My brother Brad has played trumpet in a few ska bands, at least one or two of which have performed live.  He’s a devoted ska fan. As a listener and performer, he’s somewhat of a ska expert. I asked him to make a list of the best ska songs, and he more than stepped up to the challenge, producing a list of fifty.  Without further ado, Brad’s 50 favorite ska songs.

The Top 50 Ska Songs

by Brad

Keep in mind that this list is written by a guy who listens to a lot of Suburban Legends, Catch 22, Streetlight Manifesto, and Reel Big Fish.  The list is weighted toward these groups.  I have listened to lots of other bands too, but these are my favorite.

Most lists like this will be about how important and influential songs are.  This one is simply made of ones that I like, in order from 50 down to 1.  I hope you enjoy it!

50. Fashion Zombies – The Aquabats

      Although a favorite of my brothers, I don’t view this one quite as highly.  I like a bunch of things about this song, though, and The Aquabats are great.  It’s a very strange song, but hey: I’m a very strange person.

49. The Greatest Story Ever Told – Five Iron Frenzy

      I like this song a lot, the only problem is that it get’s old pretty fast. It’s kinda repetitive although quite catch. This song has been stuck in my head plenty of times, and that’s not a bad thing at all. 

48. History of a Boring Town – Less than Jake

      My one major complaint with this song is that the vocals sound too much like yelling for my liking.  Also, the brass seems to be pinned on at the last minute, not intended for the melody or harmonies, like I’m used to hearing in a ska band.  Don’t get me wrong, though.  The voices are awesome at the refrain, and when the song goes into half time, it’s catchy. 

47. Zanzibar – Suburban Legends

      Every good ska band I know has an instrumental song.  This is the one for Suburban Legends.  It’s quite good, but VERY repetitive and it just seems to go on forever.  Give it a taste, though. If you only listen to the first 2 minutes of this song, you’ll like it for sure, but much longer than that, it gets kinda old. 

46. Point the Blame – Catch 22

      This is by the ‘new’ Catch 22.  Though not the same without Tomas Kalnoky, they’re still pretty good in my opinion.  One interesting thing about this song is that I lose the game whenever I listen to it, because at the beginning it says “Point the blame/Picture frame/Playing by the rules is why you’re losing the game”.  And it is for this reason that this song cannot be higher on this list.

45. Amalgamate – Five Iron Frenzy

      Amalgamate reminds me of an oldies song, not a particular one, but classic pop and rock in general.  It has nice horn parts and a good theme. It’s not particularly catchy, but still gets 2 thumbs up from me. 

44. Autumn in the Park – Suburban Legends

      Sweet horn parts and awesome harmonies highlight this song.  I hate to put this song so far from #1, but there are a lot better songs here.  If the whole song were as good as the refrain, this one would be way up there; the only problem is its weird interludes and verses, so I couldn’t move it any higher up. 

43. Sell Out – Reel Big Fish

      “WHAT?”  Yep, I put RBF’s most famous song this low. Well, hear me out.  This song is catchy; that’s RBF’s thing, they’re catchy ska.  I just think that this song isn’t nearly as good as some of the others they make.  I like it a lot, and I like the band, but there are better songs by them. 

42. Up all Night – Suburban Legends

      With a killer trombone line at the beginning, followed by the words “Shake your booty”.  Unfortunately, though, the beginning is the best that this song gets. It has a repetitive tune, and it’s sure to get stuck in your head if you’re not too careful.  It’s a good song, just not as good as it could have been.

41. Bats in the Belfry – Dispatch

      I learned about this song on Pandora.  And it is awesome. It’s a bit too sporadic and unpredictable to be near the top, though.  Awesome refrain, but the horn parts are not too hot.  Still, this song will get stuck in your head, watch out. 

40. Theme Song – The Aquabats

      The Aquabats pose as a group of superheros, and their song is hilarious.  It’s too short to be a serious candidate on this list at less than 2 minutes. It’s very catchy though. (And don’t forget to “watch [them] every week on [their] TV show”.)

39. My Evil Plan to Save the World – Five Iron Frenzy

      This song has a lot going for it.  With a phenomenal horn intro and some pretty sweet solos, you’d think I’d put this be higher.  However, There are many dull moments in this song and the up-beat refrain and intro can’t quite make up for them.  (It’s still awesome when the tenor sax player breaks out into a mad “Mary Had a Little Lamb” solo, though.) 

38. Walking Away – Streetlight Manifesto/Catch 22

      I absolutely love the horn solos in this song.  The mood of the song changes too much for me, though. I’m not a big fan of that approach; two, maybe three moods would suffice.  Great song off a great album by great bands (I don’t prefer one over the other). 

37. The Story of Nothing – The Aquabats

     At the beginning of this song is possibly the greatest tenor sax solo I’ve ever heard.  After that, it gets a bit weird. The singer’s voice sounds a little whinier than normal. But the key change at the end, and the tempo increase improve the song. 

36. Superman – Goldfinger

      Superman was one of the first ska songs I ever heard. It’s great: upbeat, catchy, and just plain awesome all-around.  Why isn’t this higher, then?  First, it lacks powerful horn parts.  If it had more horns and more creative use of their instruments, it would be a truly great ska song. The song also lacks a truly syncopated feel.  However, the drum part is kickin’ and the bridge is pretty cool too.  Overall, a cool song.

35. The Joust – Mad Caddies

      The Joust wins with an awesome trumpet solo.  One thing I love about the Mad Caddies is that they experiment with different genres of music as they play ska.  This one has a salsa, bossanova feel to it.  It works pretty well.  I love how each instrument is used at the same time, especially right before the trumpet solo. This one’s a keeper. 

