iPod song of the week – The Stone Roses
It’s fashionable to get up in arms about your favorite songs of the past appearing in the commercials of today, and usually I’m down with that. There are some songs that have meaning to me that I’d rather not see totally whored out for an insurance company or a car or whatever. But in the present climate of bringing back cool songs you haven’t heard in ages from bands like the Buzzcocks (for AARP!!!!) or The The, I’m just too jazzed to hear the song to get all upset about it. (Except that Pepsi commercial remake of Ca Plane Pour Moi; that’s a travesty!)
So this week I’ve decided to highlight one of these songs. This is the first time I’ve used a song that isn’t on my own iPod (except the week I had a guest pick) but it is now. See, they use the opening 30 seconds of this song and it’s pretty ripping and all, but it’s the rest of the song that I really love and so I’m always left frustrated after all the Cadillacs leave the screen. Finally, out of total desperation, I had to dig out my old copy of the CD and rip the song for my iPod and, of course, for the iPod Song of the Week.
Now, from the excerpt in the commercial, you tend to think of this number as a power-guitar anthem, but that’s because you’re unaware that it’s actually by The Stone Roses, the former trippy-psychedelic kings of Manchester. Well, you could argue that the Happy Mondays filled that role, but The Stone Roses had a quieter, deeper, more introspective kind of vibe. Witness the fact that amongst all the power chords in this track, the vocals, low in the mix, remain calm and steady. And of course there are all the “the messiah is my sister” kind of lyrics that add to it. Dig it, man.
