Michael Jackson

The World's Greatest Music writes...

I Want You Back is a contender for the greatest pop record of all time.

Billie Jean is the greatest dance record of all time.

This is the greatest dance move of all time:



Off The Wall and Thriller are the albums it's OK to like but Bad was brilliant too, as was Black And White.

He was still making great music in the mid '90s - Earth Song may be schmaltzy but it's also a fantastic song.

I wonder if there will ever again be multi-talented, mass appeal, worldwide music megastars like Michael?

Almost There

World's Greatest Music writes...

I'm hearing rumours that Shirley Bassey has covered my favourite song from Tom Baxter's debut album, Almost There. Hopefully Shirley's version will be more inspired than Boyzone's cover of Better.

Tom Baxter - Almost There (Amazon)

Torn Between Two Lovers

Joe writes: I'm a big fan of obituaries - I find them very inspiring. When I read in Barry Beckett's obituary that his first no. 1 as a producer was a record called Torn Between Two Lovers, I knew it was going to be good. Why don't they make records like this anymore?

I must admit I hadn't heard of Barry Beckett or Mary MacGregor until a week ago, then Barry passed away and his career was extensively discussed by Bob Lefsetz and his readers.

It's rather difficult to buy Mary's hit version of this song, but of course it's easy to find on YouTube and Rapidshare. The YouTube comments are fabulous, particularly this one that says it all: "Perfect voice and delivery... This song has one of the most beautiful melodies with a wonderful chord progression. Too bad the concept is from the pits of Hell. The opposite of Love is not Hate; the opposite of love is Selfishness."



Mary MacGregor - Torn Between Two Lovers (link to buy an mp3 album on Amazon including this track)

Clap Your Hands Say Yeah

Joe writes: When Clap Your Hands Say Yeah first came to prominence, I wasn't interested. I think it was the name and the buzz that put me off, or maybe I just listened to the wrong tracks.

Then a few months back I heard a track I loved playing in a vintage clothes store, Shazamed it, and discovered it was their The Skin Of My Yellow Country Teeth.

And last week my wife opened a blog about fashion and its music player started playing another great track. This time Shazam didn't recognise it but Download Helper revealed it to be Telling The Truth (And Going Away), written for the film The Great Buck Howard.

So I'm now officially a fan of Clap Your Hands Say Yeah. What do you mean they've split up?

Clap Your Hands Say Yeah - Telling The Truth (And Going Away)



Clap Your Hands Say Yeah - The Skin Of My Yellow Country Teeth (seemingly not available to buy digitally but here's a link to the album on Amazon)

Father and son

worldsgreatestmusicdad writes...

It's good to hear that Yusuf Islam is returning to music. I always thought that this was a truly excellent song. His original version was so much better than the cover by some boy band who I can't even be bothered to look up. Apart from the total blandness, they failed to notice the 'two voices', a simple enough device that turns this good song into a great one, an archetypal 'generation gap' song. And what about this: 'You will still be here tomorrow/But your dreams may not.' The father gets a fair crack of the whip.



Cat Stevens - Father and Son (Amazon)