34. What a Wicked Gang Are We – Streetlight Manifesto

      This number off of  Somewhere in the Between has one of the greatest trombone solos you’ll ever hear in a ska song. The main horn theme and solo are really the most appealing part of this song, though.  The song just lacks a certain power that I’m used to seeing in Tomas Kalnoky’s songs. 

33. Captain Hampton and the Midget Pirates – The Aquabats

      How can you not love a song with that title? No doubts about it, it’s a funny, catchy song that saves the best for last: a horn feature on the melody of “Rule, Britannia.”  I liked it so much I learned how to play it.  The song even has a full story line going along with it. Genius, pure genius. 

32. Popular Demand – Suburban Legends

      At the beginning, the song kind of has a Mariachi sound to it, but then it goes to a normal ska sound, and builds from there.  It’s a pretty sweet song, although kind of repetitive.  The rhythm is syncopated very tightly and, and everything in the song flows perfectly from part to part. 

31. We are the Few – Streetlight Manifesto

      Man, this one’s great. I have great memories of spending hours learning the horn parts because .  I couldn’t wait to get to school the next day to show the other trumpets during warm up of band class, which was the time when we’d all show off the stuff we could play.

30. Bright Spring Morning – Suburban Legends

      The one part of this song I don’t like is the second half of the refrain.  It’s a bit cliché. (The refrain is long: nearly 45 seconds.)  The rest of Bright Spring Morning is great, though.  There’re some sweet horn parts, and I love the way the bridge I love the way it unfolds, even if it’s a bit wacky.  I hate putting it all the way down at #30, but hey: there are better songs.  Keep reading. 

29. Third World Think Tank – Five Iron Frenzy

      Although it may come off as a bit goofy at the beginning, with the singer talking in a fake southern accent, this song is great once it goes  into the refrain. The background horn feature is awesome.  One annoyance with this song is the 5 minute silence at the end of the track when you take it off the CD.  It’s pretty annoying when I’m trying to listen to my mp3 player and then I notice that I haven’t heard anything for the past 2 minutes and I realize that I had just listened to this song.

28. Don Juan – Suburban Legends

      This song makes the list this high for one major reason: the trumpet part. It’s omnipresent, and I love it so much that I just want to keep listening. I even want more when the song’s over. It’s amazingly well-written.  Overall, an awesome song and a great listen. 

27. Albuquerque – Buck-O-Nine

      Albuquerque has an absolutely sick melody.  The horn feature after the first verse is outstanding.  I sometimes want to fast forward to the song, but it’s worth listening to the build-up.  That’s not to say that the rest of the song is bad; just that it doesn’t even come close to the part right after the first verse. 

26. 12341234 – Catch 22

      12341234 is… awesome. I gotta say that straight off the bat.  It’s got a slow start, until you reach The Drums. You’ll know it when you hear it. It’s kind of like a punch in the face that feels good.  The song would be betterif it had horns like most Catch 22 songs, but it doesn’t.  Even with the amazing drumming, I have to put it lower because it lacks the horns, which is always crucial.  I couldn’t bring myself to putting it in the upper half of the songs because of it. (Keep in mind that I’m just ignoring the second half, non-song part of it.) 

25. On & On & On – Catch 22

      On & On & On is one of Catch 22’s faster songs, which is actually saying quite a bit.  The lyrics are said so fast that they’re barely comprehensible. Only when the song goes into half-time is when it’s easy to make them out. Nonetheless, it’s a blast to sing along with.  Ask my family or friends: I speak from experience.  This one definitely deserves to be in the upper half. 

24. Paint by Numbers – Upstanding Youth

     Pretty awesome from the get-go, this song has outstanding tenor sax throughout the song.  The instrument has many solos in there.  Paint by Numbers has more of a reggae feel than most of the songs on this list, or at least at the beginning.  The tempo eventually picks up, thankfully.  At the end, after the song is over, about 3 minutes into it, there’s a pretty awesome piano solo, too. 

23. 241 – Reel Big Fish

      ”Two-four-one” (not “Two-forty-one”) is first-rate.  As Reel Big Fish’s instrumental song, it is great fun to listen to and even more so to play.  It has sweeet trumpet solos (that I can play!) and a nice head melody that grounds the song. Great song, great fun. 

22. The Receiving End of  it All – Streetlight Manifesto

      Another Streetlight Manifesto classic, with many still to come.  This one has a sweet intro with lots of horns and nifty drums.  When the lyrics hit you for the first time, it sounds kind of strange.  But before you know it, there’s a sweet trombone lick and then more backup trombone as it continues on.  At the refrain, the song takes somewhat of an acoustic feel, and it all just clicks. This song rocks.

21. Kristina (She Don’t Know I Exist) – Streetlight Manifesto

      This song is astounding.  For the first 2:30, you think — eh, it’s kinda catchy, but why is it so great?  And then all the instrumentalists, every single one in the band minus the drummer, have solos.  It’s great.  Particularly, the two sax solos are two of the most fantastic ones I’ve ever heard.  Incredible.  And then it winds down slowly with the recurring trumpet theme as the end of the song.

20. Riding the Fourth Wave – Streetlight Manifesto

      This is Streetlight Manifesto’s instrumental song.  It’s sensational, even if it does have a flute solo at the beginning.  That glaring error is quickly made up for by a drum fill, though.  I love listening to it, especially as an instrument-player. I get to hear a song where there’s no singing, just some great horn parts to listen to. 

