滚石杂志2011《500 Greatest Songs of All Time (91-150)》含评语

原地址：500 Greatest Songs of All Time

91 Elvis Presley, ‘Suspicious Minds’

Writer: Mark James Producers: Chips Moman, Felton Jarvis, Presley Released: Sept. '69, RCA 15 weeks; No. 1

When Moman presented this song to Presley in 1969, the singer was, as the lyrics put it, "caught in a trap" — a cash cow being milked dry by his label and hangers-on. That might be why Presley was convinced he could turn the song into a deep-soul hit, even though it had flopped in 1968 for singer-songwriter Mark James. Recorded between four and seven in the morning, during the landmark Memphis session that helped return the King to his throne, "Suspicious Minds" — the final Number One single of his lifetime — is Presley's masterpiece: He sings so intensely through the fade-out that his band returns for another minute of the tear-stained chorus.

Appears on: Elvis 30 #1 Hits (RCA)

92 Ramones, ‘Blitzkrieg Bop’

Writers:The Ramones Producer: Craig Leon Released: May '76, Sire Did not chart

In less than three minutes, this song threw down the blueprint for punk rock. It's all here on the opening track of theRamones' debut: the buzz-saw chords, which Johnny played on his $50 Mosrite guitar; the snotty words, courtesy of drummer Tommy (with bassist Dee Dee adding the brilliant line "Shoot 'em in the back now"); and the hairball-in-the-throat vocals, sung by Joey in a faux British accent. Recorded on the cheap at New York's Radio City Music Hall, of all places, "Blitzkrieg Bop" never made the charts; instead, it almost single-handedly created a world beyond the charts. The kick-off chant "Hey! Ho! Let's go!" meanwhile, is now an anthem of its own at sporting events nationwide.

Appears on: Ramones (Rhino)

93 U2, ‘I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For’

Writer: Bono Producers: Daniel Lanois, Brian Eno Released: May '87, Island 17 weeks; No. 1

"The music that really turns me on is either running toward God or away from God," Bono told Rolling Stone. U2's second Number One single revels in ambivalence — "an anthem of doubt more than faith," Bono has called it. The song was typical of the arduous sessions for The Joshua Tree: Originally called "Under the Weather," it began, like most U2 songs, as a jam. "It sounded to me a little like 'Eye of the Tiger' played by a reggae band," the Edge recalled. "It had this great beat," Lanois said. "I remember humming a traditional melody in Bono's ear. He said, 'That's it! Don't sing any more!' — and went off and wrote the melody as we know it."

Appears on: The Joshua Tree (Island)

94 Little Richard, ‘Good Golly, Miss Molly’

Writers: Robert "Bumps" Blackwell, John Marascalco Producer: Blackwell Released: Feb. '58, Specialty 15 weeks; No. 10

Little Richard first heard the phrase "Good golly, Miss Molly," from a Southern DJ named Jimmy Pennick. He turned the words into perhaps his most blatant assault on American propriety: "Good golly, Miss Molly/You sure like to ball." He swiped the music from Ike Turner's piano intro to Jackie Brenston's "Rocket 88," recorded by Sam Phillips in Memphis seven years earlier. "I always liked that record," Richard recalled, "and I used to use the riff in my act, so when we were looking for a lead-in to 'Good Golly, Miss Molly,' I did that and it fit." Richard had renounced rock & roll the previous year, but Specialty couldn't leave this classic in the vaults.

Appears on: The Georgia Peach (Specialty)

95 Carl Perkins, ‘Blue Suede Shoes’

Writer: Perkins Producer: Sam Phillips Released: Feb '56, Sun 21 weeks; No. 2

Johnny Cash had already given Perkins the phrase "blue suede shoes" as an idea for a song. But when he overheard a Tennessee hepcat who was trying to keep the girl he was dancing with from scuffing up his new kicks, Perkins was inspired to write the song that would be his Sun debut. It was the first single to crack the pop, R&B and country charts, and Perkins was driving to New York to perform the song on The Perry Como Show when his car crashed into a poultry truck, laying him up for weeks. He could only sit home and watch while "Blue Suede Shoes" was performed on The Milton Berle Show — sung by Elvis Presley, who would later admit he couldn't top Perkins' original.

Appears on: Original Sun Greatest Hits (Rhino)

96 Jerry Lee Lewis, ‘Great Balls of Fire’

Writers: Otis Blackwell, Jack Hammer Producer: Sam Phillips Released: Nov. '57, Sun 21 weeks; No. 2

With Lewis pounding the piano and leering, "Great Balls of Fire" was full of Southern Baptist hellfire turned into a near-blasphemous ode to pure lust. Lewis, a Bible-college dropout and cousin to Jimmy Swaggart, refused to sing it at first and got into a theological argument with Phillips that concluded with Lewis asking, "How can the devil save souls?" But as the session wore on and the liquor kept flowing, Lewis' mood changed considerably — on bootleg tapes he can be heard saying, "I would like to eat a little pussy if I had some." Goodness gracious, great balls of fire, indeed.

Appears on: Original Sun Greatest Hits (Rhino)

97 Chuck Berry, ‘Roll Over Beethoven’

Writer: Berry Producers: Leonard and Phil Chess Released: May '56, Chess 5 weeks; No. 29

"I wanted to play the blues," Chuck Berry told Rolling Stone. "But I wasn't blue enough. We always had food on the table." Berry originally wrote this guitar anthem as an affectionate dig at his sister Lucy, who spent so much time playing classical music on the family piano that young Chuck couldn't get a turn. But "Roll Over Beethoven" became the ultimate rock & roll call to arms, declaring a new era: "Roll over, Beethoven/And tell Tchaikovsky the news." Berry announced this changing of the musical guard with a blazing guitar riff and pounding piano from sidekick Johnnie Johnson.

