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My Personal Chart, November 7, 2010
See my chart here
My Personal Chart Blog, Nov. 7, 2010
The End of the Rock’s Summer in Popland, Part 1 (How Slash and Friends are Keeping Rock Alive)
Theory Of A Deadman/The End Of Summer (14)
I have a running joke that I like bands that sound like Nickelback more than I like Nickelback. Often, I am irritated by Nickelback. The song that irks me the most is “Photograph” from 2005 (“and what the hell is on Joey’s head”). Even with that, the song reached #30 on my personal chart. I think it took a little time before I was completely annoyed. Theory Of A Deadman is one of those bands and not ironically the first band to be signed to Chad Kroeger’s label 604 Records. They have relatively similar histories on my chart. Nickelback 31 charted songs, 2 top 10’s, TOAD 29 songs, 3 top 10s, but TOAD has had more than double the songs reach my top 30.
This was the ninth single from the band’s 2008 album “Scars & Souvenirs”, their most successful album. It spawned 3 top 3 Rock songs (“So Happy”, “Hate My Life” and the #1 “Bad Girlfriend”) and 2 Hot AC and Pop hits with the Rock ballads “All Or Nothing” and “Not Meant To Be”. They have always had a tongue-in-cheek side, most recently with the humorous “Straight Jacket” in 2017, a song that was discussed on an early episode of the Beyond Radio Presents podcast. Another song about a bad girlfriend, the best lyric is:
“And you’re supercali-pessimistic-expiali-narcissistic You are Mary Poppins, you’ll be soon be going out of business Guys, let me witness, you got a Honda Civic ‘Cause you’re backseat driving my life”
It’s full of clever phrases and haunting backing vocals with a number of critics panning it. During the song’s run on my chart, I went back and forth on it, but in the end, I enjoyed it. It just missed the Rock top 10. Their most recent Rock #1’s are more sobering efforts; “Rx (Medicate)” (also from 2017) a song about prescription drug abuse, and last year’s “History Of Violence” about domestic violence.
By the end of the aughts, Rock artists were increasingly fading from Pop radio, with it almost being a dirty word by 2020. Between 2009 and 2012 you can see the erosion according to the Billboard Hot 100. In 2009 4 Rock songs made the top 20:
#6 New Divide/Linkin Park
#7 Second Chance/Shinedown
#15 No Surprise/Daughtry
#19 If Today Was Your Last Day/Nickelback
In 2010 only 6 songs landed in the top 50:
#17 According To You/Orianthi
#27 The Catalyst/Linkin Park
#34 This Afternoon/Nickelback
#36 September & Life After You/Daughtry
#37 Radioactive/ Kings Of Leon
2011 saw 5 in the top 50 but none in the top 30
#35 (It) Feels So Good/Steven Tyler
#38 The Adventures Of Rain Dance Maggie/Red Hot Chili Peppers
#41 Crawling Back To You/Daughtry
#42 Waiting For The End/Linkin Park
#44 When We Stand Together/Nickelback
In 2012 only 6 titles made the entire top 100
#30 Burn It Down/Linkin Park
#67 Tattoo/Van Halen (their first single to hit the Hot 100 in 17 years and only for one week)
#94 Bully/Shinedown
#94 Gold On The Ceiling/Black Keys
#95 Lost In The Echo/Linkin Park
#97 Oh Love/Green Day
See the pattern? Mostly the same artists or big names. Nickelback was prominent here and had a healthy Pop presence throughout the 2000-10 decade. According to Joel Whitburn’s latest edition of his Top Singles Book, they were the #25 artist of the 2000s. California’s Linkin Park was arguably the biggest Rock act of the aughts. “Waiting For The End” (105) was on its way to a #11 peak on my chart, the last time they would make my top 25. The atypical ballad has a great build to it and gives lead singer Chester Bennington a great showcase. He claimed that this and the song “Iridescent” (a true ballad) were his favorites from the album “A Thousand Suns”. The album deals with subjects like nuclear warfare. The songs “The Catalyst” and ‘Waiting’ both hit #1 on the Alternative chart with “Iridescent” peaking at #19. The band would hit the summit one more time in 2012 with “Burn It Down” and in 2017 they made the Pop top 20 with “Heavy” featuring the female artist Kiiara, which was a true departure from their previous work.
Bennington, who committed suicide in July 2017, was briefly the lead vocalist of Stone Temple Pilots between 2013-15. This was after the original vocalist Scott Weiland was fired in 2013. The band was supposed to do a tour for the 20th anniversary of their album “Core”, their debut during the Grunge era featuring the monster “Plush”, but it never materialized supposedly because Weiland couldn’t pull off the vocal abilities of his younger self. He also died, from an overdose and alcohol and cocaine, in 2015.
In 2010 their song “Cinnamon” (44) would reach #5 on my chart by the end of December. The song has a decidedly ‘60s Brit-Pop feel, not the first time they went that direction. In 1996 “Lady Picture Show” followed a somewhat similar stylistic path, a bit more psychedelic and definitely Beatlesque. That same year was the last time before “Cinnamon”, that the band was in my top 10, with the song “Trippin’ On A Hole In A Paper Heart”. That song has one of my favorite instrumental guitar breaks ever.
In 2003 STP had split up with Weiland going on to form Velvet Revolver with Slash and 2 other members of Gun N’ Roses and the Deleo Brothers from the Pilots hooked up with Filter’s lead singer Richard Patrick as Army Of Anyone. That group produced one album and one top 5 Rock song with the #3 “Goodbye”, a song that did moderately well for me. Filter had peaked at #5 on my chart in August 2010 with “Fades Like A Flower”, their fourth top 20 on my chart. It was featured on the soundtrack of the disaster movie “2012” starring John Cusack but saw no real radio exposure.
Velvet Revolver was a much more impactful band on my chart, placing 4 songs in my top 100 of the year between 2004-07, all reaching the top 10 on my weekly chart: “Fall To Pieces” #10, “The Last Fight” #7, “Slither” #6 and the non-radio song “You Got No Right” #1. That song has such a GNR/Slash guitar break which I’m sure sent the song over the top for me, though the song is absolutely a complete package. It also has a Beatlesque part before the guitar solo. The debut album from the supergroup, “Contraband”, debuted at #1 and sold almost 3 million copies. It won the band the Grammy for Best Hard Rock Performance in 2005, which Weiland had also won in 1994 with STP on the song “Plush”.
After Velvet Revolver, Slash released his debut solo album in 2010, the first of 4 in the last decade. That album featured a myriad of guest vocalists. The opening track “Ghost” (17)was sung by Ian Astbury of the ‘80s UK band The Cult. It went to #3 on my chart. Other singers included Fergie, Adam Levine, Chris Cornell, and Ozzy Osbourne. One of the singers, Myles Kennedy, became the voice on the tour because Slash was so impressed and said he was “one of the best Rock & Roll vocalists out there”. I totally agree. He became the primary vocalist on the next 3 albums and those produced 2 #1 songs on my personal chart (2012’s “Standing In The Sun” and 2018’s “Driving Rain”-I just see the correlation!) and 2 on Rock radio (“You’re A Lie” and “World On Fire”) plus 5 other top 10s.