19. One Foot on the Gas, One Foot in the Grave – Streetlight Manifesto

      This one might be on the top of a ranking of ska song names.  I love its name.  The song itself is great, too. I really wish that I could put this one higher, but others are a bit better.  This one has a slow start, but it makes up for it later clocking in at 225+ beats per minute.  It has great horn line features, one for each type of instrument: trumpet, trombone, and saxes.  And it all wraps up with a trumpet solo and a ritardando as the tune fades out slowly.

18. One Hit Wonderful/Drunk Again – Reel Big Fish

      Now with these songs, there’s a bit of a story.  Neither of them were particularly big hits.  They’re the ones that people get when they buy an album, but never really give a chance.  “One Hit Wonderful” wasn’t even released by a record label that worked with Reel Big Fish at the time; RBF had already left.  Drunk Again is sung  by the band’s trumpeter and backup singer, Scotty Klopfenstein, and it’s awesome.  Both of these songs are slower for RBF songs: not as catchy, but quite a bit more subtle and restrained. 

17. Alternative, Baby – Reel Big Fish

      Jam-packed full of musical greatness, this song has an awesome trumpet solo and catchy refrains to back everything up.  It’s fun to listen to and I a blast to play (I learned it on trumpet).  It’s just a fun listen and vintage RBF.

16. Nobody Wins at the Laundromat – Mad Caddies

      Strange name, rockin’ song.  There is not one dull second in this song: it’s fast from start to finish.  Although it has a heavy metal sound to it, it has the horn parts moving all around the whole time; a feat not easily accomplished by a ska band.  It’s great fun and a good sing-along.  Yep, especially the screaming at the end. 

15. The Blonde Lead the Blind – Streetlight Manifesto

      My first instinct was to put this in the bottom half of the list.  But then I listened to it, and remembered how much it deserves a spot this high.  I’d forgotten, for example, the horn feature late in the song.  It’s almost inspirational, that’s how great it sounds. This song is extremely catchy, even if you can’t sing it because the vocal parts are just flying by every which way.

14. Confessional – Upstanding Youth

      I only recently discovered this song (thanks again, Pandora).  It’s rockin’.  I especially love the trumpet solo near the end of the song, even though I haven’t gotten a chance to learn how to play it yet.  The intro is legit and backed up by some clever vocal placement. Syncopated and evenly flowing, this song is a great listen and well-deserving of the spot it has. 

13. Every New Day – Five Iron Frenzy

      This was the last song that Five Iron Frenzy ever played as a band.  They broke up a while back.  I can imagine that it was quite the finale with such a great band.  In spite of a sad mood, it’s got a happy and positive message. It’s one of the most emotional ska songs I know of.  It’s got solid horns and vocals that are unmatched by any other FIF song.  Simply one of their best.

12. The Science of Selling Yourself Short – Less than Jake

      This song is highlighted by stellar vocal harmonies and progressions.  Although slow for third wave ska, it’s right up there with the best of them. The third verse has awesome vocals from the backup singer.  The changes in mood come at the just right times, it works well.

11. Me Oh My – Five Iron Frenzy

      First comes the gut-busting drum solo, then a sweet horn part, and finally the singing comes in.  The lyrical composure is quite good; it flows well like any song needs to be ranked this high.  Though the song is a bit short, but it doesn’t matter when awesome as this one.  If you like upbeat, exciting songs, this is definitely one worth listening to.

10. Here’s to Life – Streetlight Manifesto

      Woo… top 10, here come the truly amazing songs.  And we start with Here’s to Life.  It has a beautiful melody and awesome drums throughout the song, with the nice touch of some chamber sounds mixed.  The sax feature at each refrain is pretty sweet too.  My favorite part of the song is the end when with Kalnoky’s expressive cry of “Here’s to LIIIIIIIIIIIIFE” that he just holds onto.  It is a perfect ending for the song. 

9. The Big Sleep – Streetlight Manifesto

      The song starts slow but gradually picks up in tempo and mood.  Getting to the refrain is a bit like waking up in the morning: You do your routine and then you turn on the shower, but you forget it’s cold and then… BAM you wake up.  (The refrain is also one of the three that uses “na-na-na” on the album Everything Goes Numb.)  The best part of this song is at the end when the tempo takes it up one more notch, and the horns come in with a sweet melody and it all finally comes to a close.  It’s blast to listen to.  Even if it gets a little repetitive, it’s well worth multiple listens. 

8. Somewhere in the Between – Streetlight Manifesto

      It kicks off with a swashbuckling intro, but then it quickly changes to a more traditional ska sound and constantly seems to change tempo, with distortions of guitar changing all the time, and the horn parts can never seem to go away.  Halfway through the song, the trombone and the saxophone have a solo and counter-solo, then all the horns except the trumpet come in without any other instruments.  It’s a great moment. It speeds up again and comes to a crashing halt with the end the song.  This song is truly great, one of Streetlight Manifesto’s best. 

7. A Minor Point – Catch 22

      This song has an awesome beginning, with the distorted guitar + trombone combo.  It really works an gets you hooked on this song.  It changes drum beats throughout the songs at just the right times and the horns do an awesome job backing up the main melody.  It just seems that everything that happens in this song goes on at just the right time.  When you want to hear something different, they mix it up. Stuff like that.  When there’s a solo needed, the guitar comes in with some sweet lixx.  Old or new, this is Catch 22’s best song, in my opinion. 

6. Falling Down – Mad Caddies

      This song begins with a bizarre banjo part.  But then a guitar comes in, with some awesome muted trumpet.  The jazzy, smooth vocals emphasize the mysterious mood of the song.  Some background noise is faint and subtle, and it all adds up to something awesome.  The horns work perfectly with the rest of the instruments.  After a couple verses, there’s some alternating solos with the trumpet and the trombone.  It all sounds so great and can be listened to over and over.  The best song by the Caddies I have heard thus far. 

