veckinon's Musical Alphabet - a challenge brought to you by @verhp11

Collage by veckinon

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I was nominated by fellow Montanan, @bigskycustoms for the Music Alphabet Challenge. This challenge was started by @verhp11.

The Rules

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• You have to mention one song per letter of the alphabet. The song title has to start with that letter
• Write a small line of text for each song, memories or something else...
• Put a video with every song, if there aren't you can put a soundlink
• Use the hashtag #musicalphabetchallenge
• Nominate at least 1 person, the more the better

This was a tough one to put together. I actually couldn’t just do one per letter and there are a couple of other songs snuck in there. I still feel like I could have included more.

I tried to include only songs that had a big impact on me in some sort of way. For the most part, I think I succeeded, but the imposed restrictions made a couple of them difficult. There are only so many songs that start with letters like Q, X and Z after all.

Nominations

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I will nominate three people for this challenge.

I nominate:

@dflo
@mrprofessor
@agmoore

To the people I nominate, no hard feelings if you do not want to participate. To everyone else, you should check out the pages of the people I nominate if you get a chance. They are some of my favorite creators here on steemit and do amazing work!

Without further ado, here is my Musical Alphabet….

A

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All along the Watchtower - Jimi Hendrix

This was the first song I ever performed live in my very first ‘real’ band in high school, Johnny Garage. I thought we were sooooo cool.

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B

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Baby, I’m an Anarchist - Against Me!

Quite possibly one of the greatest sing-along choruses of any song.

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C

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Christian Woman - Type O Negative

There were a few years in the nineties there where I was about 2 parts punk rock, 2 parts dirty hippy, 1-part thrasher and 1-part goth. That one-part goth listened to a lot of Type O Negative.

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D

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The Decline - NOFX

When I was around 20, me and a few punk rock friends banded together with the sole purpose of learning this song and playing it live. At eighteen minutes with multiple transitions and key changes, it was a heck of a feat. I learned a lot about playing guitar from learning this song. I have a video of us playing it with shitty sound quality somewhere. I should upload it sometime.

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E

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East Hastings – Godspeed You! Black Emperor

I don’t know exactly what genre Godspeed is. But it probably starts with the word post or alt or something. Either way, good stuff.

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F

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Fuck wit Dre Day (And Everybody's Celebratin') – Dr. Dre feat. Snoop Dog

Somewhat ironically, if you were between the ages of 12 and 20 in rural Montana when The Chronic came out, you were listening to Dre.

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G

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Grinnin' in Your Face – Son House

“Just bear this in mind, a true friend is hard to find. Don’t you mind someone grinnin’ in your face.”
You should listen to Son House. Just do it!

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H

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Hard-time Killing Floor Blues – Skip James

Continuing with the delta blues theme, the king of the D minor (one of my favorite keys) blues, Skip James. This song became re-popularized from the film, Oh Brother Where Art Though.

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I

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I Will Always Love You – Whitney Houston

This track may seem a little out of place in this collection, but god damn Whitney Houston could sing. I still listen to the Bodyguard soundtrack.

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J

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Jockey Full of Bourbon – Tom Waits

There was a long period where I was very ill and also listened to a ton of Tom Waits. After I pseudo-recovered, I couldn’t listen to him for years because it would just remind me of feeling like shit. Luckily that has passed.

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K

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Kiss Off –Violent Femmes

Once in high school, one of my best friends had told me they were going to buy us Violent Femmes tickets and drive to Missoula for the concert as a birthday present for me. The band was a favorite of both of ours. The weekend before tickets went on sale they spent all their money on LSD and vodka instead. Bastard. Luckily the Violent Femmes came back to Missoula a few years ago and I finally got to see them live.

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L

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The Last Song – Jason Webley

If this guy ever plays near you, go see him. He is unreal. One of the best performers and songwriters I have seen.

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Little Wing – Stevie Ray Vaughn

Stevie Ray Vaughn’s rendition of Little Wing is one of the most perfect pieces of electric guitar music. This version is not as clean as the studio track, but seeing him play is a treat.

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M

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Mother – Tori Amos

There were many years where I considered Tori Amos my favorite songwriter and piano player. Musically she is one of the most interesting ‘pop’ artists I know of. She has a good enough grasp on music to be creative in ways that most singers and musicians are not capable.

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N

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November Rain – Guns and Roses

I remember thinking this video was the most epic thing ever when it first came out. And three guitar solos in one song! Too bad Axle Rose is a dirt-bag.

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O

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One – Metallica

Some people think of the album And Justice for All as the first album with Jason Newsted – or rather the first album without Cliff Burton.
Some people consider it Metallica’s last real ‘Thrash’ album.
I consider the album that introduced me to metal when I first saw the video for the anti-war thrash epic One on MTV. If you have somehow never seen this video, it is worth watching.