Kennedy was actually offered to audition for Velvet Revolver but turned it down. He came on my radar in 1998 as the lead vocalist for the band Mayfield Four with their debut album. 5 songs from that charted for me, including 2 #1’s, “Shuddershell” for 2 weeks and “Always” for 5 weeks. I don’t recall their second album in 2001 but it produced their only Rock radio song, the #37 “Eden (Turn The Page)”. After Mayfield Four broke up Kennedy teamed up with 3 former members of Creed and became Alter Bridge. This has been a more fruitful endeavor with 15 songs charting on Rock radio since 2004. In 2008 the ballad “Watch Over You” reached #7 on my chart (#19 Rock and #40 HotAC as well) and has gone on to become one of my all-time favorite songs. It is a strummy ballad that is the most amazing showcase for his voice. Gorgeous and stately, his vocal explodes about halfway through (“who is gonna save you when I’m gone”). It’s a heartbreaking but beautiful song. Could be about death but more likely about being pushed out of a relationship due to substance abuse. It became the unofficial theme of “Celebrity Rehab with Dr. Drew” after being featured in a number of episodes (some scenes with former Guns N’ Roses drummer Steven Adler).
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Mark Tremonti, of Alter Bridge and Creed, started his own band in 2011, Tremonti. He has his own impressive Rock pipes. In 2016 the band’s song “Dust” peaked at #8 on my chart, another song about death, perhaps suicide, with a fantastic guitar solo and soaring vocal:
“You carried the weight of everyone After all the time we spent Rewriting the rules that now we bend The whole damn thing has turned to dust You left alone, defeated us.”
Like “Watch Over You”, this song over time has been elevated for me. Between 2012-16 Wolfgang Van Halen was in the band and he played bass on this song. He is currently in the Rock top 20 as Mammoth WVH with “Distance”, his tribute to his father Eddie Van Halen.
Slash is featured on one of the heavier songs, “What I Want”, on Daughtry’s debut album. After Chris Daughtry’s success on the fifth season of American Idol, the album exploded becoming the fastest-selling album in the Soundscan era and the best-selling album of 2007, according to Billboard. The band had 3 songs on my chart this week, “What I Meant To Say” (26), “September” (43), and “Photograph” (78) with Santana (a cover of the Def Leppard song). And no, that did not do nearly as well as the original on my chart.
Chris Daughtry was quite busy during the last third of the aughts, collaborating with a number of artists featured here. Chad Kroeger co-wrote the band’s hit “No Surprise”, Daughtry co-wrote the 2009 Theory Of A Deadman single “By The Way”. He was a guest vocalist on the song “The Past” by Sevendust in 2008 and that album also has appearances from Myles Kennedy and Mark Tremonti. Sevendust had their highest charting Rock song in 2010 with the #7 “Unraveling” but have been consistent performers on Rock radio since 1997. Both Daughtry and Sevendust are in the current Rock top 40, Daughtry’s return to Rock form “World On Fire” is #20 and Sevendust’s “Dying to Live” is #34.
Daughtry also worked with 2 artists that impacted the Christian music market at the time. Ed Kowalcyzk had a bad falling out with his band Live in 2009 and released the solo album “Alive” in 2010. There was always an underlying spirituality with Live but he went deeper into it on this album (which hit #6 on the Christian Albums Chart) with songs like “Grace” (#2 on my chart in August) and “Drink (Everlasting Love)” (29). The latter was co-written by Daughtry. In 2003 Kowalcyzk performed the John Lennon song “Imagine” with Slash at a 2003 concert called “Peace On The Beach” in protest of the Iraq war. He also performed the song on tour with Live in 1999 feeling it was an appropriate song leading up to the millennium. Videos from the tour are much better than the beach concert footage. I had seen Live a number of times and on this tour, they followed “Imagine” with my favorite song of all-time (at that point), “Pillar Of Davidson”. It was the greatest concert experience of my life. We discuss it on the Beyond Radio Presents podcast, Castlist 005, Episode 2.
Finally here, Daughtry teamed up with the Christian Rock band Third Day in 2009 on the song “Slow Down”. That along with “This Is Who I Am” and the #1 “Run To You” all made my top 25 songs of the year. Their album “Revelation” was big for me, with 6 charting songs and the title track possibly my favorite song by the band (my #14 of 2008). I wrote about them last month as well and 2 songs from 2000, “Sky Falls Down” and “What Good” re-entered my chart. Both originally peaked at #101. This week ‘Sky’ sits at #2 and “What Good” at #14. It’s so great to re-discover past songs. Right now, another song from “Revelation” is playing, ‘Otherside”. This one I don’t remember and didn’t chart then but could very well now.
Part 2 will explore another side of Rock music in 2010.
The Many Faces Of Alternative and Some Alt Radio Records
My top 11 this week in 2010 shows the variety of Rock styles that fit into the Alternative universe at the time.
Anberlin/Impossible (1)
In 2008 this Florida Emo band scored a #1 Alternative song with “Feel Good Drag” from the fourth album “New Surrender” and first on a major label. ‘Drag’ took 29 weeks to reach the summit which was a record at the time and was Billboard’s #2 Alternative song of the year. The following year it was bested by Phoenix’s “1901” (31 weeks) and in 2010 “Animal” By Neon Trees eclipsed that with 32 weeks). Phoenix, a French indie-Pop band had a decade of moderate success in their homeland before they hit it big in the States in 2009 with “1901” and “Lisztomania”. Those 2 songs made Billboard’s year-end Alternative top 10, at #4 and #7, and were from their fourth album “Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix”, an album that won the Grammy for Best Alternative Music Album in 2010.
Neon Trees were descending my chart this week with “1983” (51) after peaking at #5 in September. Both that and “Animal” made my top 50 of the year and in Billboard, the former was the #44 Alternative song of 2011 and the latter was #5 of 2010. “Animal” was also the first of 2 top 10 Pop hits as well. In 2012 the Provo, Utah band returned with “Everybody Talks” which took them in the top 5. After a lengthy absence from the charts, during which time lead singer Tyler Glenn came out, they returned this year with the Alternative top 5 “Used To Like” and another charter, “New Best Friend”.
Anberlin’s ‘Drag’ was a re-recorded version of a song from their 2005 independent album “Never Take Friendship Personal” that spawned their first chart single “Paperthin Hymn”, #38 on the Alternative chart and #8 on my personal chart. The band has always been connected to the Christian music scene though the lead singer Stephen Christian (hmmm) says their intention was not to be categorized in that way. This, I believe is similar to the approach that Manic Bloom, whom I wrote about extensively earlier this year, has taken. “Impossible” was their second top 5 on Alternative radio and not their only #1 on my chart. In April of 2011 they repeated with “Pray Tell”. 2 more songs would chart in 2011, “Closer” and “Take Me (As You Found Me)”. “Impossible” also was Billboard’s #21 Alternative song of the year in 2010.
San Diego’s Switchfoot may be the most successful Christian Rock band on the mainstream charts. They have been a mainstay on my personal chart with 50 songs over the last 19 years (starting with “Learning To Breathe” in 2001). 2010 was not their best year on my chart but they did place 2 songs on Billboard’s year-end Alternative chart in 2010. “The Sound” was #25 and “Mess Of Me” was #44. 8 of the songs from their 2009 album “Hello Hurricane” made my personal chart in 2010, 2 of those made my weekly top 25. The ballad “Your Love Is A Song” performed well on Christian radio and at HotAC and went to #21 and “Free”, an anthemic non-single, and my fav from the album, which debuted on my chart the following week, rose to #4 in February 2011.
Pocket Full Of Rocks/Alive (2)
Formed in 1995, this Christian band released 6 albums between 2002-2011. This is the only song I know by them. A great Pop-Rock tune that would spend 2 weeks at #1 on my chart in November and go onto place at #18 on the year-end chart.
