“I Believe (When I Fall In Love It Will Be Forever)” – Stevie Wonder
“I’ve Been Loving You Too Long” – Otis Redding
“Save the Children” – Marvin Gaye
“A Change is Gonna Come” – Sam Cooke
“Flash Light” – Parliament
“Sign ‘O’ the Times” – Prince
“That’s the Way of the World” – Earth Wind & Fire
“You Are the Sunshine of My Life” – Stevie Wonder
“I Want You (live)” – Marvin Gaye
“Night Time Is the Right Time” – Ray Charles
“Just A Thought” – Gnarls Barkley
“Jungle Boogie” – Kool & the Gang
“You Keep Me Hangin’ On” – The Supremes
“Mustang Sally” – Wilson Pickett
“Try a Little Tenderness” – Otis Redding
“Inner City Blues (Make Me Wanna Holler)” – Marvin Gaye
“Spanish Harlem” – Ben E. King
“You Haven’t Done Nothin’” – Stevie Wonder
“Alphabet St.” – Prince

Conclusion: despite it’s inability to stray too far from convention, sometimes iTunes Genius is pretty great.

Of course, if you look at it literally, it’s true. I haven’t thrown Steinbeck on Random for this blog since September 2007.

Weird.

So, with that in mind, let’s do this.

1. The White Stripes – “Honey, We Can’t Afford to Look This Cheap”
Conquest EP

I don’t know this song.

But, I do know that, without a doubt, The White Stripes show up on random more than any artist I listen to. Despite the fact that several artists have a ton more songs available, The White Stripes always seems to bully its way into the lineup.

Which would be fine, except, you know, they have so many songs that are just, well, whatever. I mean, they’re unremarkable. They have some brilliant songs. And they have some just plain ordinary songs.

This seems like one of them.

2. Johnny Cash – “A Boy Named Sue (live)”
Johnny Cash at San Quentin

Listening to the songs on their own, not as part of an album, I can’t tell the difference between those on Live at Folsom Prison and those on this album. I guess that answers the question, “Despite how good both albums are, is it really necessary to have two live albums from the same artist during the same era?” (The answer, for those not paying attention, is, “No.”)

3. Beck – “Gettochip Malfunction (Hell Yess) (8Bit Remix)”
Guerolito

Guero is by far my favorite Beck album. And that makes my love of these remixes so much more surprising to me.

As a purist in most cases, I prefer the original – the goldy oldies, the book version of the movie, the “before it was cool” aspect of nearly everything. I probably do it to be hip – the elitism of originality. It’s one of my more noble traits, if you’re into a healthy dollop of ego mixed in with every stray comment.

But I’ll repeat it. I love these remixes. This one is pretty sweet. Do I lose punk points for revealing that? Will my subscription to Paste suddenly dry up?

4. Thirty Ought Six – “Tourmaline”
Hag Seed

Travel with me, if you will, back to 1995.

I was an aspiring punk rocker who still had a soft side for the soft-loud-soft of the post-punk landscape – the genre that eventually became known as “emo” before “emo” meant wearing black and cutting yourself. It was melodic punk. Math rock. Whatever. It’s what all of the old hardcore bands turned to when they got too old to shave their heads.

I wasn’t able to latch onto the genre as it was beginning, so I enjoyed some of the larger label versions that sprouted up in the years following. Sunny Day Real Estate was one of them and, through the power of complicated music and lyrics, they quickly became one of my favorite bands.

Which means any time singer Jeremy Enigk showed up on someone else’s album, I had to have it.

He showed up on this album, by Thirty Ought Six, a band that no one has ever heard of. I knew this thanks to a one-year subscription to CMJ magazine, which came with a sampler CD that, surprise, included this exact song.

I had to have it. My friend Eric got a hold of a promo copy for my birthday. I still have it. And I still love this song.

5. Bob Dylan – “Blood in my Eyes”
Dylan

Hey, did you hear that Bob Dylan is surprising everyone with a follow up to Modern Times? Pretty sweet.

