All-Time Greatest Music

By Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller, The duo mixed Leiber’s lyrics with Stoller’s composing skills. For example in 1952, the two compiled both “Hound Dog” for Elvis and “Kansas City” for Little Willie Littlefield (covered by Wilbert Harrison in 1959).

Illustrator: Olaf Hajek

Over the years, the Drifters were a couple of different great groups and a whole bunch of wonderful guys. In a way, that upheaval may be part of the reason they recorded so many immortal songs over such a long period.

We were both fans of the Drifters even before we started writing, and later producing, for them. There was a real tradition of great singers in the group: Clyde McPhatter, Johnny Moore, Ben E. King and Rudy Lewis. Yet for all their fantastic records, the Drifters had the least stable lineup of any of the great vocal groups. They were in essence a band of hired guns, overseen by their management. Let’s just say this wasn’t necessarily a situation where guys were getting rich off the royalties.

Our first cut writing for the Drifters was “Ruby Baby,” which Nesuhi Ertegun produced and Johnny Moore sang lead on, in 1955. We loved what they did with the song. Their management changed the lineup in 1958, and that’s when the great Ben E. King came into the picture. The Drifters records that we’re most associated with, including “There Goes My Baby,” (https://open.spotify.com/track/3jSuQJuYwiQsVbB5jQ1Dxw?si=DtsP3M1kQX6XtX61EXTqog) come from that era.

Ben E. King was this younger singer just coming up, yet he had this mature style that was so unusual. He was always wonderful to work with, and we had a truly great run together. People have said that “There Goes My Baby” was a very influential record because it helped set the stage for the Wall of Sound and Motown. Who are we to argue? Thanks to a great arrangement by Stan Applebaum, the song showed us how rock & roll and strings could really work together. When King left, we worked with him as a solo artist, and the Drifters kept on having hits too, first with Rudy Lewis as the new lead singer. Upon Lewis’ death, Moore returned to the group in time for “Under the Boardwalk.”

We wrote songs for the Drifters, but we also put the call out to all the best songwriters in our world. Doc Pomus and Mort Shuman came with perfect songs like “This Magic Moment” and “Save the Last Dance for Me.” Gerry Goffin and Carole King wrote “Up on the Roof.” We also put the Drifters together with Burt Bacharach — who met Dionne Warwick at our office for a Drifters session.

Through it all, the Drifters always had this exquisite vocal blend. It was warm and round and full and dripping with chocolate. Since we were involved in the Drifters’ career, it’s probably not our place to declare their music immortal. But you have to say, they did pretty well.

(This is the twenty-second artist that made the Top100 list but he didn’t begin recording until 1977. So, he wasn’t apart of the 1960s generation).

Illustrator: Roberto Parada

By Liz Phair, is an American rock singer songwriter. She was raised in Chicago. Her first attempt at success was singing under the stage name Girly-Sound. Her video cassette tapes landed a deal with Matador Records. She released two albums “Exile in Guyville” (1993) and Whip-Smart” (1994) that anchored the beginning of her commercial success.

Elvis Costello writes novels in three minutes. He gets inside your head, and he doesn’t let go. I’d pay a great amount of money to audit a course taught by him. If you love Elvis Costello, it’s because you love what he’s thinking — the depth and breadth of his notice is astounding. Sometimes I wonder if he watches people on the Strand in London and makes up entire histories for them. (“This person didn’t pass the bar and has thyroid problems.” “They’re jogging because they just went through a breakup.”)

When I was a teenager, it was a career aim for many of my friends to have a song written about them by Elvis Costello. His songs about women and girls are devastating, like arrows to the heart. There are very few artists who can depict a woman’s life, her thoughts and desires and her failings, like he can. Most rock songs about women are from the outside looking in: They say, “Babe, you’re so hot, come sleep with me.” Elvis’ songs say, “I see you, and I know what you’re doing.” He catches us at our tricks, and that’s always thrilling.

He’s a poet with a punk’s heart. There’s a Jerry Lee Lewis flavor to the way he just gets in there and lets it rip: His rocking stuff has a lot of raw power, a real physicality. Even when it’s just him and a piano onstage, it’s powerful. When I first heard him, I was blown away that someone could just spit those words out without even hitting the right notes, with no holding back and no shame. Of course, the Attractions were really important to his music — if you’re going to cram a whole book into one song, it helps to have a steady groove.