A Silent Film/You Will Leave Your Mark (3)
The bright Alt-Pop from this British outfit has drawn comparisons to Keane, Coldplay, and Snow Patrol. I definitely gravitated towards the driving energy of their more upbeat songs. ‘Mark’, a great car with windows down kind of song, is their only song to reach the Alternative chart in the States, peaking at #38. I’m relatively sure that it got much more exposure on SiriusXM’s Alt Nation station. In fact, looking it up the song was #4 on the station’s year-end countdown. Another band that made their top 18 of the year countdown was by The Temper Trap, an Australian Indie band whose sound was in a similar vein. Their song “Fader” was #15 for the year on Alt Nation and one of two songs to reach my top 10. The other, “Sweet Disposition” was also an Alternative radio and UK top 10. This song initially did not perform well but after its inclusion in the movie “500 Days Of Summer” it had a renewed life. In the end, in 2010 the song won Most Popular Australian Single at the ARIA Awards.
A Silent Film would chart for me 6 times and produce 3 other top 30 songs. “Driven By A Beating Heart”, even with a peak of only #22 on my weekly chart, ended up at #59 for the year (26 weeks in my top 150 and 15 of those in the top 40). In 2012 they came back with “Danny, Dakota and the Wishing Well” which was one of my husband John’s favorite songs of the year. The Temper Trap had a bit more success overall. Both bands had 3 studio albums, but A Silent Film didn’t have much chart success, while The Temper Trap had 2 of their albums go to #1 in Australia. In 2016 they would return to my chart and make it to #1 with the percolating “Alive”, a feel-good anthem from their final album “Thick As Thieves”, a single that failed to chart. The title track could chart for me in the coming weeks as I had not heard it before. The other single from that album “Fall Together” floundered on my chart for 11 weeks, never getting above #148 though in listening to it now it should have done better. I find it funny that in looking at other songs that were around it on my chart at that time 4 years ago, I remember it so much better than many of them.
Two Door Cinema Club/Come Back Home (4)
Speaking of songs that I don’t remember well; this song was spending its third week at #4 on my chart. Even with the first time I listened to it now I was like, why don’t I remember this? I’m listening to it again now while I write this (probably the third time recently) and it is coming back to me to some degree. This whole process of analyzing my past personal charts is so fascinating to me, and certainly a joy. There is a jangly essence to the UK band’s Alt-Dance vibe. I remember their first single “What You Know” better in retrospect, though that one only made it to #49 on my weekly chart. It was a top 25 hit on the U.S. Alternative chart. This is another band that my husband John has gravitated towards over the years. Songs like 2016’s “Bad Decisions” and 2019’s “Talk” (the band’s only other top 10 on my chart) were in heavy rotation on his playlist. The band has reached my top 50 8 times.
The band hails from Northern Ireland and won the Choice Music Prize for Best Irish Album of the Year in 2010 for their debut “Tourist History”. That album produced 5 singles including “Something Good Can Work” and ‘Undercover Martyn” but it was the last of those, “What You Know” that finally got them on the UK singles chart. They never reached the top 30 on that chart but the last 3 albums have all made the UK top 5.
This band, along with Phoenix and The Temper Trap, are all on Glassnote Records. Launched in 2007 by 30-year music veteran Daniel Glass. The label also is the home of Folk-based rockers Mumford and Sons whose 2009 debut single “Little Lion Man” established the UK band as one of the biggest Rock bands of the last decade. The song was a huge hit, reaching #1 on the Alternative chart in the States (#18 for the year) and the album “Sigh No More” selling over 3 million copies. The album won the Brit Award for Album of the Year, yet the song surprisingly only peaked at #24 in the UK. It produced 2 other Alternative top 10s, “The Cave” and “Roll Away Your Stone”. I was not a big fan of the band with none of these songs making my weekly top 100. They did make an appearance in my weekly top 10 once, with the lead single “I Will Wait” from their second album “Babel”. That album went on to win the Grammy for Album of the Year in 2013.
Another UK band in the Alt-Dance realm (and another fav of John’s), The Wombats, first charted for me with “Let’s Dance To Joy Division” in 2007. On this week’s chart, they had “Tokyo (Vampires & Wolves) (59). For some reason, I always thought this band was from Australia. Ironically their first album, released only in Japan, is titled “Girls, Boys, and Marsupials”. Many of the tracks on that album were included on the international debut album in 2007. Like so often happens in the UK, the original single releases were re-released to better effect after they had established themselves with the public. Their debut single “Backfire At The Disco” had one week on the UK singles chart in April 2007 and then another 5 weeks a year later in April/May of 2008.
The band has had 10 songs reach my weekly top 100 (well 2 of those almost made it so technically 8) though they only have gotten past #33 once. In 2015 they quickly clicked and shot up to #1 on my chart with “Emoticons”. With 14 weeks in my top 10 and 5 in my top 2, that song ended as my #2 of the year in 2016. There was just something to the build of that song. It starts with a simple beat, a lazy guitar line, breathy vocals, and simple keyboards. By the end, it is an exuberant denouncing of emojis (“all these emoticons and words, they try to make it better, but they only make it worse”). I like it when a middling band has a moment in the sun.
30 Seconds To Mars/Closer To The Edge (5)
Moving to the heavier side of Alternative is this Jared Leto led L.A. band. Some may remember that Leto won numerous acting awards in 2013 for his supporting turn in the movie “Dallas Buyers Club”. Matthew McConaughey also won Best Actor in that film, a biopic about AIDS patient Ron Woodroof who smuggled experimental drugs into the country. The band has placed 9 songs in the Alternative top 10, this one peaking at #7. This was their second and last Pop hit. Both ‘Edge’ and 2006’s “The Kill (Bury Me)” reached #30. These are 2 of 4 songs to reach my top 10 (“From Yesterday” and “A Beautiful Lie” are the other 2). The band made the “Guinness Book of World Records” in 2011, clocking in 309 live performances during a one-album cycle. The tour was in support of the 2009 album “This Is War’. The title song and “Kings And Queens” both hit #1 on the Alternative chart and ‘Edge’ was the best-selling rock single in the UK, topping that chart for 8 weeks.
Solon Bixler was in the band from 2000-2003 and went on the form the band Great Northern. In 2007 they landed a #4 on my chart with “Home”, a dreamy concoction with back and forth vocals from Bixler and Rachel Stolte that was featured in a 2008 Nissan Murano ad and in the movie “21”. “Story” (58) is one of three songs that charted for me from their second album “Remind Me Where The Light Is”. All but one of the songs on that album have a one-word title.
Finger Eleven/Living In a Dream (6)
Following the huge success of 2007’s “Paralyzer”, “Living In A Dream” was the lead single from the Canadian band’s sixth album “Life Turns Electric”. The former song was the #1 song at my music party in 2008. The song was a top 5 Pop hit in addition to #1 at Rock and Alternative, plus #3 at HotAC. ‘Dream’ went a similar route, incorporating a bit of a Dance-Rock feel. Unfortunately, it did not repeat the overwhelming success of Paralyzer”. It did go to #1 on the Canadian Rock chart but peaked at #10 in the States without getting much Pop airplay. Both songs peaked at #4 on my chart and have held up well for me. They also made it to #25 on my chart in 2011 with “Whatever Doesn’t Kill Me”.
