoned the elaborate sets. Then, when the tour resumed after a summer break in Philadelphia for recording new material, the Diamond Dogs sound no longer seemed apt. Bowie cancelled seven dates and made changes to the band, which returned to the road in October as the Philly Dogs tour. For Ziggy Stardust fans who had not discerned the soul and funk strains already apparent in Bowie's recent work, the "new" sound was considered a sudden and jolting step. 1975's Young Americans was Bowie's definitive exploration of Philly soul—though he himself referred to the sound ironically as "plastic soul." It contained his first number one hit in the US, "Fame", co-written with Carlos Alomar and John Lennon (who also contributed backing vocals). It was based on a riff Alomar had developed while covering The Flares' 1961 doo-wop classic "Foot Stompin'", which Bowie's band had taken to playing live during the Philly Dogs period. One of the backing vocalists on the album is a young Luther Vandross, who also co-wrote some of the material for Young Americans. The song "Win" featured a hypnotic guitar riff later taken by Beck for the track/live staple "Debra" off his Midnite Vultures album. Despite Bowie's unashamed recognition of the shallowness of his "plastic soul," he did earn the bona fide distinction of being one of the few white artists to be invited to appear on the popular "Soul Train." Another violently paranoid appearance on ABC's The Dick Cavett Show (1974 5 December) seemed to confirm rumours of Bowie's heavy cocaine use at this time.[36] Young Americans was the album that cemented Bowie's stardom in the US; though only peaking there at number nine, as opposed to the number five placing of Diamond Dogs, the album stayed on the charts almost twice as long. At the same time, the album achieved number two in the UK while a re-issue of his old single "Space Oddity" became his first number one hit in the UK, only a few months after "Fame" had achieved the same in the US. Around this time, Bowie performed with Cher on her second variety tv program, The Cher Show doing a medley of his songs and popular hits, as well as a version of his song Fame. Station to Station (1976) featured a darker version of this soul persona, called "The Thin White Duke". Visually the figure was an extension of Thomas Jerome Newton, the character Bowie portrayed in The Man Who Fell to Earth. Station to Station was a transitional album, prefiguring the Krautrock and synthesizer music of his next releases, while further developing the funk and soul music of Young Americans. By this time, Bowie had become heavily dependent on drugs, particularly cocaine; many critics have attributed the chopped rhythms and emotional detachment of the record to the influence of the drug, to which Bowie claimed to have been introduced in America. Bowie refused to relinquish control of a satellite, booked for a worldwide broadcast of a live appearance preceding the release of Station to Station, at the request of the Spanish Government, who wished to put out a live feed regarding the death of Spanish Dictator Francisco Franco. His sanity—by his own later admission—became twisted from cocaine: he overdosed several times during the year. Additionally, Bowie was withering physically after having lost an alarming amount of weight. Nonetheless, there was another large tour, the Isolar - 1976 Tour, which featured a starkly lit set and highlighted new songs such as the dramatic and lengthy title track, the ballads "Wild Is the Wind" and "Word on a Wing", and the funkier "TVC 15" and "Stay". The core band that coalesced around this album and tour—rhythm guitarist Alomar, bassist George Murray, and drummer Dennis Davis—would remain a stable unit through the 1970s. The tour was highly successful but also mired in political controversy. Bowie was quoted in Stockholm as saying that "Britain could benefit from a Fascist leader", and detained by customs in Eastern Europe for possessing Nazi paraphernalia. Matters came to a head in London on 2 May 1976, in what became known as the 'Victoria Station incident', when Bowie arrived in an open-top Mercedes convertible and apparently gave a Nazi salute to the crowd that was captured on film and published in NME. Bowie claimed that the photographer simply caught him in mid-wave,and later blamed his addictions and the character of The Thin White Duke for his troubles at this time. Bowie's interest in the growing German music scene, as well as his drug addiction, prompted him to move to West Berlin to dry out and rejuvenate his career. Sharing an apartment in Schöneberg with his friend Iggy Pop, he co-produced three more of his own classic albums with Tony Visconti, while aiding Pop with his career. With Bowie as a co-writer and musician, Pop completed his first two solo albums, The Idiot and Lust for Life. Bowie joined Pop's touring band in the spring, simply playing keyboard and singing backing vocals. The group performed in the UK, Europe, and the US from March to April 1977. The brittle sound of Station to Station proved a precursor to Low, the first of three albums that became known as the "Berlin Trilogy". Partly influenced by the Krautrock sound of Kraftwerk and Neu! Bowie journeyed to Neunkirchen near Cologne to meet the famed German producer Conny Plank. The album provided him with a surprise number three hit in the UK when the BBC picked up the first single, "Sound and Vision", as its 'coming attractions' theme music. The album was produced in 1976 and released in early 1977. Much of the band were present for the first five days only, after which Eno, Alomar and Gardiner remained to play overdubs. By the time Bowie wrote and recorded the lyrics everybody but Visconti and studio engineers had departed. The next record, "Heroes", was similar in sound to Low, though slightly more accessible. The mood of these records fit the zeitgeist of the Cold War, symbolized by the divided city that provided its inspiration. The title track, a story of two lovers who met at the Berlin Wall, is one of Bowie's most-covered songs. In 1977, Bowie also appeared on the Granada music show Marc, hosted by his friend and fellow glam pioneer Marc Bolan of T. Rex, with whom he had regularly socialized and jammed before either achieved fame. He turned out to be the show's final guest, as Bolan was killed in a car crash shortly afterward. Bowie was one of many superstars who attended the funeral. For Christmas 1977, Bowie joined Bing Crosby, of whom he was an ardent admirer, at the ATV Television Studio in Herts England to do "Peace on Earth/Little Drummer Boy", a version of "Little Drummer Boy" with a new lyric.[44] The resultant video in a Christmas seasonal setting was actually recorded during a late summer heatwave with the air conditioning breaking down. The two singers had originally met on Crosby's Christmas television special two years earlier (on the recommendation of Crosby's children—he had not heard of Bowie) and performed the song. One month after the record was completed, Crosby died. Five years later, the song would prove a worldwide festive hit, charting in the UK at number three on Christmas Day 1982. Bowie later remarked jokingly that he was afraid of being a guest artist, because "everyone I was going on with was kicking it", referring to Bolan and Crosby. Bowie and his band embarked on an extensive world tour in 1978 (including his first concerts in Australia and New Zealand) which featured music from both Low and Heroes. A live album from the tour was released as Stage the same year. Songs from both Low and Heroes were later converted to symphonies by minimalist composer Phillip Glass. 1978 was also the year that saw Bowie narrating Sergei Prokofiev's Peter and the Wolf. Lodger (1979) was the final album in Bowie's so-called "Berlin Trilogy", or "triptych" as Bowie calls it.[48] It featured the singles "Boys Keep Swinging", "DJ" and "Look Back in Anger" and, unlike the two previous LPs, did not contain any instrumentals. The style was a mix of New Wave and world music, which included pieces such as "African Night Flight" and "Yassassin". A number of tracks were composed using the non-traditional Bowie/Eno composition techniques: "Boys Keep Swinging" was developed with the band members swapping their instruments while "Move On" contains the chords for an early Bowie composition, "All The Young Dudes", played backwards; the song "Red Money" took backing tracks from the Iggy Pop/David Bowie composition "Sister Midnight" from Pop's album The Idiot. This was Bowie's last album with Eno until 1. Outside in 1995. In 1980, Bowie's style retrogressed, integrating the lessons learnt on Low, Heroes, and Lodger while expanding upon them with chart success. Scary Monsters (and Super Creeps) included the number one hit "Ashes to Ashes", featuring the textural work of guitar-synthesist Chuck Hammer, and revisiting the character of Major Tom from "Space Oddity". The imagery Bowie used in the song's music video gave international exposure to the underground New Romantic movement and, with many of the followers of this phase being devotees, Bowie visited the London club "Blitz"—the main New Romantic hangout—to recruit several of the regulars (including Steve Strange of the band Visage) to act in the video, renowned as being one of the most innovative of all time. While Scary Monsters utilised principles that Bowie had learned in the Berlin era, it was considered by critics to be far more direct musically and lyrically, reflecting the transformation Bowie had gone through during his time in Germany and Europe. By 1980 Bowie had divorced his wife Angie, stopped the drug use of the "Thin White Duke" era, and radically changed his concept of the way music should be written. The album had a hard rock edge that included conspicuous guitar contributions from King Crimson's Robert Fripp, The Who's Pete Townshend, and Television's Tom Verlaine. As "Ashes to Ashes" hit number one on the UK charts, Bowie opened a three-month run on Broadway starring in The Elephant Man on 23 September 1980. In 1981, Queen released "Under Pressure", co-written and performed with Bowie. The song was a hit and became Bowie's third UK number one single. In the same year Bowie made a cameo appearance in the German movie Christiane F. Wir Kinder vom Bahnhof Zoo, the real-life story of a 13 year-old girl in Berlin who becomes addicted to heroin and ends up prostituting herself. Bowie is credited with "special cooperation" in the credits and his music features prominently in the movie. The soundtrack was released in 1982 and contained a version of "Heroes" sung partially in German that had previously been included on the German pressing of its parent album. The same year Bowie appeared in the BBC's adaptation of