Appears on: The Anthology (Chess)

98 Al Green, ‘Love and Happiness’

Writers: Green, Mabon "Teenie" Hodges Producer: Willie Mitchell Released: June '72, Hi 12 weeks; No. 3

"Sixty percent of my audience are women," Green once said. "And a woman is more sensitive than a man, especially in the area of love and happiness." Hodges wrote the urgent, romantic "Love and Happiness" one morning in between having sex with his girlfriend and watching wrestling on TV. Green recently claimed that Hodges sang him the opening guitar riff on a road trip and they drove 160 miles back to Memphis to record it that night. He has described the song as "like a slow fever, building on the beat, pushing up the temperature with each breath of the staccato horns and pushing through delirium as we came up on the fade."

Appears on: I'm Still in Love With You (Capitol)

99 Creedence Clearwater Revival, ‘Fortunate Son’

Writer: John Fogerty Producer: Fogerty Released: Oct. '69, Fantasy 14 weeks; No. 14

"Fortunate Son" is a blast at rich folks who plan wars and then draft poor people to fight them. Fogerty wrote it out of disgust at the fancy wedding plans of Richard Nixon's daughter. "You just had the feeling that none of these people were going to be too involved with the war," he said.

Appears on: Willy and the Poor Boys (Fantasy)

100 Gnarls Barkley, ‘Crazy’

Writers: Brian Burton, Thomas Calloway, Gianfranco Reverberi, Gian Piero Reverberi Producer: Danger Mouse Released: May '06, Downtown 24 weeks; No. 2

"Crazy" was a rarity in the 2000s: a universal pop smash that was played on virtually every radio format — it went Top 10 on both the pop and the modern-rock charts — and was covered by singers from Nelly Furtado to Billy Idol. The lyrics, which celebrate risk-taking, came out of a conversation Cee-Lo and Danger Mouse had in the studio: The pair decided that their genre-smashing collaborations were indeed "crazy." With a haunting melody inspired by spaghetti Western soundtrack-composer Ennio Morricone, "Crazy" didn't feel like a hit. "It seemed too out there for urban radio and too urban for rock radio," Danger Mouse told Rolling Stone.

Appears on: St. Elsewhere (Downtown)

101 The Rolling Stones, ‘You Can’t Always Get What You Want’

Writers: Mick Jagger, Keith Richards Producer: Jimmy Miller Released: July '69, London 8 weeks; No. 42

After a November 1968 recording session, Al Kooper asked Jagger if he could take a stab at a horn chart for a new song. Kooper got his wish, but only his French horn made the final mix, providing "You Can't Always Get What You Want" with its signature intro. The song's piano groove was based on an Etta James record, and producer Miller — "Mr. Jimmy" in the Jagger lyric — subbed for Charlie Watts when the Stones drummer had difficulty mastering the tricky groove. Phil Spectoraccomplice Jack Nitzsche provided the crowning touch in March 1969, orchestrating the London Bach Choir into a towering backing chorus. A grandiose finale for a landmark album.

Appears on: Let It Bleed (ABKCO)

102 The Jimi Hendrix Experience, ‘Voodoo Child (Slight Return)’

Writer: Jimi Hendrix Producer: Chas Chandler Released: Oct. '68, Reprise Non-single

After a night of partying in New York on May 2nd, 1968, Hendrix, Experience drummer Mitch Mitchell, Traffic's Stevie Winwood and Jefferson Airplane's Jack Casady returned to Electric Ladyland studio and cut "Voodoo Chile," a 15-minute take on Muddy Waters' "Rolling Stone." Later that day, Hendrix, Mitchell and bassist Noel Redding were being filmed by a TV crew. Hendrix improvised the staggering wah-wah guitar riff that kicks off the apocalyptic blues "Voodoo Child (Slight Return)" on the spot. "It was like, 'OK, boys, look like we're recording,'" Hendrix said. "We weren't thinking about what we were playing."

Appears on: Electric Ladyland (MCA)

103 Gene Vincent and His Blue Caps, ‘Be-Bop-A-Lula’

Writers: Vincent, Bill Davis Producer: Ken Nelson Released: May '56, Capitol 20 weeks; No. 7

With Vincent's echo-soaked voice, Cliff Gallup's high-reverb guitar and 15-year-old drummer Dickie Harrell's wildcat screams, "Be-Bop-A-Lula" went to Number Seven in 1956. Vincent signed to Capitol, which had been hunting for its own Elvis-type singer. A restless sort, Vincent joined the Navy while still underage and nearly had his leg amputated after a motorcycle crackup. He reportedly wrote "Be-Bop-A-Lula" with a fellow patient while recuperating at a naval hospital.

Appears on: The Screaming End: The Best of Gene Vincent and His Blue Caps (Razor and Tie)

104 Donna Summer, ‘Hot Stuff’

Writers: Pete Bellotte, Harold Faltermeyer, Keith Forsey Producer: Giorgio Moroder, Bellotte Released: April '79, Casablanca 21 weeks; No. 1

The Rolling Stones' "Miss You" and Rod Stewart's "Da Ya Think I'm Sexy" approached disco from the world of rock. Now Summer and producer Moroder wanted to return the favor. Setting a thumping kick-drum pulse against a raunchy guitar solo from Doobie Brother (and disco hater) Jeff "Skunk" Baxter, they paved the way for such hybrids as Michael Jackson's "Beat It." The Queen of Disco snarled with an assertiveness rarely heard on her earlier Euro-disco hits. The 12-inch memorably segues directly into Summer's follow-up, "Bad Girls."