“Paralyzer” is tied to the 30 Seconds To Mars song “The Kill” as they both spent a record 52 weeks on the Alternative chart. In 2010 that record was smashed by the song “Saviour” (68) by Rise Against. That song from the Chicago Punk-rockers spent 65 weeks on the Alternative chart and peaked at #3. When Billboard did their list of the top Alternative songs from the first 30 years of the chart it placed at #1. That record was broken in 2019 by ironically “Broken”, the #1 Alt song by Lovelytheband that stayed on the chart for 76 weeks. Rise Against had a second song on my chart this week, “Long Forgotten Sons” (18), their only top 10 on my chart. It was not a single from the 2010 album “Appeal To Reason” but 2 other songs from the record reached the Alt top 5, “Re-Education (Through Labor)” and “Audience Of One”. Of the 17 songs that they charted at Rock and Alternative radio between 2005-2018, two peaked at #2, “Help Is On The Way” in 2011, and “The Violence” in 2018. That came close to my top 10, reaching #14.
Another set of Punk-rockers from Gainesville, Florida share a word with Rise Against, as well as an aesthetic. Against Me! Is fronted by Laura Jane Grace who came out as a transgender woman in 2012. After tooling around independent labels for 10 years, the band moved to Sire and in 2007, releasing the album “New Wave” that Spin Magazine named the album of the year. Their first single from that, “Thrash Unreal” reached #11 Alternative with 2 others from the album joining it in my top 25, “White People For Peace” and “Stop!” which spent 2 weeks at #1, becoming my #22 on 2008. The 2010 #16 Alternative song “I Was A Teenage Anarchist” (63) had peaked at #1 on my chart in August and was my #16 of the year. All of these except ‘Peace’ made the Rock top 10 in Canada. The first album after Laura’s revelation was their highest peaking album. “Transgender Dysphoria Blues” hit #23 on the Billboard 200.
Manic Bloom/A Thousand Angels (7)
This was the first of 5 songs from the Nashville band’s second EP “In Loving Memory” to reach #1 on my chart. I’ll speak more about this in a 2011 blog post. At this point in the year, it looked like ‘Angels’ was going to stall at #7. It was slipping for 3 weeks before turning around in mid-December and finally reaching #1 on January 16, 2011.
Pendulum/Watercolour (8)
Perth, Australia is where this Alt-Dance band is originally from. They felt isolated being on the west coast of Australia and eventually moved to London. They are most associated with a sub-genre of Dance music called Drum ‘N Bass. I don’t understand enough about the nuances of electronic dance music, but the style is characterized by very fast beats. By the mid-2000s they started to incorporate more Rock elements into their style and “Watercolour” was the second of their songs to reach #1 on my personal chart. The other was “Propane Nightmares” in 2008. That became my #2 song of the year. Both of those songs reached the top 10 in the UK. They have actually made the UK singles chart 13 times. This type of music is not necessarily something I could listen to all the time but these songs, mixed in with other styles, had a certain impact on me that fit at the time they came out.
After a 9-year hiatus, the band is back with 2 songs “Driver” and “Nothing For Free”. That song moved up to #44 on my chart last week. In 20011 2 of the founding members, Rob Swire and Gareth McGrillen formed the techno duo Knife Party and had a UK top 5 the following year with “Antidote” a collaboration with another Dance outfit Swedish House Mafia, best known for their song “Don’t You Worry Child” (another huge favorite of John’s) the same year. That song was the #8 for the year in 2013 on the Billboard Mainstream Top 40 chart. The group disbanded soon after that. Knife Party had one song reach my chart, last year’s “Death And Desire”.
John Butler Trio/Revolution (9)
Another Australian act, this one of the Roots Rock persuasion, have had 7 studio albums since 1998, 4 of them hitting #1 down under. They had a #1 Adult Alternative song in 2007 with “Better Than”, one of 7 songs that have made that chart between 2005-2018. In 2010 2 songs reached the top 20 “One Way Road” #9 and “I’d Do Anything” #20. I can’t remember if I heard “Revolution” on the radio (it may have been on New Hampshire’s “The River”) or found it through someone’s personal chart. It definitely was played in Australia on their national Alternative station Triple J as it was the station’s #39 of the year. The song has a slow build that works up to a nice climax. Actually, Pendulum showed up on the Triple J list 3 times in 2010 with “Watercolour” #39, “Witchcraft” #48, and “ABC News Theme (Remix)” #11. Yes, a remix of the Australian Broadcast Company’s TV news theme.
Another trio, Sons Of Sylvia, are 3 brothers from Virginia: Adam, Ashley, and Austin Clark. They are considered a Country-Pop group but “Love Left To Lose” (31) sounds like it would be more comfortable on an Adult Alternative station than a Country station. The next single “I’ll Know You”, a power ballad, definitely had a slight Country slant. The brothers were in a band called the Clark Family Experience with their 3 older brothers (Aaron, Andrew, and Allen) and had a top 20 Country song in 2000 called “Meanwhile Back At The Ranch”. The band went bankrupt in 2001. I couldn’t possibly remember all the songs that I have charted through the years (thank goodness for my databases). I actually charted a song from the Clark Family Experience in 2002 called “To Quote Shakespeare”. The fiddle-laden song was a single but only made it to #51 on the Country chart.
The 3 younger brothers re-emerged in 2007 as just the Clark Brothers on the 1 season reality show on Fox called “The Next Great American Band”. They won the competition and then changed their name. Both songs by Sons Of Sylvia made my top 30 so they had potential, but they only recorded one album, “Revelation”, which actually hit #33 on the Billboard 200 and #9 on the Rock album chart (not Country). The Rock-edged song “50 Ways” is a song I’m just hearing so that now has the potential to make my personal chart. “Love Left To Lose” was co-written by Ryan Tedder of OneRepublic, who happens to be their cousin. Their top 15 Pop song “Secrets” (62) also made the top 30 at Adult Alternative.
Jimmy Eat World/My Best Theory (10)
This song marks the fourth time the Mesa, Arizona band reached #1 on my chart. You would think their massive pop hit “The Middle” would be one of them but that only peaked at #18 on my chart. It was their 2004 album “Futures” that had the most impact on me. The title track, “Pain” and “23” all made my top 10 of the year in 2005 at numbers 7, 5, and 2. A fourth song “Work” peaked at #3. While the band started out in the mid-90s as part of the Emo scene, they morphed into competent and reliable Alt-rockers churning out 7 Alternative top 10s and another 7 making the top 30. 2 other songs from the 2010 album “Intended made my chart, “Coffee And Cigarettes” and “Littlething”. Their most recent album, 2019’s “Surviving” brought the song “Criminal Energy” to #40 on my chart this past spring.
Guster/Do You Love Me (11)
The Massachusetts band had 3 songs from their sixth album ‘Easy Wonderful” on my chart in 2010. In addition to “Do You Love Me”, “Bad Bad World” reached #34 and “Architects & Engineers” #49. They both deserved better than that. Another minor charter, “This Is How It Feels To Have A Broken Heart” will undoubtedly get a second life on my chart, feeling much happier than the title suggests (same with ‘Bad Bad World”). There could be other potential songs from the album to chart for me, adding to the 30 songs they have already charted, as listening to this album today has made me happy.
My Personal Chart, June 1, 2010
See my June 1, 2010 chart here
The companion Spotify playlist has all the songs discussed in the blog that are available. Individual playlists for each blog entry are available on My YouTube Channel.