6. Brother Ali (w/ Slug) – “Blah Blah Blah”
Shadows on the Sun

As I’ve grown older, I’ve stopped going to shows.

Not just shows in Minneapolis or Omaha – places I’d happily drive to several years ago in order to see bands I only borderline liked – but here in Sioux Falls. As in, band I truly like, in my own backyard. As in, I could walk there. As in, I have no excuse.

The list of bands I’ve missed, either due to prior engagements or apathy, includes Against Me, Atmosphere and Brother Ali. I like all three a lot. But I didn’t go to the show because, well, whatever.

I guess that’s the long way of saying its cool to hear Slug and Brother Ali together on this song. It pairs a fantastic hook with two of my favorite indie rappers, and the chorus is as irrelevant as can be created by today’s advanced technology. And, it has this short breakdown that sends the track into a mini-version of “Guns and Cigarettes.” Sweet little trick there, boys.

7. The Decemberists – “The Infanta”
Picaresque

Huh. How about that. A Decemberists song that sounds like a mix between sea shanty and military march. Who’d have thunk it?

8. Jurassic 5 – “Sum of Us”
Power in Numbers

Like most album cuts from Jurassic 5, I can honestly say I don’t think I even know this song. And I can also say it sounds strangely like every other album cut from every other Jurassic 5 album.

Don’t get me wrong. I love these guys. But the difference between the awesome singles-worthy songs and the rest of the stuff is pretty wide. They could have gotten away with releasing 5-song EPs every time around and they’d have just as many great songs without the filler.

And, people would probably remember them more fondly. They’d have been scrambling for more, raising their value by a low number of releases. See – that’s supply and demand. That’s economics, as illustrated by Jurassic 5! I’m like Malcolm Gladwell in my ability to explain complex concepts using trite examples!

9. Office – “Company Calls”
A Night at the Ritz

If you don’t listen to Office yet, stop what you’re doing and start listening to them. That’s all. I don’t know what’s wrong with you.

10. Seven Storey Mountain – “Incomplete”
The Emo Diaries, Chapter Two – A Million Miles Away

I’ve always had a short list of phenomenal bands that consistently go unrecognized by me: Jets to Brazil, Mason Jennings, Frank Black, Seven Story Mountain. These are bands that I absolutely love. They can do little wrong in my eyes. They put forth smart, rocking music that, upon hearing, sends me into a weeklong obsession.

Yet, if you were to ask me what my 10 favorite artists were, I’d probably forget all of them. I’d go through the obvious favorites and, upon consulting my iPod to find the rest, I’d slap my head in amazement, wondering how I ever forgot to add them.

It happens every time.

Seven Storey Mountain, like Texas is the Reason before them, are one of the bands from my emo days that still sound fresh. Some of the bands I followed grew old, their sound became dated and silly, too angsty or too complicated or simply too boring. Seven Storey Mountain just rocked. That’s all they did, every song, and they still rock today. They’d be just as cool now as they were in the mid 90s.

Another note – this Emo Diaries album was the last to actually include great music from bands anyone had heard of. What started as a who’s who of the genre on album one and two quickly turned into a series of “the best of people you’ve never heard of.”

By album five and six, I had stopped buying these albums. I realized there was a reason no one had heard of the bands they were featuring.

Today, I didn’t. I just Super Shuffled it. In doing this, outside of a ramping up at both ends, I found tranquility in staying quiet, my playlist ranging from brooding to folky, emo to childish. Nothing hard-core. Nothing from the streets. Just a vanilla and, surprisingly, soothing playlist.

It worked. I was able to think. I left not just physically accelerated, but mentally.

“Your Kisses Are Wasted On Me” – The Pipettes
“Red Letter Day” – The Get Up Kids
“Rear View Mirror” – Grandaddy
“Hot Cha” – They Might Be Giants
“Origami” – Ani DiFranco
“Star Me Kitten (Demo)” – R.E.M.
“Reckoning (Live)” – Ani DiFranco
“Bombtrack” – Rage Against the Machine

(Let’s stop here for a second. While it sometimes seems as if Steinbeck can read my mind, piecing together a perfect series of songs using some intense E.S.P., there are times when it reveals its inner machine – pulling some song out of the recesses of the system that is so completely off track it leaves me wondering how it ever ended up on the iPod in the first place.