Bertolt Brecht's play Baal. Coinciding with transmission of the film, a five-track EP of songs from the play was released as David Bowie in Bertolt Brecht's Baal, recorded at Hansa by the Wall the previous September. It would mark Bowie’s final new release on RCA, as 1983 saw him change record labels from RCA to EMI America. In April 1982, Bowie released "Cat People (Putting Out Fire)" with Giorgio Moroder, for director Paul Schrader's film Cat People. David Bowie on the Hollywood Walk of Fame Bowie scored his first truly commercial blockbuster with Let's Dance in 1983, a slick dance album co-produced by Chic's Nile Rodgers. The title track went to number one in the United States and United Kingdom. The album also featured the singles "Modern Love" and "China Girl", the latter causing something of a stir due to its suggestive promotional video. "China Girl" was a remake of a song which Bowie co-wrote several years earlier with Iggy Pop, who recorded it for The Idiot. In an interview by Kurt Loder, Bowie revealed that the motivation for recording "China Girl" was to help out his friend Iggy Pop financially, contributing to Bowie's history of support for musicians he admired. Let's Dance was also notable as a stepping stone for the career of the late Texan guitarist Stevie Ray Vaughan, who played on the album and was to have supported Bowie on the consequent Serious Moonlight Tour. Vaughan, however, never joined the tour after various disputes with Bowie. Vaughan was replaced by the Bowie tour veteran Earl Slick. Frank and George Simms from The Simms Brothers Band appeared as backing vocalists for the tour. Bowie's next album was originally planned to be a live album recorded on the Serious Moonlight Tour, but EMI demanded another studio album instead. The resulting album, 1984's Tonight, was also dance-oriented, featuring collaborations with Tina Turner and Iggy Pop, as well as various covers, including one of The Beach Boys' "God Only Knows". The album bore the transatlantic Top Ten hit "Blue Jean" whose complete video — the 21-minute short film "Jazzin' for Blue Jean" - reflected Bowie's long-standing interest in combining music with drama. This video would win Bowie his only Grammy to date, for Best Short Form Music Video. It also featured "Loving the Alien", a remix of which was a minor hit in 1985. The album also has a pair of dance rewrites of "Neighborhood Threat" and "Tonight", old songs Bowie wrote with Iggy Pop which had originally appeared on Lust for Life. In 1985, Bowie performed several of his greatest hits at Wembley for Live Aid. At the end of his set, which comprised "Rebel Rebel", "TVC 15", "Modern Love" and 'Heroes', he introduced a film of the Ethiopian famine, for which the event was raising funds, which was set to the song "Drive" by The Cars. At the event, the video to a fundraising single was premièred – Bowie performing a duet with Mick Jagger on a version of "Dancing in the Street", which quickly went to number one on release. In the same year Bowie worked with the Pat Metheny Group on the song "This Is Not America", which was featured in the film The Falcon and the Snowman. This song was the centerpiece of the album, a collaboration intended to underline the espionage thriller's central themes of alienation and disaffection. Bowie performing in 1987 In 1986, Bowie contributed several songs to as well as acted in the film Absolute Beginners. The movie was not well reviewed but Bowie's theme song rose to number two in the UK charts. He also took a role in the 1986 Jim Henson film Labyrinth, as Jareth, the Goblin King who steals the baby brother of a girl named Sarah (played by Jennifer Connelly), in order to turn him into a goblin. Bowie wrote five songs for the film, the script of which was partially written by Monty Python's Terry Jones. Bowie's final solo album of the 80s was 1987's Never Let Me Down, where he ditched the light sound of his two earlier albums, instead offering harder rock with an industrial/techno dance edge. The album, which peaked at number six in the UK, contained hit singles "Day In, Day Out", "Time Will Crawl", and "Never Let Me Down". Bowie himself later described it as "my nadir" and "an awful album". Bowie decided to tour again in 1987, supporting the Never Let Me Down album. The Glass Spider Tour was preceded by nine promotional press shows before the 86-concert tour actually started on 30 May 1987. In addition to the actual band, that included Peter Frampton on lead guitar, five dancers appeared on stage for almost the entire duration of each concert. Taped pieces of dialogue were also performed by Bowie and the dancers in the middle of songs, creating an overtly theatrical effect. Several visual gimmicks were also recreated from Bowie's earlier tours. Critics of the tour described it as overproduced and claimed it pandered to then-current stadium rock trends in its special effects and dancing. However, fans that saw the shows from the Glass Spider Tour were treated to many of Bowie's classics and rarities, in addition to the newer material. In 1989, for the first time since the early 1970s, Bowie formed a regular band, Tin Machine, a hard-rocking quartet, along with Reeves Gabrels, Tony Sales, and Hunt Sales. Tin Machine released two studio albums and a live record. The band received mixed reviews and a somewhat lukewarm reception from the public, but Tin Machine heralded the beginning of a long-lasting collaboration between Bowie and Gabrels. The original album, Tin Machine (1989), was a success, holding the number three spot on the charts of the UK. Tin Machine launched its first world tour, featuring a now unshaven David Bowie and additional guitarist Eric Schermerhorn, that year. Despite the success of the Tin Machine venture, Bowie was mildly frustrated that many of his ideas were either rejected or changed by the band. Bowie began the 1990s with a stadium tour, in which he played mostly his biggest hits. The Sound + Vision Tour (named after the Low single) was conceived and directed by choreographer Edouard Lock of the Quebec contemporary dance troupe La La La Human Steps, with whom Bowie collaborated and performed on stage and in his videos. Bowie vowed during the tour that he would never play his early hits again. Though he surprised no one when he later reneged on that promise and also on the promise that his set in each country would be focused on the favourite hits voted by phone poll in that country — an idea quickly jettisoned when a campaign by the British magazine NME resulted in a landslide in favour of The Laughing Gnome, it is true that his later tours generally featured few of those hits, and when they appeared, they were often radically reworked in their arrangement and delivery. Bowie's negative press-image continued when the cover of Tin Machine's second album became unusually controversial, due to the presence of naked statues as its cover art. After the less successful second album Tin Machine II and the complete failure of live album Tin Machine Live: Oy Vey, Baby, Bowie tired of having to work in a group setting where his creativity was limited, and finally disbanded Tin Machine to work on his own. In 1992 he performed his hits "Heroes" and "Under Pressure" (with Annie Lennox) at the Freddie Mercury Tribute Concert. 1993 saw the release of the soul, jazz and hip-hop influenced Black Tie White Noise, which reunited Bowie with Let's Dance producer Nile Rodgers. The album hit the number one spot on the UK charts with singles such as "Jump They Say" (a top-10 hit) and "Miracle Goodnight". Bowie explored new directions on The Buddha of Suburbia (1993), based on incidental music composed for a TV series. It contained some of the new elements introduced in Black Tie White Noise, and also signalled a move towards alternative rock. The album was a critical success but received a low-key release and only made number 87 in the UK charts.[55] The ambitious, quasi-industrial release Outside (1995), conceived as the first volume in a subsequently abandoned non-linear narrative of art and murder, reunited him with Brian Eno. The album introduced the characters of one of Bowie's short stories, and achieved chart success in both the UK and US. The album and its singles put Bowie back into the mainstream of rock music. In September 1995, Bowie began the Outside Tour with Gabrels returning as guitarist. In a move that was equally lauded and ridiculed by Bowie fans and critics, Bowie chose Nine Inch Nails as the tour partner; Trent Reznor also contributed a remix of the Outside song "The Hearts Filthy Lesson" for its single release. On 17 January 1996, Bowie was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame at the eleventh annual induction ceremony. Receiving some of the strongest critical response since Let's Dance was Earthling (1997), which incorporated experiments in British jungle and drum 'n' bass and included a single released over the Internet, called "Telling Lies"; other singles included "Little Wonder" and "Dead Man Walking". There was a corresponding world tour. Bowie's track in the Paul Verhoeven film Showgirls, "I'm Afraid of Americans" was remixed by Trent Reznor for a single release. The video's heavy rotation (also featuring Reznor) contributed to the song's 16-week stay in the US Billboard Hot 100. In 1998, David Bowie had reunited with Tony Visconti to record a song for The Rugrats Movie called "(Safe in This) Sky Life". Although the track was edited out of the final cut, and did not feature on the film's soundtrack album, the reunion led to the pair pursuing a new collaborative effort. "(Safe In This) Sky Life" was later re-recorded and released as a single b-side in 2002 where it was retitled "Safe". Among their earliest work together in this period, was a reworking of Placebo's track "Without You I'm Nothing", from the album of the same name, in which Visconti oversaw the additional production required when Bowie's harmonized vocal was added to the original version for a strictly limited edition single release. In 1999 Bowie made the soundtrack for "Omikron," a computer game. Bowie and his wife, Iman, made appearances as characters in the game. That same year, re-recorded tracks from Omikron and new music was released in the album 'hours...' featured "What's Really Happening", with lyrics by Alex Grant, the winner of Bowie's "Cyber Song Contest" Internet competition. This album was Bowie's exit from heavy electronica, with an emphasis on more live instruments. Plans surfaced after the release of 'hours...' for an album titled Toy, which would feature new versions of some of Bowie's earliest pieces as well as three new songs. Sessions for the album commenced in 2000, but the album was never released, leaving a number of tracks, some as yet unheard, on the editing floor. Bowie and Visconti continued collaboration with the production of a new album of completely original songs instead. The result of the sessions was the 2002 album Heathen, which had a dark atmospheric sound, and was Bowie's biggest chart success in recent years. 