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Song of the Day #4,568: ‘Life on Mars? (Live)’ – David Bowie

Continuing the chronological presentation of my 25 favorite songs…

‘Life on Mars?‘ – David Bowie (1971)

This is the first of six songs from the 70s to make my list (tying that decade with the 80s for most represented). I guess that makes sense, given that those two decades made up my first 18 years, and isn’t that when music makes its biggest impact?

That’s one theory, but a deeper dive reveals that half of those 12 songs — including both of today’s featured tracks — didn’t find me until much later. So maybe they were just good musical decades.

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Song of the Day #4,567: ‘April Come She Will (Demo)’ – Paul Simon

In recent months, I’ve found myself declaring a couple of times that one song or another was officially among my all-time favorites.

That got me interested, during these pandemic times, in creating a definitive playlist of my favorite songs. This is an exercise fraught with peril and subject to repeated second-guessing, but that’s also what makes it fun.

Narrowing such a list to ten songs proved impossible, so I kept at it until I had close to 30, then pared back to 25, which feels like a good number.

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Song of the Day #4,566: ‘Hate to See You Like This’ – Fountains of Wayne

Fountains of Wayne’s fifth and final album, 2011’s Sky Full of Holes, is the one I know least. It’s nice, then, to see it pop up on a Random Weekend and treat me to a “new” song.

‘Hate to See You Like This’ is a sweet plea to a loved one who is suffering from depression. I like that the music is more power pop upbeat than you would expect from the lyrics.

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Song of the Day #4,565: ‘Ivy’ – Taylor Swift

After Taylor Swift blessed fans with two surprise full-length albums in 2020, the records were invariably paired up in interesting ways.

Swift called the second album, Evermore, a “sister record” to the earlier Folklore, prompting fans to match “sister songs” on the albums. Track 13 on one is about Swift’s grandfather, while track 13 on the other is about her grandmother. The video for ‘Willow’ picks up where ‘Cardigan’s video left off. Both albums feature duets with Bon Iver. And so on.

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Song of the Day #4,564: ”Tis the Damn Season’ – Taylor Swift

Happy New Year to all of my readers! Let’s hope 2021 finds us all happier and healthier.

And now, concluding my countdown of the songs on Taylor Swift’s Evermore…

#3. ‘Ivy’

This song is very reminiscent of ‘Invisible String,’ one of my favorite tracks on Folklore. I love the banjo and the chorus, both of which sound like classic Taylor. Swift plays the cheating wife in this song and sells the “illicit affair” with subtlety and mystery.

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