Disclaimer - yes "of all time" is a useless statement, yes classifying art is redundant.

Well after much excitement for the Australian population, the top 100 songs of all time were counted down. It received over 500,000 votes.

http://www.abc.net.au/triplej/hottes...wn/cd_list.htm

Smells like teen spirit was number 1, U2 didn't place at all and Radiohead placed the most times.

5. Paranoid Android
13. Creep
15. Karma Police
28. Fake plastic trees

The poll was conducted by a government funded "indie" station, so while most radio station lists are pretty sad I quite liked this one. You can also see the bias of the primary audience = No elvis or frank sinatra.

Really the only thing I strongly disagree with are the some Australian artists and a foo fighters song.

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This message has been edited. Last edited by: PrairieFire,

Your government funds an indie station? I guess we have NPR...

It's a rock station, not an 'indie' station and it's sucked for a verrrrrrrrrrrrrrry long time now.

As an Australian I'm embarrassed that the UK gets the glorious BBC 2 and 6 and all the other riches for their tax and we get fucking JJJ.

Yes, JJJ has sucked for a verrry long time now.

The UK does have many more people than us Aussies and a far grander, older music tradition, so it makes more sense they get more public investment in these things.

What'ya complaining about anyway Ninny G, shouldn't you as an Aussie be out playing backyard cricket waving your beer in time to Powderfinger??!!

Ohhhhhhh shiverrrrr...Powderfinger....

I saw them a few times in pubs before they made any recordings and that was enough.
That people actually paid for their stuff...!!

Back to Mickey Bradley on Radio Ulster. He plays Wire!!

JJJ are a youth radio station. There is no reason for them to play indie obscurities any more than middle of the road. They also have a committment to Australian Music.

So their top 100 says a lot about their audience. Young with non mainstream tastes generally (There is very little of the mega sellers - Dion, Houston, Timberlake, Spears, Twain, Brooks, Linkin Park, Carey, etc), and with a preference for recent stuff.

As most radio stations play those bands listed above, I feel it is churlish to knock JJJ for not being obscure enough. They are not meant to play obscure stuff, they are meant to play stuff people in their 20s can relate to. (At least those 20 year solds that dont like Linkin Park).

Anyway it is not a bad list.

quote:

I feel it is churlish to knock JJJ for not being obscure enough.

Nah mate, it's not about obscurity. It's about quality control. Far too much junk gets played and a lot of that junk is Aussie music.
It's so stupid that a bad song will get played simply to meet a criteria.
Plus, apart from Buck and to a lesser degree,Kingsmill and a couple others, the DJ's are bloody twits.

And there's no R.E.M. on the list!! Fucking absurd.

quote:

Originally posted by Ninny Gooptz:

quote:

I feel it is churlish to knock JJJ for not being obscure enough.

Nah mate, it's not about obscurity. It's about quality control. Far too much junk gets played and a lot of that junk is Aussie music.
It's so stupid that a bad song will get played simply to meet a criteria.
Plus, apart from Buck and to a lesser degree,Kingsmill and a couple others, the DJ's are bloody twits.

And there's no R.E.M. on the list!! Fucking absurd.

I am exactly the same and it is the reason I have such a dislike for Australian music. Unfortunately though, besides FBI there isn't really anything else.

Damn right Prairie Fire!
Triple J is killing Australian music!

Kev, Pete, call a commission. No more unearthed...

Unfortunately FBI is struggling for its existence too, given that it's a subscription based not for profit service trying to operate in an economic downturn.

Sydneysiders will have heard the repeated pleas for support and various benefit concerts to keep FBI going.

As for disliking Aussie music, I'm not with you there. Our underground scenes are small as is our population, but especially the great garage rock coming out of Brisbane, the neo-folk in Sydney and Melbourne and the psych rock coming out of Perth, are alive and very well. Our homegrown hip hop is also in extremely rude health.

If there is anything I dislike it is the Aussie audience, not Aussie music! If more people were more invested in quality music and the other arts, then, while our small population would always limit things to some extent, we would get a much more healthy and diverse music scene.

I understand why this is the situation; everything about our history and climate etc explains why "we" value sport and other less esoteric pursuits than the arts. While we can thank God for globalism and the web - allows Wire fans like Ninny G to keep satisfied - it is still a shame there isn't a greater communal space for music appreciation here in Australia.

quote:

Originally posted by Ninny Gooptz:
And there's no R.E.M. on the list!! Fucking absurd.

You know recently I realised just how much the failure of REM to exercise quality control for years now has hurt their standing.