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P

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Paranoid Android – Radiohead

Although I am a big fan of Radiohead, I primarily included this song because of its video. The surreal illustrative animation style was right up my alley. There were a few summer days wear I waited all day long for this video to come on MTV. I should have just recorded it. Thankfully we have youtube now.

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Q

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Que Sera Sera – The Chipmunks

Q is obviously a difficult one to find a song for. I had to hop in the way-way-back machine to find this one and dig up the very first cassette tape I ever owned, The Chipmunks Sing With Children. "Alllllvvviiiinnnn!!!!"

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R

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Rock and Roll All Night - Kiss

My parents had all the old Kiss albums. When I was first old enough to have one of those cassette tape/record player combos that were popular in the 80’s and early 90’s, I would listen to Kiss, full-blast in my bedroom non-stop. My dad has always played in a band and both my parents listened to a lot of loud music, so nobody stopped me.

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S

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I couldn’t really narrow down the S songs, so you get three.

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Symphony Number 9 Second Movement – Ludwig Van Beethoven

I originally got into classical music through frugality. As a kid, I quickly realized that I could get many classical cassettes and CDs for much cheaper than their modern ‘Pop’ counterparts. In an effort to stretch my allowance dollar as far as I could at the music store, I would buy a lot of classical music. I truly do enjoy it though and I especially love Beethoven. There were times both in high school and college where I had to forbid myself from listening to Beethoven while working on my homework because I would become too engrossed in the music.

I feel like the chorale section of this piece – The aptly titled Ode to Joy - is the most popular part of this symphony, but the second movement has always been my favorite. Right from the beginning it lets you know it means business with the string hits and the timpani. It is a musical journey.

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Shine on You Crazy Diamond – Pink Floyd

When I ask myself, “Hey, Colin? What is an electric guitar supposed to sound like?” I usually answer myself “David Gilmour…”

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Sultans of Swing – Dire Straits

…and when the answer is not David Gilmour, it is Mark Knopfler.

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T

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Thundersteel – Riot

I did not get into Riot until I saw an article posted on a Crohn’s disease support page about the lead guitar player who died from complications of the disease. I myself have Crohn’s (which is why I was on the site. I wasn't just Marla Singer-ing it). I decided to check out some of their music and was immediately blown away. Their album Thundersteel is amazing. It is kind of like Iron Maiden on Steroids.

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U

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Unit 7 – Wes Montgomery and the Wynton Kelly Trio

The first jazz song I learned to play was a Wes Montgomery song. Not this one though. It was a song called Sundown. This was in my second band, Abeja’s Revenge. I played bass in this particular band. The guitar player discovered Sundown and really wanted to play it, but wasn’t much of a lead guitarist. Thus, I played the guitar and he played bass for this track. I really enjoyed the song, looked up more of Montgomery's work and discovered his outstanding album with the Wynton Kelly trio, Smokin’ at the Half Note. and the song Unit 7.

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V

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Violin Concerto #1 - Niccolò Paganini

One of the first musicians that was so good people swore he sold his soul to the devil.

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W

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The Weight – The Band

“Take a load off, Fannie.” Come on, you know the words. I recently did this song for steemit open mic. Here is a link if you want to check it out. https://steemit.com/openmic/@veckinon/steemit-openmic-week-86-the-weight-my-first-openmic

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X

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Xanadu – Rush

I do enjoy Rush, though I am not a huge fan. But, how many ‘X’ songs are there?

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Y

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You Took the Words Right Out of My Mouth – Meatloaf

My parents liked to party quite a bit when I was younger (they still do on occasion). Through most of the eighties, every time they were having parties they were listening to Meatloaf (or Fleetwood Mac). It eventually just became a part of who I am. I still enjoy Meatloaf to this day. What many people don’t know is that all of Meatloaf’s songs and music were written by some guy named Jim Steinman. He also wrote hits for other people, including Bonnie Tyler’s epic hits Total Eclipse of the Heart and I Need a Hero, as well as Celine Dione’s It’s All Coming Back to Me.

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Z

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Zombie – The Cranberries

I couldn’t find any ‘Z’ songs that really meant a lot to me. But, this is a very strong song and I happened to see an amazing cover of it recently as a steemit open mic entry. So here is @lillywilton’s version. Check her out. She has lots of good stuff!

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That's my musical alphabet. If you made it this far, I hope you enjoyed some of the songs I posted. If you are just dying to do this challenge yourself and are sad that you weren’t nominated, well then congratulations, I nominate you as well!

Best wishes,
@veckinon