Confessions of a Fanboy

The 7 Days of Satriani rolls along, and I thought today we would combine this special feature with one of the mainstays of Fanboy, Let’s Talk About My iPod.

These 10 songs are the Satriani songs I’ve listened to most often according to my iPod. A couple of notes: these 10 songs are not necessarily my favorites but it stands to reason they would rank amongst them. Second, due to having had my music library on multiple computers and having owned multiple iPods, I cannot say for certain how far back the play counts go. This is very unscientific, but it might be interesting.

1. “One Big Rush” — Flying in a Blue Dream: I’m surprised this is number one, but only a little. I’ve owned this album since its release and this was not one of my favorites from the early days. I took to this song only in the last couple years but it is now solidly among my favorites.

2. “Gnaahh” — Is There Love in Space: This is certainly one of my favorite latter-day Satriani songs. I know I listened to this one a lot when Space was first released.
3. “Redshift Riders” — Super Colossal: I wrote a review of Super Colossal for BC, so I listened to this album intensely upon its release. I like the record and this song but “Redshift” wouldn’t rate this high if I were trying to list my favorites.
4. “Is There Love in Space” — Is There Love in Space: Once again, a product of the proximity of its release. I listened to the new album repeatedly when I got it and so some of the newer songs are more heavily weighted in terms of raw play count. Still, this is a good one! Satriani is not a classic blues player, but I like his variations of blues playing and this is one of those interesting variations.
5. “Ten Words”
6. “Cool New Way”
7. “One Robot’s Dream” — Super Colossal: see “Redshift Riders.” I will say of these three, “Cool New Way” is the one that’s wormed its way deepest into my head. I like the call/answer in the lead melody line.
8. “Oriental Melody” — Strange Beautiful Music: This is perhaps a Top 5 all time. I love the sinister opening sounds and the brilliant melody. This is unbelievably good.
9. “Tumble” – iTunes only single: I would love to know more about this one. It was made available on iTunes around the time Love in Space was released. This song should have made that album, perhaps instead of one of the two vocal tracks.
10. “Baroque” — Time Machine: This is my second or third favorite track from that album, so I’m surprised it’s the first to make this list. A rare acoustic track, this is one of the prettiest melodies he’s ever recorded.

    I’m intimidated by the prospect of trying to make an ultimate favorites list, but this obviously didn’t scratch the surface. It’s interesting to see them listed like this and there isn’t a bad song in the bunch but some of my older favorites have been supplanted by the newer ones. Maybe I’ll go back and break it down by year/era or something. We still have time. The 7 Days of Satriani continues…

    Filed under: Tags: Joe Satriani, Let's Talk About My iPod, Seven Days of Satriani