My Personal Chart Blog, June 1, 2010
Part 3, Pop Got Punked and There Will Be Fall Out, Party Music and the Orbit Around Mars
Boys Like Girls/Heart Heart Heartbreak (3)
YouTube playlist with the songs from Part 3
Aah, the aughts, and early 2010s saw a lot of boy bands under the Punk-Pop moniker and it certainly had an impact on me. This song had just dropped from #1 2 weeks earlier. The Boston area band emerged in 2007 with the top 10 Pop single “The Great Escape” and scored a couple of other top 25 hits in the following 2 years. Taylor Swift (I may get into my overall dislike of her at some point) helped bring them back to the Pop top 10 in late 2009 with “Two Is Better Than One”. Up to this point, the band did not register to a great degree, though they did make my 60 in 2009 with “Love Drunk”, another moderate Pop hit.
“Heart Heart Heartbreak” was their moment to shine on my chart with its huge hook. This one really never lets up the energy from beginning to end. It was their last Pop charter, reaching #31. It is a common occurrence that my favorite songs by an artist tend to not be their biggest hits. The song did make the music party top 40 at #36 the summer of 2010. For those uninformed, my annual music party, started in 1984, features a countdown of the top songs of the prior 12-month period, so June through May. The participants are mostly friends and usually in the 20-25 range so a song that is well-liked by a few people can make the lower reaches of the top 40.
The band released a final album in 2012 and made my chart 1 last time with “Be Your Everything”. Lead singer Martin Johnson re-surfaced in 2017 as the Night Game, a name he took from a Paul Simon song. His first single was “The Outfield” with backing vocals from Gotye, the artist who had the biggest song in the world in 2012, “Somebody That I Used To Know” (and also the #1 song at the summer 2012 party). It’s as if Gotye vanished after the success of that song, he never released another album. The funny thing about “The Outfield” is that it totally reminds me of the 80’s band of the same name, especially their song “Your Love”.
It was the more interesting song, “Once In A Lifetime” that would make it to #3 on my personal chart in December 2017. This one starts with a subdued, almost mysterious vocal style. It has a quality that is unlike any other song I can remember though I could hear Crowded House doing this song. His guitarist is from Australia (as is Gotye) so maybe that makes sense. Also, though sounding different, I can relate this to the late 80’s song “Welcome To The Boomtown” by David & David (the #3 song at the 1987 party). The Night Game just released a song on May 29 of this year called “Magic Trick”.
What is interesting to me is that Johnson co-wrote and produced songs for a lot of Pop artists over the last decade. These include Jason Derulo (“The Other Side”), Avril Lavigne (“Here’s To Never Growing Up”) and Elle King (“America’s Sweetheart”). He also is partially responsible for 2 other top 5 songs on my weekly chart, Lavigne’s “Rock N Roll” and Country artist Hunter Hayes’ “Yesterday’s Song”.
2 Canadian Punk-Pop bands from British Columbia were making some waves north of the border at the time. Faber Drive was discovered by Chad Kroeger of Nickelback (and husband of Avril Lavigne) in 2007. They were enjoying their biggest hit in 2009 with “G-Get Up And Dance”. 2 songs from 2007 made my top 20; “When I’m With You” and “Second Chance”.
Hedley has had the more prosperous career though mired in some scandal. All 7 of their albums have made the Canadian top 10 and they have had 10 top singles as well. They splashed on the Canadian charts at #1 in 2005 with their first song “On My Own”. This was right after lead vocalist Jacob Hoggard’s third-place showing in 2004 on “Canadian Idol”. In 2009-10 they were riding high with “Cha-Ching” and “Perfect”. It wasn’t until 2014-15 that they reached my top 10 with “Crazy For You” and “Hello”. In recent years Hoggard and the band have been involved in sexual assault accusations which led to their management company dropping them and the band going on indefinite hiatus.
The Tallahassee band Mayday Parade joins the conversation with 3 connections to the Night Game and Johnson. Their biggest radio song was a cover of Gotye’s hit in 2012 that made the Rock top 20. In 2010 they had 2 songs on my chart, “The Silence” with a #11 peak and “Kids In Love” (which is also the name of a Night Game song). Also, in 2010 they did a cover of Jason Derulo’s 2009 hit “In My Head”. The band has a penchant for long, strange song titles like 2018’s “It’s Hard To Be Religious When Certain People Are Never Incinerated By Bolts Of Lightning” and 2014’s “The Torment Of Existence Weighed Against The Horror Of Nonbeing”.
The Cab was a band that had a good amount of success on my chart between 2008-2014, racking up 2 #1’s, a #2 plus 2 other top 10’s. “I’ll Run” (19) saw a bit of action in 2009 but re-entered my chart in April 2010 and peaked at #2 in July. The Las Vegas band scored their initial #1 on my chart in 2011 with “Bad”, a song written and produced by Martin Johnson. ‘Run’ was from their debut 2008 album “Whisper War” that was produced by Patrick Stump of Fall Out Boy and was on his independent label (with Pete Wentz of FOB) Decaydance. The lead song on the album “One Of THOSE Nights” features Brendon Urie of Panic! At The Disco. The Cab’s only song to really get radio exposure was “Bounce”, but not even reaching the Pop top 50.
Alexander DeLeon, the lead vocalist, was a co-writer of Panic’s 2015 single “Victorious” (Rivers Cuomo of Weezer also gets a songwriting credit on this song). Like Martin Johnson, he has emerged in the last couple of years with the moniker Bohnes, most recently with the song “Ugly Habits”.
There were 2 record labels in the 2005-2015 range that were responsible for a large amount of the Punk-Pop of the day. Both independent labels started up in the mid-’90s. Fearless Records, based in California was the home of Mayday Parade, Michigan’s Every Avenue, Virginia’s The Downtown Fiction, Australia’s Tonight Alive, and 2 bands just outside of Phoenix; Tempe’s The Maine and Scottsdale’s The Summer Set. Every Avenue made it to my weekly top 100 in 2010 with “Tell Me I’m A Wreck”. The latter 2 bands both reached my top 10 many years later. The Maine has charted 6 songs since 2016 with the highest being “(Un) Lost” in 2018 (actually from a 2015 album “American Candy”). The Summer Set reached #1 in 2016 with the hooky and upbeat “All Downhill From Here” from their final album “Stories For Monday”. The name of the band came from opening an atlas and landing on Somerset, New Jersey.
Fueled By Ramen was formed in Gainesville, Florida, and now is based in New York City. The label started as an indie but struck a deal with WEA and operates in the best possible world, acting like an indie label but with the resources of a major label. Their earlier success was with the alt band Jimmy Eats World in 1998. It was around 2003 when they struck a deal to release Fall Out Boy’s first album “Take This To The Grave” before the band would move on to Island Records, who had plans to take the band to radio.
Fall Out Boy’s relationship with Fueled By Ramen remained intact with the creation of the aforementioned Decaydance Records. This label still fell under the indie/major agreement and released albums by The Academy is, Gym Class Heroes, Cobra Starship and Panic! At The Disco and the Cab (remember Stump and Brendon Urie were involved in the first album). For the Cab’s second album “Symphony Soldier”, one review called it a masterpiece, they also had collaborations with Fall Out Boy in addition to Adam Levine and Bruno Mars who co-wrote the song “Endlessly”.