2002 also saw Bowie curate the annual Meltdown festival in London. Amongst the acts selected by Bowie to perform were Phillip Glass, Television and The Polyphonic Spree. Bowie himself played a show at the Royal Festival Hall which notably included a rare performance of his experimental opus Low in its entirety. In 2003, a report in the Sunday Express named Bowie as the second-richest entertainer in the UK (behind Sir Paul McCartney), with an estimated fortune of £510 million. However, the 2005 Sunday Times Rich List credited him with a little over £100 million. In September 2003, Bowie released a new album, Reality, and announced a world tour. 'A Reality Tour' was the best-selling tour of the following year. However, it was cut short after Bowie suffered chest pain while performing on stage at the Hurricane Festival in Scheeßel, Germany, on 25 June 2004. Originally thought to be a pinched nerve in his shoulder, the pain was later diagnosed as an acutely blocked artery; an emergency angioplasty was performed at St Georg Hospital in Hamburg by Dr Karl Heinz Kuck. He was discharged in early July 2004 and continued to spend time recovering. Bowie later admitted he had suffered a minor heart attack, resulting from years of heavy smoking and touring. The tour was cancelled for the time being, with hopes that he would go back on tour by August, though this did not materialise. He recuperated back in New York City. In October 2004, Bowie released a live DVD of the tour, entitled A Reality Tour of his performances in Dublin on 22 and 23 November 2003, which included songs spanning the full length of Bowie's career, although mostly focusing on his more recent albums. Still recuperating from his operation, Bowie worked off-stage and relaxed from studio work for the first time in several years. In 2004, a duet of his classic song "Changes" with Butterfly Boucher appeared in Shrek 2. The soundtrack for the film The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou featured David Bowie songs performed in Portuguese by cast member Seu Jorge (who adapted the lyrics to make them relevant to the film's story). Most of the David Bowie songs featured in the film were originally from David Bowie (debut album), Space Oddity, Hunky Dory, The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars and Diamond Dogs. Bowie commented, "Had Seu Jorge not recorded my songs acoustically in Portuguese I would never have heard this new level of beauty which he has imbued them with". Despite hopes for a comeback, in 2005, Bowie announced that he had made no plans for any performances during the year. After a relatively quiet year, Bowie recorded the vocals for the song "(She Can) Do That", co-written by Brian Transeau, for the movie Stealth. Rumors flew about the possibility of a new album, but no announcements were made. David Bowie finally returned to the stage on 8 September 2005, alongside Arcade Fire, for the US nationally televised event Fashion Rocks, his first gig since the heart attack. Bowie has shown interest in the Montreal band since he was seen at one of their shows in New York City nearly a year earlier. Bowie had requested the band to perform at the show, and together they performed the Arcade Fire's song "Wake Up" from their album Funeral, as well as Bowie's own "Five Years" and "Life on Mars?". He joined them again on 15 September 2005, singing "Queen b****" and "Wake Up" from Central Park's Summerstage as part of the CMJ Music Marathon. Bowie contributed back-up vocals for TV on the Radio's song "Province" from their album Return to Cookie Mountain. He made other occasional appearances, as in his commercial with Snoop Dogg for XM Satellite Radio. He appeared on Danish alt-rockers Kashmir's 2005 release, No Balance Palace, sharing lead vocals with Kashmir singer Kasper Eistrup on the song "The Cynic". The album was produced by Tony Visconti, who also arranged the contact. No Balance Palace also featured a spoken word performance by Lou Reed, making it the second project involving both Bowie and Reed in two years, since Reed's 2003 The Raven. On 8 February 2006, David Bowie was awarded the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. In November, Bowie performed at the Black Ball in New York for the Keep a Child Alive Foundation alongside his wife, Iman, and Alicia Keys. He duetted with Keys on "Changes", and also performed "Wild is the Wind" and "Fantastic Voyage". For 2006, Bowie once again announced a break from performance[67], but he made a surprise guest appearance at David Gilmour's 29 May 2006 concert at the Royal Albert Hall in London. He sang "Arnold Layne" and "Comfortably Numb", closing the concert. The former performance was released, on 26 December 2006, as a single. In May 2007, it was announced that Bowie would curate the High Line Festival in the abandoned railway park in New York called the High Line where he would select various musicians and artists to perform.[68] Bowie contributed backing vocals to two tracks - "Falling Down" and "Fannin' Street" - on Scarlett Johansson's 2008 album of Tom Waits covers, Anywhere I Lay My Head. On 29 June 2008, Bowie released a new compilation entitled iSELECT. This CD was a collection of personal favorites compiled by Bowie himself and was available exclusively as a free gift with the British newspaper The Mail On Sunday. The compilation is notable in that it only contained one major hit single, "Life on Mars?", and concentrated on lesser-known album tracks. A double-album of the 2003 A Reality Tour is due to be released in January 2010. David Bowie discography 1969 "Space Oddity" - US Hot 100 #15 1972 "Changes" - Hot 100 #41 1972 "Starman" - #65 1972 "The Jean Genie" - #71 1974 "Rebel Rebel" - #64 1975 "Young Americans" - #28 1975 "Fame" - #1 1975 "Golden Years" - #10 1976 "TVC 15" - #64 1977 "Sound and Vision" - #69 1980 "Fashion" - US Hot 100 #70 1981 "Under Pressure"(w/Queen) - Hot 100 #29 - US Mainstream Rock #7 1982 "Cat People (Putting Out Fire)" - Hot 100 #67 - Main #9 1983 "Let's Dance" - #1 - #8 1983 "China Girl" - #10 - #3 1983 "Modern Love" - #14 - #6 1983 "Without You" - Hot 100 #73 1984 "Blue Jean" - #8 - #2 1984 "Tonight" (w/Tina Turner) - #53 - #32 1985 "This Is Not America"(w/Pat Metheny Group) - #32 - #7 1985 "Dancing in the Street" (w/Mick Jagger) US Hot 100 #7 1986 "Absolute Beginners"- #53 - #9 1986 "Underground" - US Main #18 1987 "Day-In Day-Out" - #21 - #3 1987 "Time Will Crawl" - US Main #7 1987 "Never Let Me Down" - #27 - #15 1992 "Real Cool World" - US Modern Rock #11 1992 "Jump They Say" - Mod #4 1995 "The Hearts Filthy Lesson" - #92 - #20 1997 "I'm Afraid of Americans" - #66 - #29 Factoid: Bowie portrayed Pontius Pilate in the Martin Scorsese film The Last Temptation of Christ. "Starman" http://media-convert.com/convert/?xid=7-kczatpjr

Maclin.

40. Paul McCartney/Wings 3 of 24 lists - 40 points - highest ranking #6 RibbieRubarb Wings (sometimes credited as Paul McCartney and Wings) was a rock group formed in 1971 by ex-Beatle Paul McCartney and his wife Linda McCartney. The group was the only "permanent" group that any of the former members of the Beatles were ever involved with after their break-up. Wings had 12 top-10 singles (including one #1) in the United Kingdom and 14 top-10 singles (including six #1's) in the United States. All 23 singles credited to Wings reached the US Top 40 (and one single, Junior's Farm/Sally G, reached it with each side). Of the nine albums credited to Wings during the group's life, all went top 10 in either the UK or the US, with five consecutive albums topping the US charts. Wings was noted for its personnel changes as well as its success. The only three permanent members of Wings were McCartney, his wife Linda, and ex-Moody Blues guitarist and singer Denny Laine. In less than a decade, Wings had three different lead guitarists and four different drummers. As the Beatles were breaking up in 1970, McCartney was working on his debut solo album, McCartney. Backing vocals were provided by his wife, Linda, whom he had married the previous year. McCartney had insisted from the beginning of their marriage that his wife should be involved in his musical projects, so that they did not have to be apart when he was on tour. On his second solo album, Ram, McCartney added select outside musicians, including drummer Denny Seiwell, who had to perform in a secret audition for Paul and Linda before being chosen. In August 1971, Seiwell and guitarist/singer Denny Laine joined Paul and Linda McCartney to record Paul's third post-Beatles project on Apple Records. The result was Wild Life, released December 7. It was the first project to credit Wings as the artist. In an attempt to capture the spontaneity of live performances, five of the eight songs on Wild Life were first takes by the band. However, the record left music critics cold. The band name is said to have come to McCartney as he was praying in the hospital while Linda was giving birth to their second child together, Stella McCartney. Paul McCartney recalled in the film Wingspan that the birth of Stella was "a bit of a drama"; there were complications at the birth and that both Linda and the baby almost died. He was praying fervently and the image of wings came to his mind. He decided to name his new band Wings. Denny Laine during the 1976 tour. In late 1971, McCartney added ex-Spooky Tooth guitarist Henry McCullough, a native of Northern Ireland, to the line-up of Wings and returned to touring, mounting an impromptu tour of U.K. universities and later a tour of small European venues (with the group driving around in a van), playing no Beatles numbers. In February 1972, Wings released a single called "Give Ireland Back to the Irish", a response to the events of Bloody Sunday. The song was banned by the BBC for its anti-Unionist political stance and only mentioned in chart rundowns on BBC Radio 1 as "a record by Wings". Despite its limited airplay, it reached #16 in the United Kingdom, as well as #1 in The Republic of Ireland and #1 in Spain. Partly in reaction to the ban, Wings released a children's song, "Mary Had a Little Lamb", as its next single, which surprisingly reached the Top 10 in the United Kingdom. However, Wings followed that with November 1972's "Hi, Hi, Hi", which was again banned by the BBC, this time for its alleged drug and sexual references. The B-side, "C Moon", was played instead. The single made it into the Top 5 in the United Kingdom and the Top 10 in the United States. In