Author Allen M Werner

The countdown continues. I finally broke into the top 100 songs of all-time. I am only posting five at a time and giving a little more detailed information about the songs, the bands, and the reasons why these songs might be this high on my list.
Hope you are enjoying this countdown.
Be sure to click on the videos to hear the songs.
So far…

100 – Cheap Trick – Dream Police
99 – Creed- One Last Breath
98 – Blind Melon – No Rain
97 – Living Colour – Cult of Personality
96 – Triumph – Ordinary Man

Here we go!

If you haven’t figured it out yet, the Scorpions are my favorite band and there are a lot of Scorpion songs on this countdown.
31 songs in the top 1000. More than any other band or artist.
And that still does not do them justice because I know pretty much their entire catalog and can listen to just about every song by them and be happy.
The Scorpions have released 92 singles which could nearly fill the entire top 100 by themselves.
The song ‘You and I’ ranks #7 on my list of best Scorpion songs. There are still six more Scorpion songs on the countdown to come.
‘You and I’ was the first single off the Scorpion’s 13th album, Pure Instinct. The album didn’t do well in America. The single climbed #22 in their homeland Germany.
The Scorpions are known for producing great power ballads and ‘You and I’ is one of them. I think it is classic Scorpions musically and lyrically. It has enough guitar work to keep it rocking while the lyrics touch on personal relationship aspects like many Scorpion songs. My wife even likes this song, and she doesn’t like many rock songs. And she has seen the Scorpions live with me several times, so I’m grateful for that.
The Pure Instinct album is the only album by the Scorpions not to list a drummer in its credits because longtime drummer Herman Rarebell had left the band and a full-time replacement had not been chosen yet. Session’s drummer Curt Cress stepped in to complete work on the Pure Instinct album.

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#95 – You and I – 7/31
#119 – Fly People Fly – 8/31
#125 – Fly To The Rainbow – 9/31
#159 – Rock N Roll Band – 10/31
#186 – Rhythm of Love – 11/31
#224 – Someday Is Now – 12/31
#231 – The Sails of Charon – 13/31
#257 – Alien Nation – 14/31
#273 – Lust or Love – 15/31
#293 – Drifting Sun – 16/31
#335 – Hurricane 2000 – 17/31
#351 – Time Will Call Your Name – 18/31
#363 – Hour 1 – 19/31
#380 – Wind of Change – 20/31
#430 – Humanity – 21/31
#472 – When The Smoke Is Going Down – 22/31
#505 – Tease Me Please Me – 23/31
#526 – The Zoo – 24/31
#568 – In Trance – 25/31
#721 – Don’t Stop At The Top – 26/31
#762 – Big City Nights – 27/31
#822 – Evening Wind – 28/31
#870 – 10 Light Years Away – 29/31
#886 – Where The River Flows – 30/31
#949 – Love Will Keep Us Alive – 31/31

‘Forever More’ is the title track of Tesla’s 8th album. As soon as I hear the guitar, I turn this song up. This is such an amazing album, and the song ‘Forever More’ is my favorite Tesla song.
Tesla, after going by two other names in the early 80s, changed their name to Tesla in 1986 right before releasing their first album, Mechanical Resonance.
Tesla have released eleven albums, their most popular ones being released in the late 80s and early 90s.
Personally, I prefer the Forever More album over the other albums.
The song ‘Forever More’ is a straightforward hard rocker with powerful lyrics focusing on standing your ground when it comes to love and concern for others despite the odds, a common theme in many great rock songs.
I’ve only seen Tesla live once and it was in support of the Forever More album in 2009. They were opening for the Scorpions.

#94 – Forever More – 1/8
#181 – The First Time – 2/8
#404 – Fallin’ Apart – 3/8
#428 – Signs – 4/8
#449 – What A Shame – 5/8
#469 – So What! – 6/8
#525 – What You Give – 7/8
#981 – Love Song – 8/8