This was the case with Rage Against the Machine this go around. Steinbeck was gently soothing me through my first trip to the gym in over a month, keeping me settled and smooth, and it tried to slip this one past me.

I skipped it. Then I scolded the machine. It responded with one of the oldest songs in its repertoire.)

“I Wish I Were in Love With You” – Ella Fitzgerald
“In 3’s” – Beastie Boys
“In the Jailhouse Now” – Johnny Cash
“Unemployed Black Astronaut (Nobody Remix)” – Busdriver

The idea was that I could get up early, sneak out of the house and have a routine finished before even making it in to work. It seemed to be a perfect idea – I didn’t have to waste my evening running to the fitness center. It worked well for a while. Until Sierra was born. And sleeping in became a luxury I could ill afford to neglect.

Before the morning routine, I was working out after work. I would see the same people every day, a few of which stood out. There’s ultra-scrawny computer geek, a guy who looks like he’s here on court-sanction and resembles my first college roommate (a kid who grew up on a turkey farm) right down to the constant wearing of blue pocket t-shirts. And there’s DVD-walker – a bigger bearded guy who brings a portable DVD player to the center, which he watches as he walks the track. No joke.

Now that I’m back on the fitness wagon, I’ve started going at night again. And lo and behold, a year and a half later, those two are still there, working away. DVD-walker has lost his DVD player, and ultra-scrawny computer geek looks more confident – and in much better shape.

I used to look at them and think to myself, “what a couple of characters – I wonder what their story is.” I would take comfort in the fact that I wasn’t the most unlikely guy at the fitness center – certainly not with those two around.

Now, I realize that, while I left, fell off the routine, and still continue to struggle to stay on track, those two continued on, fighting through the annoyance and hard work, persevering in their workout patterns. To get healthy on their own.

I lapsed. They didn’t.

Maybe I am the most unlikely guy at the gym. And maybe I need to change that.

Song wise, I threw it on Super Shuffle for my 30-minute elliptical ride.

“I Can’t Win” – The Strokes
“Long View” – Green Day
“The Stallion, Pt. 2” – Ween
“You Gave Your Love To Me Softly” – Weezer
“Shake it Off (Bad Dreams Part II)” – Lyrics Born
“Busy with Other Things” – Office
“Speaking of Errors” – Floodplain
“Rock Singer” – Hot Water Music
“Jamming” – Bob Marley and the Wailers

I couldn’t have picked a better wind-down song if I had tried.

My favorite feature of this weekly column is the “Pregame Song That Makes Me Want To Run Through A Goddamn Brick Wall,” where he naturally pulls from his extensive collection of rock to give us a little insight as to what music you might want to listen to in the event you needed to, well, hype yourself up. For a game, you know.

Or, in my case, for a bi-weekly session at the gym.

I’ve fallen off of my routine, sure. This is harder than it looks. But I know one thing – if there was ever a band that made me want to run through a goddamn brick wall, it would be Hot Water Music. Thankfully, I chose the “Punk” genre on Steinbeck the iPod – a genre that’s actually pretty thin outside of several Hot Water Music and Alkaline Trio albums – and was able to get myself into the workout mode.

Today’s list:
“Olympia, WA” – Rancid
“Nameless (live)” – Avail
“Wild in the Streets” – Hot Water Music
“Oyster” – Jawbreaker

Wait. A quick aside. I know Jawbreaker could be considered punk. But this album? It belongs in indie, or even the dreaded emo. This is not Jawbreaker’s punk album. I love the stuff, but I about fell asleep on the treadmill.

“We Laugh At Danger and Break All the Rules” – Against Me!
“Alachua (live)” – Hot Water Music
“This is Getting Over You” – Alkaline Trio
“Not For Anyone” – Hot Water Music
“8 Full Hours of Sleep – Against Me!
“(Ben)” – Avail

(Not even a real song. Doesn’t count.)