late 1972, Wings was re-christened Paul McCartney and Wings for the 1973 album Red Rose Speedway, which yielded the first U.S. #1 Wings hit, the romantic ballad "My Love". One possible reason for the renaming was that two songs on this album had been recorded by Paul, Linda, and Denny Seiwell during the Ram sessions; Denny Laine added backing vocals to one of these songs, but Henry McCullough was not on either. Among the unreleased songs recorded by Wings during the extensive sessions for this album (which stretched over seven months and two continents) was the Linda composition "Seaside Woman", which was finally released in 1977 (although credited to "Suzy and the Red Stripes"). Near the end of these sessions, in October 1972, Wings recorded the theme song to the James Bond film Live and Let Die, which reunited McCartney with Beatles producer/arranger George Martin. The uptempo song, released as a non-album single in the summer of 1973 (immediately after "My Love"), became a sizable worldwide hit and has remained a popular part of McCartney's post-Wings concert performances (often accompanied by pyrotechnics). That same year, McCartney released his first American TV special James Paul McCartney, which featured extensive footage of Wings but was savagely criticised by noted rock journalist Lillian Roxon. After a successful British tour in May-June 1973, Wings went right into rehearsals for the next album. However, Henry McCullough and Denny Seiwell left the band in August, at the end of rehearsals, leaving the McCartneys and Laine to cut what turned out to be Wings' most successful album, Band on the Run, at EMI's primitive 8-track recording studio in Lagos, Nigeria. The album went to #1 in both the United States and United Kingdom and spawned three hit singles: the rockers "Jet" and "Helen Wheels" (originally included on the U.S. album only) and the title track—a suite of movements recalling side 2 of Abbey Road. It also included "Let Me Roll It", which was seen as an affectionate impersonation of John Lennon's vocal style, and "No Words", the first song released by Wings that was co-written by Denny Laine (all Wings releases to this time were either Paul and Linda compositions or cover versions). Band on the Run enjoyed very positive critical reception and did much to restore McCartney's tarnished post-Beatles image among critics. After Band on the Run, Jimmy McCulloch, former lead guitarist in Thunderclap Newman and Stone the Crows, joined the band. The first Wings project with McCulloch was McGear, a 1974 collaboration between Paul and his younger brother Mike McGear, with session musician Gerry Conway playing drums. Warner Bros. Records chose not to play up the "Wings" angle in its marketing for McGear, and the album sold poorly. However, the sessions also generated a single credited to McGear's group The Scaffold, "Liverpool Lou", which became a top-10 hit in the United Kingdom. Paul and Linda McCartney at the Los Angeles Academy Awards, April, 1974. Shortly thereafter, Geoff Britton joined Wings on drums, and the first recording session with this full lineup was held in Nashville, where the band stayed at the farm of songwriter Curly Putman Jr. The trip was memorialized in the 1974 non-album single "Junior's Farm", backed with a straight country track entitled "Sally G", the group's last release on Apple Records. In a rare occurrence, both sides of the single separately reached the Billboard Top 20 in the U.S. During these sessions, Wings (with guest musicians Chet Atkins and Floyd Cramer) also recorded a single that was attributed to The Country Hams entitled "Walking in the Park with Eloise," a song written years before by Paul's father James. At the end of 1974, Paul McCartney's contract with Apple expired, and the band returned to just being named Wings. Wings started recording sessions for its next album in London in November 1974, then moved to New Orleans to complete Venus and Mars (1975), the first release from the group on MPL Communications, distributed worldwide by EMI (Parlophone in the United Kingdom, Capitol in the United States). The album topped the charts and contained the U.S. #1 single "Listen to What the Man Said", which also featured Dave Mason of Traffic on guitar and Tom Scott on saxophone. When the Venus and Mars recording sessions moved to New Orleans, Britton quit Wings and was replaced by Joe English. Like Denny Seiwell before him, English won the job at a secret audition before McCartney. McCulloch co-composed (with former bandmate Colin Allen) and sang one song ("Medicine Jar"); Laine sang lead vocals on a McCartney song ("Spirits of Ancient Egypt"); Paul composed and sang the rest. In the Autumn of 1975 Wings embarked on the Wings Over the World tour, starting in Bristol, which took them to Australia (November), Europe (March 1976), the United States (May/June), and Europe again (September), before ending in a four-night grand finale at London's Wembley Empire Pool. For this tour, added to Wings' stage act was a horn section consisting of Tony Dorsey, Howie Casey, Thaddeus Richard, and Steve Howard on horns, brass, and percussion. In between, Wings recorded Wings at the Speed of Sound, which was released at the end of March 1976, just prior to the U.S. leg of the world tour. It represented a departure from the prior Wings template in that each of the five primary members of the band (including Linda and Joe English) sang lead on at least one song, and both Laine ("Time to Hide") and McCulloch ("Wino Junko", again with Colin Allen) contributed songs. However, the two U.S. #1 singles, "Silly Love Songs" and "Let 'em In", were both written and sung by Paul. Four of the album tracks were played in the 1976 portion of the tour, which also included five Beatles songs. Laine sang lead vocals on several songs (including his old Moody Blues hit "Go Now" and Paul Simon's "Richard Cory"), and McCulloch on one ("Medicine Jar"), emphasizing that Wings was more than just Paul McCartney's backing band. One of the Seattle concerts from the American leg of the 1975–76 world tour was filmed and later released as the concert feature Rockshow (1980). The tour also spawned a triple live album, Wings over America (1976), which became the fifth consecutive Wings album to reach number 1 in the U.S. After the world tour, and following the single release of a live version of "Maybe I'm Amazed" in early 1977, Wings took a break. Later in the year, the band started recording their next album in the Virgin Islands, but the sessions were interrupted by Linda's pregnancy and then by the departures of both Jimmy McCulloch and Joe English. McCulloch, who joined The Small Faces, had difficulty handling the rock'n'roll lifestyle, ultimately dying of a heroin overdose in 1979. English joined Chuck Leavell's band Sea Level and later founded the Christian-oriented Joe English Band. Undeterred by their departure, Wings released the already-completed McCartney-Laine ballad "Mull of Kintyre", an ode to the Scottish Mull of Kintyre coastal region where McCartney had made his home in the early 1970s. Its broad appeal was maximized by a pre-Christmas release. It became a massive international hit, dominating the charts in Britain (where it was Wings' only #1 single), Australia and many other countries over the Christmas/New Year period. Ultimately, it became one of the biggest selling U.K. singles of all time. However, it was not a success in the United States, where the B-side "Girls School" received most of the airplay but barely reached the Top 40. The core trio of Wings then released the album London Town in 1978, a collection that sometimes included McCulloch and English. Much of the album had been recorded before the departures of McCulloch and English, but only pictures of the remaining trio appeared on the album. It was a commercial success, although it became the first Wings album since Wild Life to not reach #1 in the United States (peaking at #2),. London Town featured a markedly softer-rock, synth-based sound than prior Wings albums. Laine co-wrote five of the album's songs with McCartney and sang two of them. "With a Little Luck" reached #1 in the United States and #5 in the United Kingdom, but "I've Had Enough" and "London Town" were commercial disappointments in both countries. Later in 1978, lead guitarist Laurence Juber and former Elton John drummer Steve Holley joined the band, restoring Wings to touring strength. In 1979, McCartney signed a new record contract, leaving Capitol, the company he had been with since he was a Beatle, in the United States and Canada and joining Columbia Records, while remaining with Parlophone/EMI in the rest of the world. Influenced by the punk and New Wave scenes, Wings abandoned its mellow touch and hired former Apple engineer Chris Thomas to help in the production process. The result was a somewhat less polished sound. This new version of Wings first released the disco-oriented single "Goodnight Tonight", backed by "Daytime Nighttime Suffering", which reached the top 5 in both the United States and United Kingdom. However, the subsequent album Back to the Egg, which was not favorably received by critics, sold disappointingly, at least when compared to its immediate predecessors. Still, it went platinum in the United States. It contained the Grammy-winning song "Rockestra Theme", the result of an October 1978 superstar session with members of Wings, The Who, Led Zeppelin, and Pink Floyd, among others. Two other singles were culled from the album, but both performed poorly on the charts. One album song ("Again and Again and Again") was composed and sung by Laine; the rest were Paul's. During much of 1979, Wings was inactive as McCartney worked on a new solo album (McCartney II) without the band. In November and December 1979, Wings performed its final tour of the United Kingdom, once again adding the horns and brass section consisting of Tony Dorsey, Howie Casey, Thaddeus Richard, and Steve Howard. This tour climaxed with a massive "Rockestra" all-star collection of musicians in London in aid of UNICEF and Kampuchean refugees. Also during this tour, a live version of the McCartney II track "Coming Up" was recorded in Glasgow and became Wings' sixth and final U.S. #1 hit (as well as the last Wings single, although once again credited to Paul McCartney and Wings) the following year. Plans for a new Wings world tour were abandoned when Paul McCartney was arrested for possession of about 7.7 ounces of marijuana at Tokyo airport on 16 January 1980. Other Wings members were questioned but not charged. Although McCartney was released from jail after 9 days, on 25 January, he was deported from Japan. As a result, the Japanese tour was cancelled along with other short-term plans for Wings. During 