I became a fan of My Chemical Romance (MCR) because of my daughters. They were huge fans for years before The Black Parade album was released. The got me to listen to The Black Parade album and they had me take them to their concerts and I learned to love them. The Black Parade album is an excellent album from start to finish and they were really good live.
The Black Parade was MCR’s 3rd album. The album has now gone 4x Platinum.
The band was known earlier for their emo/gothic nature, but The Black Parade threw them squarely into the hard rock category and expanded their fan base exponentially.
House of Wolves is an energetic, fast-paced song that never gets out of control but takes the listener to the brink of being out of control. Awesome lyrics. It was not released as a single but ranks #3 on my list of MCR songs.
There are two more MCR songs to come.
I have seen them live a handful of times thanks to my daughters and I enjoyed every performance – probably more so because I was sharing it with my daughters. 🙂

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#93 – House of Wolves – 3/11
#265 – How I Disappear – 4/11
#318 – The Sharpest Lives – 5/11
#358 – Na Na Na – 6/11
#702 – Give’em Hell Kid – 7/11
#857 – To The End – 8/11
#879 – I’m Not Okay – 9/11
#902 – Dead – 10/11
#940 – Cemetery Drive – 11/11

Rise Against started out as a punk band in Chicago before becoming a full-fledged rock outfit producing amazing songs that were more accessible to the public while maintaining their socially conscious mentality.
Re-Education was the first single off their 5th album, Appeal To Reason, released in 2008.
It is a heavy track with a heavy metal feel. The lyrics are powerful, attacking the system of labor which forces so many people to work long difficult hours without getting much back in return. A great protest song.
I have seen Rise Against live at least a handful of times. If you want to see what they were like back 2009, I shot this video of them at Summerfest. Great time. Great memories. You can see how jamming the place by the movement of the camera. I couldn’t hold it still. They had the place rocking.

There are ten Rise Against songs in my top 1000.
Re-Education is my third favorite Rise Against song.
There are still two more songs to come.

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92 – Re- Education
162 – Swing Life Away
283 – Prayer of the Refugee
372 – The Dirt Whispered
429 – Satellite
610 – People Live Here
699 – Paper Wings
731 – Saviour

I was a huge fan of Yngwie from the start. I heard about him when he was introduced to the public through a band called Steeler with vocalist Ron Keel. They bumped heads and Yngwie moved to play with Alcatrazz and vocalist Graham Bonnet.
Yngwie is a classically trained guitarist with an enormous ego and his time with Alcatrazz was also short. Malmsteen and Bonnet actually got in a fight on stage, and he was fired the next day.
Yngwie did what Yngwie was meant to do – he became a solo act.
The stuff in Steeler and Alcatrazz held him back and didn’t highlight his mastery of the guitar, or the complexity of his arrangements.
In 1984, Yngwie released his first solo album, Rising Force. The album is considered to be the beginning of the neoclassical metal genre. The album was hailed by many guitarist as a classic upon its arrival.
The problem for Yngwie, however, was that radio audiences weren’t accustomed to listening to type of music.
His third album, Trilogy, was aimed more at structuring songs for the radio and a wider audience.
Purist consider Trilogy to be his second-best album to Rising Force, but for a radio listening audience, Trilogy is a much more accessible album from beginning to end.
I personally love all the songs on this album. Only one song, You Don’t Remember, I’ll Never Forget, was the only single released from it.
Fury, for me, is Yngwie at his song writing best. An absolute gem. It’s a song about anger controlling one’s life and how difficult it can be to manage it. Amazing song.
I saw Alcatrazz with Yngwie once, and I saw Yngwie’s solo act three times. I remember there being long breaks in the show where the other members of the band left the stage and it was just Yngwie mesmerizing the audience with blistering solos. Pure ego yes. Skill and talent? A huge yes.
There are six Yngwie songs in my top 1000 songs which is probably not enough but that’s how it worked out.

91 – Fury
200 – Fire
581 – As Above, So Below
882 – Trilogy Suite Op. 5
925 – Blitzkrieg
994 – Far Beyond The Sun

That’s all for this weekend.
I’ll continue the countdown next weekend.
Here’s the top 100 so far.

100 – Cheap Trick – Dream Police
99 – Creed- One Last Breath
98 – Blind Melon – No Rain
97 – Living Colour – Cult of Personality
96 – Triumph – Ordinary Man
95 – Scorpions – You And I
94 – Tesla – Forever More
93 – MCR – House of Wolves
92 – Rise Against – Re-Education
91 – Yngwie Malmsteen – Fury

Best Songs Ever 96 – 100

Best Songs Ever 101 – 110

Allen M Werner is the author of the epic dark fantasy series
THE CRYSTAL CRUX