Appears on: Bad Girls (Mercury/Chronicles)

105 Stevie Wonder, ‘Living for the City’

Writer: Wonder Producer: Wonder Released: August '73, Tamla 17 weeks; No. 8

Wonder went epic with "Living for the City," a bleak seven-minute narrative about the broken dreams of black America that was so powerful, Richard Pryor later recorded the lyrics delivered as a church sermon. Wonder sings about a boy growing up in the mythical town of Hard Times, Mississippi, surrounded by poverty and racism. When he takes the bus to New York in search of a better life, he gets set up for a drug bust and goes to jail. Wonder filled the song with cinematic dialogue, even recruiting one of the janitors at the recording studio to play the white prison guard who mutters, "Get into that cell, nigger." Public Enemy sampled the line years later on It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back.

Appears on: Innervisions (Motown)

106 Simon and Garfunkel, ‘The Boxer’

Writer: Paul Simon Producers: Roy Halee, Simon, Art Garfunkel Released: April '69, Columbia 10 weeks; No. 7

"The Boxer" is about a New York kid who can't find love, a job or a home — just those whores on Seventh Avenue. "I was reading the Bible," Simon said of the song's genesis. "That's where 'workman's wages' came from." He sang the song as a tribute to New York on the first Saturday Night Live after 9/11.

Appears on: Bridge Over Troubled Water (Columbia)

107 Bob Dylan, ‘Mr. Tambourine Man’

Writer: Dylan Producer: Tom Wilson Released: March '65, Columbia Non-single

Inspired by Bruce Langhorne — a session guitarist who played on several Dylan records — "Mr. Tambourine Man" is the tune that elevated Dylan from folk hero to bona fide star. "[Bruce] was one of those characters….He had this gigantic tambourine as big as a wagon wheel," Dylan said. "The vision of him playing just stuck in my mind." Written partly during a drug-fueled cross-country trek in 1964, the song was recorded on January 15th, 1965; five days later, based on a demo (which Dylan cut with Ramblin' Jack Elliott) they'd heard, the Byrds recorded their own electrified version. "Wow, man," said Dylan, "you can even dance to that!"

Appears on: Bringing it All Back Home (Columbia)

108 Buddy Holly and the Crickets, ‘Not Fade Away’

Writers: Holly, Norman Petty Producer: Petty Released: Oct. '57, Brunswick 20 weeks; No. 10

Recorded in Clovis, New Mexico, in May 1957, "Not Fade Away" was originally the B side to Holly's hit "Oh, Boy!" The Crickets were no strangers to the Bo Diddley beat — they had already covered "Bo Diddley" — but with "Not Fade Away" they made the rhythm their own, thanks to drummer Jerry Allison, who pounded out the beat on a cardboard box. Allison, Holly's best friend, also claims to have written most of the lyrics, though his name never appeared in the songwriting credits. In 1964, the song became the Rolling Stones' first release in the U.S.

Appears on: Greatest Hits (MCA)

109 Prince, ‘Little Red Corvette’

Writer: Prince Producer: Prince Released: March '83, Warner 22 weeks; No. 6

A horse-racing metaphor, a car metaphor and, probably, a clitoris metaphor: Prince didn't scrimp on literary possibilities in coming up with what would be his first Top 10 hit. In 1982, Prince had a 24-track studio installed in his basement; by 6 p.m. the day after it was set up, he had recorded "Little Red Corvette." The song is an almost perfect erotic fusion of rock and funk that builds slowly until exploding into a guitar solo. Fittingly, Prince wrote the lyrics in the back seat of a car, but not a red Corvette: It was a bright-pink Ford Edsel belonging to Revolution keyboardist Lisa Coleman.

Appears on: 1999 (Warner Bros.)

110 Van Morrison, ‘Brown Eyed Girl’

Writer: Morrison Producer: Bert Berns Released: June '67, Bang 16 weeks; No. 10

The cheery "sha-la-la" chorus of "Brown Eyed Girl," originally titled "Brown Skinned Girl," brought Morrison to the top of the pop charts, even though he didn't much like the record and recently said he doesn't even consider it one of his best 300 songs. "The record came out different," Morrison said. "This fellow, Bert, he made it the way he wanted it, and I accepted the fact that he was producing it, so I just let him do it." After its smash success, Morrison turned his back on mainstream pop. "It just put me in some awkward positions," he said. "Like lip-syncing on a television show. I can't lip-sync." His next album, the masterful Astral Weeks, was a personal acoustic song cycle that sold practically nothing.

Appears on: Blowin' Your Mind (Sony)

111 Otis Redding, ‘I’ve Been Loving You too Long (to Stop Now)’

Writers: Jerry Butler, Redding Producers: Jim Stewart, Steve Cropper Released: April '65, Volt 11 weeks; No. 21

Redding and soul balladeer "Iceman" Butler were hanging out in Redding's hotel room in Buffalo, New York, after a gig when Butler sang a half-finished song he had been working on. "Hey, man, that's a smash," Redding said. "Let me go mess around with it. Maybe I'll come up with something." Sure enough, "I've Been Loving You Too Long" became Redding's first Top 40 single, in June 1965. And when Redding performed a scorching drawn-out version at the Monterey Pop Festival in 1967 — in front of the audience he called "the love crowd" — the single made the transition from hit to legend.

Appears on: Otis Blue: Otis Redding Sings Soul (Atco)

112 Hank Williams, ‘I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry’

Writer: Williams Producer: Fred Rose Released: Nov. '49, Sterling Did not chart

This track — a vision of lonesome Americana over a steady beat — was Williams' favorite out of all the songs he wrote. But he worried that the lyrics about weeping robins and falling stars were too artsy for his rural audience, which might explain why the track was buried on the B side of "My Bucket's Got a Hole in It." "Lonesome" didn't catch much attention, but after Williams' death it came to symbolize his whiskey-soaked life, and artists such as Willie Nelson resurrected it, setting the mood for much of the country music that followed.