2010 saw the debut of a superstar in Bruno Mars. His rise started in 2008 but his music industry journey started in 2004 when he signed a deal with Motown Records. That contract went south after a year and he then devoted his energy to songwriting. He teamed with songwriter Phillip Lawrence and the first song that made a splash was Menudo’s Pop top 40 song “Lost”. In January 2009 Mars also had a songwriting credit on Flo Rida’s Billboard #1 “Right Round” which was the first song to feature Kesha. She went on to nab Billboard’s #1 song of the year in 2010 with “Tik Tok” (music party entries #18 and #21 respectively). She had quite a year in 2010, placing 6 songs in the Billboard top 10 by the end of the year including “We R Who We R”, “Your Love Is My Drug”, and “My First Kiss” with 3OH!3; all of those getting substantial radio play. Flo Rida also nabbed a Billboard top 10 in 2010 with “Club Can’t Handle Me”, his collaboration with David Guetta.
Another international smash in 2009 that Mars co-wrote was “Wavin’ Flag” by Somalian/Canadian artist K’Naan. It became Coca-Cola’s anthem for the World Cup in 2010. The remixed version was produced by The Smeezingtons, a production and songwriting team including Mars, Lawrence, and Ari Levine. K’Naan joined forces with Keane on the 2010 song “Stop For A Minute” (55), on its way to a #35 peak. The UK band has reached my personal chart top 10 11 times out of 36 appearances.
The Smeezington team was responsible for putting Mars on the map as a vocalist. This was first on B.O.B.’s #1 song “Nothin’ On You” (77), which debuted in December 2009. In March he showed up on Travie McCoy’s top 5 “Billionaire”. McCoy was the leader of the band Gym Class Heroes who topped the Billboard Hot 100 in 2006 with “Cupid’s Chokehold”, a song that was built largely on Supertramp’s song “Breakfast In America”. This New York band skillfully straddled Hip-Hop, Rock, and Pop, resulting in 6 Pop hits between 2006-2011. On ‘Chokehold’ they got an assist from fellow Fueled By Ramen/Decaydance labelmate Patrick Stump of Fall Out Boy.
Around the same time in 2006, Travie McCoy also showed up on a song from another band on the label’s roster, Cobra Starship. “Bring It (Snakes On A Plane)”, the theme to the movie on the same name, was too ridiculous and fun. The swirling synths of the intro lead into a hooky Alt-Pop gem. The song existed before the movie so the lyrics were altered to incorporate the gist of the movie (“kiss me goodbye, I can see the venom in your eyes”). The top 40 Alternative song had no choice but to go to #1 on my weekly chart. Between 2009-11 the band had 2 Pop top 10’s with “Good Girls Go Bad” and “You Make Me Feel”. Neither of those songs had much of an impact on me with ‘Feel’ not even making my chart. In 2014 they made my top 5 again with “Never Been In Love” featuring Icona Pop. The band pays homage to Pete Wentz of Fall Out Boy on the song “Pete Wentz Is The Only Reason We’re Famous”
Cobra Starship’s vocalist Gabe Saporta was friends with Wentz before Cobra Starship was formed. He had been in a Punk-Pop band called Midtown with fellow Rutgers University friends and released 3 albums on Drive-Thru Records between 1998-2004. That was another independent label that fueled the evolution of Punk-Pop with bands like New Found Glory, Something Corporate, and Hellogoodbye, who landed my #27 song of 2014 with “Everything Is Debatable”.
Something Corporate was led by Andrew McMahon and had a few minor Alternative hits in the early 2000s, one of which, “Space” made it to #26 on my chart. McMahon went on to form the band Jack’s Mannequin (leaving the Punk part behind and moving more Adult Pop) which similarly had a couple of minor hits including “The Resolution” a #27 Alternative song and the best performing of their 6 songs on my chart, reaching #13 in 2008. In 2012 he went solo under the name Andrew McMahon In The Wilderness and has had better luck on the Alternative chart with 2 top 10’s and a few others making the top 40. The Concord, Massachusetts native would reach #1 on my chart in 2015 with “Cecilia and The Satellite”, his only top 10 out of 7 tries.
Florida’s New Found Glory got as high as #11 on the Alternative chart in 2004 with a different “All Downhill From Here” (I guess those punk-poppers are a sad bunch) and #5 in 2002 with “My Friend’s Over You”. Their U.S. radio activity was all early 2000s but they have released 10 albums since 1999, the latest called “Forever + Ever x Infinity” this past Friday. Also, they had released 4 cover albums, 3 being a series called “From The Screen To Your Stereo”. Last year they had their best showing on my chart with Huey Lewis’ “The Power Of Love”, a song that forever will be associated with my Mom. For the 1986 music party, it was her #1 song, though that was not enough for it to get into the top 100, only placing at #132. The New Found Glory album also boasts versions of “This Is Me” from “The Greatest Showman” and “Let it Go” from “Frozen”.
Colorado’s 3OH!3 could loosely fall under the Punk-Pop umbrella and had a similar style to Gym Class Heroes, melding Electronic Dance and Hip-Hop in the mix. In 2009 they went to #1 on Pop radio with “Don’t Trust Me” before their 2 Billboard top 10’s with Kesha. Their song “Starstrukk” with Katy Perry was featured on the soundtrack to the Kristen Bell/Josh Duhamel romantic comedy “When In Rome” and was a substantial hit in Australia and across Europe (especially the UK and Poland) while only achieving moderate success in the States.
I was surprised that Gym Class Heroes had 5 songs hit the Pop top 20 including a second #1, “Stereo Hearts” with Adam Levine of Maroon 5 and “The Fighter” with Ryan Tedder of Onerepublic. My relationship with Maroon 5 has gone sour in recent years, the last time they made my top 10 was in 2011 with “Moves Like Jagger” and nothing has hit my top 100 since 2014. Funny thing is back in 2009 there were some thoughts of the band disbanding, the irony being that they are 1 of the biggest Pop artists of the last decade.
In 2010 they had 2 songs make my top 100 of the year, “Misery” at #69, which also saw a second life on my chart in 2011 (not sure why) and the funky “Give A Little More”, #46 and the best performer by the band ever for me. In another irony, it is the worst performer on the Hot 100 by the band ever, only landing at #86. Another odd stat for the band is that they reached #8 (but never higher) on my weekly chart 4 times. Besides ‘Jagger’ and ‘More’, “If I Never See Your Face Again” in 2008 and “Sweetest Goodbye”, a track from their debut album in 2004. I guess I like their funky side.
Since 2007, when they were integral to the huge Timbaland song “Apologize” (Billboard’s #5 song of the year in 2008), Onerepublic has had 9 appearances in the Pop top 25. Ryan Tedder since 2005 has produced and co-written a plethora of songs (Adele’s “Rumour Has It”, Beyonce’s “Halo” and Jonas Brothers “Sucker” to name 3) and has become a well-known name without the band. All 4 of those songs reached the music party top 12. In 2010 the band was promoting their second album “Waking Up”, spawning 3 hits, “All The Right Moves”, “Secrets” and “Good Life” (reaching #25 on my chart).
Besides, Tedder co-wrote songs for a few artists I have discussed here; Cobra Starship, K’Naan, and B.O.B. (that was a long aside from Bruno Mars!). He was also a featured vocalist on the Hot 100 top 10 song “Rocketeer” by Far East Movement, a song co-written by Bruno Mars and co-produced by The Smeezingtons. It was the follow-up to the group’s #1 Electro-Hip-Hop song “Like A G6”.
There is another coincidence that connects Onerepublic to Bruno Mars. The band was originally signed to Columbia Records but was dropped from the label 2 months before the release of their first album in 2006 (like Mars being dropped from Motown). They were highly active on Myspace and “Apologize” was to be the first single release, which they debuted on Myspace a short time after they were dropped. Timbaland caught attention of the song and thus a career was changed.
