The 100 Best Songs of All Time

A Few Weeks Ago,

I was driving home from work in my car, listening to Snow Patrol's "Run."

This song is overdone, cheesy...and one of the best songs I've ever heard.

I am a blatant fan of pop music, and "Run" is an amazingly crafted work of that genre. It starts out with this horribly minor key-guitar grind underneath sad, sad lyrics, in the sort of vein of sad where you sort of instantly want to change the song to something else. If you can make it to the chorus, though, the song errupts into...well, pop euphoria, and then beats it into the ground until the solo FINALLY emerges, and you kind of want to play air guitar with a look on your face that would get your ass kicked if you were in public.

But you're not.

Let's just say it's anguished. (The look.)

Anyways, I found myself considering if it was one of the best 100 songs that I've ever heard.

I decided that it was, and then, it being a long drive, started adding other songs to that list.

The Best Songs Ever

1. A Day in the Life – The Beatles
2. Float On – Modest Mouse
3. What I Got – Sublime
4. Do You Realize? – The Flaming Lips
5. While My Guitar Gently Weeps – The Beatles
6. Fake Plastic Trees – Radiohead
7. Across The Universe – The Beatles
8. Paranoid Android – Radiohead
9. Oakland Blackouts – Hieroglyphics
10. Agnus Dei – Samuel Barber
11. All Along The Watchtower (live) – Dave Matthews Band
12. Such Great Heights – The Postal Service
13. Smells Like Teen Spirit – Nirvana
14. Killing in the Name Of – Rage Against the Machine
15. Bartender – Dave Matthews Band
16. Prayer of the Children – Kurt Bestor
17. Hey Ya! – Outkast
18. Bohemian Rhapsody – Queen
19. Tiny Dancer – Elton John
20. Eleanor Rigby – The Beatles
21. Interstate Love Song – The Stone Temple Pilots
22. November Rain – Guns 'n Roses
23. Laid – James
24. Good Vibrations – The Beach Boys
25. Don't Stop Believing – Journey
26. Sex Type Thing – The Stone Temple Pilots
27. Crazy – Gnarls Barkley
28. Send Me on My Way – Rusted Root
29. Solisbury Hill – Peter Gabriel
30. Clocks – Coldplay
31. Hide Your Love – The Beatles
32. Two of Us – The Beatles
33. Feel Good, Inc – Gorillaz
34. Ave Maria – Franz Beibel
35. Longview – Green Day
36. No Rain – Blind Melon
37. Immigrant Song – Led Zeppelin
38. Under African Skies – Paul Simon
39. Basket Case – Green Day
40. Mr. Jones- Counting Crows
41. Ants Marching – Dave Matthews Band
42. Losing My Religion – REM
43. Suite Judy Blue Eyes – Crosby, Stills and Nash
44. Aenemia – Tool
45. Gentlemen – Fela Kuti
46. If I Fell – The Beatles
47. Caress Me Down – Sublime
48. Free – Phish
49. Diamonds on the Soles of Her Shoes – Paul Simon
50. Chicago – Sufjan Stevens
51. Hold Me, Thrill Me, Kiss Me, Kill Me – U2
52. Let Go – Frou Frou
53. Sweet Adeline – Elliott Smith
54. Standing Outside a Broken Phone Booth – The Primitive Radio Gods
55. Run – Collective Soul
56. High and Dry – Radiohead
57. Bulls on Parade – Rage Against the Machine
58. Help! – The Beatles
59. Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots Part One – The Flaming Lips
60. Sgt. Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band/With a Little Help – The Beatles
61. Ruby Soho – Rancid
62. Over and Over (live) – Hot Chip
63. I Know What I Know – Paul Simon
64. White Room – Cream
65. Stairway to Heaven – Led Zeppelin
66. SemiCharmed Life – Third Eye Blind
67. Even Flow – Pearl Jam
68. Real Love – The Beatles
69. Clint Eastwood – The Gorillaz
70. Mr. Brightside – The Killers
71. Barrel of a Gun – Guster
72. Holland, 1945 – Neutral Milk Hotel
73. Nowhere Man – The Beatles
74. It's Only Love – The Beatles
75. Stinkfist – Tool
76. Run – Snow Patrol
77. Loser – Beck
78. Light My Fire – The Doors
79. Crash Into Me – Dave Matthews Band
80. Creep – Radiohead
81. Today – The Smashing Pumpkins
82. She's Leaving Home – The Beatles
83. A Hard Day's Night – The Beatles
84. I Would Walk 500 Miles – The Proclaimers
85. The Circle of Life – Elton John
86. I Can't Get Next to You - The Temptations
87. Buddy Holly – Weezer
88. Selling the Drama – Live
89. Without Me – Eminem
90. Transatlantisism – Death Cab for Cutie
91. Billie Jean – Micheal Jackson
92. Arc of Time – Bright Eyes
93. One Headlight – The Wallflowers
94. Where is the Love – The Black Eyed Peas
95. 93 'till Infinity – Souls of Mischief
96. Redemption Song – Bob Marley and the Wailers
97. Dig For Fire – The Pixies
98. Mrs. Robinson – Simon and Garfunkel
99. Be My Baby – The Ronettes
100. Istanbul (Not Constantinople) – They Might Be Giants

Now, about this list:

Beethoven, Bach, Mozart, The Who, Pink Floyd, More Bob Marley, More Led Zeppelin, etc. They were all 'superior music geniuses' than, say, the Black Eyed Peas.

However, this is not a list of the greatest music geniuses.

It's a list of the best songs ever. By Me.

Take #66, Semi-Charmed Life. I realize that this song may not be as powerful as Pink Floyd's "Mother," to some, but here's the difference. In 8^th grade, I was violently in love with a girl who was moving away. I already (like most 8^th graders) thought that Semi-Charmed Life was a pretty great song.

One day, she called me, and said, hey, you know that song semi-charmed life?

I said yeah?

She said, it reminds me of you every time I hear it.

I asked her why.

She said, because of that line about having sand in between your toes. It just reminds me of you.

This instantly made it my favorite song for the whole summer.

Some would say, well, this doesn't qualify it as one of the greatest songs ever.

I say, fuck yes it does.

Every factor needs to be considered when making your list of the best 100 songs of all time.

Pink Floyd are indeed an amazing rock band.

But I, for some reason or another, have yet to really be really, really obsessed with a Pink Floyd Song.

Maybe it's because I saw The Wall when I was too young, and it fucked me up.

Who knows.

Whatever the reason, Pink Floyd could make my list in a year. It might make it with 10 songs.

But it's not on it now.

The songs also have to stand out on their own: Phish's Farmhouse is one of my favorite discs of all time but none of the tracks really hold their own (for me) as singles, so no cuts for them.

The Beatles could probably squeeze 15 more tracks onto my top 100, but I'm a little Beatled-out right now, which hurt their showing.

I included a few live tracks. I didn't mean to- it's just that there is no non-live recording of Dave Matthews Band's "Watchtower."

Also, with Hot Chip: their song, "over and over," was one of the coolest things I've ever seen-live. On the Album, it might make top 200, but not 100. So I gave 'em the live version for the list.

If the song made you weep because someone didn't love you anymore, (two songs on my list) if the song made you dance 'cause you were falling in love, (4 or 5) or maybe you liked if the song said the 'fuck yous,' to all the people you already hated at the time, (a few more), or you were addicted to lying in bed, listening to the song, and watching rain hit your windows (at least one huge one), then it belongs on the list.

If the song was just catchy or well crafted, or maybe you just said shit, that's a good song.

Then it belongs on you list.

These are the best songs that have ever been written