Appears on: The Ultimate Collection (Universal)

113 Elvis Presley, ‘That’s All Right’

Writer: Arthur Crudup Producer: Sam Phillips Released: Aug. '54, Sun Did not chart

Presley was halfway into his first recording session, with Sun Records' Sam Phillips, when Presley pulled out "Big Boy" Crudup's 1946 blues obscurity "That's All Right," and the world changed. Recorded in a shockingly fast, lusty new style, the single was the place where race and hillbilly music collided and became rock & roll. Presley would cover two more Crudup tunes in 1956: "My Baby Left Me" and "So Glad You're Mine." Presley would remember, "I said if I ever got to the place where I could feel all old Arthur felt, I'd be a music man like nobody ever saw."

Appears on: Sunrise (RCA)

114 The Drifters, ‘Up on the Roof’

Writers: Gerry Goffin, Carole King Producers: Jerry Leiber, Mike Stoller Released: Nov. '62, Atlantic 20 weeks; No. 5

"Up on the Roof" — a breezy summertime song for city dwellers whose only getaways were the tar beaches at the top of their buildings — was written by the husband-and-wife team of Goffin and King, rising stars on New York's Tin Pan Alley scene who had broken through with the Shirelles' "Will You Love Me Tomorrow" and had already written one Drifters hit ("Some Kind of Wonderful"). It was sung by Rudy Lewis, the third in the Drifters' cavalcade of great lead voices; in 1970, King reclaimed the song as a recording artist with a wistful, downtempo version.

Appears on: The Very Best of the Drifters (Rhino)

115 Sam Cooke, ‘You Send Me’

Writer: Cooke Producer: Richard "Bumps" Blackwell Released: Oct. '57, Keen 26 weeks; No. 1

The plan was to remake gospel star Cooke as a secular singer. But Specialty Records owner Art Rupe objected so strongly to Blackwell's use of white female backing vocalists for a session — Rupe thought that Cooke was watering his sound down too much — that he released Cooke from his contract. Major-label scouts were confused by the record, too, thinking it was too soft for R&B but too gritty for the pop charts. Then Blackwell took the tapes to Keen Records' Bob Keane, who had signed Ritchie Valens and who smelled another winner. "I said, 'Screw the black market,'" Keane said. "'This is a pop record, daddy-o!'"

Appears on: Greatest Hits (RCA)

116 The Rolling Stones, ‘Honky Tonk Women’

Writers: Mick Jagger, Keith Richards Producer: Jimmy Miller Released: July '69, London 15 weeks; No. 1

Mick Jagger and Keith Richards came up with "Honky Tonk Women" on a South American vacation, using their girlfriends at the time, Marianne Faithfull and Anita Pallenberg, as sounding boards. Returning to the recording studio in May 1969 with pure-rock lyrics such as "I met a gin-soaked barroom queen in Memphis," the Rolling Stones recorded the song in five hours. "Honky Tonk Women" marked the debut of guitarist Mick Taylor, who overdubbed in his part; producer Jimmy Miller added some crucial cowbell, which pounded home "Honky Tonk's" strip-club bump and grind.

Appears on: Let It Bleed (ABKCO)

117 Al Green, ‘Take Me to the River’

Writers: Green, Mabon Hodges Producer: Willie Mitchell Released: Nov. '74, Hi Non-single

Al Green and Hi Records house guitarist Mabon "Teenie" Hodges wrote "Take Me to the River" not by a river but by a lake: They holed up in a rented house at Lake Hamilton in Hot Springs, Arkansas, for three days in 1973 to come up with new material. "I was trying to get more stability in my life," said Green, who has famously struggled at balancing his gospel and sexy, earthier sides. "I wrote, 'Take me to the river/Wash me down/Cleanse my soul.'" When it became the first Top 40 hit for Talking Heads in late 1978, "River" gained a whole new audience.

Appears on: Al Green Explores Your Mind (The Right Stuff)

118 Beyonce feat. Jay-Z, ‘Crazy in Love’

Writers: Rich Harrison, Beyonce, Jay-Z Producers: Harrison, Beyonce Released: May '03, Columbia 27 weeks; No. 1

Those horns weren't a hook; they were a herald: Pop's new queen had arrived. Beyoncé's debut solo smash, powered by a brass blast sampled from the Chi-Lites' "Are You My Woman (Tell Me So)," announced her liberation from Destiny's Child and firmly established her MO: She'd best the competition by doing everything sassier, bigger, crazier. Her future husband, Jay-Z, stepped up, too — it took him just 10 minutes to create (he writes nothing down) and record his typically braggadocious cameo.

Appears on: Dangerously in Love (Columbia)

119 The Isley Brothers, ‘Shout (Parts 1 and 2)’

Writers: Rudolph Isley, Ronald Isley, O'Kelly Isley Producers: Hugo Peretti, Luigi Creatore Released: Sept. '59, RCA 11 weeks; No. 47

The five-minute-long workout "Shout" was a modest hit upon its original release in 1959, but it's perhaps better remembered for its appearance in the 1978 movie Animal House, where the fictional Otis Day and the Knights (with a young Robert Cray on bass) played an almost note-for-note copy of the Isley Brothers' original. As O'Kelly Isley, who helped found the group in the mid-Fifties, noted, the world was just coming around to the Isley Brothers' original sound. "People have been playin' our music in bars and discotheques for years," he told Rolling Stone in 1975, "''cause it's danceable, man."