“Alive or Dead” – The Draft

End of workout. See you Wednesday. That is, if I can manage to get to the fitness center within another two weeks.

I even went as far as to post my first playlist: Steinbeck on Steroids, a play off of the Steinbeck on Random posts.

And then, schedules were rearranged. Day care was switched. The days seemingly became more packed. Vacation threw things for a loop. And I haven’t been to the fitness center in over a month and a half.

I went back today, and the only thing I could think of is “which Metallica album is more likely to rock my way back into heavy elliptical use?”

It turns out it was Master of Puppets. Today’s playlist:
“Battery” by Metallica
“Master of Puppets” by Metallica
“Welcome Home (Sanitarium)” by Metallica
“Disposable Heroes” by Metallica
“Leper Messiah” by Metallica

Metallica fans will notice two things.

First, there’s no “The Thing that Should Not Be.” That’s on purpose – I skipped it, knowing that it was ill-equipped to handle the metal ways of elliptical pounding. It’s too sludgy, too dark and slow. I wanted my Metallica the way it was best – fast, blistering solos and nod-along time changes.

Second, this is only about 30 minutes worth of music. Yeah. I only did 30 minutes worth of working out.

I’ve noticed over the past month that my tendencies toward Metallica have improved considerably. I find myself gently humming Kirk Hammett’s solo from “The Unforgiven.” I long for the noise of …And Justice for All. I have given in to my middle school being, memorializing the best albums from their catalog and embraced them, as I always should have.

I was wondering yesterday, which wickedly metal album is best to mow the lawn to: Metallica’s …And Justice For All or Metallica’s Master of Puppets.

I compromised. I played Metallica’s Live Shit: Binge and Purge. And got the best of both worlds.

I’ve tried and failed at some kind of workout/diet regiment about, oh, I don’t know, six or seven times in the past two years. Unfortunately, I don’t really know what to do – I have a weak disposition, and when the bagels and donuts show up at work, I certainly have my share.

I realize that one of the few things that will motivate me to work out regularily is my iPod – Steinbeck, as you might recall – and that the idea of music fueling my desire to lose weight can be a strong motivation.

Today’s workout was the tip of the iceberg. And all I could think about was that I had a great playlist, randomized on the Indie Rock genre.

“Grounds for Divorce” – Wolf Parade
“Live at Dominoes” – The Avalanches
“The Farewell Party” – Cursive
“Modesto” – Beck
“Busy with Other Things” – Office
“Poor Places” – Wilco
“The Crystal Lake” – Grandaddy
“300 MHz” – At the Drive-In
“Going On” – Gnarls Barkley

This should be a regular feature. So you can see what’s driving me to work out. And so you can see what I’m currently rocking.

Other times, I seem to forget about music, becoming bored with the entire concept and preferring silence, or talk, or sports.

Regardless, I’ve been lucky enough to be fueled by a constant stream of new music for the past 15 years. My parents were purveyors of what is now known as classic rock. My first job was at Best Buy, stocking CDs and, naturally, purchasing the best ones. High school coincided with a rich influx of pop punk and post-hardcore emo. College brought me Napster, then Kazaa, and eventually a group of friends with an almost equally obsessive quality toward music.

I’m still in touch with these friends today, receiving several albums per week via mix tape or samples or whatever. When I purchased my iPod, I was frantically collecting everything I had lost over the years, ballooning my playlist with thousands of songs I may or may not ever listen to. Anything that sounded remotely familiar made the list, anything recommended was added, anything done by a side project’s side project was holed away for later.

In other words, I’ve been adding music to my collection for a very long time. I’ve rarely taken anything out. I’ve never retired something I enjoy, and I barely ever delete something that has even a glint of promise.

Currently, my iPod has 9,230 songs.

My friends, it’s time to pare back.

Seriously. I don’t even know why I have half of the music I do. Air? Sheryl Crow? Warren G? I’ve got albums I’ve never listened to, albums I thought were funny at the time and artists I don’t like on compilation albums I must keep intact lest the gods of incomplete compilations smite me down in a rain of fire.