5. If and When We Rise Again – Streetlight Manifesto

      This song starts out with some abstract guitar.  Give it a few seconds, and it builds — slowly but surely.  You can tell the big hit is coming, you just don’t know when.  But it keeps building past what you expect. It keeps going, and finally… IT HITS YOU!  The drums come in with some crazy beats, the horns backing it up quite effectively.  Then the guitar comes in with a crazy fast pace.  The horns soon follow the drums as well.  All the instrumentalists join in harmonizing as background singers while Tomas Kalnoky is singing and they back him up in the refrain as well.  This song features a classic Mozart riff during one of the instrumental sections.  It’s all just beyond belief.

4. Get Up – Goldfinger

      I only recently discovered this song, but that doesn’t take away from how great it is.  The has some pretty sweet lyrics.  It’s about being a rebel, something I’m all for.  And then just as you get used to the fast paced punk mood of the song, it throws a half time part at you with a wicked trombone solo.  Crazy awesome. “Now it’s time to start a fight!”

3. A Better Place, a Better Time – Streetlight Manifesto

     It’s slow for the first 2 or so minutes into the song, but then it just picks up, and you realize how well it’s been building to the fast part.  The guitar has some sweet progressions and the horns have nice parts that synergize with the rest of the song.  Ska is all about syncopation, and this song has tons of that.  It’s got the horns to make great ska, and flows at such a comfortable pace.  The best part of all, though, is at the end when the drums and guitars are working off of each other.

2. Down, Down, Down, to Mephisto’s Café – Streetlight Manifesto

     Like many Streetlight songs, Mephisto’s starts slow, and picks things up from there.  But everything just happens perfectly here.  The horns sound perfect.  Their licks are delicious, especially a killer sweet trombone solo later in the song.  One of the reasons I put this song so high is how happy it made me when I first listened to it.  It was the first Streetlight Manifesto song I’d heard when I got it on a demo CD from a concert.  I brought it home, I put it on my mp3 player.  And then, I listened to this song, over and over.  I put it on repeat, and every time through, I found myself smiling.  This song truly raised my expectation of ska music.

1. I Want More – Suburban Legends

      This song rocks. It has my absolute favorite horn part ever.  It just sounds so… so perfect.  I have never heard, in all my years of playing trumpet and listening to ska, any more pleasant brass part than this series of notes.  After 2 verses, the song goes into a bridge-type thing, another an awesome part.  I try to do the harmonies when I’m in the shower and listening to this song, but I can never pull it off.

      The song then builds a little bit again and goes into a complete outburst of musical genius, with the vocals going crazy, the horns playing that gorgeous lick.  And it just sounds so… wow.  That’s all I can say about it.  Know that there is a reason this song is #1.  It emphasizes everything good I know about ska: the horns, the syncopation, everything.  I am proud to have this song as my #1 pick in my ska list, because it most certainly deserves it.  Ya gotta love it. 

     Well, there you have it, my list.  I hope you see where I’m coming from on all these, and that I didn’t just put my mp3 on shuffle and write some stuff down about the next song that came up.  It actually took quite a bit of thought to straighten everything out.  Thanks for reading, and leave me some comments or send me an e-mail with your thoughts.

Short version:

Listosaurus Rex will now be focusing on publishing new, original lists instead of discussing old lists from other sources.

Contribute your own lists, and we’ll gladly consider them for publishing here!

Long version:

I started this blog just over a year ago with no real goal for the site.  It was just an experiment in whether I could create and sustain a blog.  Spotty success so far, but 372 days later, and here I am still writing for it, so I guess it’s gone well enough.

The thing is, I never really defined what success was for me on the blog.  Was it number of page hits?  Number of subscribers? Ad revenue? Acclaim and attention? Just intelligent discussion?

At various points, I’ve really pushed for each one of those.  But going for page hits or subscribers or revenue seems a bit fake, like I’m trying to lure attention to myself.  It feels like I’m not doing it because I mean it, just because I’m trying to squeeze something out of it.  I don’t like that.

Discussion, then? Maybe, but this blog isn’t the best way to generate it.  Just bringing it up with my friends is more effective.  And a good portion of the discussion in the comments comes from friends.

Thanks to some attention from a few readers, I was inspired to revive the site for the past two months, and I’ve been reflecting on the purpose of the site since I brought it back to life.  Why am I doing it?  Sure, it’s fun — most of the time.  Portions of it get tedious, especially when I try and set myself on a daily post schedule as I tried for most of December.

Doing it just for fun means I’ll stop whenever it’s not fun.  That’s not how you’re supposed to run a blog.  I don’t want to do it that way.  Who says I won’t just get bored once and for all with it?  It’d be less a project and more a personal indulgence.  I want to consider this a successful project.

I really enjoyed writing most of the recent posts, but I just cannot keep it up.  Each post takes between a half hour and five hours depending the depth and the amount of reading of the list required and, especially, if it’s an original or not.

Compounding the time problem, I now have more going on than ever.  I’m a full-time student, I’m running for sports editor for a daily newspaper, working part-time recruiting teachers for a summer shool, writing as a weekly sports columnist, playing part-time in my school’s basketball pep band, and, not to mention, just enjoying college life.

I cannot keep up with writing a post a day.  I just don’t have the time or the perfectly consistent schedule to be able to.

So I have two problems: lack of consistent time, lack of a vision for the site.