Appears on: The Isley Brothers Story, Vol. 1: Rockin' Soul (Rhino)

120 Fleetwood Mac, ‘Go Your Own Way’

Writer: Lindsey Buckingham Producers: Fleetwood Mac, Richard Dashut, Ken Caillat Released: Jan. '77, Warner Bros. 15 weeks; No. 10

Quintessential Fleetwood Mac: "I very much resented him telling the world that 'packing up, shacking up' with different men was all I wanted to do," said Stevie Nicks of this Buckingham kiss-off.

Appears on: Rumours (Warner Bros.)

121 The Jackson 5, ‘I Want You Back’

Writers: Freddie Perren, Fonce Mizell, Deke Richards, Berry Gordy Jr. Producers: Perren, Mizell, Richards, Gordy Released: Nov. '69, Motown 19 weeks; No. 1

"I Want You Back" was the song that introduced Motown to the futuristic funk beat of Sly Stone and James Brown. It also introduced the world to an 11-year-old Indiana kid named Michael Jackson. The five dancing Jackson brothers became stars overnight; "ABC," "The Love You Save" and "I'll Be There" followed in rapid succession on the charts, but none matched the boyish fervor of "Back." It remains one of hip-hop's favorite beats, sampled everywhere from Kris Kross' "Jump" to Jay-Z's "Izzo (H.O.V.A.)."

Appears on: The Ultimate Collection (Motown)

122 Ben E. King, ‘Stand By Me’

Writers: King, Elmo Glick, Jerry Leiber, Mike Stoller Producers: Leiber, Stoller Released: April '61, Atco 14 weeks; No. 4

Ben E. King wrote "Stand By Me" when he was still the lead singer of the Drifters — but the group didn't want it. As King recalled, the Drifters' manager told him, "Not a bad song, but we don't need it." But after King went solo, he revived "Stand By Me" at the end of a session with Leiber. "I showed him the song," King said. "Did it on piano a little bit, he called the musicians back into the studio, and we went ahead and recorded it." "Stand By Me" has been a pop-soul standard ever since, covered by everyone from John Lennonto Green Day.

Appears on: The Very Best of Ben E. King (Rhino)

123 The Animals, ‘The House of the Rising Sun’

Writer: Alan Price Producer: Mickie Most Released: July '64, MGM 11 weeks; No. 1

"We were looking for a song that would grab people's attention," said Animals singer Eric Burdon. They found it with the old U.S. folk ballad "The House of the Rising Sun." In 1962, Bob Dylan had sung this grim tale of a Southern girl trapped in a New Orleans whorehouse. The Animals, from the English coal town of Newcastle, changed the gender in the lyrics, and keyboardist Price created the new arrangement (and grabbed a composer's credit). Price also added an organ solo inspired by Jimmy Smith's hit "Walk on the Wild Side."

Appears on: The Best of the Animals (ABKCO)

124 James Brown, ‘It’s A Man’s Man’s Man’s World’

Writers: Brown, Betty Jean Newsome Producer: Brown Released: April '66, King 9 weeks; No. 8

James Brown had been tinkering with the building blocks to this song for years — his singer Tammy Montgomery (who would become Tammi Terrell) had recorded the sound-alike "I Cried" in 1963. But Brown's recording of "Man's World" — a play on the 1963 cross-country chase comedy It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World — was a stunningly dramatic record. Amid swooping strings, Brown's abject singing makes the biblically chauvinistic lyrics ("Man made the boat for the water, like Noah made the ark") sound genuinely humane.

Appears on: 50th Anniversary Collection (UTV/Polydor)

125 The Rolling Stones, ‘Jumpin’ Jack Flash’

Writers: Mick Jagger, Keith Richards Producer: Jimmy Miller Released: May '68, London 12 weeks; No. 3

Keith Richards was on a historic run in 1968, exploring the open-D blues-guitar tuning for the first time and coming up with some of his most dynamic riffs. He overheard an organ lick that bassist Bill Wyman was fooling around with in a London studio and turned it into the unstoppable, churning pulse of "Jumpin' Jack Flash." The lyric was inspired by Richards' gardener, Jack Dyer, who slogged past as the guitarist and Jagger were coming to the end of an all-night session. "Who's that?" Jagger asked. "Jumpin' Jack," Richards answered. The song evolved into supernatural Delta blues by way of Swinging London. The Stones first performed it at their final show with Brian Jones.

Appears on: Forty Licks (Virgin)

126 The Shirelles, ‘Will You Love Me Tomorrow’

Writers: Gerry Goffin, Carole King Producer: Luther Dixon Released: Nov. '60, Scepter 19 weeks; No. 1

After a few minor Shirelles hits, Scepter Records founder Florence Greenberg asked King and Goffin to write the group a song. On the piano in Greenberg's office, King finished a song the team had been working on. "I remember giving her baby a bottle while Carole was writing the song," Greenberg said. Lead singer Shirley Owens initially found "Tomorrow" too countryish for the group, but Dixon's production changed her mind. King's devotion to the song was so strong she replaced a subpar percussionist and played kettledrum herself. With its forthright depiction of a sexual relationship, it became the first girl-group record to go Number One.

Appears on: Girl Group Greats (Rhino)

127 Big Joe Turner, ‘Shake, Rattle & Roll’

Writer: Charles Calhoun Producer:Ahmet Ertegun, Jerry Wexler Released:April '54, Atlantic Predates chart

Atlantic Records' contribution to the birth of rock & roll(Wexler and Ertegun even sangbackup), "Shake, Rattle & Roll"was written specifically forbig-voiced blues singer Turner, one of thelabel's early stars."Everybody wassinging slow blueswhen I was young,and I thought I'dput a beat to it andsing it uptempo,"Turner said. This track,with its big bounce and raunchy lyrics ("I'm like a one-eyedcat peepin' in a seafood store"),topped the R&B charts; typicalof the times, a sanitized coverby Bill Haley and the Cometsgot white America bopping.