I’ve had many of these songs for a long time. And my completist nature halts me from deleting songs willy nilly, like a farmer going after wheat with a scythe, cutting down whatever is in my path.

Instead of going after this like a music fan, I’m looking at it as if they were a staff of employees during a budget crunch. The losers will be whisked away to the unemployment line, unable to continue working on my iPod, no longer available to take up precious space.

There are several classes of employees. There’s the tried and true workers – those who have been with me forever and will continue to lock on because they’ve met their five year tenure, bands that I may not have listened to since college, but still hold a place in my heart.

There are the hard workers, the best employees – my favorite bands, those whom I’ll generously give space to, including side projects, rare b-sides and one-star slacker albums.

Then, there are those who came in on a temp contract, still hanging around even after I’d deemed them unlistenable. Those who were hired with a group of songs I really liked, hiding away for a while due to their proximity to better music. Those who I’ve only kept on because I’m supposed to, serving to boost my quota of jazz or spoken word or whatever.

When I’m done, I should have a streamlined iPod, one that is easy to navigate, one where a new album isn’t instantly lost in the shuffle, squirreled away between Air and Air Supply.

I hope to cut the music down to 8,000, though I know that will be difficult to do.

Moderation is such a difficult practice.

1. Cursive – “Mothership, Mothership, Do You Read Me?”
Burst and Bloom EP

I love Cursive. It’s no surprise. And this EP was the bridge between, “Boy, that last album was amazingly good!” and, “Holy shit. These guys are for real.”

It’s a dynamic song – one of the best on the album, and one of the best in the Cursive canon – about spaceships or the birth process or something like that. I’ve never really figured out the lyrics. I’ve just rocked out.

2. The Roots – “The Next Movement (live)”
The Roots Come Alive

So, like, the whole reason The Roots kill everyone in the coolness department is that they’ve created a pretty sweet array of mainstream hip hop that has three incredible differences from the usual lame gangsta/party rap genres.

1. They are their own backing band. They’re not completely dependent on DJ loops and old, forgotten and ironic period pieces.

2. Their lyrics mean something, either socially or metaphorically.

3. One of the members of the band spells his name with a question mark.

Awesome.

3. Hank Williams – “I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry”
The Ultimate Collection

I’m not all that lonesome, so I can’t relate.

That being said, I haven’t listened to much of the “oldster country guy” category that sparsely litters Steinbeck’s music library. Usually, when I’m in the mood for something like this, I turn to either the newer stuff (Cub Country, Rumbleseat) or I dial it back to Woody Guthrie. So Hank’s sat a little despondent, forgotten and sad.

No wonder he’s so lonely.

4. Snapcase – “Caboose”
Progression Through Unlearning

Snapcase was always really good at that guitar technique that made the echoic “KOO KOO KOO” noise. And their snare drum sounded like it was about to break at the end of every song.

I loved these guys in high school. Now they simply hold a place in my most nostalgic of memories. Is there any title that better represents the late 90s attitude of “FTW! YOU CAN’T TELL US WHAT TO DO! FIGHT CONVENTION!” hardcore punk than Progression Through Unlearning?

ROCK!

5. Simon and Garfunkle – “The Boxer”
Greatest Hits

“The Boxer.” A great song.

The real story, though, is the awesome Gallagher costume that Paul Simon wears on the cover of the Greatest Hits album. I always laugh, and I always wonder what John McEnroe is doing hanging out with that lame watermelon-smashing comic.

I mean, look at this.

Gallagher. Paul Simon.

John McEnroe. Art Garfunkle.

6. Iron & Wine – “Such Great Heights”
Such Great Heights

So I discovered the other day that Iron & Wine is really just one person – some hippie looking singer/songwriter that happens to sing a little huskily and play guitar. This is a cover of a The Postal Service song, which is funny because I also have a cover of The Shins playing We Will Become Silhouettes.

