100 Greatest Rock Songs of All Time

 

The (Very Nearly) Definitive List

I can still stake some sort of a claim to being a knowledgeable source of rock music, based largely on the fact that I lived through (and stayed awake for most of) the “classic rock” era.  If you did, too, then maybe I saw you at one of the concerts; Grand Funk Railroad at Shea Stadium, or Jethro Tull at The Fillmore East, a few weeks before that hallowed hall forever closed its doors.  Those really were the days, man . . .

It occurs to me, as I write this, that many alive now think radios always came with FM and AM; I know differently.  Most radios back in the 1960’s were AM-only, since FM broadcasting was reserved for primarily classical music, which few in America listened to.  Then The Doors’ Light My Fire came along.  AM radios adhered to a 3-minute rule for songs, and so only played the 3-minute version of Light My Fire, which simply eliminated the instrumental solo.  But a few groundbreaking radio stations (I listened to WNEW-FM in New York) played the full song, which lasted six or seven minutes.  Suddenly, we all had to have FM radios.  But I digress . . .

It’s impossible, of course, to truly put together a list such as the one below that would satisfy everyone.  Music is personal.  I’m more than willing to listen to suggestions, but if you do send an e-mail, please make it a polite one; the fact that your favorite song isn’t on the list shouldn’t be taken as a personal affront.  Besides, there are some who may not appreciate the classic sound of The Archies the way you do . . . 🙂
 

Number	Song Title	Artist
1	All Day and All of the Night	Kinks
2	Sunshine of Your Love	Cream
3	Satisfaction	Rolling Stones
4	Light My Fire	Doors
5	Stairway to Heaven	Led Zeppelin
6	Runaway	Del Shannon
7	House of the Rising Sun	Animals
8	Born To Be Wild	Steppenwolf
9	In the Presence of the Lord	Blind Faith
10	Truckin’	Grateful Dead
11	Whiter Shade of Pale	Procol Harum
12	Purple Haze	Jimi Hendrix
13	Good Vibrations	Beach Boys
14	Sounds of Silence	Simon & Garfunkel
15	Woodstock	Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young
16	Bad Moon Rising	Creedence Clearwater Revival
17	Like A Rolling Stone	Bob Dylan
18	American Woman	Guess Who
19	You’ve Lost That Loving Feeling	Righteous Brothers
20	Jailhouse Rock	Elvis Presley
21	Here Comes My Girl	Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers
22	Born To Run	Bruce Springsteen
23	California Dreaming	Mamas & Papas
24	Jesus Is Just Alright	Doobie Brothers
25	You Really Got Me	Kinks
26	Hey Jude	Beatles
27	Train Kept A-Rollin’	Yardbirds
28	Eight Miles High	Byrds
29	Oye Como Va	Santana
30	Long Cool Woman in a Black Dress	Hollies
31	Johnny B Goode	Chuck Berry
32	When A Man Loves A Woman	Percy Sledge
33	Nights in White Satin	Moody Blues
34	Do You Believe In Magic	Lovin’ Spoonful
35	Hotel California	Eagles
36	Imagine	John Lennon
37	Ticket to Ride	Beatles
38	Whole Lotta Love	Led Zeppelin
39	Gimme Shelter	Rolling Stones
40	Walk Away Renee	The Left Banke
41	La Bamba	Richie Valens
42	Pretty Woman	Roy Orbison
43	Do Wah Diddy Diddy	Manfred Mann
44	Yesterday	Beatles
45	Sultans of Swing	Dire Straits
46	Pinball Wizard	Who
47	Whipping Post	Allman Brothers
48	Somebody To Love	Jefferson Airplane
49	Time of the Season	Zombies
50	Turn, Turn, Turn	Byrds
51	White Room	Cream
52	Dust In the Wind	Kansas
53	Feelin’ Alright	Traffic
54	For What It’s Worth	Buffalo Springfield
55	Daniel	Elton John
56	You Ain’t Seen Nothin’ Yet	Bachman Turner Overdrive
57	Heart Full of Soul	Yardbirds
58	Bohemian Rhapsody	Queen
59	Unchained Melody	Righteous Brothers
60	Glad All Over	Dave Clark Five
61	You Make Loving Fun	Fleetwood Mac
62	Lay Lady Lay	Bob Dylan
63	Changes	David Bowie
64	Brown Eyed Girl	Van Morrison
65	Maggie May	Rod Stewart
66	Summer In the City	Lovin’ Spoonful
67	Layla	Derek and the Dominoes
68	Dream On	Aerosmith
69	Brown Sugar	Rolling Stones
70	Heart of Gold	Neil Young
71	One	Three Dog Night
72	Won’t Get Fooled Again	Who
73	Roadhouse Blues	The Doors
74	More Than a Feeling	Boston
75	Wear Your Love Like Heaven	Donovan
76	Piece of My Heart	Big Brother and the Holding Company
77	Shambhala	Three Dog Night
78	Magic Carpet Ride	Steppenwolf
79	All Along the Watchtower	Jimi Hendrix
80	Take It to the Limit	Eagles
81	Suite Judy Blue Eyes	Crosby, Stills & Nash
82	It’s Only Make Believe	Conway Twitty
83	Ball and Chain	Big Brother and the Holding Company
84	Badlands	Bruce Springsteen
85	Refugee	Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers
86	Bad to the Bone	George Thorogood and the Destroyers
87	I’m A Man	Spencer Davis Group
88	Morning Has Broken	Cat Stevens
89	Lucky Man	Emerson, Lake & Palmer
90	Goodbye Yellow Brick Road	Elton John
91	Still Haven’t Found . . .	U-2
92	Hush	Deep Purple
93	Black Magic Woman	Santana
94	The Flame	Cheap Trick
95	Roxanne	The Police
96	25 or 6 to 4	Chicago
97	Smoke on the Water	Deep Purple
98	Can’t Get It Out of My Head	Electric Light Orchestra
99	Louie, Louie	Kingsmen
100	I Wonder Why	Dion and the Belmonts

 

Like I said, not everyone will agree, and the order of the songs is almost a moot point when listing such great music, but I doubt you could go wrong by assembling this group of songs for your listening pleasure.  (Don’t tell me these songs aren’t on your iPod!)  And if I’ve reminded you of a few you’d forgotten, or encouraged you to go out and listen to one or two you might not have heard, then my task is accomplished.