Appears on: The Very Best of Big Joe Turner (Rhino)

128 David Bowie, ‘Changes’

Writer: Bowie Producer:Ken Scott Released:Dec. '71, RCA 11 Weeks; No. 41

The keynote from David Bowie's 1971 album Hunky Dory, "Changes" challenged rock audiences to "turn and face the strange." But the song originally stalled on the charts in both Britain and the United States, and it didn't really take off until after the commercial success of 1972's Ziggy Stardust. Eventually, Bowie fans adopted it as the theme song for the man who'd already given them Hippie Bowie, Mod Bowie and Bluesy Bowie. As it turned out, he had barely begun to show the world his wardrobe of disguises. The poignant sax solo at the end is played by Bowie himself.

Appears on: Hunky Dory (Virgin)

129 Chuck Berry, ‘Rock & Roll Music’

Writer: Berry Producers: Phil and Leonard Chess Released: Sept. '57, Chess 19 Weeks; No. 8

This was a manifesto. "I was heavy into rock & roll and had to create something that hit the spot without question," Chuck Berry wrote in his autobiography. "I wanted the lyrics to define every aspect of its being." Set to a jolting rumba rhythm, "Rock & Roll Music" features Berry's genre-defining guitar licks and bass work from the legendary Willie Dixon. Berry's original made the Billboard Top 10, and the Beatles and the Beach Boys cut popular versions as well. For years it was this simple: If you played rock & roll, you knew this song.

Appears on: Johnny B. Goode: His Complete '50s Chess Recordings (Chess/Hip-O Select)

130 Steppenwolf, ‘Born to Be Wild’

Writer: Mars Bonfire Producer: Gabriel Mekler Released: Jan. '68, Dunhill 13 Weeks; No. 2

The first two singles from Steppenwolf's 1968 debut stiffed; the third was "Born to Be Wild." It hit Number Two on the Billboard charts in the summer of '68, a year before Dennis Hopper used it in a rough cut of the movie Easy Rider, where it was originally just a place holder – actor-producer Peter Fonda had asked Crosby, Stills and Nash to do the soundtrack. But "Born to Be Wild" stayed. "Every generation thinks they're born to be wild," said frontman John Kay, "and they can identify with that song as their anthem." The line "Heavy-metal thunder" would help give a new genre its name.

Appears on: Steppenwolf (MCA)

131 Rod Stewart, ‘Maggie May’

Writers: Stewart, Martin Quittenton Producer: Stewart Released: June '71, Mercury 17 weeks; No. 1

Stewart plays a schoolboy in love with an older temptress in "Maggie May" — he claimed it was "more or less a true story about the first woman I had sex with." The song, a last-minute addition to Every Picture Tells a Story, was initially the B side of "Reason to Believe." Stewart has joked that if a DJ hadn't flipped the single over, he'd have gone back to his old job: digging graves. But the song's rustic mandolin and acoustic guitars — and Mickey Waller's relentless drum-bashing — were undeniable. The song became Stewart's first U.S. Top 40 hit — and first Number One.

Appears on: Every Picture Tells a Story (Mercury/Universal)

132 U2, ‘With or Without You’

Writers: Bono, the Edge, Adam Clayton, Larry Mullen Jr. Producers: Brian Eno, Daniel Lanois Released: March '87, Island 18 weeks; No. 1

The Joshua Tree was U2's ode to America: Its songs were inspired by folk, gospel and roots music, and its lyrics, as the Edge noted, were sparked by civil rights heroes and the "new journalism" of the 1960s. Yet "With or Without You" – with its simple bass groove and ethereal guitar hum framing Bono's yearning vocals – was one of U2's most universal songs to date, a meditation on the painful ambivalence of a love affair. Bono insisted it was "about how I feel in U2 at times: exposed." It would turn out to be U2's first Number One hit in the U.S.

Appears on: The Joshua Tree (Island)

133 Bo Diddley, ‘Who Do You Love?’

Writer: Ellas McDaniel Producers: Phil and Leonard Chess Released: March '57, Checker Did not chart

Diddley's first band performed with a washtub-bass player and a guy who danced on a sand-covered board: These experiments with rhythmic possibilities kept him from lugging a drum set around town. "I'm a lover of basic bottom," he once said. "If the bottom is right, crazy." And there's plenty of bottom here – not much more, actually. Just Diddley playing his guitar like it's a drum, goosed by maracas and lyrics about chimneys made from human skulls and houses built from rattlesnake hide that reach back into voodoo mythology (the title is a pun on"hoodoo," a bad-luck charm).

Appears on: His Best: The Chess 50th Anniversary Collection (Chess)

134 The Who, ‘Won’t Get Fooled Again’

Writer: Pete Townshend Producers: Glyn Johns, the Who Released: July '71, Decca 13 weeks; No. 15

Townshend wrote this for an aborted concept album and film called Lifehouse. But many of that project's songs were resurrected for Who's Next, which started off with a week of demo sessions at Mick Jagger's country house, Stargroves. The synthesizer on "Won't Get Fooled Again" is from those demos. "Pete came up with sounds, synthesizer basics, for tracks which were just unbelievable," said producer Johns. "Nobody had done it before in that way."

"It's interesting it's been taken up in an anthemic sense," Townshend said of the song, "when in fact it's such a cautionary piece."

Appears on:Who's Next(MCA)

135 Wilson Pickett, ‘In the Midnight Hour’

Writers: Pickett, Steve Cropper Producers: Jerry Wexler, Jim Stewart Released: July '65, Atlantic 12 weeks; No. 21

Pickett's first two singles for Atlantic were recorded in New York, and they flopped. "I told Jerry Wexler I didn't want to be recorded this way anymore," Pickett said. "I said I heard a song by Otis Redding out of Memphis, and that's the direction I wanted to take." Pickett soon headed south. He and Cropper wrote "In the Midnight Hour" in the Lorraine Hotel, (where Martin Luther King, Jr. would later be assassinated), and while they were cutting the song, an idea shot Wexler out of his seat.