Elvis Costello greatest hits playlist:

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/0ptNBy7AerwKMgAD9L6V8z?si=5AFxuL-2QzumGGNjNdtjEw&pi=JHsDy2suQDSWz

Nobody sounds like him. People imitate Stevie Wonder or whomever, but how many people can do Elvis Costello? Not bloody many. His melodies weave in and out and all over the place, and you can tell they just spring out of him. Finally, Elvis is the definition of a career artist — he’s always coming up with a different sound, always challenging himself. All of his music tells you: You could come along for the ride — but I’m not stopping.

By Smokey Robinson, founder and frontman of The Miracles (active from 1955-present). Elected into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1987. His single “Just to See Her” won a Grammy in 1988. Released a total of 35 albums.

Illustrator: Gregory Machess

The Four Tops are a one-in-a-million singing group. They were the best in my neighborhood in Detroit when I was growing up. When I was 11 or so, my first group was an early version of what would become the Miracles. Back then the Four Tops were called the Four Aims. We all used to sing on the corners, at school functions and at house parties. Sometimes we’d have talent competitions. But all the groups in the neighborhood knew that if the Four Aims were going to be there, you were going to be singing for second place at best.

They were the first group from the neighborhood that sang modern harmony: They could sing like a gospel group but then do R&B like no one else. I love singers whom you can identify the first second they open their mouth, and Levi Stubbs is one of those; he’s one of the greatest of all time. He has that distinctive voice, and his range is staggering. The combination of Levi, Obie Benson, Duke Fakir and Lawrence Payton was truly awesome.

When they came to Motown and teamed up with Holland-Dozier-Holland, there was no looking back. They performed some of the most dramatic records ever written: “Standing in the Shadows of Love,” “Bernadette,” “Reach Out I’ll Be There,” “I Can’t Help Myself” and “Baby I Need Your Loving.” Later, when Holland-Dozier-Holland left, I co-wrote “Still Water (Love)” with Frank Wilson for the Four Tops.

The Four Tops greatest hits playlist:

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/1CxTjYrA6DVfV8knVh4qUm?si=zvsrYEk4T5-ohRzXcAlnUw&pi=pXmIK-KAT4iVj

They were always great singers and great guys. When the Four Tops first came to Motown, the Miracles and I were the mainstays of the label, and the Temptations had just gotten there. But all the guys were very, very close. You’d come back to town from a 51-night tour, and the first thing you did was shower and head back to Hitsville. We’d play cards and shoot pool together into the early hours.

The Four Tops will always be one of the best groups ever. Their music is forever.

By Thurston Moore, an American guitarist, singer-songwriter best known for being a member of the rock band Sonic Youth (1981-2011).

Illustrator: Tim Bower

For me, The Stooges were the perfect embodiment of what music should be — of wanting it to be alive, riding the edge of control. Their music was total high-energy blues, with the contemporary freakout of Jimi Hendrix and the free-jazz spirit of John Coltrane. Iggy wanted the Stooges to be what he’d seen in Chicago as a young guy — these old bluesmen playing so hard that, as Iggy once said, the music drips off you.

I was 14 when I first saw a picture of Iggy onstage: shirtless, with his body spray-painted silver. He was sweating — it looked like glitter sweat — and he had a chipped tooth. He looked young and on fire. Iggy’s parents were intellectuals — his father was an English teacher — and that gave him an edge. He had focus. Iggy believed what he was doing was important — this self-reliant, anti-establishment art form.

The Stooges’ sound was so evocative yet so simple. Scott Asheton played drums as if he was in an electric-blues band. On The Stooges and Fun House, while his brother Ron, the guitarist, was playing these loud bar-chord progressions, Scott was making the band rev and swing. And when I played with Ron for the soundtrack of Velvet Goldmine, the first week was a crash course on how to play Stooges songs. We went through those first two albums, and there was that Asheton swing again, the way he rocked the chord grooves.

The Stooges greatest hits playlist:

https://open.spotify.com/album/0sZysU7lWI01Vjla0AZ7AV?si=6gLN9_5VSmei2HcnYLxsXw

Raw Power was made by a different lineup, with James Williamson on guitar and Ron on bass. It’s the ultimate fuck-off. This is a band getting very strung out, putting so much blood and soul into what it’s doing, and for the most part looked upon as trash. There’s a damaged quality to David Bowie’s original mix that is way ahead of its time.

Seeing the Stooges in reunion with Mike Watt from the Minutemen on bass was awesome. When they played their first gig, in 2003 at Coachella, the first thing Iggy did was start jumping in the air, flipping the bird to the crowd — “F__k you, f__k you and f__k you.” Then Iggy turned to the side of the stage, where the elite were standing — Sonic Youth, Queens of the Stone Age, the Red Hot Chili Peppers and the other all-access rock stars — and he gave us the jerk-off motion. It was great. After all this time, he’s still at war.

