List Your FAV FIVE: Songs

FAV FIVE Series

Songs • Albums • Singer-songwriters • Rock 'n' Roll Bands • Guitar Players 
Beatles Songs • Bob Dylan Songs • Rolling Stones Songs • Neil Young Songs

In the past, you may have seen my favorite 100 Songs, Second 100, Third 100, and I'm currently working on a Fourth 100 song playlist. Now doing a list of 100 of your 'fav' songs I found to be a bit of a challenge. My friend Paul Hobbs, found it to be harder than he first realized, as he has just completed his TOP 100 (on Spotify) which I've linked here for you to check out. (By the way, this Hobbs fellow has extremely good taste in my opinion.)

In fact, if you spend the time to make a 'My 100 Songs' list on Spotify, I will link it in a future blog. But for now, let's do the warm up!

So I ran an idea by my wife Mary Kit the other day, and said, "What if I give my readers a ten song challenge to rank their favorite ten songs of all-time?" She didn't hesitate and said, "Make it five and you'll get more responses back." Well, I listened to that advice and when I made my own list, I found that doing a list of five songs is actually harder than a ten song list, which one's to leave out, oh not that one! Anyway, I liked the five song challenge and think you will too.

So here's how you can easily participate in LIST Your FAV FIVE Songs.

1. Rank 1-5 your favorite songs of all-time.
2. Name the song, and also identify the band or musician performing the song.
   (I would suggest- you write all the songs that come to mind down on paper. Then whittle it down and rank the top five.)
3. Fill out the Google Form below, and submit. Please Submit only ONE TIME. The deadline for submittal will be Sunday, August 9th, 1pm.
4. I will create a YouTube Playlist of your FAV FIVE Songs released from record labels that would typically have the song published on YouTube. By sending me your list, you will also agree that I will Title the playlist with your first and last name.
   (example-  Bill DeVoe's FAV FIVE Songs)

This week, I'll work on all the responses and embed all the playlists in this blog this week! In creating a playlist, I try to do two things: 1) Find a high quality audio YouTube video of a track or performance; 2) Find a video of the band performing. If I can't find a video of the band performing, I usually opt for the artist's original audio track on video from their album.

For this post, I tried to find one live or concept video for each playlist, but understand I couldn't always match my #1 requirement. I also usually hate concept videos, but you'll see several here. Speaking of concept videos, my wife's #1 song is The Boys of Summer by Don Henley. For some reason, Don keeps pulling down the original 1984 MTV video, too soon Don? Well I hope the video I found makes it to the Monday post before being pulled down. C'mon Don!

a disclaimer (of sorts) - By filling out the form, it goes directly to my Google Forms account. I will only share on this blog what you have agreed to share- Your first and last name, and the 5 songs you have listed on the Google Form. A friend jokingly asked me if this was going to William Barr's desk? I said no. I can also safely say that your submittal will not be part of Hillary's 30,000 emails. 

So, here's my- All-Time Favorite Five Songs

1. Penny Lane, The Beatles
2. Like a Rolling Stone, Bob Dylan
3. (I Can't Get No) Satisfaction, The Rolling Stones
4. Sweet Baby James, James Taylor
5. Carry On, Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young

Now it's your turn.

If for some reason, the Google Form is not showing in this blog, click on the LINK Here for the form.

I'll be looking forward to making and posting Your FAV FIVE Songs YouTube playlist soon! (I will create the playlists in the order I receive them on my end.)

You can see below that I already got a little help from my friends to get this party started so if they can do it, you can too. Thank you for reading my blogs!

Stay well and come back to this blog post to view your playlist, and as the number of fav five playlists will grow daily this week, I know you will be wanting to see everyone's list!

Doug McIntosh's FAV FIVE Songs

Mary Kit McIntosh's FAV FIVE Songs

Jeremy Ouellette's FAV FIVE Songs



Jeff McCarthy's FAV FIVE Songs



Chuck Stark's FAV FIVE Songs



Paul Hobbs' FAV FIVE Songs



Ron Zieman's FAV FIVE Songs

Shawna McIntosh's FAV FIVE Songs

Roger Demchak's FAV FIVE Songs

Bill DeVoe's FAV FIVE Songs



Ken Forman's FAV FIVE Songs



Ron Ouellette's FAV FIVE Songs




Jane Hobbs' FAV FIVE Songs

Keith Richards Under the Influence

Keith Richards is many things to many different people. The public mainly knows him for the legendary reputation of being the 'bad boy' mumbling substance abuser that inspired Johnny Depp's pirate. But if you know a bit about rock 'n' roll, you know that he is simply the best band leader of the genre. Like Count Basie as a supreme band leader, Richards crafted a rhythm of sound in the Rolling Stones that is unmatched in creativity and longevity. The best beat in rock 'n' roll is the Rolling Stones and Keith is the instrument through which Muddy Waters and Chuck Berry flow together.


Last night, I watched the new documentary film by Morgan Neville, Keith Richards Under the Influence on Netflix. Mr. Neville uses the backdrop of the the making of Keith Richards' new album, Crosseyed Heart (available @ Amazon) with photographs and video of Richards' live and musical influences, starting with his mother and grandfather. Keith talks about the meeting on the train, where Mick Jagger and Keith reconnect as former classmates with Mick carrying a Muddy Waters and Chuck Berry album under his arm. That story and many others make Neville's film a must see that you will enjoy. In a recent blog, I featured another Neville film, 20 Feet from Stardom. My favorite part of that film is Merry Clayton's experience who was brought into a midnight recording session to sing on Gimme Shelter in 1969. Gimme Shelter is one of the best rock 'n' songs ever where many musical elements all came together. Keith is rarely the front man, but always the architect. In Under the Influence, you'll see how he teams with Steve Jordan his drummer and collaborator to build the rhythm from the ground up. In the film, you will also see how Keith and Stones' drummer Charlie Watts create the structure for Street Fighting Man. I love this stuff, hope you like my playlist of somethings old and new this week.