To deal with these two at the same time, I am going to start focusing on writing original lists.  I want to make them unmissable and authoritative.  I’ve had a lot of contribution from friends and readers the past couple weeks with phenomenal results all around.  I really love empowering people to share their knowledge, expertise, and opinions.  I love hearing what other people have to say and getting their voices into the mix.

The new goal of this site is to post about once a week with in-depth and high-quality original lists both by me and others.

My two new goals are to a) write a solid set of good lists in areas I consider myself pretty-decently informed, and b) get as many and as good guest contributors as I can to write lists on the site.

My call to readers out there who have any interest in contributing (for the first time, or again) is to think about what type of list you might be interested in writing for this site.  You don’t need to be an recognized expert, nor professional in your expertise.  I just look for committed fandom and good experience with the topic.

If the site ever grows enough where ads generate noticeable revenue, I’d be glad to split revenue with writers.  As I’m still a long, long way from generating enough revenue to even cash out the first time, I can’t promise that right now.  So the only incentive I can offer now is an opportunity to get your voice out and generate discussion in the topic.  I’ll also, per custom for guest posts on blogs, provide you a short by-line for you to advertise yourself or your site if you run something.  Or I can write something, as I’ve been doing.

Another tangent: I liked the way the recent discussion post turned out.  I want to do more of these.  If you want to work with me on one of these, let me know.  Now that I have some audio and video recording experience thanks to a class I took last semester, I might even work on a multimedia post of some sort.

Anyways, I apologize for the long rambling post, and I’m curious what any of you think of these ideas.  Please let me know in comments.  I’m not saying I’m going to completely eliminate discussion of lists from other sources, but my hope is to increase quality and depth of posts while trimming down quantity.

~raptor

listosaurusrex@gmail.com

Editor’s note: This post is written as a dialogue between me — raptor — and Listosaurus Rex regular, yoshi.

Alright, we came across a list on the site FilmSchoolRejects.com, which is a pretty popular movie blog I sometimes read, that caught our attention.  It’s a ranking of the top five Batman films.  The list is a bit outdated, though.  It was released in 2006, a couple of years before the most recent Batman movie.  Here’s what the site came up with:

1. Batman Begins
2. Batman Forever
3. Batman and Robin
4. Batman (1989)
5. Batman Returns

raptor: I’m not a big fan of this list.  In 2006, Batman Begins was easily the best Batman movie.  But after that, I’m not sure I like where it heads.

yoshi: I agree with your and FSR’s ratings about Batman Begins.  I did see it before all of the Batman movies, so I’m going to be biased.  But it was one of my favorite movies of all time even before the hype of the sequel.  Although I haven’t seen it all the way through, I definitely would not have put Batman and Robin at number three.

raptor: Yeah, I agree.  Batman and Robin is regarded by some as one of the worst sequels of all time.  My feelings aren’t quite that strong against it, but I just didn’t find its wacky art direction and campy one-liners all that appealing.  Cute, maybe, but not great.  Batman Forever, at number two, isn’t quite as bad, but I was still not a big fan.

yoshi: As a side note — my aunt designed some of the furniture props on the evil half of Two-Face’s lair in Batman Forever!  I agree with you, though, raptor.  I preferred the darker feel of Burton’s movies, Batman and Batman Returns.  It reflected the type of introspection that makes Batman as a character interesting, as opposed to the comedic side of the later two.

raptor: I’m with you, yoshi.  For my money, the original Batman is the best of the four from the eighties and nineties, if for no other reason than Jack Nicholson as The Joker.  His performance was a 10 out of 10 in that, and made up for the stiff acting of Keaton and somewhat shallow plot.  You can go through any of the other villains in the series up until Begins, and none of them match the greatness of Nicholson.  Jim Carrey, too manic.  Schwarzenegger, too hard to see as Mr. Freeze.  I haven’t seen Batman Returns all the way through, so I can’t say much about those villains.

yoshi: I’ve seen it.  Michelle Pfeiffer as Catwoman and Danny DeVito as the Penguin impressed me.  I would’ve put  Batman Returns ahead of the other three from the era.

raptor: But we can agree, yoshi, that by far the best villain from any Batman movie is Heath Ledger?  The Dark Knight came out afte this list was made, but it surely would’ve held the number one spot.

yoshi: Yes.  It was really the details that brought out the insanity of the evil deeds of Ledger’s Joker:  the lip-licking, the makeup, the limping, and especially the way he talked.

raptor: I agree.  He couldn’t have done it better.  He’s a cross between a criminal mastermind, a psychotic creep, and a silly clown.  It just blew my mind.  That wasn’t the only good thing about The Dark Knight, though.  It’s just a top-rate piece of cinematic storytelling, engrossing and thrilling from beginning to end.

yoshi: The Dark Knight wasn’t the only movie missing from the list.  The Batman Movie from 1966 has always held a special place in my heart.  It was in no way a good movie.  The acting was terrible.  But it was so terrible it was hilarious.  The puns are really what made it.  So, raptor, what has yellow skin and writes?

raptor: A ball-point banana! And, you know, some days you just can’t get rid of a bomb.  I read an interview with Adam West, he said people still come up to him and quote lines from that awful but wonderful, extremely campy Batman movie from the ’60s.  I’m with you, yoshi.  In terms of entertainment value, it’s a good one.  The only other Batman movie I thought of that wasn’t on the list was the animated Mask of the Phantasm from 1993.  I adored it as a kid.  I haven’t seen it in a while, but I remember it was an entertaining and thoughtful piece of animated noir.

yoshi: I haven’t seen that one.

raptor: The animated series that it came from was great and pretty influential.  You see touches of it in the other movies, especially in Batman and Robin.  As subpar as Batman and Robin was as a movie, it did a decent job with clever Batman references.  So, at this point, are we goin to make our own respective Top 5 Batman Movies list?  Ready, yoshi?

yoshi: Yep!  My top five are:

1. The Dark Knight
2. Batman Begins
3. Batman Returns
4. Batman (1989)
5. Batman Forever

yoshi: With the 1966 movie barely missing the cut.

raptor: Solid all-around.  To me, Forever and Batman and Robin were just too disappointing.  They couldn’t decide if they were going to be silly or if they were going to be great, nuanced and deep.  The result was a mishmash.  Here are my five:

1. The Dark Knight
2. Batman Begins
3. Mask of the Phantasm
4. Batman (1989)
5. Batman (1966)

yoshi: Sounds pretty good.

raptor: Yep.  And Batman, in general, is the bomb-diggity.

yoshi: You know it.