1980, Wings continued to demo some more tunes, and some work was done on a never-released "cold cuts" album of previously unreleased songs. Finally, in October 1980, Wings returned to the studio to record demonstration versions of a number of songs for its next album. However, following the murder of John Lennon in December 1980, Paul McCartney was unable to continue with the sessions, and Wings went into hiatus. When McCartney restarted the project on 2 February 1981 as a solo album to be dedicated to Lennon and soon after, Juber and Holley left the band although Denny Laine continued as part of what became the Tug of War sessions, which ended on 3 March. On 27 April 1981, it was announced that Laine also had left the group, and that Wings had formally disbanded. McCartney claimed that the group members "parted in a friendly way." Unlike other post-Beatles projects such as the Plastic Ono Band, Wings was more than just a backing band for an ex-Beatle. Both Denny Laine and Jimmy McCulloch wrote songs, and Laine, McCulloch, Joe English, and Linda McCartney all contributed lead vocals. However, Paul McCartney was unquestionably the band's leader and star. Every song on a single credited to Wings was at least co-composed by Paul, and the only three songs to appear on Wings singles that weren't sung by Paul were all B-sides: "I Lie Around" (Denny Laine, flip of "Live and Let Die"), "Cook of the House" (Linda McCartney, flip of "Silly Love Songs"), and "Deliver Your Children" (Laine, flip of "I've Had Enough"). The success of Wings was a vindication for McCartney (although, as one commentator noted, McCartney really did not need the vindication). His early home-grown solo output, which often featured simpler songs and less lavish production than The Beatles received from George Martin, often was dismissed by critics as "lightweight" next to the more serious nature of his former bandmates' solo output after the breakup. But, by 1975, John Lennon's solo career had been put on hold following the birth of his son Sean, and he stopped recording. A year later, George Harrison had all but retired from performing live (although not from recording). Ringo Starr was living in L.A. and he was still recording and writing, but his success was intermittent. As the leader of Wings, however, McCartney continued to tour regularly and to enjoy hit singles and albums the world over. By 1980, even Lennon was envious of Wings' (and McCartney's) continuing success, which largely inspired Lennon's own comeback that year. Paul McCartney/Wings discography 1971 "Another Day" - US Hot 100 #5 - US Adult Contemporary #4 1971 "Uncle Albert/Admiral Halsey" - Hot 100 #1 - US AC #9 1972 "Give Ireland Back to the Irish" - Hot 100 #21 1972 "Mary Had a Little Lamb" - Hot 100 #28 - US AC #29 1972 "Hi, Hi, Hi" - Hot 100 #10 1973 "My Love" - #1 - #1 1973 "Live and Let Die" - #2 - #8 1973 "Helen Wheels" - Hot 100 #10 1973 "Jet" - Hot 100 #7 1974 "Band on the Run" - #1 - #22 1974 "Junior's Farm" - Hot 100 #3 1975 "Listen to What the Man Said" - #1 - #8 1975 "Letting Go" - Hot 100 #39 1975 "Venus and Mars/Rock Show" - Hot 100 #12 1976 "Silly Love Songs" - #1 - #1 1976 "Let 'Em In" - #3 - #1 1977 "Maybe I'm Amazed" (live) - Hot 100 #10 1977 "Seaside Woman" - Hot 100 #59 1977 "Mull of Kintyre" - #33 - #45 1978 "With a Little Luck" - #1 - #5 1978 "I've Had Enough" - Hot 100 #25 1978 "London Town" - #39 - #17 1979 "Goodnight Tonight" - #5 - #30 1979 "Getting Closer" - Hot 100 #20 1979 "Arrow Through Me" - Hot 100 #29 1980 "Coming Up (Live at Glasgow)" - #1 - #48 1980 "Waterfalls" - Hot 100 #106 Solo Artist 1982 "Ebony and Ivory" (w/Stevie Wonder) - #1 - #1 1982 "Take It Away" - #10 -#6 1982 "Tug of War" - #53 - #31 1982 "The Girl is Mine" (w/Michael Jackson) - #2 - #1 1983 "Say Say Say" (w/Michael Jackson) - #1 - #3 1983 "So Bad" - #23 - #3 1984 "No More Lonely Nights" - #6 - #2 1985 "Spies Like Us" - US Hot 100 #7 1986 "Press" - Hot 100 #21 1986 "Stranglehold" - Hot 100 #81 1986 "Only Love Remains" - US AC #9 1987 "Once Upon a Long Ago" - AC #68 1989 "My Brave Face" - #25 - #4 1989 "This One" - #94 - #28 1989 "Figure of Eight" - #92 - #47 1990 "Put It There" - AC #11 1993 "Hope of Deliverance" - #83 - #9 1993 "C'Mon People" - AC #27 1993 "Off the Ground" - AC #27 1997 "Young Boy" - AC #44 1997 "The World Tonight" - Hot 100 #64 2001 "From a Lover to a Friend" - AC #24 2001 "Freedom" - #97 - #20 2005 "Fine Line" - AC #25 2007 "Dance Tonight" - Hot 100 #69 2007 "Ever Present Past" - #110 -#16 Factoid: When she joined Wings, Linda McCartney couldn't play any instruments or really sing, Paul had to teach her. "Band On The Run" http://media-convert.com/convert/?xid=7-tcpemgsx

Turning this thread around! Adrian Gonzalez!

QUOTE (boejouma @ Nov 17, 2009 -> 02:22 AM) july 23rd blows... July 23, 2009 sure sucked... for Tampa Bay.

Perhaps the road jerseys would look better with pinstripes as well. P.S., you guys' jerseys are starting to look more and more like the Sox's.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Nov 16, 2009 -> 11:35 PM) Honestly, I started crafting one, but then gave up when I reached the same issue many of you have mentioned...Do I list MY favorite bands, or the ones I think have been most celebrated by popular culture, or that had the greatest impact, etc., etc. So I scrapped the whole idea. The idea was to list your favorite bands. The music on your iPod. That's what a lot of people did.

I like Soundgarden better than Pearl Jam. But I didn't vote for either.

41. Creedence Clearwater Revival 4 of 24 lists - 39 points - highest ranking #12 RibbieRubarb, Soxy Creedence Clearwater Revival (often abbreviated CCR) was an American rock band that gained popularity in the late 1960s and early 1970s with a number of successful singles drawn from various albums. The group consisted of lead vocalist, lead guitarist, and primary lyricist John Fogerty, his brother and rhythm guitarist Tom Fogerty, bassist Stu Cook, and drummer Doug Clifford. Their musical style encompassed rock and roll and swamp rock genres. Despite their San Francisco Bay Area origins, they are sometimes also cited as southern rock stylists. CCR's music is still a staple of American and worldwide radio airplay and often figures in various media. The band has sold 26 million albums in the United States alone. CCR was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1993. John Fogerty, Doug Clifford, and Stu Cook (all born 1945) met at senior high school in El Cerrito, California and began playing instrumentals and "juke box standards" together under the name The Blue Velvets. The trio also backed singer Tom Fogerty— John's older brother by three years—at live gigs and in the recording studio. By 1964, the band had signed to Fantasy Records, an independent jazz label based in San Francisco at the time. For the band's first release, however, Fantasy co-owner Max Weiss renamed the group The Golliwogs (after the children's literary character, Golliwogg), apparently to cash in on a wave of popular British bands with similar names. The group had suffered a setback in 1966 when the draft board called up John Fogerty and Doug Clifford for military service. Fogerty managed to enlist in the Army Reserve instead of the regular Army while Clifford did a tenure in the United States Coast Guard Reserve. In 1967, Saul Zaentz purchased Fantasy Records from Weiss and offered the band a chance to record a full-length album, but only if the group changed its name. Never having liked The Golliwogs, the foursome readily agreed. Zaentz and the band agreed to come up with ten suggestions each, but he enthusiastically agreed to their first: Creedence Clearwater Revival. The band took the three elements from, firstly, Tom Fogerty's friend Credence Newball, (to whose first name Credence they added an extra 'e', making it resemble a faith or creed); secondly, "clear water" from a TV commercial for Olympia beer; and finally "revival", which spoke to the four members' renewed commitment to their band. (Rejected contenders for the band's name included 'Muddy Rabbit', 'Gossamer Wump,' and 'Creedence Nuball and the Ruby', but the latter was the start that led to their finalized name.) By 1968, Fogerty and Clifford had been discharged from military service. All four members subsequently quit their jobs and began a heavy schedule of rehearsing and playing area clubs full-time. Unlike many other rock artists of the day, they (for the most part) eschewed drug use. The resulting 1968 debut album Creedence Clearwater Revival struck a responsive note with the emerging underground pop culture press, which touted CCR as a band worthy of attention. More importantly, AM radio programmers around the United States took note when a song from the LP, "Suzie Q", received substantial airplay in the San Francisco Bay Area as well as on Chicago's WLS. Blues aficionados doubtless appreciated the similarities between CCR's tough style and R&B artists on the Chess and Vee-Jay labels. A remake of a 1956 song by rockabilly singer Dale Hawkins, "Suzie Q" was the band's second single, and its first to crack the Top 40. Reaching #11 nationally, it would be Creedence's only Top 40 hit not written by John Fogerty. Two other singles from the debut were released: a cover of Screamin' Jay Hawkins' "I Put a Spell On You" (which made it to #58) and "Porterville", written during John Fogerty's Army Reserve stint. While undertaking a steady string of live dates around the country to capitalize on their breakthrough, CCR also was hard at work on their second album Bayou Country at RCA Studios in Los Angeles. Released in January 1969 and becoming a #7 platinum hit, the record was the first in a string of hit albums and singles which continued uninterrupted for the next three years. Bayou Country's seven songs were well-honed from Creedence's constant live playing. The album showed a distinct evolution in approach, much more simple and direct than the band's first release. The single "Proud Mary", backed with "Born On the Bayou", went to Number 2 on the national Billboard chart. It would eventually become the group's most-covered song, with some 100 cover versions by other artists to date, including a hit version in 1971 by Ike and Tina Turner. Bob Dylan named it his favorite single of 1969. The album also featured a blistering remake of the rock & roll classic "Good Golly Miss Molly" and the band's nine-minute live-show closer, "Keep On Chooglin' ". Only weeks later, in March 1969, "Bad Moon Rising" backed with "Lodi" was released and peaked at #2 on the charts. The band's third album, Green River, followed in August and quickly went gold along with the single "Green River", which again reached #2 on the Billboard charts. The B-side of "Green River", "Commotion"—a