I went into red eye records, which always has everything, imported or otherwise, albanian bootlegs of nigerian punk singles etc. I went to their REM section to pick up the deluxe editions of their first couple of albums only to find a couple of old IRS issues and that most recent IRS greatest hits. Deluxe reissues were everywhere for the Cure and Pavement but nada for REM. I checked at the counter and a disinterested clerk sighed and said he may be able to get them in - what were they again?

Maybe REM never had the connection in Australia they had in America and the UK - either way any connection there was seriously seems to have decayed here, more's the pity.

Think yr right on the money there melV.

R.E.M. never quite grabbed the Aussie audience enough after the early 90's and this poll is very much of the contemporary mindset, save a few indelibles like Teen Spirit.

As for the music scene in Oz, it is most certainly true that we don't appreciate live music enough.

I lived through the 90's in Brisbane, staggered at the continual shutdown of band friendly bars to be renovated into pool halls.

My mates in bands were like polar bears on rapidly shrinking icebergs, and while it did get better and currently is not too bad, to be a sports star in Orstraylia is always to gain greater profile, funding and support than to be an 'artiste'.

Still waiting for that Ian Thorpe album...


P.S. Let it never be forgotten, let it shouted from the top of buildings across the world; Brisbane at the height of state fascism in the 70's gave the planet both:

THE GO-BETWEENS

&

THE SAINTS

Don't get no better.

quote:

Originally posted by Ninny Gooptz:
P.S. Let it never be forgotten, let it shouted from the top of buildings across the world; Brisbane at the height of state fascism in the 70's gave the planet both:

THE GO-BETWEENS

&

THE SAINTS

Don't get no better.

No arguments re the greatness of the Go-Betweens and the Saints - but keep in mind they had to swiftly decamp to London in order to survive!

The only Australian acts still making music, that they play on triple j, that i like, are The avalanches, nick cave and Cut Copy.

The thing is, it is really hard to be passionate about discovering new Australian music because of the way JJJ promotes it. Like someone said, there is no quality control. The way they hype josh pyke, hiltop hoods and Sarah Blasko, I can't take them seriously.

'Sing to me O muse' cried out Sarah Blasko, as she hugged herself tight.

No answer ever came.

quote:

Originally posted by Ninny Gooptz:
'Sing to me O muse' cried out Sarah Blasko, as she hugged herself tight.

No answer ever came.

What?

quote:

Originally posted by PrairieFire:

quote:

Originally posted by Ninny Gooptz:
'Sing to me O muse' cried out Sarah Blasko, as she hugged herself tight.

No answer ever came.

What?

I think Ninny G is obliquely hinting that Sarah is without inspiration and yet overwrought and self important all the same.

This is something with which I strenuously disagree - I think her latest album is simply fantastic and altogether genuinely inspired. If JJJ has happened onto her swooning indie torch songs, well that's a happy turn of events.

You see, I do not know about Sarah's music or anyone else's from any hyping on JJJ because I simply do not listen to JJJ - I know this from constantly surfing the web - myspace, blogs, music sharing sites etc - and also writing for online music mags which means you get a lot of promo straight from the bands and their agents.

In short, there is more than enough going on out there to avoid whatever lame promo work mainstream radio stations like JJJ are forking out lately. This is not say listening to the radio can't be fun while washing the car etc but to source music it is a pretty unreliable source.

melV, you old chancer, you defined exactly what I meant about Blasko, but I'll ignore her as a topic for now, and turn to the greater issue at hand; namely radio.

I'm a huge defender of radio, and I found it quite saddening to read this report:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/busi...teenage-media-habits
which suggests a dearth of next generation listeners.

Mainstream radio has always been bad, (as Queen in their dissertation, Radio Ga Ga, illustrated) but if you take the time, even with bloated beasts such as Triple J, there is excellence to be found.

Late night slots, playing all kinds of weird and wonderful...

Speaking for myself, radio has introduced me to many, many acts I could now not live without.

Vive Le Radio!

I have no probs with radio itself and I too have heard some beauties on there - I heard TV on the Radio on the radio a few years back while lying sickly hungover in my back yard.

My point is that, while radio, whether online or not, will always have a place as that uniquely communal listening station, with the proliferation of mp3s, streaming, band and music fan blogs and incrementally speedy web communications it simply isn't the first and most valuable point of call re sourcing music nowadays.

You are absolutely right, as the munchkins in their millions are proving to us day after day.

In the immortal words of The Sports, 'Who listens to the radio, that's what I'd like to know'.