The website The Top Tens has polled readers and created a list of the top 10 funniest comedians of all time.

In my opinion, comedy is one of the most subjective forms of entertainment.  Great movies, music, and books are very often universally acclaimed, but it’s comedy is usually so one-dimensional (funnier=better), then it’s little more than personal taste.  There’s so much room disagreement that it’s hard to imagine a list of greatest comedians without controversy.

And if you’re going to trust anyone’s opinions on what is funny, are you sure a random, probably small sampling of people’s opinions on the Internet is the best option?

What I’m hinting at is that I don’t think this list is particularly great.  It could be useful if you’re just looking for names of a bunch of comedians to check out.  But there’s no reason to respect it as an authoritative list.  Here are the Top 10.  The site also has some runners up.

1. Jerry Seinfeld
2. Russell Peters
3. Dane Cook
4. George Carlin
5. Dave Chappelle
6. Mitch Hedberg
7. Steve Martin
8. Katt Williams
9. Robin Williams
10. Chris Rock

I suppose a lot of these picks are respectable, but I’m sort of surprised the ever-divisive and gradually-more-loathed Dane Cook was able to make his way to the top.  My two favorite comedians are Mitch Hedberg as the runner up and Demetri Martin, who is listed as a #18 in the runners up section, as by far my favorite.  I’m glad to see Mitch making the top ten and sort of wish Demetri would receive more votes.

The explanations as to who was why the comedians receive different spots are just quotes from voters, and never really insightful.  Very often the quotes voters included are just quotes from the comedians themselves.

Overall, an unexciting list of best comedians.

Happy New Year!

What better way to kick off ‘09 than to look back at some of the things that made ‘08 great?

If Time-magazine’s bewildering set of end-of-year lists wasn’t enough lists for you, here is a run-down of some more countdown lists by the critics:

/Film’s Top 10 list podcast

Joystiq Network’s Video Game of the Year awards

allmusic’s (very extensive) Best Albums and Songs Films

NPR Best Books of 2008 Series

As thorough as those lists are, if you’re looking for something easier to scan, Metacritic’s probably the place to go, especially because most of these pages also have a section incoroporating in the top ten lists of most major critics.

Metacritic’s Best Films of 2008

Metacritic’s Best Music of 2008

Metacritic’s Best Games of 2008

I personally would make and share my own top ten lists in these categories, but I haven’t really experienced enough of any of these released in 2008 for me to be comfortable making the list.  What were some of your favorite movies, albums, or games of the year?

Top 10 Episodes of Scrubs

  

One of my favorite TV series of all time is Scrubs, a hospital sitcom that rarely fails to delight me with its quirky humor, snarky banter, and profound insights. This series can make me smile about a divorce and cry about an engagement as if that’s the natural thing to do. Sometimes it’s very predictable, sometimes it presents you with such a shocking hairpin plot turn that you go careening off the edge of your seat, gasping for breath. Every episode is a gem in itself, but here’s a list I made of what I consider the top 10 best Scrubs episodes out of the 7 seasons that have been released so far. Enjoy! (note: The review I wrote of each episode contains plot spoilers.) 

Editor’s note:   All readers are welcome to submit list articles of their own to be published on this site!  If you have an idea for a list you’d like to submit to this site, please send us an e-mail! with your idea, or just write the post and send it in.  Thanks again to the recent contributors to this site for all their great work!  ~raptor, editor for Listosaurus Rex

This is a guest post by my good friend,  littlefoot.  This is his first post as a contributing writer.  Leave him some nice comments!

So when raptor asked me to write this, I wasn’t really sure what to think. I got my GameCube late in the generation, and have been at college during much of my time owning a Wii, so relative to the size their libraries, I have a somewhat limited experience with either console. Now — trust me — I like video games as much as the next guy, probably even more. It’s really just been a time commitment issue more than anything else. 

So what authority did I have when it came to video games, I wondered? And then it came to me: It’s true I’m the Joe six-pack who only bought a couple games for their systems. However, I read the reviews, talked to friends, and did thorough research before I shelled out the cash.  I’m well-versed on games for the systems.  So with that, I present to you…

If You Only Buy 5 Games For Gamecube and Wii, You Should Buy… 

When reading this list, you have to keep in mind that it’s not strictly a top 5 best games list. These are the games that you play when your friends come over and say, “hey, you have a Wii, let’s play something!”. These are the games your family breaks out at Thanksgiving when they’re tired from stuffing their faces with Turkey. But no, that doesn’t just mean the best multiplayer games. Your younger cousin could get hours of amusement by watching you play through a hard single-player game. These games are the ones that you can get the most hours out of playing through and attempting to master. 