one-chord two-step about the perils of city life—peaked at #30. The bar-band story of "Lodi" became a popular staple on then-emerging FM radio. The band's emphasis on remakes of their old favorites continued with "The Night Time Is the Right Time", which found its way into the band's live set as a crowd sing-along. Creedence was busy honing material for a fourth album, Willy and the Poor Boys, released in November 1969. "Down on the Corner", a good-time street-corner number, and the famously militant "Fortunate Son" climbed to #3 and #14, respectively, by year's end. Just after the new year, 1970, CCR released yet another new double-sided 45, "Travelin' Band"/"Who'll Stop the Rain". John Fogerty has said that the flip side was inspired by the band's experience at Woodstock. The speedy "Travelin' Band", however, bore enough similarities to "Good Golly, Miss Molly" to warrant a lawsuit by the song's publisher; it was eventually settled out of court. In the meantime, the single had topped out at #2. In April 1970, Creedence was set to begin its first European tour. To support the upcoming live dates, Fogerty came up with "Up Around the Bend", a good-time party rocker, and the brooding "Run Through the Jungle", about the burgeoning problem of societal violence in the United States. The single—written, recorded, and shipped in only a few days' time—went to #4 that spring, enjoying enthusiastic response from European live audiences and high commercial success in the U.S. and the rest of the world. The band returned to Wally Heider's San Francisco studio in June to record what many consider the finest CCR album, Cosmo's Factory. The title was an in-joke about their various rehearsal facilities and factory work ethic over the years. (Drummer Doug Clifford's longtime nickname is "Cosmo", due to his keen interest in nature and all things cosmic.) The album contained the earlier Top 10 hits "Travelin' Band" and "Up Around the Bend" plus highly popular album tracks such as the opener "Ramble Tamble", an ambitious and snarling seven-minute cut about life in urban America with its "police on the corner, garbage on the sidewalk, actors in the White House." Cosmo's was released in July 1970, along with yet another #2 national hit, "Lookin' Out My Back Door"/"Long As I Can See the Light". It was the band's fifth #2 single. Though they topped some international charts and local radio countdowns (such as WLS's, which rated three of their singles at #1), Creedence Clearwater Revival never had a #1 Billboard Hot 100 hit. Their five #2 singles were exceeded only by Elvis Presley and Madonna with 6 each. CCR has the odd distinction of having the most #2 singles on the Billboard charts without ever having had a #1. Other cuts on the "Cosmo's Factory" album included an incisive eleven-minute jam of the 1967 and 1968 R&B hit "I Heard It Through The Grapevine" ( which would become a minor hit when an edited version was released as a single in the 70s a few years after the group's breakup ) and a nearly note-for-note homage to Roy Orbison's "Ooby Dooby". John Fogerty's musical range clearly had expanded. He now wove in slide guitar, keyboards, saxophones, tape effects, and layered vocal harmonies—and pushed himself vocally more than ever on "Long As I Can See the Light". The album, eleven songs in all, was Creedence's best seller and went straight to #1 on the Billboard 200 album charts and #11 on Billboard's Soul Albums chart. The Cosmo's Factory sessions had seen the stirrings of tensions within the foursome as the incessant touring and heavy recording schedules took their toll. John had taken control of the group in its business matters and its artistic output. The situation began to grate on Tom, Stu, and Doug, who wanted more of a say in the band's workings. John resisted, feeling that a 'democratic' process would threaten their success. Other issues included John's decision at a 1970 Nebraska gig that the band would no longer give encores at its live shows. Pendulum, released in December 1970, was another top seller, spawning a Top 10 hit with "Have You Ever Seen the Rain?". The album marked yet another shift in the band's approach. But even continued musical innovation and success could not resolve the differences between John and Tom Fogerty. During the recording of Pendulum Tom Fogerty, who had already quit the band several times in disgust but was always talked into returning, left Creedence Clearwater Revival permanently. His departure was made public in February 1971. The band members considered replacing Tom but never did, Fogerty saying on an Australian TV broadcast that no new member could endure being in Creedence. Creedence Clearwater Revival never reunited after the break up, although Cook and Clifford eventually started the band Creedence Clearwater Revisited. In 1973, John began his solo career with The Blue Ridge Rangers, his one-man band collection of country and gospel songs. His first major solo hit was Centerfield, a chart-topping success in 1985. On tour in 1986, however, Fogerty suffered complaints over his steadfast refusal to play Creedence songs live and suffered with recurring vocal problems which he blamed on having to testify in court. Fogerty's explanation for not playing CCR songs was that he would have had to pay performance royalties to copyright holder Saul Zaentz—and that it was "too painful" to revisit the music of his past. With the Centerfield album, Fogerty also found himself entangled in new, tit-for-tat lawsuits with Zaentz over the song "The Old Man Down the Road" which was, according to Zaentz, a blatant re-write of Fogerty's own 1970 Creedence hit "Run Through the Jungle". On February 19, 1987, at the Palomino Club in Los Angeles, Fogerty broke his self-imposed 1972 ban on performing his CCR hits, on an admonition from Bob Dylan and George Harrison (who both joined him onstage) that "if you don't, the whole world's gonna think 'Proud Mary' is Tina Turner's song." At a Fourth of July benefit for Vietnam veterans, Fogerty finally ran through the list of Creedence hits—beginning with "Born on the Bayou" and ending with "Proud Mary"—to an ecstatic audience. He retreated from music again in the late 1980s but returned in 1997 with the Grammy-winning Blue Moon Swamp. John Fogerty still tours frequently and plays CCR tunes alongside material from his newer albums. Creedence Clearwater Revival discography 1968 "Suzie Q (Part One)" - #11 1968 "I Put a Spell on You" - #58 1969 "Proud Mary" - #2 1969 "Bad Moon Rising" - #2 1969 "Green River" - #2 1969 "Down on the Corner" - #3 1969 "Lodi" - #52 1969 "Commotion" - #30 1969 "Fortunate Son" - #14 1970 "Travelin' Band" - #2 1970 "Up Around the Bend" - #4 1970 "Lookin' out My Back Door" - #2 1971 "Have You Ever Seen the Rain?" - #8 1971 "Sweet Hitch-Hiker" - #6 1972 "Someday Never Comes" - #25 1976 "I Heard It Through the Grapevine" - #43 1982 "Cotton Fields" - Country #50 Factoid: In 1980, John Fogerty traded his rights to CCR's songs in order to cancel his remaining contractual obligations to his previous record company. When he released "The Old Man Down The Road", the old record company sued him essentially for plagiarizing himself because it sounded so much like "Run Through the Jungle". Travelin' Band http://media-convert.com/convert/?xid=7-gdgrzeoo

42. Guns N' Roses 3 of 24 lists - 39 points - highest ranking #2 TheGooch Guns N' Roses is an American hard rock/heavy metal band that formed in Hollywood, Los Angeles, California in 1985. The band, led by frontman and co-founder Axl Rose, has gone through numerous line-up changes and controversies since its formation; the current lineup comprises vocalist Rose, guitarists Ron "Bumblefoot" Thal, DJ Ashba and Richard Fortus, bassist Tommy Stinson, drummer Frank Ferrer and keyboardists Dizzy Reed and Chris Pitman. The band has released six studio albums, three EPs and one live album during its career. The band has sold an estimated 100 million albums worldwide, including over 43 million in the United States. The band's 1987 major label debut album Appetite for Destruction has sold in excess of 28 million copies and reached number one on the United States Billboard 200. In addition, the album charted three Top 10 hits on the Billboard Hot 100, including "Sweet Child o' Mine" which reached number one. The 1991 albums Use Your Illusion I and Use Your Illusion II debuted on the two highest spots on the Billboard 200 and have sold a combined 14 million copies in the United States alone and 35 million worldwide. After over a decade of work, the band released their follow-up album, Chinese Democracy, in 2008. Their mid-to-late eighties and early nineties years have been described by individuals in the music industry as the period in which "they brought forth a hedonistic rebelliousness and revived the punk attitude-driven hard rock scene, reminiscent of the early Rolling Stones." The group was formed in early 1985 by Hollywood Rose members Axl Rose (vocals) and Izzy Stradlin (rhythm guitar), and L.A. Guns members Tracii Guns (lead guitar), Ole Beich (bass) and Rob Gardner (drums). The band created its name by combining two of the group members' names. A short time later, bassist Ole Beich was fired and replaced by Duff McKagan. After a short while Tracii Guns was replaced by Slash; after Tracii didn't show up to rehearsal. Slash had played with McKagan in Road Crew and Stradlin during a short stint in Hollywood Rose. The new line-up came together quickly, but after deciding to go on a "tour" from Sacramento, California to Duff's home town of Seattle, drummer Rob Gardner quit and was replaced by Slash's close friend Steven Adler. The band, which continued to be called Guns N' Roses even after the departure of Tracii Guns, established its first stable line up on this so-called "Hell Tour". In an interview, Slash stated, "That [trip to Seattle] is really what cemented the band" and established its chemistry. The band's first album, Appetite for Destruction was released on July 21, 1987. The album underwent an artwork change after the original Robert Williams cover design (a surrealist scene in which a dagger-toothed monster vengefully attacks a robot rapist) spawned complaints from religious groups and caused some record stores to brown bag, obscure, or refuse to sell the album. The revised cover was a design by Bill White, a tattoo artist, who had originally designed it for a tattoo Rose had got the previous year. The design featured each of the five band members' skulls layered on a cross. Rose later insisted that the Gold and Platinum plaques issued by the RIAA be set using the original cover. The artwork from the original cover can be found in the booklet of the CD release. In the US, "Welcome to the Jungle" was issued as its first