Bands That I Like

157 John Lennon John Lennon The shorthand assessment of Lennon was as the tough rock genius and McCartney as the sweet pop craftsman has always seemed facile (and unfair to Paul). But with John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band , Lennon brutally, brilliantly, and definitely underlined the differences between himself and his ex-Beatle brother. " Love " is one of John's prettiest songs, and " Look at Me " is all fragile yearning, but the rest isn't just anitpop: rather, it's rock & roll as Lennon always understood it: anger, catharsis, deliverance. One of the most demanding albums ever made, Plastic Ono Band is also one of the finest-singing with more verve than he's mustered since the Beatles' " Money ," his urgency encouraged by primal scream therapy with Arthur Janov, Lennon bares his soul. The trio lineup- John on guitar and piano, Ringo on drums, and longtime Beatle ally Klaus Voorman on bass keeps the playing fierce, spare and commandin...

155 John Williams / John Williams   John Williams The NBC Olympics ; Jaws ; Indian Jones ; Jurassic Park ; Harry Potter ; [mother fuckin'] STAR WARS ! You can easily imagine each of those epic melodies for each of those iconic movies in your head & for good reason: each were created by the legendary (and [as of this writing] 80-year-old) & the always-high-in demand-Hollywood composer John Williams! And it's easy to see why for Mr. John Williams has a wickedly great-and-keen-sense of creating a true score which not only just fits every FILM he is responsible for scoring- but nearly every God-damn SCENE! It's almost like God undoubtedly blessed him with this-other-worldly sixth-sense. And the credibility and recognition is there: He has 75 Grammy nominations & with that ultimately brings him to be the 6th most winning-est with 26 [!]. A complete compositional genius. Newbies  should seek out his John Williams Greatest Hits 1969-1999 - but unfortunately that doesn...

 154 John Denver John Denver Not many people can get away or even pull-off having a stage-name "Denver" as a last name but as this poet basically dedicated most of his songs (" Rocky Mountain High ," " I Guess He'd Rather Be In Colorado ," & " Starwood In Aspen " [just to name a few].) about the mountains, not only did Mr. John Denver pull it off but he also managed to do it while letting his authentic-sunshine-self shine through. Denver was truly one of the first to combine country & pop into one cohesive sound. John was super prolific, beginning with 1966's self-released John Denver Sings all the way up until his last album- 1997's All Aboard! , with Denver dying tragically while piloting a plane just two months after the release, bringing a whole new-dark-perspective-and-dimension to his song " Leaving on a Jet Plane ." Twenty-seven albums total! There was also the compilation of unreleased material ti...

 153 Jimi Hendrix Jimi Hendrix Jimi Hendrix is the quintessential rock guitarists, as much as Bob Dylan is the quintessential singer/songwriter and the Beatles are the ultimate rock band. As only classical or jazz players had done before him, Hendrix RE-defined his music's instrument: Expanding the possibilities of the amplified six-string, he confirmed beyond question its status as rock's essential vehicle What Yo-Yo Ma is to the cello or Charlie Parker was to the saxophone, so was Jimi Hendrix to the electric guitar. A psychic successor to Elvis Presley, Hendrix also embodied the politics of rock & roll as a black-white fusion- the twin pillars of his music were the earthiness of the blues and the ethereality of jazz, but his primary contemporary audience was rock fans and the psychedelic subgenre that provided the context for his particular triumph was a white one. Finally, through lyrics heavily influence by Bob Dylan, he delivered a message of universal emancipation. ...

 151 Jeff Beck Jeff Beck Let's just start off with this: " Freeway Jam (Live) ." If you need anymore convincing why Jeff Beck made the list of "Bands That I Like," then you will forever be clueless. I first became aware of this legendary guitarist with his April 2010 release Emotion & Commotion . I was immediately blown away by the first note and continued to be blown away- Blow By Blow - by the entire album; I had never heard the guitar sound so orchestral, eerie, emotional & eternal. The saying, "better late than never," surely applies to me here:  In typical millennial fashion- I had heard of the artist Beck before this legendary guitarist (ranked No. 5 of the 100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time by Rolling Stone). After being converted with Emotion & Commotion, I quickly did a deep dive into his catalogue- and I do mean DEEP. This a man who has been recording since 1968 with his legendary Jeff Beck Group , which introduced the world to...