Also, a quick note: the majority of this list happens to be Nintendo exclusives, strictly because in general, 3rd party games released on multiple consoles are best on one of the other consoles. Also, the Wii offers an original control scheme, which few 3rd party games have managed to implement into a game so that it improves its overall quality, so it’s usually a better idea to just opt for the improved graphics of the other versions of multiplatform games.

So now, the lists. 

GameCube

5. Mario Kart: Double Dash

Not a lot needs to be said about this one. On one hand, it’s another great Mario Kart game, but on the other hand… it’s just another Mario Kart game. It doesn’t add much to the N64 version besides new maps, the “double” feature (which really doesn’t change the experience very much), and improved powersliding. If you have a Kart game for the N64 or an SNES this probably isn’t a must-buy, but otherwise it’s well worth the money.

4. Metroid Prime

The start of the Prime series. My personal experience with the game is limited, but that’s mostly just because I’m not a fan of first person shooters. From what I understand of the genre and system, it’s an absolute classic. Winner of multiple game of the year awards in 2002 and recipient of rave reviews, it should be a shoo-in for this list. However, this game is single-player only and has (to my knowledge) little replay value outside of speed runs. The game itself was incredibly well done, but its play is limited.

3. Super Monkey Ball 2

An excellent single-player game in its own right, this game is also a good party game. It’s incredibly simple to pick up, and has a cute charm to it. What could be more fun than rolling a monkey around in a ball trying to get bananas? It’ll take you a while to beat the 100 different levels on your own, and if you’re REALLY dedicated, you could continue working to improve your times.

2. Paper Mario: Thousand Year Door

One of my favorite games of all time, and this is probably the only reason why it’s on this list. It’s a ~30-hour single player game with many different ways to play. It’s an RPG that you don’t need a long time to get into the storyline. It \uses characters that are already familiar and has a fairly simple plot. However, the combat has a lot of strategy and the puzzles require creative thinking to get through. Before very long, you’ll get absorbed by it and will hopefully enjoy it as much as I did.

1. Super Smash Bros. Melee

One of the best multiplayer competitive games ever (at least, since the home console era). I’ve put countless hours into this game, and I still can’t consistently beat a level 9 computer. So much strategy and practice is involved to master this game. And even once you master one character, there are 20-some others to work on. Not that I ever got that far… It takes an awful lot of practice to get good. This game is a multiplayer classic. With 3 or more other friends, you can play this game for hours and still not be even slightly bored. 

Screenshot courtesy of GameSpot.com

Wii

5. The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess

I picked this game up a week ago, and have fallen in love with it. The graphics are a generation behind (not to say that they’re bad though), but the storyline and the gameplay make up for it. Not to mention that you will get a solid 40+ hours of gameplay out of it. Rumor has it that there’s another Zelda game coming for the Wii in 2009, and if that game is anything like what I think it will be, Twilight Princess may get kicked off of this list.

4. Wii Fit

Wait, what? Did Wii Fit really get on this list? The main audience of Wii Fit is the family just trying to stay healthy. That’s part of the appeal, though. Like Wii Sports did, it gets the entire family involved in an activity that was once reserved for the kids. Also, what’s so bad about a game that promotes a healthy lifestyle? I know there will be people who say that it doesn’t help as much as going outside for a run, but it’s still better than nothing.

3. Super Smash Bros. Brawl

I have a hard time putting Brawl this low on the list, but it needs to be done. In most Nintendo fanboys’ opinions, Brawl doesn’t have quite the competitive atmosphere that Melee did. This argument wasn’t what prevented it from reaching the top of this list, though.  There are other problems.

In terms of raw gameplay, Brawl didn’t improve much over Melee. Sure, there was a graphical update and then there were a bunch of new characters and stages, but — unlike the jump from the original to Melee — nothing added much to the experience. For example, I doubt anyone was playing Melee one day and said, “gee, I really wish I could play as Wolf or Lucas”.

2. Mario Kart Wii

Unlike Brawl, this game took a popular series and made game-changing improvements to it. The addition of the wheel by itself turned the game into something you can just pick up and play. They added motorcycles into the mix as well. Various shortcuts and tricks make the game difficult to master. Also, Nintendo made the environment competitive by allowing you to upload your high scores and send them to your friends. Sure, the battle mode still sucks, but why would you even bother with that when you can race your friends around 32 awesome tracks?

1. Super Mario Galaxy

Of course. The graphics are spectacular, the music is fantastic, the gameplay is unrivaled. Seriously, a platformer game where the platforms are tiny planets? The physics must have been a royal pain to program. Regardless, it was executed exceptionally well. If you just want to rescue the princess, 60 stars isn’t that hard to obtain (though still rewarding). The real challenge is collecting all 120 stars. Although the multiplayer capabilities are limited, who cares? You can still trade off with friends trying to beat various levels. Multiplayer isn’t the point of this game. Go ahead and enjoy this fantastic game for what it is: the most essential Wii game.

Screenshot courtesy of 1UP.com

Last week, I declared Make Believe to be Weezer’s worst album.  This is a guest post by regular reader and commenter Grant J. that defends the album and explains why Make Believe is, in fact, Weezer’s best album.

In their career trajectory, Weezer have rarely followed the traditional rules of rock and roll.  Their debut was an unexpected success, but the subsequent long layoff and eventual follow-up, Pinkerton, suggested they didn’t have aspirations of grandeur; yet it was hardly a typical sophomore slump, as it became, over time, their most popular album.  Lulls and comebacks have defined the band’s career, but Make Believe, their fifth studio album, is the work of a supremely confident group doing just what it wants to do.  It succeeds both by projecting a more mature emotional perspective than their earlier output and because of its sheer sonic grace and beauty.