PS – Thanks to a reader for suggesting Dion and the Belmonts.

……

A reader from Britain recently wrote and asked why Back in Black by AC/DC wasn’t on the list.  I’m sorry to admit that I don’t know the song.  Maybe I’m too old . . .

He also asked “why do all these lists include not rock songs…” which is, I think, a good question.  Rock has always been difficult to define, which is why people are always trying to create sub-genres, like classic rock, folk rock, etc. 

A good bit of what we might consider rock music is simply blues music.  Two of Cream’s biggest hits were “Crossroads,” by Robert Johnson, and “Spoonful,” by Willie Dixon.  The Rolling Stones, especially in their early days, were heavily blues-influenced.  (Am I the only one who realizes that Mick Jagger has spent his entire musical career imitating the song stylings of African-American women?)  You can hear a lot of blues music by listening to the Spencer Davis Group and, of course, Cream’s most famous band member, Clapton.  Even Jethro Tull did a version of “Stormy Monday.”  (Not great – don’t rush right out to find it.)  Back to Cream – what about “Born Under a Bad Sign”?

The Grateful Dead did, “Turn on Your Love Light,” which had previously been recorded by James Cotton.  Rock or blues?  The Dead also did a song about teaching that weeping willow how to cry, cry cry . . . rock or country?  The Byrds were almost always a folk/country/rock mix, which was inevitable, given the deep folk roots of their founders.  Is Dylan folk or rock?  It’s hard – some might say semi-blasphemous – to exclude him from either group.

The Moody Blues tried to be classical/rock, and so did, in a way, ELO. 

One could go on, ad infinitum.

Lastly, there is the question of rock versus “easy listening.”  My only observation here is that some songs we might today regard as being “easy listening” were once clearly regarded as rock songs.  Perceptions change over time. 

Update – Thanks to recent input from a correspondent, a few changes have been made – notably, The Police and U-2 are now represented, as they should probably always have been.  However, we remain unrepentant for rating The Kinks as highly as we do….

 

Ten Years After….?

A reader from Denver recently wrote, “I don’t agree totally with your list; it is however, probably more accurate than most I have seen. One song always seems to stand out in my mind as I read these lists. That is “I’d Love to Change the World” by Ten Years After. I don’t find it on many lists and did not find it on yours. I think that song rocks pretty hard and is a great anthem of that time as well.”  This is a good point, and brought to mind Ten Years After’s other great song, “I’m Going Home,” which was probably one of the better tunes performed at Woodstock.  I didn’t change the list to add Ten Years After (at least not yet), but the group certainly deserves to be remembered more than it is today, and you couldn’t really go wrong adding a few of their songs to your iPod.  Thanks to J.Y. for the memory jog.

 

It’s More Than a Feeling

I was in a fairly mellow (some might say comatose) mood when I first made up the list years ago, and over time most of the not-really-anything-remotely-like-rock songs on the list from that early period have been removed and replaced.  So I was surprised when reader S.B. wrote and said, “Pretty good list, but Bread and Melanie don’t belong on it.”  Bread?  Melanie?  Still there?  (If you’re curious, the two songs were “Lost Without Your Love” and “Lay Down, Lay Down,” respectively.)  S.B. suggested three possible replacements, the first two of which are now on the list: “More Than a Feeling,” by Boston; “All Along the Watchtower,” by Hendrix; and “Who Are You,” by the Who.  The Who are already fairly well represented on the list, they were never great musicians anyway, and I just simply liked the first two choices better.  Thanks, S.B.! 

 

Long, Cool Woman

Reader A.S. wrote in to suggest the Hollies’ “Long Cool Woman in a Black Dress,” and I thought, “That must be on the list – it’s a great song!”  But it wasn’t, so I added it, replacing Aretha Franklin’s “Respect,” which is also a fine song, but technically R&B and not rock.  Thanks, A.S.!

 

More Changes . . .

Maybe it’s age, but more and more I’ve been going back to the Sixties when listening to music.  A group of younger coworkers tried to place me music-wise recently with, “I guess you were into the Beatles, huh?”  It was hard to get across to them that, while the Beatles were indeed big in the Sixties, there was so much going on musically besides the Fab Four.  So anyway, I’ve made some changes on the list.  I took out the Kinks’ Lola from Spot 40 (great song, but the Kinks are already very well-represented on the list), and replaced it with The Left Banke’s Walk Away Renee (not Just Walk Away Renee, which I always thought was the title).  Someone once told me that the original members of the Left Banke were from Glen Oaks in Queens, New York, where I spent my adolescent years, but that’s another story, and not the reason I put the song on the list. 

I also changed out Spot 57, replacing the Yardbirds’ For Your Love (great song) with the Yardbirds’ Heart Full of Soul (perhaps greater song).  If you’re into the Yardbirds – and as a rock aficionado, it would be hard not to be – be sure to also give a listen to their song, Over, Under, Sideways, Down.  I’d listened to Elvis and others as a small child, but Over, Under, Sideways, Down was the first song that really made an impression on me.  (The second was Eve of Destruction.  My parents despaired.)