 151 Jay-Z   Jay-Z Although the late Biggie Smalls used to joke about going from "ashy to classy," his Brooklyn partner-in-rhyme, Jay-Z, would best embody that shift in style and station. Jay's recording debut, however, was anything but auspicious, spitting a well-constructed yet unremarkable verse on 1993's " Can I Get Open? " by Original Flavor, a group that featured Big Jaz, Jay's mentor in rhyme. At the time, Jay was a small-time hustler trying to make ends meet; "Open" gave him the boost he needed to begin working on his debut album, Reasonable Doubt . After shopping it to every major label record company with no success, Jay and his business partner, Damon Dash, decided to form their own label, Rec-A-Fella Record s, a move that would eventually make them very rich men.  To this day, Reasonable stands as one of rap music's essential albums, not to mention one of the greatest debuts. Like Biggie's Ready to Die , released two years ...

 150  Jawbreaker / Jets To Brazil Jawbreaker / Jets To Brazil Jawbreaker are a pop-punk trio that bridged the gap between Nirvana and blink-182. It would be too easy to brush Jawbreaker off as just another pop-punk band with simple melodies but their poetic lyrics and complex song structures prove anything but. Jawbreaker is an emo/punk rock band based in San Francisco, CA's Mission District, although the band's members, Blake Schwarzenbach (vocals/guitar), Chris Bauermeister (bass), and Adam Pfahler (drums), actually came together at New York University in the mid 1980's. The band's first release was 1989's " Whack & Blite " 7" on their own Blackball Records. The band released 4 LPs (1990’s Unfun , 1991’s Bivouac , 1993’s high-water-mark 24 Hour Revenge Therapy , and 1995’s major-label debut and decisive Dear You [which saw a sorta-Pinkerton-effect, many fans were upset about the major label switch... that isn't very punk-rock...but in retro...

 149 Japandroids   Japandroids  First off- you gotta' respect any god-damn duo out there who make a name for themselves. Secondly, if this band (which formed in Vancouver in 2006 [& consisting of members: David Prowse {Drums/Vocals} & Brian King {Guitar/Vocals}]) released nothing except their first album, 2009's Post-Nothing , and the 2010 compilation of two early E.P.'s. (2007's All Lies & 2008's Lullaby Death Jams ) No Singles - this band would have still made this list! They are that great. Their second album, Celebration Rock, was anything but a sophomore-slump, quite the opposite in fact... it included the only 'hit' (if you can even call it that [even though there was a solid crowd-funding attempt to change this song as the National Anthem for Canada]) " The House The Heaven Built ." Since then, the band has blessed us with one more album- 2017's Near to the Wild Heart of Life . A live album came out in 2020. In tribute to t...

 148 Jamiroquai  Jamiroquai Sorry for the redundancy, but: Time is the ultimate test for timeless music- and so far- Time has been nice to Jamiroquai. Whether it was their use in the dance scene of Napoleon Dynamite or a recent Woodstock '99 documentary , time (and hindsight being what it is) has shown that these neo-hippies, who were everything all at once: proudly multicultural, yet, rooted in their own British and filtered funk-  were pioneers in blending genres and actually come off as the normal ones in today's musical-landscape where rappers are rock-stars and rock-stars are playing country music over hip-hop beats... what a world! A little bit about this band: Jamiroquai formed in London in 1992 & got their name from the word jam and a Native American tribe (Iroquois). Their music serves as a certain blend of Stevie Wonder's funky era, Bootsy Collins' heaviness, plus- with the magic charm of lead-singer's Jay Kay's iconic voice- the band creates an ...

