The All-Time Favorite Songs Ballot Thread

Yesterday, Rolling Stone published its revised version of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time list, previously published in 2004. Writers, musicians, and other experts from across the musical spectrum were asked to help build the list by contributing ballots ranking their top 50 favorite songs of all time. Since ranking things is fun, and since we did our own mini RS-inspired Chorus list for albums last year, why not share what your Rolling Stone ballot would have looked like if the magazine had asked for your opinion?

Here's the thread about the Rolling Stone list: Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Songs List • forum.chorus.fm

Here's the albums thread from last year: The Chorus.Fm Users Definitive Albums List • forum.chorus.fm

 

This is gonna suck! I'm in

 

Oh boy

 

I'll probably abort this mission in like two hours and be pissed at myself for making this thread.

 

I've already started making my list, so I don't know what to tell you haha

 

Oh jeez

 

I didn't say I'd delete the thread, I said I'd be pissed at myself for making it!

 

Are we doing any arbitrary rules like only one song per artist or like only one song from the same album? Asking for Bad Religion lol

 

Nah I'm not limiting it

 

Trying to decide how much credence to give my younger self. Are the deep cuts on Americana still my favorite songs? No. But have I listened to them more in my life than anything in the last five years? Yes.

 

This is FAVORITE, not best. I expect to see a lot of bands deep cuts and B sides with next to zero consensus.

I’m already calling “Whatsername” by Green Day.

 

I'd say everyone gets to make their own rules on that front. I know some people prefer the cleaner look of a list with one song per artist. But I've got artists that I couldn't possibly limit to one song, so I'm not doing that!

Let's just say that "Whatsername" isn't NOT on my preliminary list...

 

I was worried that you'd have to pick a single Butch Walker song. Which, if you did, would be?

 

Butch is the one of my favorite artists who I have the toughest time picking an absolute favorite for. If pressed, it’s probably “Don’t Move.”

 

I'm tempted to throw my hat into this ring...

One particular issue with these things, that I don't expect many to share, is that until my early twenties I was a devout christian. So much of my favourite music as a teen was religious and I hold a lot of sentiment for some of that stuff. Even though I wouldn't class it as my "favourite" music anymore, it feels almost disingenuous to not have like, a token dc talk song or whatever.

 

Throw a DC Talk song in there. Mine will ABSOLUTELY have a bunch of Relient K and extremely likely have some House of Heroes.

EDIT: And Anberlin

 

50 songs is genuinely impossible. I don't know if I can get past the 70s with even 100 as a limit

 

My approach so far has been to just scroll through my library in alphabetical artist order and type every song I love into Bias Sorter.

 

My approach as well - Although I have no idea what Bias Sorter is so i'm being old school and using a Word document

 

Ha, I think this is gonna be me as well. I can't imagine trying to sort everything mentally.

 

It's a website that essentially turns sorting into a quiz. It'll pit songs against each other and you vote for your favorite and do that until it spits out a list for you!

 

I think i'll have a crack at that when i'm down to 'whittling' stage

 

Definitely going to have 50 honorable mentions.

 

Cheating!

 

Way more opportunity for chaos than the albums one