BREAKING NEWS! BREAKING NEWS!
This just in. The Such Great Heights single, in fact, contained a rarity in the record industry – two covers by two other bands on the actual original band’s single.: The Shins and Iron & Wine. So The Postal Service did Such Great Heights. And Iron & Wine covered it. And The Shins covered a different The Postal Service song. And it was all on the same album.

I happen to have different source CDs – The Shins cover is on a Believer Music Issue disc, and the Iron & Wine cover was released as its own single. So really, it’s not that funny at all – they were all on the same disc. Neat.

7. The Postal Service – “We Will Become Silhouettes”
Give Up

This is how Steinbeck fucks with me. By playing a song I was just talking about. Just to think it can read my mind.

Shuffle my ass.

8. Bad Religion – “American Jesus”
Recipe for Hate

The story goes like this.

I was once in a band. It turns out that everyone that was in the band had incredible talent. Yet, at the time, none of them had actually harnessed it, allowing it to wander all over the place under the guise of pseudo-punk rock. Eventually, the band broke up and the musicians went on their own ways to hone their skills and become phenomenal musicians. The vocalist – me – retired from music and became a writer.

When we were a band, we had five names. The name changes, however much we considered it, never made us much better as a band.

We covered “American Jesus.” That is our story.

9. Modest Mouse – “Baby Blue Sedan”
Building Nothing out of Something

Modest Mouse. I like them a lot.

Apparently, this song was supposed to be included on the Lonesome Crowded West album, and was if you purchased the LP version. I didn’t have a record player. Of course, I didn’t listen to Modest Mouse much when either of these releases came out, so it wouldn’t have mattered anyway. I like this song a lot, for the record.

The best part about listening to Modest Mouse on CD is that you can’t tell how drunk Isaac Brock is. And it doesn’t suck.

10. R.E.M. – “What’s the Frequency, Kenneth?”
Monster

How can anyone hate this album? I don’t get it. I always liked it.

We all know the story about the song. Dan Rather and all.

But yeah, listen to this a few times. If you’re an R.E.M. fan, you’ll miss the days when the band actually put out original music that didn’t sound like mall bathroom muzak.

If you’re not an R.E.M. fan, then you wouldn’t like it anyway. What are you listening to it for?

And now, it’s back. Back with a vengeance. For several reasons.

First of all, I’ve created a playlist that has 1000 of my favorite songs. It’s a pure cross section of my collection – there’s at least one song from nearly every artist available. And, it’s all of the best songs, so we wont be surprised by some deep album track I’ve never bothered to listen to.

So, after months, the waiting can stop.

Wait no more. Let’s random this be-otch.

1. Debbie Gibson – “Lost In Your Eyes”
Greatest Hits

Oh God.

How embarrassing. Listen, this is not my song. I swear. In college, Kerrie would sing drunk, loud and proud to this song with her roommates and friends. With that in mind, those same friends ended up giving her this Greatest Hits CD for her birthday. And so, just like that, it ended up on Steinbeck.

It’s my fault, really. I wanted the most complete experience, which meant putting something from EVERY CD on the iPod, and from there, on the 1000 Songs playlist. I just never thought it would come up in public. Oh God.

2. Fragma – “Toca’s Miracle (Radio Edit)”
Toca

Okay. The joke’s up, people. I get it. Steinbeck is taking advantage of my aloneness to rub in every single non-Corey song in the collection. Toca’s Miracle? Really? I mean, this song is so far from my collection that I can barely name the song.

Of course, name it is one thing. Recognize it? I can do that. This isn’t just some crazy House Brit-Dance song – this is, to me, THE House Brit-Dance song, a memory that Kerrie brought back from her trip to England, a single that was popular for just a few months, a track that peaked when Kerrie’s Englishness peaked, while she was at the climax of her Anglophilia. She lived England to its fullest. And I live England through her. And this song helps. I can imagine myself drunk, at Tanner’s Pub, on the tables in a stupor.

So, as dumb as the song may seem, I still feel a little twinge when it comes on.