 147 James Vincent McMorrow    James Vincent McMorrow James was a drummer before switching to the lead-singer/song-writer role. Hailing from Dublin, Ireland- McMorrow started playing pubs & uploading his music to MySpace- all of which was well-received. For a taste of this time period, I would recommend the song " Like The River " which I believe best encapsulates this time period in McMorrow's early recording career. 2008 saw the release of The Sparrow and The Wolf E.P. After that, he held himself in a cabin to write songs, songs like "The Old Dark Machine ," that would eventually become his 2011 debut album Early in the Morning . Think five-part harmony, acoustic guitars, and heart-wrenching & chillingly beautiful melodies. McMorrow would head to El Paso, TX and add some studio charm for his second album, 2014's Post Tropical . This was the album where I jumped on board as a fan and discovered this amazing Irish singer-songwriter. I was amazed by ...

 145 James Brown James Brown James Brown may never have captured the zeitgeist as Elvis Presley or the Beatles did, nor can he be said to have dominated the charts like Stevie Wonder or the Rolling Stones, but by any real measure of musical greatness- endurance, originality, versatility, breadth of influence- he rivals or even betters them all. Brown was astonishingly productive over the five decades that spanned his recording career, churning out more than 100 albums (give or take a few anthologies) as a singer, bandleader, or instrumentalist; many are great, and nearly all are worth hearing. And even though none of the 44 singles he put into the Billboard Top 40 ever made it to #1- indeed, only two cracked the Top 5- in retrospect, that reflects worse on the pop audience than it does on his music. Indeed, Brown has long boasted that his best ideas were years ahead of their time, and history has proven him out. Hip-hop borrowed freely from his catalogue, as rappers such as Rob Ba...

 146      James Taylor James Taylor Jame's Taylor's 1969 debut album was one of the first albums released on the Beatles' Apple label. Though nearly capsized by heavy-handed orchestration, it was an eye-opening collection of songs whose highlights- " Knocking 'Round the Zoo ," " Something in the Way She Moves " and " Carolina in My Mind " (the latter two rerecorded for the 1976 Greatest Hits )- point toward the path he'd pursue in the next decade. Sweet Baby James , Taylor's landmark second release, heralds the arrival of pop music's sensitive phase. " Fire and Rain " epitomizes singer/songwriter stance: acoustic-based autobiography, where the arresting musical sparseness casts Taylor's gently melodies and warm, unassuming vocals in full relief. On " Steamroller ," he effectively mocks the straining pomposity of then-current white bluesmen- though Taylor became entrapped by his own laid-b...

 144 James Blake James Blake U.K. dance music sub-genre's don't usually produce soulful singer-songwriters... but then again, there aren't a lot of artists like Blake. James Blake uses neosoul keyboards, blip beats & layers of heart-starved snippets into a sonically full yet empty space of melody. His cover of Feist's " Limit to Your Love " is what first caught my attention. James released 2009's 12" Air & Lack Thereof , 2010's The Bells Sketch (E.P.) , Klavierwerke (E.P.) and CMYK (E.P.) , before releasing his self-titled debut album in 2011. Blake is soulful, having one of the sweetest voices in modern music. Since then he has released 2011's Enough Thunder (E.P.) , & Love What Happened Here (E.P.) before releasing his sophomore effort & my personal favorite, 2013's Overgrown , with the amazing tracks " Retrograde " and the title track . Black has released two more albums since then: his third album, 2016...

 143 J Dilla J Dilla  James Dewitt Yancey, better known to the world as J Dilla, was born in 1974. He was raised on the east side of Detroit, where his mother was a former opera singer and his father was a jazz bassist. With that kind of family tree- it's easy to see how Dilla would go on to become one of hip-hops most influential producers. He first came to prominence when he formed Slum Village with two of his high school friends in 1988. Q-Tip from A Tribe Called Quest heard some of Dilla’s beats and soon helped spread the word. Dilla would go on to produce for the Parcyde (“ Runnin’ ”), De La Soul (“ Stakes is High ”) and A Tribe Called Quest (“ Stressed Out ”) as well as Busta Rhymes (“ So Hardcore ”), and an unaccredited remix for Janet Jackson in the ‘90s. He also did notable work with the Soulquarians , a loosely associated neo-soul collective with the likes of Questlove, Common, Erykah Badu, D’Angelo, Most Def and Talib Kweli. It wasn’t until 2001’s Welcome 2 Det...