I’ve never been a huge fan of
ballads. Back in the day I used to joke
the greatest ballad of all time was Sweet
Child of Mine. Recently I watched
what should really be called Ballad of
Ages, and it did nothing to dissuade me from this line of thinking, and if
Alec Baldwin can’t make you like ballads nothing can.
My opinion of ballads was cemented
recently when I took chance and took my wife to a 40’s big band revival. Which by the way fits my criteria for the “arts”,
meaning it earns me brownie points,
while mitigating potential retinal, ear drum, or tailbone damage that can come
from some of the more pretentious pieces.
If I point them out, she doesn’t seek them out herself, so I put myself in
win, hopefully not lose setting. Next
year by the way I’m thinking The Nutcracker
done to Dark Side of the Moon. Anyway what this excursion taught me was
they had ballads in 40’s too, and they are just as boring as modern day
ballads.
This doesn’t mean all music needs to
be fast for me to enjoy, but I need it to be at least a step above a
ballad. With that in mind I decided to
put together a list of songs that don’t quite fall into the ballad
category.
10.
Just a Friend – Biz Markie: It’s got a piano. It’s
about a broken heart. What else do you
need? How about a catchy hook and an out
of key singer. It’s just too much fun to
be considered a ballad, which is probably one of the reasons it became the most
unlikely of hits.
9.
Beast of Burden – The Rolling Stones: I only
like a handful of Stones’ songs, but this is one of them. This is one of those songs that has a tempo
that can’t be considered slow or upbeat which is why I think it qualifies as
not quite a ballad, and as a plus is also not quite a love song either.
8.
Been Down so Long – The Doors: This the first of many that has a heavy blues influence. This song starts out with the lyrics, “I’ve
been down so long, it looks like up to me.”
Morrison makes it drips with anguish.
Ballads tend to rely on anguish and crooning, this song manages both
without cheese, or a tempo slugs could march to.
7.
Moondance – Van Morrison: We go from one of the all-time great crooners to the
next. A sweet love song that is just a
little bit too upbeat to be considered a ballad.
6.
Whiskey Without Women – Drive by
Truckers: A song about two of my favorite
things, with all the angst you could want, by what I would consider a country
band that writes great rock songs.
5.
The Lemon Song – Led Zeppelin: Zeppelin is the king
of bands that refuse to have their songs fall into one tempo. I had a High School teacher that liked to
tell a story about one of his friends who was at a dance during Zep’s
heyday. He was very uncomfortable fast
dancing, but there was a girl there he liked, so he waited all night for his
chance to dance with her. He made the
mistake of waiting until Stairway to
Heaven started to make his move.
Awkward.
I probably could have went with half
of Zeppelin’s catalog, but chose this reimaging of Howlin’ Wolf’s Killing Floor because the way the song squeezes, “my lemons
it makes me wanna' fall out of bed.”
4.
Life by the Drop – Stevie Ray
Vaughn: Another artist that thrives with
songs that don’t quite cross over into full on ballad territory. On the surface there is not much to the song,
which largely is nothing more than a classic blues shuffle. There is something about the way Stevie sings
about his real life struggle with alcohol, and in a very understated way
manages to make us care more about his plight than many of the pandering
ballads you’ll run across.
3. Sweet Child of Mine – Guns N’ Roses:
I’ve loved
this song since I first saw the video in the youth (full disclosure, I also
liked Rico Suave). It was also my go to Karaoke song for a
while, so I have a lot of history with this particular song, but more
importantly it is a reminder of how dynamic the combination of Slash and Axle
Rose was before egos got in the way.
Plus it’s way better than their true ballad November Rain.
2.
Ride On – AC/DC: When you think of AC/DC you usually don’t think of slow songs
or serious songs but, Bon Scott and the boys decide to take it down a notch and
croon about the lonely life on the road in this number. When he sings of being so lonely you can’t
help feel bad for him.
1.
Wish You Were Here – Pink Floyd: For my money this is one the prettiest songs in the history
of popular music. If you didn’t pay
attention to the words it could easily be confused for a love ballad. Great riff, great lyrics, great song.