(This is the twenty-first artist who made this Top100 list but didn’t begin recording until 1979. So, they were not a part of the 1950s or 1960s generation.)

By Darryl “DMC” McDaniels, an American rapper and record producer. Best known for being the founding member of the hip hop band Run-DMC.

Illustrator: Anita Kunz

In the early days of rap, the conventional wisdom was that only black people were supposed to like hip-hop and only white people were supposed to like rock. But it wasn’t like that. In Run-DMC, we were rapping over rock beats. The Beasties were a punk band listening to hip-hop.

I met the Beastie Boys in Rick Rubin’s dorm room at NYU. What bugged me out about the Beasties was that they knew everything about hip-hop — the Cold Crush Brothers, the Treacherous Three and Afrika Bambaataa, all the old-school shit. In addition, they could rap, they could sing and they could play instruments.

Run-DMC gave “Slow and Low” to the Beastie Boys. The song was basically their blueprint. But then they started writing anita kunztheir own rhymes, and when Licensed to Ill came out, it went to Number One. They were writing songs we wished we had written, like “No Sleep Till Brooklyn.” They put rock with rap like we did, but it made so much sense when they did it because they were punk rockers.

The Beastie Boys greatest hits playlist:

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/6HMyz9WasDPETukqHfOnhc?si=qH0nVJ4bSqiDRVDEY-LT8g&pi=9zu0sg4EQ4WeQ

The first time we toured with the Beastie Boys was the Raising Helltour in 1986: Run-DMC, Whodini, LL Cool J and the Beastie Boys. We were playing the Deep South — Crunkville, before there was crunk — and it was just black people at those shows. The first night was somewhere in Georgia, and we were thinking, “I hope people don’t leave when they see them.” But the crowd loved them, because they weren’t trying to be black rappers. They rapped about shit they knew about: skateboarding, going to White Castle, angel dust and television. Real recognizes real.

One of the most significant things about the Beasties is their longevity. They’ve put out genius records for decades. When Paul’s Boutique came out, it didn’t sell as well as their debut. Now people realize it’s one of the best albums of the Eighties.

Each of the Beastie Boys has a different personality. Mike D is the examiner: He looks around, he takes in all the information, he’s a little laid-back. MCA was always the mature one, but he could be a fool when it was time to be a fool. And Ad-Rock is just full of life. He’s approachable, affectionate and funny. But maybe my favorite thing about the Beastie Boys is that they’re worldly. They taught me and many other people a lot about life, people and music.

By Paul Shaffer, a Canadian musician that served on the David Letterman Show as bandleader from 1982-2015.

Illustrator: Gary Kelly

The Shirelles had a “sound,” a word that people from the Sixties vocal-group era use with a lot of reverence. Shirley Alston Reeves, who did most of the group’s lead vocals, wasn’t a gospel shouter like Arlene Smith of the Chantels. Shirley was more sentimental and street. When she said, “Baby, it’s you,” you thought, “Baby, it isme.”

They weren’t the first girl group, but the Shirelles were the first to have many hits. They influenced everyone from the Ronettes and Motown girl groups like the Supremes to the Beatles, who covered “Baby It’s You” and “Boys.” The Shirelles were given some of the all-time greatest songs to sing: “Will You Love Me Tomorrow,” “Soldier Boy,” “Tonight’s the Night,” “Mama Said.” But what’s interesting to me is that they wrote their very first hit, “I Met Him on a Sunday,” themselves, when they were still high school students in New Jersey. It was on this song that the group combined doo-wop with very accessible pop melodies: It began with the whole group singing, “Doo ron, day ron, day ron day papa, doo ron,” then one of them would sing, “Well, I met him on a Sunday.” It was the cutest thing.

The Shirelles greatest hits playlist:

https://open.spotify.com/album/483nAiMzsnzn1OJOSWyvuL?si=KiW8IjtvSIqvZ503FBS2mg

The girl-group sound was everything to me. As a kid, I used to sit at home after school and just bang out those songs on the piano. Later in life, in the early Nineties, I witnessed a wonderful moment, when the Shirelles were honored by the Rhythm & Blues Foundation. The three living members of the group — Shirley, Beverly Lee and Doris Jackson — were at the awards ceremony. The fourth member, Addie “Micki” Harris, had died in 1982. I had heard that they hadn’t seen each other in quite a while, so there was some apprehension when the three of them took the stage. They certainly hadn’t planned to perform. But when Doris took her award in hand, she said, “This is dedicated to the one I love,” and then they just started singing it.

