The Best of Purk Radio

I have a number of play lists on my Spotify music app and one of them, Purk Radio, has approximately 100 tunes. I decided that I needed to whittle the list down to a Top Thirty, which I call "The Best of Purk Radio". This is my go to music list. Why the name "Purk Radio" you might ask? It is the nickname that I had when I was in high school and college. Some of my closest and oldest friends still use it.

Note that these tunes are not necessarily ranked in the order of my "best songs". I have tried to group them in songs that lead into the next song in a similar manner.

The lead of tune is a great song from Cheap Trick, Live At Budacon. It has a lead in drum and guitar solo that runs about two minutes before the lyrics kick in and it is a great song for leading off any list of hit tunes. The beat of the tune leads nicely into the similar tempo of LaGrange by ZZ Top and then picks it up a little bit faster going into Sweet Emotion by Aerosmith.

Then I switch it up and tone it down a bit with Pink House, Lawyers Guns and Money (one of my faves), Take It Easy and Listen to The Music. Steve Gill turned me on to You Better You Bet by The Who and it has become one of my real top ten favorite songs. I had to include The Cowbell Song, better known as Don't Fear the Reaper by Blue Oyster Cult. Money For Nothing has some derogatory name calling in one of the lyrics, so in this day and age, I might remove it from the list and add another Rolling Stones song.

The First Ten

1. Ain't That A Shame (Live at Budacon)  - Cheap Trick

2. LaGrange - ZZ Top

3. Sweet Emotion - Aerosmith

4. Pink Houses - John Mellencamp

5. Lawyers Guns and Money - Warren Zevon

6. Take It Easy - The Eagles

7. Listen to the Music - Doobie Brothers

8. You Better You Bet - The Who (thanks to Steve Gill for this one)

9. Don't Fear the Reaper (the Cowbell Song on SNL) - Blue Oyser Cult

10. Money for Nothing - Dire Straits

The next ten songs are kind of "I'm pissed off at you" or "rebellion" songs. Who doesn't want to take care of business from time to time by doing nothing all day; who isn't looking towards the weekend when you have days off from work and you can do whatever you darn please.

The Second Ten

11.  Surrender - Cheap Trick

12.  Fortunate Son - Creedence Clearwater Revival

13.  Workin' For the Weekend - Loverboy

14.  Takin' Care of Business - Bachman, Turner Overdrive

15.  We're Not Going To Take It - Twisted Sister

16.  Hold On Loosely - 38 Special

17.  Gimme Shelter - Rolling Stones

18.  Rocky Mountain Way - Joe Walsh

19.  Who Are You - The Who

20.  American Women - The Guess Who

The final ten songs don't have any particular connection to one another, other than the fact that I like the songs and I had to put them somewhere. I do think that ending with The Who's "We Won't Get Fooled Again". Joe Walsh's "Life's Been Good" should have probably followed Takin' Care of Business. I like Joe Walsh a lot. I saw him live at a recent Eagles concert and I had no idea of what a great guitar player he is.

The Third Ten 

21. Lido Shuffle - Box Scaggs

22. Rock And Roll All Night - KISS

23. Baba O'Reilly - The Who

24. Life's Been Good - Joe Walsh

25. Authority Song - John Mellencamp

26. Smoke On The Water - Deep Purple
27. Honky Tonk Woman - Rolling Stones

28. Running on Empty - Jackson Browne

29. Already Gone - The Eagles

30. We Won't Get Fooled Again - The Who

Well that's my list. There are a lot of other songs that should have been on the list, but there just wasn't any room and I wanted to keep the list short. I had started with a Top Twenty list and needed to expand it, thus the number thirty.