The Song that Best Represents a Band/Artist

[tragabigzanda]

[epilogue]

And I'm the one who's bad at this.

Fuckin spike...

[VinylGuy]

RHCP: Give It Away

Beastie Boys: So Watch Want

Pearl Jam: Porch

Alanis: Hand In My Pocket

The Rolling Stones: Start Me Up

[verb_to_trust]

The Stones is 100% Gimme Shelter. I don't see how you can even debate it.

[wease]

The Stones is 100% Gimme Shelter. I don't see how you can even debate it.

[spike]

Okay, so... I've been thinking this through since my Bowie post...

The song that best represents a band/artist.

To me, that's one song that if you played it for someone it would tell them what they needed to know about that artist. It doesn't mean everything that artist does has to be represented. It's the song that represents the group's essence. One song that would tell a novice whether or not they needed to bother digging deeper into a body of work.

With that in mind, I think Life on Mars? is my pick for Bowie. It's lush. It's weird. It's lyrical. It's catchy. It's character driven. It's dramatic and cinematic. It transports. All things I associate with David Bowie.

nineteen pages in and you finally got there pal

Wat

This is where I've been the entire time. Go yell at the posters giving me shit this whole time.

The way you worded your post, it seemed like you had an epiphany after your recent Bowie posts.

Also, no one is yelling, gaslighter.

[Chris_H_2]

I thought I made the point of the exercise sufficiently clear in my first post, no?

[epilogue]

Okay, so... I've been thinking this through since my Bowie post...

The song that best represents a band/artist.

To me, that's one song that if you played it for someone it would tell them what they needed to know about that artist. It doesn't mean everything that artist does has to be represented. It's the song that represents the group's essence. One song that would tell a novice whether or not they needed to bother digging deeper into a body of work.

With that in mind, I think Life on Mars? is my pick for Bowie. It's lush. It's weird. It's lyrical. It's catchy. It's character driven. It's dramatic and cinematic. It transports. All things I associate with David Bowie.

nineteen pages in and you finally got there pal

Wat

This is where I've been the entire time. Go yell at the posters giving me shit this whole time.

The way you worded your post, it seemed like you had an epiphany after your recent Bowie posts.

Also, no one is yelling, gaslighter.

Nah the "epiphany" was about which Bowie song to pick. Three rest was explaining my thought process.

[The Argonaut]

Elliott Smith - Sweet Adelaine

Nah, there is no answer for Elliot Smith. There is no one song

[Jorge]

lol the super eclectic, impossible to summarize wildly diverse art of ELLIOTT SMITH

[Jorge]

Get the fuck out of here

[The Argonaut]

That's why there is no one answer. All his stuff is too similar to pick one as quintessential

[Jorge]

"Sweet Adeline" is a perfect pick for Elliott Smith. It has his quiet mopey sound and his slightly louder mopey sound

[The Argonaut]

um ok. If you want to find a song for a "super eclectic, impossible to summarize wildly diverse" artist, what about Tom Waits?
I think I have the answer, and I think the answer is "Come On Up to the House"

[Jorge]

Yeah that probably works. Definitely something from Mule Variations which always felt to me like a good TW entry point

[tragabigzanda]

[tragabigzanda]

[tragabigzanda]

Top 10 maybe?
Hello Morning
Close Captioned
The Kill
Place/Position
Do You Like Me?
Latest Disgrace
Recap Modotti
Nightshop
Break
Life & Limb

I'd maybe bump Life & Limb for Epic Problem

[knee tunes]

Sweet Caroline for Lenny dDykstra

[epilogue]

lol the super eclectic, impossible to summarize wildly diverse art of ELLIOTT SMITH

I think there are too many Elliott Smith songs.

Personally, I'd go with Waltz #2.

But there are a lot of good answers.