From beginning to end, the album sounds soothing and heavenly, with a majestic scope that rivals 1980s U2.  Whereas some of Weezer’s other work can come across as abrasive upon repeated playings, Make Believe is one of the most euphonious albums I own.  Without sacrificing power, the band and producer Rick Rubin create mellifluous soundscapes that underscore the emotional purity at the center of the songs, producing a strikingly absorbing result.

And the album has the songs to match its sound, for along with eschewing their occasionally caustic sound, Weezer also leave behind their amateurishness.  The album opens with the hit single “Beverly Hills,” which announces that anthemic chants will rule the day.  Make Believe is full of grandiose choruses and guitar solos that envelop songs sung with full conviction by frontman Rivers Cuomo, with themes ranging from typically self-conscious (“Perfect Situation”) to idealistic (“This is  Such a Pity”) to shamelessly emotional (“Hold Me”).

Yet even when the chorus isn’t perfect (“Situation”), the band nevertheless sounds stronger than ever.  “Hills” is a touch bland, but “My Best Friend” could easily be a Green Day ballad, and the verses of “The Other Way,” especially on the heels of the chorus, click along in ideal rhythm.  “Pardon Me” builds to its crescendos masterfully, and the haunting album closer “Haunt You Every Day,” which wouldn’t fit on any other Weezer album, makes you want to do nothing more than close your eyes and be carried away.

Then, however, there are songs (such as “Pardon Me”) where the choruses are just about perfect, and it’s almost impossible to deny Cuomo’s sentiments.  That’s all the more true because his lyrics are as smooth as the music, conveying a refreshing gratitude to replace his prior whininess. (“I can’t tell you how the words have made me feel” wipes the floor with “What could you possibly see in little old three-chord me?”) But it’s his vocals that deserve the most acclaim.  His extended notes in “Hold Me” represent his finest moments, and he shows an equally deft touch sighing “Did I hurt you / Are you OK” on the change-of-pace effective “Freak Me Out” as he does belting out the lovely oh-oohhs of “Perfect Situation” and “Peace.”  Playing to the crowds, perhaps, but the earnestness is undeniable.

That sentiment applies to the whole album.  The band may be striving for accessibility, but in a much different way than their early power-pop did.  Their melodies have never been stronger, their songs never denser, and they’re accessible because Weezer is capable of wearing their hearts on their sleeves without coming off as overwrought.  That’s not easy to do, as albums can collapse under the weight of their good intentions, but the songwriting prowess evinced here alleviates any such concerns.  They’ve stripped away their unfortunate qualities to reveal their musical gifts, in the process indicating a willingness to continue to grow.

Make Believe isn’t quite muscular enough to be one of my all-time favorite albums, and you could argue that the songs sound a little too similar, but the exquisitely warm and soothing sound ensures that playing it lights you up.  All their talent coalesces on “Hold Me,” which has more heart than most modern bands’ entire catalogues.  They stretch all the way out here, and in the interlude, Brian Bell launches into a guitar solo that sounds timeless and old-fashioned at once, the product of a forgotten age when bands were unafraid of unabashed emotion.  When they leave their insecurities behind, Weezer are one of the few bands who can still pull that off.

Every once in awhile I like to look at the lists that don’t necessarily inspire a lot of intelligent discussion but just make you smile as you read them.

Here is such an example: The Top 10 Worst Shoes to Wear and Step in Dog Poop In.

If you’re curious and don’t want to read the whole thing, here are the picks:

1. Aqua socks
2. Custom-dyed wedding/prom shoes
3. Bunny slippers
4. Espadrilles
5. Converse (classic style Chuck Taylors)
6. Flip flops
7. Brand new white running shoes
8. Marabou slippers
9. Heelys
10. Kitten Heels

The low (high?) point of the list is the surprisingly colorful and icky story to accompany number five.

Thanks to regular reader and commenter yoshi for recommending this list.  You can recommend a list, too, by e-mailing me.

GameSpy started making annual top ten lists in 2002 at the latest.  Just by changing the year in the URL, you can go back to 2003, and they reference game awards back through 2002.  It’s possible there were earlier lists, too.  Here we are in 2008 and they’re still making them.

Their lists are really good, year in and year out.  First, the picks are always solid.  A good balance of mostly highly-reviewed titles everyone talks about with a few forgotten gems.  The clincher, though, is the writing.  It explains well what was good about the games that get picked.  I feel genuinely excited about playing these games after I read the picks.  In recent years, the site has had multiple perspectives on each games for some lists by having remarks from different writers about each game.  It provides points, counterpoints, arguments, and a variety of perspective.  This year Gamespy provided multiple perspectives for each game in the Top 10 Overall Games of the Year list.

Speaking of that list, here are the picks:

1. Fallout 3 (PC/360/PS3)
2. Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning (PC)
3. Left 4 Dead (PC/360)
4. Gears of War 2 (360)
5. LittleBigPlanet (PS3)
6. Grand Theft Auto IV (PC/360/PS3)
7. Rock Band 2 (360/PS3)
8. World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King (PC)
9. Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots (PS3)
10. Professor Layton and the Curious Village (NDS)

2008 was a year in which more great video games were released than any year before, so it was probably quite difficult to pick and rank the games.  The writing explains why the picks were made and kept me hooked.  Here’s the link again.

My runner up choice for my favorite end-of-year games list in 2008 is one that isn’t even really a traditional list.  It’s GamesRadars’ yearly recap awards thingy.

I like it because of some unpredictable picks and an excellent big-picture analysis.  When I went to go find the link, I accidentally read the whole thing again, so I guess the writing’s pretty compelling too.

Too bad I’m a poor college student so I can only play games I download on my computer.