After laying the foundation with his collaborations, Mars released his first solo single in July 2010, “Just The Way You Are”, which brought him back to the Hot 100 #1 position. The mid-tempo love song spent 20 weeks at #1 on the Adult Contemporary chart as well and won the Grammy for Best Male Pop Vocal Performance. A relatively simple yet effective song. It showed up in Billboard’s top 20 of the year in both 2010 (#18) and 2011 (#15) along with a #17 showing at the 2011 music party.
The album “Doo-Wops and Hooligans” (Mars said he was inspired by Doo-Wop and his band is the Hooligans) surfaced in October and brought with it another Hot 100 #1 in “Grenade” (#6 of 2011). K’naan shows up again on the next single, the Reggae-Pop “The Lazy Song” as a co-writer. That one topped the UK chart and #4 on the Hot 100 (#26 of 2011). “Marry You” was an international success but not a single in the U.S., though it did get extensive airplay. “Talking To The Moon” was a #1 song in Brazil, thanks to its inclusion in a Brazilian telenovela and “Count On Me” #1 in Germany.
The final song on the album “The Other Side” features B.O.B. and Cee-Lo Green and of course, Mars co-wrote and The Smeezingtons produced his 2010 hit “F*** You” (Forget You for radio purposes). That song peaked at #2 on the Hot 100 and became Billboard’s #7 song of 2011 (#3 at the 20011 music party). It was nominated for Record and Song of the Year at the 2011 Grammys (alongside “Nothin’ On You” for Record of the Year). In both categories, the winner was “Need You Now” by Lady Antebellum. As of June 11 they are now called Lady A, after the band realized the connotation the word has to slavery. This created more controversy than it alleviated with an African American singer and activist Anita White (ironic, don’t ya think) having used that moniker for over 2 decades. Now that’s a failed attempt at righting a wrong.
To end on a happier note, many of the artists discussed here (both Punk-Pop and Pop/R&B) have shown up on Fearless Records album series “Punk Goes Pop”. There are 7 editions in that series between 2001-2017. In total there are 20 including Punk Goes Metal, Classic Rock, Crunk, and more.
YouTube playlist with the songs from Part 2
Part 2, Manic Musings, the Queen is Everywhere, Trick Shots and Kickstarting Video Gimmicks
Manic Bloom/Tonight Is When I Say Goodbye (2)
This was the second song by the Nashville indie band to make my chart. They first appeared on a personal chart I processed for Beyond Radio that I called JDM. I can not remember what chart that was. I have lost a lot of data files, personal chart files of my own and Beyond Radio and Top Hits Online data files as well. Many were on an external hard drive that was damaged by a fall, and data could not be recovered. Other files were lost from computer crashes or on damaged floppy disks. I wish I had been more vigilant in saving things.
What I know about the debut of Manic Bloom is that it showed up on JDM’s chart the week of Nov. 15. 2009. The song was “Running From The Scene” and it reached the Beyond Radio Rock top 100 in December but not sure how long it was on or where it peaked. On my chart it peaked at #2 in early 2010 and was my #11 of the year. It is a mid-tempo rock song with prominent piano and a very polished sound for an indie band. I was hooked by the melody, singer David Joel Stevenson’s voice and the radio friendly grandiosity (somewhere between Muse and Queen).
“Tonight Is When I Say Goodbye” was their next appearance on my chart and again reached #2. I was falling in love with their sound (what they describe as epic, melodic rock) and all 5 songs from the 2008 self-titled debut EP reached my top 10. “Betrayer” and “What Scares You Most” (23) both hitting #10 and “Everything I Saved You From” spending 4 weeks at #1, which helped it land at #3 for the year. A great guitar hook and Stevenson’s soaring pipes solidified that. He is also and actor and an author. In August 2010 they released a second EP, “In Loving Memory”, and the first song from that to chart was a bit more of a love ballad (“just one more touch, just one more word, where would I be if I never had you here with me”). “A Thousand Angels” again hit #1 and was #4 for the 2010-2011 cycle.
Seeing a pattern here? They were my #2 artist of 2010, behind Shinedown. Most of the songs from “In Loving Memory” charted for me. A total of 5 hitting #1. The ‘what should have been a sports anthem’ and most straightforward rock song of theirs, “Never Back Down” was #1 for 3 weeks. Its lyric and the insistent guitar intro would be a perfect fit for a team. In fact, the band did garner some attention on the YouTube channel Dude Perfect, the second most subscribed to sports channel on YT. The channel has been around since 2009 and it is filled with trick shot videos and comedy musings.
Speaking of Muse, “Push Off the Ground” (3 weeks at #1), “Death And Conversation” (1 week) and “Toynbee” (2 weeks) veer the closest to Muse territory. Can’t really connect the title to the lyrics on that one. Wikipedia offers famous British people with the last name and mysterious “Toynbee” tiles, found in many cities around America. ‘Push’ has the most otherworldly sound, with great instrumentation and a 50 second instrumental bridge with the piano ascending and descending rapid fire, choral background and a wall of guitar and synths.
Their 2015 album “I Know What’s Next…But You Won’t Believe Me” hints much more directly to their Christian faith though they do not consider themselves a Christian band. They used a Kickstarter campaign to fund its production, which I contributed to. All those who contributed were thanked in the liner notes. The album produced 8 more songs for my personal chart top 100, including 3 more #1’s. “False Prophet” has some of the atmospheric sounds of “Push Off The Ground” but with a more driving rock chorus. “Farewell” segues from the instrumental “Prepare The Way” and eases into its gorgeous intro. The bands essence of melody throughout their catalogue is impressive. The only part of this song I could do without is the “I’m ready to break” scream. Other than that, this song kills with a chorus lyric “the one who holds the truth is saving you”. This seems to be a companion piece to “Everything I’ve Saved You From”. I get what the Christian message this album is espousing, and I think with a lot of Christian based music I have my own takeaway.
Funny until this moment I did not realize that the first song on the debut, “What Scares You Most”, has a bible verse from the Old Testament’s “Book of Daniel”; “Menne, Menne, Tekel Uparisin“. It speaks of the end of times and connects to the last book of the New Testament, “Revelations”. With that new-found knowledge it is easy to see how the intent of the band may have come full circle with “Farewell”. Why they were not embraced by Christian radio (or radio at all) baffles me.
The band’s biggest song on my chart also comes from this 2015 album. “One More Chance” spent 4 weeks at #1 and was my #1 for 2016 with 41 weeks on my chart. Based on the number of songs that made my year-end top 40 through the years Manic Bloom is tied for my #22 artist of all-time with The Carpenters and Chicago, though all 11 of those songs reached #1 or #2.
Muse had a good year on my chart (but not as good as the 2004-2005 cycle) with 6 songs from the album “The Resistance” plus 1 soundtrack song making my personal chart. That album hit #1 in 19 countries and hit #3 on the Billboard 200. “Guiding Light” (68) was the fourth to chart, the first 2, “Uprising” and “The Resistance” both peaked at #6 on my chart while “Uprising” was Billboard’s #1 Alternative track of the year and as of 2018 was the biggest song ever on the magazine’s Alternative chart.
The album was compared to Queen and Radiohead. I have always said that Muse took on the mantle of the sound that Radiohead had in the late 90’s before that band became pretentious and experimental into the 2000’s. That was evident on their debut album “Showbiz” in 1999 and the great songs “Muscle Museum” and “Cave”, though at the time they did not perform to their potential on my chart, both missing my weekly top 40. Funny tidbit about “Muscle Museum”, there is no lyric like that in the song. The title came from the words before and after muse in the dictionary.