single with an accompanying music video. Initially, the album and single lingered for almost a year without performing well, but when Geffen Records founder David Geffen was asked to lend support to the band, he obliged by personally convincing MTV executives to play "Welcome to the Jungle" during their after hours rotation. Even though the video was initially only played one time at 4 a.m. on a Sunday, rock and punk fans took notice and soon began requesting the video and song en masse. In Japan, an entire EP entitled Live from the Jungle was issued, containing the album version of "Sweet Child o' Mine" along with a selection of numerous Marquee Club recordings. "Sweet Child O' Mine" was the album's second US single co-written by Axl Rose as a poem for his girlfriend and future wife, Erin Everly. Due to the growing grassroots success of the band and the cross-gender appeal of the tune, the song and its accompanying music video received heavy airplay on both radio and MTV, and became a smash hit during the summer of 1988, reaching the top of the charts in the U.S. Slash stated on VH1's 100 Greatest songs of the 80's, "It was actually my least favorite song we ever wrote...I hate it, but it turns out to be our greatest song ever". "Welcome to the Jungle" was then re-issued as a single, with new pressings of records and tapes and new artwork. It was a successful re-release, as the single reached #7 in the U.S. The UK re-release was backed with an acoustic version of "You're Crazy", recorded much earlier than the one featured on the G N' R Lies EP. By the time "Paradise City" and its video reached the airwaves and peaked at #5 in the U.S., the band's touring success and fame had catapulted the album to #1 on the Billboard charts. "Welcome to the Jungle", "Sweet Child o' Mine" and "Paradise City" were all top ten singles in the U.S. To date, Appetite for Destruction has sold over 28 million copies. The band's next release was G N' R Lies in 1988, which reached #2 in the Billboard music charts. The album included the four Live ?!*@ Like a Suicide recordings on one side and four acoustic songs on the other. The song "One in a Million", which included the words "n**gers" and "f**gots" among other such obscenities, led to controversy in which critics accused the band, and specifically Axl Rose, of racism and homophobia. Rose responded (in a 1990 interview with MTV) by saying the claims were unfounded, particularly considering Slash himself is half black. He went on to explain that the words were those of a protagonist and not a personal statement, and that the lyrics reflected racial and prejudicial problems within society rather than promoting them. Rose also cited that he idolized gay/bisexual singers like Freddie Mercury and Elton John. The band had played gigs alongside the all-black metal band Body Count, and lead singer Ice T wrote in his book, The Ice Opinion, that Axl had been "a victim of the press the same way I am". In 1990, Guns N' Roses returned to the studio to begin recording their most ambitious undertaking yet. During the recording session of "Civil War", drummer Steven Adler was unable to perform well due to his struggles with cocaine and heroin addiction—his difficulties in the studio caused the band to do nearly 30 takes. As a result, Adler was fired in July 1990, and was replaced by former Cult drummer Matt Sorum, who Axl credited for saving the band. A few months prior, keyboardist Dizzy Reed became the sixth member of the group when he joined as a full time member. The band fired their manager, Alan Niven, in May 1991, replacing him with Doug Goldstein. According to a 1991 cover story by Rolling Stone magazine, Rose forced the dismissal of Niven (against the wishes of some of his bandmates) by refusing to complete the albums until he was replaced. With enough music for two albums, the band released Use Your Illusion I and Use Your Illusion II on September 17, 1991. The tactic paid off when the albums debuted at #2 and #1 respectively in the Billboard charts, setting a record as they became the first and only group to date to achieve this feat. The albums spent 108 weeks in the chart. Guns N' Roses accompanied the Use Your Illusion albums with many videos, including "Don't Cry", "November Rain" and "Estranged"—some of the most expensive music videos ever made. The hit ballad "November Rain" (#3 U.S.) became the most requested video on MTV, eventually winning the 1992 MTV Video Music Award for best cinematography. It is also the longest song in chart history to reach the Top Ten, clocking in at 8:56. During the awards show, the band performed the song with Elton John accompanying on piano. On November 23, 1993, Guns N' Roses released a collection of punk and glam rock covers entitled "The Spaghetti Incident?". Despite protests from Rose's band-mates, an unadvertised cover of the Charles Manson song "Look at Your Game Girl" was included on the album at his request. Years later, Rose said he would remove the song from new pressings of the album, claiming that critics and the media had misinterpreted his interest in Manson. Axl can be seen wearing a black Manson shirt in the video for "Estranged" from Use Your Illusion II. He also can be seen wearing a red Manson shirt in footage from their show in Milton Keynes, England in 1993. This version of the shirt had additional text on the back, "Charlie Don't Surf'. "Look at Your Game Girl" is still on the album. The Spaghetti Incident? did not match the success of the Illusion albums and tension increased within the band. Interviews with Guns N' Roses band members suggest that between 1994 and 1996, the band sporadically began to write and record new material, most of which, according to Slash, had been written by Axl. At the time, the band had intended to release a single album with 10 or 12 songs. Regarding the dysfunction of the band's recording at that time, Axl is quoted as saying "We still needed the collaboration of the band as a whole to write the best songs. Since none of that happened, that’s the reason why that material got scrapped." Slash and Duff McKagan later left the group, and as such all of the original members (aside from Axl Rose) had departed from the band. 1994 was the last year Axl held a press conference or performed until 2001 with his new cast. Axl's only performance in 1994 was a duet with Bruce Springsteen on a cover of the Beatles song "Come Together". An actual break-up of Guns N' Roses never occurred, as new players were brought in as the old ones left. (For more information on the personnel changes over the years see the article: "List of Guns N' Roses band members") McKagan was the last of Rose's original bandmates to leave; in 1997 he was replaced by Tommy Stinson (formerly of The Replacements.) By the end of 1998, a new version of Guns N Roses had emerged: many musicians have come and gone from the new band, but the core group has included Rose, Stinson, keyboardist Dizzy Reed, multi-instrumentalist Chris Pitman, and guitarist Robin Finck. The New Guns N' Roses The revised lineup finally made a public appearance in January 2001, with two well-received concerts, one in Las Vegas and one at the Rock in Rio Festival in Rio de Janeiro. The band played a mixture of old hits as well as new songs from their forthcoming album. Chinese Democracy was released on November 22, 2008 in Europe and Australia, in North America on November 23, 2008 and in the United Kingdom on November 24, 2008, becoming the band's sixth studio album and their first since 1993's "The Spaghetti Incident?". Guns N' Roses signed with a major label within eight months of their inception and topped national sales charts weeks after garnering late hours airplay on MTV. Appetite for Destruction is the highest-selling debut album of all time. Their peers in the music industry often spoke highly of the band: Ozzy Osbourne called Guns N' Roses "the next Rolling Stones." In 2002, Q magazine named Guns N' Roses in their list of the "50 Bands To See Before You Die". Also, the television network VH1 ranked Guns N' Roses ninth in its "100 Greatest Artists of Hard Rock" special, and also ranked 11th on "Top 50 bands". Appetite for Destruction appeared in the Rolling Stone Magazine special issue "The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time". In 2004, Rolling Stone ranked Guns N' Roses #92 on their list of the "100 Greatest Artists of All Time". "Welcome To The Jungle" had also been voted "Best Rock Song". The band has not been free of criticism. The flagrant alcohol and drug abuse by some members of the group, and Axl's fondness of Charles Manson T-shirts, were used by the media to portray Guns N' Roses as a poor example and negative influence on their young fans. The long periods of time that the band took to release albums were also a source of heavy criticism (the band's second album, GN'R Lies, was actually an EP and an old EP packaged together, and one of the songs was an acoustic cover of one from the band's debut album, it took from 1987 to 1991 to come up with a proper follow up to Appetite for Destruction, and it took over 15 years to release Chinese Democracy). Frontman Axl Rose has become a source of both controversy and criticism since the other founding members left the group. His constant elusiveness, such as the fact that he has not held a press conference since 1994, has led to several stories claiming he is suffering from bipolar disorder. Music critics have blamed Rose for the break-up of the original group, have criticized him for continuing the band after the original members had departed and have questioned the constant change in band members. They also cite his neurotic behavior and sense of perfectionism as a cause of personal conflict and the long delays between albums. Guns N' Roses discography 1987 "Welcome to the Jungle" - US Hot 100 #7 - US Mainstream Rock #37 1988 "Sweet Child o' Mine" - US 100 #1 - US Main #7 1989 "Paradise City" - US 100 #5 - US Main #14 1989 "Patience" - #4 - #7 1989 "Nightrain" - #93 - #26 1991 "You Could Be Mine" - #29 - #3 1991 "Don't Cry" - #10 - #3 1991 "Live and Let Die" - #33 - #20 1992 "November Rain" - #3 - #15 1992 "Knockin' on Heaven's Door" - US Main #18 1992 "Yesterdays" - #72 - #13 1993 "Ain't It Fun" - US Main #8 1994 "Estranged" - US Main #16 1994 "Since I Don't Have You" - US 100 #69 1994 "Hair of the Dog" - US Main #11 1994 "Sympathy for the Devil" - US 100 #55 - US Main #10 1999 "Oh My God" - US Main #26 2008 "Chinese Democracy" - US 100 #34 - US Main #5 2008 "Better" - US Main #18 Factoid: Guns N' Roses originally wanted to use an image of Tiananmen Square rendered as an amusement park for the cover of Chinese Democracy. "You Could Be Mine" http://media-convert.com/convert/?xid=7-fzhlxeav

We have a new #50!