"I was shaking my booty to a groove made popular by the Larks' 'The Jerk,' a mid-Sixties hit," wrote Wexler. "The idea was to push the second beat while holding back the fourth." And a soul classic was born.

Appears on: The Very Best of Wilson Pickett (Rhino)

136 The Beatles, ‘While My Guitar Gently Weeps’

Writer: George Harrison Producer: George Martin Released: Nov. '68, Apple Non-single

One of Harrison's greatest songs was conceived during a visit to his parents' home. Having studied the Chinese fortune-telling book the I Ching, Harrison decided he should surrender to chance. "I picked up a book at random, opened it, saw 'gently weeps,' then laid the book down again and started the song," he said. Dissatisfied with the Beatles' recording of the song, he invited Eric Clapton to play the guitar solo. "It was good because that then made everyone act better," Harrison recalled. "Paul got on the piano and played a nice intro, and they all took it more seriously." Although Martin was the credited producer, the session tape box read "Produced by the Beatles."

Appears on: The Beatles (Capitol)

137 Elton John, ‘Your Song’

Writers: Bernie Taupin, John Producer: Gus Dudgeon Released: Nov. '70, Uni 14 weeks; No. 8

Taupin has often claimed that a song should never take more than a half-hour to write. His first classic took all of 10 minutes. In 1969, Taupin and Johnwere sharing a bunk bed at Elton's mom's house when Taupin wrote the words to "Your Song" one morning at the breakfast table. The soaring piano ballad would become the breakthrough single that introduced John to America. Although John insisted that the song was inspired by an old girlfriend of Taupin's, the lyricist maintains that it was aimed at no one in particular. "The early ones were not drawn from experience but imagination," Taupin said. "'Your Song' could only have been written by a 17-year-old who'd never been laid in his life."

Appears on: Greatest Hits (Island)

138 The Beatles, ‘Eleanor Rigby’

Writers: John Lennon,Paul McCartney Producer: George Martin Released: Aug. '66, Capitol 8 weeks; No. 11

When McCartney first played the song for neighbor Donovan, the words were "Ola Na Tungee/Blowing his mind in the dark/With a pipe full of clay." McCartney fumbled around with the lyrics until he landed on the line "Picks up the rice in a church where a wedding has been." It was only then that he realized he was writing about the loneliness of old age. "Father McKenzie" was originally "Father McCartney"; Ringo chipped in the line "darning his socks in the night." The character sketch was fleshed out by the Beatles' vocals, but the backing music was the sole product of an eight-man string section, working from a George Martin score.

Appears on: Revolver (Capitol)

139 Sly and the Family Stone, ‘Family Affair’

Writer: Sly Stone Producer: Stone Released: Oct. '71, Epic 14 weeks; No. 1

When There's a Riot Goin' On came out in 1971, a Rolling Stone reporter mentioned the rumor that Stone had played all the instruments himself, and he asked Sly just how much he played. "I've forgotten, man," Stone said. "Whatever was left." The leadoff single, the aquatic funk number "Family Affair," was widely considered to be about his relationships with his band, family and the Black Panthers. "Well," Stone said, "they may be trying to tear me apart; I don't feel it. Song's not about that. Song's about a family affair, whether it's a result of genetic processes or a situation in the environment."

Appears on: There's a Riot Goin' On (Sony)

140 The Beatles, ‘I Saw Her Standing There’

Writers: John Lennon,Paul McCartney Producer: George Martin Released: Jan. '64, Capitol 11 weeks; No. 14

"One, two three, fah!" The B side to the band's American breakthrough single, "I Want to Hold Your Hand," this song had been written by McCartney two years earlier. After penning the first line - "She was just 17" – McCartney wanted to avoid completing the rhyme with "beauty queen." He and Lennon had "started to realize that we had to stop at these bad lines or we were only going to write bad songs," he said. "So we went through the alphabet: between, clean, lean, mean." With "you know what I mean," he was on his way.

141 Led Zeppelin, ‘Kashmir’

Writers: John Bonham, Jimmy Page, Robert Plant Producer: Page Released: March '75, Swan Song Non-single

While vacationing in southern Morocco, Plant conjured the lyrics for Led Zeppelin's most ambitious experiment, the centerpiece of 1975's Physical Graffiti. As he traveled the desert in northwest Africa, Plant envisioned himself driving straight through to Kashmir, on the India-China border. Meanwhile, back in the band's studio in rural England, Page and Bonham began riffing on an Arabic-sounding set of chords that would perfectly match Plant's desert vision. "The song was bigger than me," said Plant. "I was petrified. I was virtually in tears." John Paul Jones' string arrangement provided the crowning touch, ratcheting up the song's grandeur tostadium-rock proportion.

Appears on: Physical Graffiti (Atlantic)

142 The Everly Brothers, ‘All I Have to Do Is Dream’

Writers: Boudleaux and Felice Bryant Producer: Archie Bleyer Released: May '58, Cadence 11 weeks; No. 21

Although Don Everly had a contract to work as a songwriter before he and his brother Phil began their hitmaking, their first three big singles were all written by the husband-and-wife songwriting team of Boudleaux and Felice Bryant. "I would go to them for lovelorn advice when I was young, and divorce advice when I was older," Phil said. "All I Have to Do Is Dream," with Chet Atkins' innovative tremolo chording backing the brothers' high-lonesome harmonies, went to Number One on not just the pop chart but the R&Bchart as well.

