Orianthi was an anomaly in the testosterone-heavy realm of 2000s-era rock music. The mononymous guitar virtuoso transitioned from stints behind superstars Carrie Underwood and Michael Jackson to solo success with “According to You,” which appended her hair metal shredding onto American Idol-inspired pop stylings.
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“Reach Out I’ll Be There” is a light in the darkness — an achingly tender declaration of commitment and compassion delivered with the force of rolling thunder. Released in August 1966 following a summer of mounting civil unrest and violent rebellion, the Four Tops’ humanist anthem remains a bottomless reservoir of strength and succor through all times of turmoil, its physical and emotional impact unmatched across the Motown Records canon. “To me, it felt like a chant, almost religious — a song of hope for the world,” the group’s Duke Fakir proclaimed nearly half a century after the single stampeded to the top of the Billboard charts.
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Hip-hop in the 1980s was a wonderfully weird scene. No one quite epitomized that creative weirdness as totally as the eyepatch-wearing, “truck jewelry”-festooned, British-sounding kid from the Bronx known as Slick Rick (a.k.a. Rick the Ruler, MC Ricky D). “Children’s Story,” the second single from Slick Rick’s classic debut album The Great Adventures of Slick Rick, remains one of the high points of hip-hop’s golden age.
Read MoreBefore he was the impish foil of rapper Lil Dicky on the FX network’s must-watch cringe comedy Dave, benny blanco was merely one of the biggest music producers in the universe. His shapeshifting, kitchen-sink production ethos is the sound of pop radio in the post-millennium age, midwifing career-defining records for superstars Ed Sheeran, Rihanna, Justin Bieber, Maroon 5 and countless others — a run of stratospheric chart success culminating in the release of blanco’s first headlining single, the 2018 smash “Eastside.”
Read More“(I Just) Died in Your Arms” topped the Billboard Hot 100 in May 1987, more than a year after the Parents Music Resource Center compiled its “Filthy Fifteen” — the now-infamous list of pop songs the committee’s founders blamed for the moral decay of America’s youth. Censors were asleep at the wheel by the time Cutting Crew stormed the charts, however. “(I Just) Died in Your Arms” isn’t only about the moment of male orgasm: it was also conceived during the moment of male orgasm, and if you’re easily offended (or if you’re PMRC co-founder Tipper Gore), consider yourself warned, because there is much more orgasm talk to come.
Read MoreWhen the Temptations released their debut Motown Records single “Oh Mother of Mine,” Paul Williams was firmly ensconced as the group’s lead singer. But by the time the Tempts topped the charts with “I Can’t Get Next to You,” Williams’ life and career were in irreversible decline, his formidable baritone confined almost exclusively to backing vocals and the occasional B-side showcase.
Read MoreKeyboard – Electric Piano
First released: 1964
Produced in: Trossingen, Germany (fmr. West Germany)
Even in 2006, it was hard to separate Thirty Seconds to Mars from its frontman, Jared Leto. Though he and his brother Shannon founded the band in the late 1990s, Jared’s success as a Hollywood actor long overshadowed his musical reputation. It took a record like “The Kill (Bury Me)” for the Leto brothers to break through: along with its hit music video, the song shattered the record for most weeks on Billboard’s Modern Rock charts and established Thirty Seconds to Mars as a prominent voice in America’s rising emo sect.
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Toot-Toot! Heyyy, Beep-Beep! “Bad Girls,” Donna Summer’s biggest-selling single, may seem on its surface a frivolous disco concoction. The song’s Latin-flavored beat, brassy, exuberant riffs and joyous hooks made it a dancefloor staple and propelled it to the top of the charts, and its onomatopoeic singalong refrain has been getting stuck in people’s heads ever since. But there’s much more to “Bad Girls” than meets the eye.
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“Obsession” perfectly captures the zeitgeist of mid-Eighties pop. Animotion’s signature hit marries sinister human emotion and ominous state-of-the-art production to generate synth-pop soap opera precision-made for the ascendent MTV.
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