In 2010 the band won the Silver Clef Award, which honors artists who have made significant contributions to the UK music scene. It was presented to them by Brian May and Roger Taylor of Queen. “The Resistance” also won a Grammy for Rock album of the year. On the album they perform a 3-part symphony called “Exogenesis”. Their Queen influence and grand theatrics are also displayed on “Neutron Star Collision”, their contribution to “The Twilight Saga: Eclipse” film, which made the Alternative and UK top 15. For the tour to support the album they started with a 2 night stint in their hometown called “A Seaside Rendezvous”, most likely an homage to the song “Seaside Rendezvous” from Queen’s album “A Night At The Opera” (and a #1 song on my personal chart in May 1976).
Crash Kings are an L.A. band lead by brothers Tony and Mike Beliveau. They scored an Alternative #1 in 2010, and #13 Alt track of the year with “Mountain Man” (42). Like both Muse and Manic Bloom, there is prominent piano in their brand of Alt Rock. And in Manic Bloom fashion they employed a Kickstarter campaign to help complete their second album, Dark of The Daylight”, in 2013.
Reviewers at the time also compared them to the White Stripes, Ben Folds and Queen (isn’t everybody?). In fact, one review noted some similarity to the Stripes “My Doorbell”, with “Mountain Man” taking on a harder edge. That Stripes influence is also heard on “You Got Me”, a top 20 Alternative song in 2010, while the Folds connection comes into play on the lighter “Non Believer”, the third single from the debut album.
In 2010 Ben Folds teamed up with British writer Nick Hornby for the album “Lonely Avenue”, with Hornby writing the lyrics and Folds composing the music. Hornby is best known for the novels/movies/TV shows “High Fidelity” and “About A Boy”. The TV version of ‘Fidelity’ debuted on Hulu in February of this year with Zoe Kravitz (daughter of Lenny and Lisa Bonet), putting a female spin on the titular character, record store owner Rob. 2 songs from the Folds/Hornby collaboration were on my radar in 2010, “Belinda” and “From Above” yet neither reached my top 100. The album also includes a song called “Levi Johnston’s Blues”; yes that’s Bristol Palin’s former fiancé. It has been a while since Folds has been on my chart so I’m giving those songs another go.
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OK Go (get the transition?) circles back nicely to Manic Bloom (well indirectly). “This Too Shall Pass” (50), was a top 40 Alternative song accompanied by a video that features a Rube Goldberg Machine. That is a machine that uses unrelated objects that are combined to create a series of actions. Named after early 20th century cartoonist Rube Goldberg who had a comic strip between 1929-1931 that lead to the phenomenon. To put it more simply, if you’ve ever played the game Mouse Trap, that would be an RBG.
The Chicago based group had gotten notoriety in 2007 with the song and video “Here It Goes Again”, top 20 Alternative and on my chart as well (#16). That one was choreographed with the band using 8 treadmills and won a Grammy for Best Music Video. Both are great to watch. There is a series of trick shot videos from the Dude Perfect guys using Rube Goldberg Machine style (the Manic Bloom reference). Which leads back to OK Go. On the video for their debut single “Get Over It” in 2002, there is a 5 second stop in the middle of the song with the 4 band members playing a game of ping pong. They sent out miniature ping pong tables to the press to promote the song.
Over the last 15 years they have made quite a number of gimmicky, synchronized, and choreographed videos with 10’s of millions views, but the music has always stood up as well. Their brand of power pop has made my chart 12 times, most recently with “Writing’s On The Wall” in 2019 and “Obsession” in 2018 (both from 2014’s album “Hungry Ghost”) but they have never reached by top 10, a surprise.
It was the video for ‘Pass” that would lead the band to leave their major label and start their own independent own, Paracadute. Their record company only allowed views of the video on YouTube and lead singer Damian Kulash posted a letter on their website with an embed code of the video, against the companies wishes. In April 2010 they severed relations with EMI and Capitol, took control of the album “Of The Blue Colour Of The Sky”, and formed their label. A cute aside, Kulash has a dog named Bunny Carlos, named after the drummer Bun E. Carlos of another power pop band from Chicago, Cheap Trick.
In watching the videos for this piece 2 other songs from “Hungry Ghost” will re-emerge on my chart, “The One Moment” and “I Won’t Let You Down”. There is a third brand new song, “All Together Now”, a tribute to healthcare workers that was released on May 12. Early in the pandemic Kulash and his wife contracted COVID-19; his was mild, hers lead to a hospital stay, and both have since recovered. The video is a zoom style video, done with the band’s signature inventive style, and it ends in a very sobering way. You can donate to “Partners In Health” by downloading the video.
YouTube playlist with the songs from Part 1
My Personal Chart Blog, June 1, 2010
Part 1, Spiritual Questions to Ponder, an Unstoppable Album, a Potent Memory, a Hot 100 Analysis and the Soap Connection
Better Than Ezra/Just One Day (1)
“What would do, what would you say, if everyone you loved came back for just one day?”. That line helped to solidify the #1 position on my chart this week in 2010. There was quite a lot of emotion circling my chart at this time. I can not pinpoint what the reason was, I think maybe things sometimes go in cycles. It had been 9 years since my Mom had passed and I am certain this song triggered my sense of loss.
The Baton Rouge band, Better Than Ezra had their heyday in the mid to late 90’s with the songs “Good” and “Desperately Wanting” among others. Since 2001, when they were dropped by Elektra, the band had been releasing albums on independent labels, 4 between 2001-2014. They have graced my chart 24 times with 4 songs off the 2009 album “Paper Empires”. Besides the thought provoking ‘Day’, the first single “Absolutely Still” made my top 20 and the strummy yet funky “Black Light” made it up to #2. Unfortunately, they did not see any radio success with this album.
“Absolutely Still” was co-written by lead singer Kevin Griffin and singer-songwriter Val Emmich who had released it previously in 2007. Emmich is connected to the Broadway musical ‘Dear Evan Hansen” as he wrote a YA novel based on it. Griffin produced and co-wrote the song “Be There” for singer-songwriter Howie Day of Bangor, Maine. That song was a top 25 Adult Pop song in 2009 and made my top 40 of that year. His song “So Stung” (76), the lead song on his album, was co-written by Jay Clifford of the North Carolina band Jump, Little Children who had an Adult Alternative hit in 1999 with the gorgeous lament “Cathedrals”, a song that spent 2 weeks at #1 on my chart. It was really their only national success, but they have become a mainstay of the Charleston, South Carolina music scene. Clifford just released a video of the song on April 21, he alone with guitar, singing in an empty Charleston Music Hall, this to help raise money for artists during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Better Than Ezra’s producer Warren Huart was involved with some of the other artists on my chart this week including Howie Day and the next 2 artists. Vedera, a Kansas City, Missouri band whose song “Satisfy” (80) ponders the question “is there anything left in this world that will satisfy me?” Lead singer Kristen May went on to replace the lead singer of Christian rock band Flyleaf. Lacey Strum, in 2012. South Carolina’s Trevor Hall dabbles in a mix of rootsy folk and reggae. His moment in time on my chart was 2010-11 with 3 songs making impact. “Volume” (6) ending up as my #9 song of the year. This along with “Brand New Day” and “Unity” all possess a positive spiritual energy.