Appears on: All-Time Original Hits (Rhino)

143 James Brown and His Famous Flames, ‘Please, Please, Please’

Writers: Brown, Johnny Terry Producer: Ralph Bass Released: Feb. '56, Federal 2 weeks; No. 95

On parole after three years in a Georgia juvenile pen, Brown hooked up with the Famous Flames for his debut single: a screaming burst of R&B. It had been in the Flames' act for two years before they put down a demo, which caught the ear of talent scout Bass. He signed the group to King/Federal Records, despite label head Syd Nathan's opinion that the song was "a piece of shit." Kicking off with Brown's shriek, the single drove women wild and became his set-closer, but the Flames, feeling upstaged, quit the act a year later.

Appears on: 50th Anniversary Collection (UTV/Polydor)

144 Prince and the Revolution, ‘Purple Rain’

Writer: Prince Producer: Prince Released: June '84, Warner Bros. 16 weeks; No. 2

Bobby Z of the Revolution recalled the first time he heard Prince play "Purple Rain": "It was almost country. It was almost rock. It was almost gospel." The basic tracks were recorded live at a 1983 club date in Minneapolis, benefiting the Minnesota Dance Theater. But the seeds came from Prince's 1999 tour; Bob Seger was touring at the same time, and Prince decided to try writing a song in the same anthemic vein.

Appears on: Purple Rain (Warner Bros.)

145 Ramones, ‘I Wanna Be Sedated’

Writers: Ramones Producer: Tommy Erdelyi, Ed Stasium Released: Oct. '78, Sire Did not chart

The greatest God-does-the-road-ever-suck song, "I Wanna Be Sedated" was written by Joey Ramone, who at the time was suffering from severe teakettle burns and was upset about having to fly to London for a gig. Plagued by obsessive-compulsive disorder and various other ailments, Joey always had a rough time touring. "Put me in a wheelchair/And get me to the show/Hurry, hurry, hurry/Before I go loco!" he rants. Johnny's guitar solo – the same note, 65 times in a row – is the ultimate expression of his anti-artifice philosophy; the bubblegum-pop key change that follows it, though, is pure Joey.

Appears on: Road to Ruin (Rhino)

146 Sly and the Family Stone, ‘Everyday People’

Writer: Sly Stone Producer: Stone Released: Nov. '68, Epic 19 weeks; No. 1

"Everyday People" appeared on Sly and the Family Stone's fourth LP, Stand!, which explored everything from hot funk to cool pop. Stone, a former DJ in San Francisco who also produced the hits "Laugh, Laugh" and "Just a Little" for the white pop group the Beau Brummels, seemed blind to the lines between musical genres. "I was into everyone's records," he said of his radio days. "I'd play Dylan, Hendrix, James Brown back to back, so I didn't get stuck in any one groove." As the song was going to Number One, Sly canceled three months of bookings, including a slot on The Ed Sullivan Show, when trumpeter Cynthia Robinson needed emergency gallbladder surgery. Hits were nice, but family came first.

Appears on: Stand! (Sony)

147 The B-52’s, ‘Rock Lobster’

Writers: Fred Schneider, Ricky Wilson Producer: Chris Blackwell Released: July '79, Warner Bros. 8 weeks; No. 56

A self-described "quirky little dance band," the B-52's invented New Wave weirdness with this slice of bouffant pop topped with Farfisa organ, Yoko Ono-ish vocals and Schneider's creepy speak-singing about a bizarro seaside scene. "I was at a disco that had pictures of lobsters and children playing ball," he said. "'Rock Lobster' sounded like a good title for a song."

Appears on: The B-52's (Warner Bros.)

148 Janis Joplin, ‘Me and Bobby McGee’

Writers: Kris Kristofferson,Fred Foster Producer: Paul Rothchild Released: Jan. '71, Columbia 15 weeks; No. 1

Joplin's only Number One hit was a posthumous one, and a country, not a blues, song. "Me and Bobby McGee" came from her drinking buddy and occasional crush Kris Kristofferson, who was inspired to write it after seeing Federico Fellini's 1954 film La Strada, Italian for "the road." (It had already been recorded by "King of the Road" singer Roger Miller.) Joplin's version was "just the tip of the iceberg, showing a whole untapped source of Texas, country and blues that she had at her fingertips," recalled pianist Richard Bell. It was a standout from Pearl, her last solo album, released less than a year after she died of a heroin overdose.

Appears on: Pearl (Sony/Legacy)

149 Iggy Pop, ‘Lust for Life’

Writers: David Bowie, Pop Producer: Bowie Released: Sept. '77, RCA Did not chart

With its enormous kaboom and Pop's sneering, free-associative lyrics (the line about "hypnotizing chickens" is a reference to William S. Burroughs' The Ticket That Exploded), "Lust for Life" is half a kiss-off to drugged-out hedonism, half a French kiss to it. The opening riff was supposedly taken from some Morse code Bowie heard on the Armed Forces Network. Nineteen years after the song first appeared, it was used in the 1996 movie Trainspotting, paving the way for cleaned-up versions to be used in TV ads for cars and cruise lines. And the line "Of course I've had it in the ear before"? "That's a common expression in the Midwest," Pop said. "To give it to him right in the ear means to fuck somebody over."

Appears on: Lust for Life (Virgin)

150 The Everly Brothers, ‘Cathy’s Clown’

Writers: Phil and Don Everly Producer: Wesley Rose Released: April '60, Warner Bros. 17 weeks; No. 1

After seven Top 10 hits for Cadence Records, the Everlys became the first artists signed to a new record label: Warner Bros. The fledgling company wooed the Kentuckians with a 10-year, $1 million contract. They cut eight songs as potential debut singles and rejected all of them before settling on "Cathy's Clown." The duo continued scoring hits until they enlisted in the Marines in 1962.

Appears on: All-Time Original Hits (Rhino)