They sounded fantastic. The band fell into place, and people in the audience just fell over. After that, Shirley, Beverly and Doris were having so much fun that they went into “Soldier Boy.” This was a group that hadn’t sung together in years, but they sounded heavenly. I was so inspired, I stood at attention and saluted. There was nothing else I could do.

(This is the twentieth artist included in this Top100 list that began producing records in 1971 so, therefore, just missed being included in the 1960s generation.)

By Sheryl Crow, An American singer-songwriter active in 1983-present. She is noted for her optimistic and idealistic subject matter, and incorporation of genres including rock, pop, country, folk, and blues. Has won nine Grammys. She had four Top10 hits including “All I Wanna Do” (1994) at No2.

Illustrator: Mark Stutzman

The Eagles forever changed country and rock, but I just think of what they did as being great American music. It’s amazing how one band could take all those influences — country and rock, of course, but also soul, R&B and folk — and still sound so distinctive.

The Eagles were a real band. After an album or two, Don Henley and Glenn Frey turned into one of rock’s all-time great songwriting teams. But everyone contributed material and incredible musicianship to the effort: Randy Meisner and Bernie Leadon, then Don Felder, and later Joe Walsh and Timothy B. Schmit. They started out in the age of the sensitive singer-songwriter, and their music was as smart and sensitive as anyone’s, but when they called upon it, they also had the power of a great rock & roll band.

The first song of theirs that I vividly remember hearing was “Take It Easy.” Those lyrics — by Frey and Jackson Browne — could have been from any Merle Haggard or Willie Nelson song, but the instrumentation and energy were decidedly rock. The combination sounded so powerful.

The Eagles greatest hits playlist:

https://open.spotify.com/album/2Lgsa7jbu86SK5zJVFCh3S?si=p5U905ycTburRVCUXU8Ysw

I also remember being on a long cross-country family road trip as a kid, driving across the Texas desert at night. The only radio station we could get was a scratchy AM station from who knows where. The haunting opening strains of “Hotel California” came on the radio. My father thought that all of us kids were asleep; I immediately assumed that he would shut the radio off. But he didn’t. He couldn’t resist it any more than I could.

The Eagles provided the soundtrack to so many of my summers, and likely many of yours, too. Their melodies and harmonies have always been instantly familiar. “Desperado,” “Take It to the Limit,” “Tequila Sunrise” and “Best of My Love” are some of the best pop songs ever written. To this day, it simply doesn’t get any better than that guitar riff from “Life in the Fast Lane.”

When I sang backup for Don Henley in the early Nineties, it was a surreal experience, supplying vocals every night to Eagles songs. The audience’s reaction to those classics cemented their value in my head. In my own way, I got to experience the power of the Eagles’ music. But then again, we all have.

By Beck, involved in the anti-folk movement in New York City in 1989. Was a solo artist and had his commercial breakthrough in 1993 with his hit “Loser.”

Illustrator: Marc Burckhardt

Hank Williams songs like “Lonesome Whistle” and “Your Cheatin’ Heart” are wonderful to sing because there is no bullshit in them. The words, the melodies and the sentiment are all there, clear and true. It takes economy and simplicity to get to an idea or emotion in a song, and there’s no better example of that than Hank Williams.

Hank had a voice that split wood. From his records, it sounded like he was projecting from a completely different place in his body. It was a voice that could play roadhouses without amplification, that could cut through barroom crowds. The places he played were so tough that he hired a wrestler, Cannonball Nichols, to be his bass player. Hank lived what would have been a rock star’s life — full of touring, drinking and woman troubles.

I bought a 10-song Hank Williams collection on vinyl for $4.99. It was like I unlocked a box: His music spoke to me. His records are enormously important to country music, but I think I responded to them because they sounded so exotic. It’s significant that Hank learned to play guitar from an elderly black musician: Hank is the ultimate hillbilly, but there’s other stuff going on. For a while he was my only reference point; I’ve covered his songs for years. On Sea Change, I made a conscious effort to try to write songs as direct as Hank’s.

Hank Williams greatest hits playlist:

https://open.spotify.com/album/6zIYEv6soMoaZiypsHB5dd?si=0coA7MU5Ro-XQCTnX3I0-w

I see more and more people getting into his music today. When I played his songs early on, I used to get really sick of everyone in the crowd yelling “yee-haw” all the way through. But I’ve noticed that there’s been a rediscovery of the haunting quality of Hank Williams’ music. People are listening.