43. Soundgarden 3 of 24 lists - 38 points - highest ranking #2 Steve9347 Soundgarden was a Grammy Award winning American rock band formed in Seattle, Washington, in 1984 by lead singer and drummer Chris Cornell, lead guitarist Kim Thayil, and bassist Hiro Yamamoto. Matt Cameron became the band's permanent drummer in 1986 while bassist Ben Shepherd became a permanent replacement for Yamamoto in 1990. Soundgarden was one of the key archetypes in the creation of grunge, a style of alternative rock that developed in Seattle and was based around the band's record label Sub Pop. Soundgarden was the first grunge band to sign to a major label, though the band did not achieve commercial success until Seattle contemporaries Nirvana and Pearl Jam popularized grunge in the early 1990s. Soundgarden achieved its biggest success with the 1994 album, Superunknown, which debuted at number one on the Billboard charts and yielded the Grammy Award–winning singles "Black Hole Sun" and "Spoonman". In 1997, the band broke up due to internal strife over its creative direction. Soundgarden has sold eight million records in the U.S., and an estimated twenty million worldwide. Soundgarden traces its origins to a cover band called The Shemps that performed around Seattle, Washington in the early 1980s.[4] The Shemps featured bassist Hiro Yamamoto and drummer and vocalist Chris Cornell. Following Yamamoto's departure from The Shemps, the band recruited guitarist Kim Thayil as its new bassist.[4] Thayil had moved to Seattle from Park Forest, Illinois with Yamamoto and Bruce Pavitt, who would later start the independent record label Sub Pop.[5] Cornell and Yamamoto stayed in contact, and after The Shemps broke up Cornell and Yamamoto started jamming together, eventually bringing in Thayil to join them.[4] Soundgarden was formed in 1984 by Cornell (drums and vocals), Yamamoto (bass), and Thayil (guitar). The band named themselves after a wind-channeling pipe sculpture, "A Sound Garden," located on NOAA property next to Magnuson Park, Seattle, Washington. Cornell originally played drums while singing, but in 1985 the band enlisted Scott Sundquist to allow Cornell to concentrate on vocals. KCMU DJ Jonathan Poneman was impressed after seeing Soundgarden perform one night, later saying, "I saw this band that was everything rock music should be." Poneman offered to fund a release by the band, so Thayil told him to team up with Bruce Pavitt. Poneman offered to contribute $20,000 in funding for Sub Pop, effectively turning it into a full-fledged record label. Soundgarden signed to Sub Pop, and the label released "Hunted Down" in 1987 as the band's first single. The B-side of the "Hunted Down" single, "Nothing to Say", appeared on the KCMU compilation tape, Bands That Will Make Money, which was distributed to record companies. Upon hearing the song, record labels began contacting the band. Through Sub Pop, the band released the Screaming Life EP in 1987, and the Fopp EP in 1988. A combination of the two was issued as Screaming Life/Fopp in 1990. Bassist Ben Shepherd replaced previous bassist Jason Everman and the new line-up recorded Soundgarden's third album in 1991. Cornell said that Shepherd brought a "fresh and creative" approach to the recording sessions, and the band as a whole said that his knowledge of music and writing skills redefined the band. The resulting album, Badmotorfinger, was released on October 8, 1991. Steve Huey of Allmusic said that the songwriting on Badmotorfinger "takes a quantum leap in focus and consistency." He added, "It's surprisingly cerebral and arty music for a band courting mainstream metal audiences." Thayil suggested that the album's lyrics are "like reading a novel [about] man's conflict with himself and society, or the government, or his family, or the economy, or anything." The first single from Badmotorfinger, "Jesus Christ Pose", garnered attention when MTV decided to ban its corresponding music video in 1991. Many listeners were outraged by the song and its video, perceiving it as anti-Christian. The band received death threats while on tour in the United Kingdom in support of the album. Cornell explained that the lyrics criticize public figures who use religion (particularly the image of Jesus Christ) to portray themselves as being persecuted. Although overshadowed at the time of its release by the sudden popularity of Nirvana's Nevermind, the focus of attention brought by Nevermind to the Seattle scene helped Soundgarden gain wider attention. The singles "Outshined" and "Rusty Cage" were able to find an audience at alternative rock radio and MTV. Badmotorfinger was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Metal Performance in 1992. The album was among the 100 top selling albums of 1992. Soundgarden began work on its fourth album after touring in support of Badmotorfinger. Cornell said that while working on the album the band members allowed each other more freedom than on past records, while Thayil observed that the band spent a lot more time working on the actual recording of the songs than on previous records. Released on March 8, 1994, Superunknown became the band's breakthrough album, driven by the singles "Spoonman", "The Day I Tried to Live", "Black Hole Sun", "My Wave", and "Fell on Black Days". Upon its release in March 1994, Superunknown debuted at number one on the Billboard 200 album chart. The songs on Superunknown captured the creativity and heaviness of the band's earlier works, while showcasing the group's newly evolving style. Lyrically, the album was quite dark and mysterious, as much of it is often interpreted to be dealing with substance abuse, suicide, and depression. Cornell was inspired by the writings of Sylvia Plath at the time. The album was also more experimental than previous releases, with some songs incorporating Middle-Eastern or Indian music. J.D. Considine of Rolling Stone said Superunknown "demonstrates far greater range than many bands manage in an entire career." He also stated, "At its best, Superunknown offers a more harrowing depiction of alienation and despair than anything on In Utero." The music video for "Black Hole Sun" became a hit on MTV and received the award for Best Metal/Hard Rock Video at the 1994 MTV Video Music Awards and in 1995 it received the Clio Award for Alternative Music Video.Soundgarden won two Grammy Awards in 1995; "Black Hole Sun" received the award for Best Hard Rock Performance and "Spoonman" received the award for Best Metal Performance. Superunknown was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Rock Album in 1995. Superunknown has been certified five times platinum in the United States and remains Soundgarden's most successful album. Following the worldwide tour in support of its previous album, Superunknown, the band commenced work on what would become the band's final album. The members of Soundgarden opted to self-produce the record. However, tensions within the group reportedly arose during the sessions, with Thayil and Cornell allegedly clashing over Cornell's desire to shift away from the heavy guitar riffing that had become the band's trademark. Cornell said, "By the time we were finished, it felt like it had been kind of hard, like it was a long, hard haul. But there was stuff we were discovering." The band's fifth album, Down on the Upside, was released on May 21, 1996. The album was notably less heavy than the group's preceding albums, and marked a further departure from the band's grunge roots. Soundgarden explained at the time that it wanted to experiment with other sounds. David Browne of Entertainment Weekly said, "Few bands since Led Zeppelin have so crisply mixed instruments both acoustic and electric." The overall mood of the album's lyrics isn't as dark as on previous Soundgarden albums, with Cornell describing some songs as "self-affirming." The album spawned several singles, including "Pretty Noose", "Burden in My Hand", and "Blow Up the Outside World". "Pretty Noose" was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Hard Rock Performance in 1997. Despite favorable reviews, the album did not match the sales of Superunknown. Tensions continued to increase during the band's ensuing tour in support of the album. When asked if the band hated touring, Cornell said, "We really enjoy it to a point and then it gets tedious, because it becomes repetitious. You feel like fans have paid their money and they expect you to come out and play them your songs like the first time you ever played them. That's the point where we hate touring." At the tour's final stop in Honolulu, Hawaii on February 9, 1997, Shepherd threw his bass into the air in frustration after suffering equipment failure, and subsequently stormed off the stage. The band retreated, with Cornell returning to conclude the show with a solo encore. On April 9, 1997, the band announced its disbanding. Thayil said, "It was pretty obvious from everybody's general attitude over the course of the previous half year that there was some dissatisfaction." Cameron later said that Soundgarden was "eaten up by the business." Soundgarden's final release, a greatest hits collection entitled A-Sides, was released the following fall. Cornell released a solo album in September 1999, entitled Euphoria Morning. Later, in 2001, he formed the supergroup Audioslave with the former instrumental members of Rage Against the Machine and recorded three albums as Audioslave's vocalist (Audioslave (2002), Out of Exile (2005), and Revelations (2006)). Cornell departed Audioslave in early 2007, resulting in the band's break-up. His second solo album, Carry On, was released in June 2007 and his third solo album, Scream, produced by Timbaland, was released in March 2009, both to mixed commercial and critical success. Soundgarden was one of the early bands of the 1980s Seattle music scene and is regarded as being one of the originators of the genre later known as grunge. The band has been praised for its technical musical ability and the expansion of its sound as the band's career progressed. Regarding Soundgarden's legacy, in a 2007 interview Cornell said, "I think and this is now with some distance in listening to the records but on the outside looking in with all earnestness I think Soundgarden made the best records out of that scene. I think we were the most daring and experimental and genre pushing really and I'm really proud of it. And I guess that's why I have trepidation about the idea of reforming. I don't know what it would mean. I guess I just have this image of who we were and I had probably a lot of anxiety during the period of being Soundgarden, as we all did, that it was a responsibility and it was an important band of music and we didn't want to mess it up and we managed to not, which I felt is a great achievement." Soundgarden Discography 1994 "Spoonman" - US Mainstream Rock #3 - US Modern Rock #9 1994 "The Day I Tried to Live" - US Main #13 - US Mod #25 1994 "Black Hole Sun" - #1 - #2 1994 "My Wave" - #11 - #18 1994 "Fell on Black Days" - #4 - #13 1996 "Pretty Noose" - #4 - #2 1996 "Burden in My Hand" - #1 - #2 1996 "Blow Up the Outside World" - #1 - #8 1997 "Rhinosaur" - US Main #19 1997 "Bleed Together" - #13 - #32 Factoid: Chris Cornell was once in a band called Temple of the Dog. This band consisted of all present members of Pearl Jam with Cornell added. "Fell On Black Days" http://media-convert.com/convert/?xid=7-jrfoagkq

It was one point. I just realized that I only made a 49 band list. I'm going to have to make a new #50.