3. Lily Allen – “LDN”
Alright, Still

Okay, I can admit this song as mine.

Not only is Lily Allen British, and not only is this song a welcome respite AND segue from the previous song, but it’s one of my favorites from the past year. The album as a whole isn’t much of anything. But, the first three songs make up for the rest of it. It gets tired after a while (yeah, you’re against authority and you hate dudes and you swear and it’s great fun because you’re cute and English) but until that “tired’ point, Lily Allen is great fun.

Overall, it’s pop at its greatest. I can’t imagine she’ll do much more, but this is enough for an entire career.

4. Built to Spill – “Carry the Zero”
Keep it Like A Secret

I’ve never seen Built to Spill live. There are three living bands I’d like to see live before I die. Tool. Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band, and Built to Spill.

And here’s the thing – I could have. They opened for Modest Mouse in Minneapolis. And where was I? I was just one hour away, in St. Cloud, a “sort-of” fan of both bands but not yet aware of what I was missing. Instead, I continued my duties as a Resident Advisor, months after I had stopped caring.

With that said, “Carry the Zero” is one of my favorites – it’s got great lyrics, and it’s one of the better first-song album starters.

5. Outkast – “Roses”
Speakerboxxx/The Love Below

Hey Ya! is a great song. But I have always like Roses a hundred times better – both for the Prince-esque lyrics and vocals and the mention of poo-poo.

So, yeah. A Grammy was earned for this song alone.

6. Jimmy Eat World – “Opener”
The Emo Diaries: What’s Mine is Yours

Okay. I’ll admit. Before Jimmy Eat World was a viable, superstar, MTV entity (which, after a few months and a few silver looking shirts, dropped off like nothing ever happened), I was a big fan. And, while I liked their Static Prevails album, the true love didn’t start until I heard this song.

This song – the first song on the first Emo Diaries album – the first instance of having a complete compilation set based around the idea of emo music, the complex and ultra-emotional cry-fest that I loved through all of college. Some of it still stands up, and this song is one of them. It’s a cast off from a real album, but it’s one of my favorites, and it makes me proud of supporting the energy and great music that came out of the poppy-emo scene.

7. Elvis Costello – “Shipbuilding”
High Fidelity (Soundtrack)

I love this movie. And I love every song involved therein.

I love Nick Hornby, as much as he’s reviled by the literary community.

So there you go.

8. Jimmy Eat World – “Digits”
Static Prevails

See? If you mention a specific album, Steinbeck will fetch it, bringing it back to you like a dog eager to please, like an automatic vending machine designed to deliver safe and effective products with the push of a button. My little machine brought this to me, thinking I was missing it, thinking I was going without my daily fix of Jimmy Eat World.

The song starts off with an extended instrumental, then blasts into a typical Jimmy Eat World rocker. It is, for the record, one of my three favorite Jimmy Eat World songs (and don’t ask me to rank them… I’m just guessing that there aren’t three JEW songs better.) So it’s fun, all the same, to hear it. Yay for college.

9. Face to Face – “Blind”
Face to Face

I never owned this album. Kerrie brought this into our relationship.

That’s not to say I wasn’t a Face to Face fan. On the contrary – I loved these guys during my EpiFat punk era. I loved the poppy, happy punk rock they executed to a brilliant precision. And, if I had stuck around for an extra album, I’d have placed this album high on my list of favorites.

This song, especially, was one of the best, an often overlooked masterpiece in fast, emotional punk, a song easily remembered and quickly recognized. So well, in fact, that I felt incredibly familiar with it after just a few listens, knowing I’d had already encountered it a few years before.

10. The Doors – “Break On Through”
Greatest Hits

The Doors were a fascination through high school, when I dabbled in what I considered the “Big Four” of classic rock – The Beatles, Pink Floyd, The Who and The Doors (which is not to contain others that could be included, like The Rolling Stones and Led Zeppelin). So with that, I cling tightly to these songs. And, with age, I find them, for the most part, nostalgic relics.

Except for Pink Floyd and the Beatles. Both bands are beyond good, both in their smartness and their legendry.