(This is the nineteenth artist that made this Top100 list that began producing records in 1985 therefore not a part of the 1960s generation.)

By Dave Matthews, the leader of his Dave Matthews Band (active 1991-present). Was born in South Africa. Created 106 and sold more than 33M records. “Before These Crowded Streets” (1998) reached No1 on the charts.

Illustrator: Andrea Ventura

Every time I buy a Radiohead album, I have a moment where I say to myself, “Maybe this is the one that will suck.” But it never does. I wonder if it’s even possible for them to be bad on record.

It belittles Radiohead to describe their music as having “hooks.” Their music talks to you, in a real way. It can take you down a quiet street before it drops a beautiful musical bomb on you. It can build to where you think the whole thing will crumble beneath its own weight — and then Thom Yorke will sing some melody that just cuts your heart out of your chest. There’s a point on the album Kid A where I start feeling claustrophobic, stuck in a barbed-wire jungle — and then I suddenly fall out and I’m sitting by a pool with birds singing. Radiohead can do all of these things in a moment, and it drives me f__king crazy.

Radiohead greatest hits playlist:

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/6OKFkqo8EZeaDfsrKUwd3M?si=oD5f6xL1SsKm4m0Z55vC2g&pi=iID4P3BBT7u25

My reaction to Radiohead isn’t as simple as jealousy. Jealousy just burns; Radiohead infuriate me. But if it were only that, I wouldn’t go back and listen to those records again and again. Listening to Radiohead makes me feel like I’m a Salieri to their Mozart. Yorke’s lyrics make me want to give up. I could never in my wildest dreams find something as beautiful as they find for a single song — let alone album after album. And every time, they raise their finger to the press and the critics and say, “Nothing we do is for you!” They followed their most critically acclaimed record, OK Computer, with their most radical change, Kid A. It’s not that they’re indifferent — it’s that the strength of character in their music is beyond their control.

Seeing them perform makes me even angrier. No matter how much they let go in their shows, they never lose their clarity. There’s no point where Jonny Greenwood or Ed O’Brien will suddenly look up and say, “Where the fuck are we?” There are no train wrecks in Radiohead; every album and performance is wrenching. God, these guys have suffered, or they can fake it like nobody else.

(This was the eighteenth artist that made this Top100 list that began producing records in 1973 therefore not a part of the 1960s generation.)

By Rick Rubin, record producer, co-founder of Def Jam Recordings and former co-president of Columbia Records..

Illustrator: Christopher Kasch

When I was in junior high, my classmates all liked Led Zeppelin. But I loved AC/DC. I got turned on to them when I heard them play “Problem Child” on The Midnight Special. Like Zeppelin, they were rooted in American R&B, but AC/DC took it to a minimal extreme that had never been heard before. Of course, I didn’t know that back then. I only knew that they sounded better than any other band.

For AC/DC, rock began with Chuck Berry and ended around Elvis. They poured their lifeblood into that groove, and they mastered it. Highway to Hell is probably the most natural-sounding rock record I’ve ever heard. There’s so little adornment. Nothing gets in the way of the push-and-pull between the guitarists Angus and Malcolm Young, bassist Cliff Williams and drummer Phil Rudd. For me, it’s the embodiment of rock & roll.

When I’m producing a rock band, I try to create albums that sound as powerful as Highway to Hell. Whether it’s the Cult or the Red Hot Chili Peppers, I apply the same basic formula: Keep it sparse. Make the guitar parts more rhythmic. It sounds simple, but what AC/DC did is almost impossible to duplicate. A great band like Metallica could play an AC/DC song note for note, and they still wouldn’t capture the tension and release that drive the music. There’s nothing like it.

AC/DC greatest hits playlist:

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/0wTrfNrOLJnH8XJed32zaE?si=jPGViY0OTFSBihTHt5RtIA&pi=SDoOIsvmRhCeI

The other thing that separates AC/DC as a hard-rock band is that you can dance to their music. They didn’t play funk, but everything they played was funky. And that beat could really get a crowd going. I first saw them play in 1979 at Madison Square Garden, before their singer Bon Scott died and was replaced by Brian Johnson. The crowd yanked all the chairs off the floor and piled them into a pyramid in front of the stage. It was a tribute to how great they were.

I’ll go on record as saying they’re the greatest rock & roll band of all time. They didn’t write emotional lyrics. They didn’t play emotional songs. The emotion is all in that groove. And that groove is timeless.