The 100 Greatest Artists of All Time

Music was not a huge part of my earliest childhood. I split my time between the two sides of my family, spending the majority with my evangelist mother, who listened to very little other than Christian music and the occasional Stevie Wonder’s Greatest Hits or Grammy nominee CD, and visiting my father, who listened to…

Burnes Turns: Nov. 26, 2016-Feb. 15, 2017

My first Burnes’ Turns in months highlights some early Hip-Hop classics, joyfully pissed off Hard Rock riffing and an urgently apocalyptic message from the dearly departed David Bowie that is more pressing than ever. “Five Years” – David Bowie When I was first getting into music and reading Rolling Stone, they published a playlist issue…

Highway to Hell – AC/DC (1979)

****1/2 Bon Scott’s potentially aptly-named farewell to our world features everything that makes AC/DC great; guitar badassery, gutteral vocals, funky rhythms, and lots and lots of sex. As the precursor to the infinitely more famous Back in Black, Highway to Hell is often shut out in discussions of the greatest Rock albums ever made, but…

Back in Black – AC/DC (1980)

****1/2 When original AC/DC frontman Bon Scott passed away following a deadly case of alcoholism (he drank himself into a stupor, threw up and then choked to death on his own vomit) during the recording of Back in Black, it seemed like it would be the end for one of the most iconic Hard Rock…

Rolling Stone’s 500 Greatest Songs: 190-171

190. “Back in Black” – AC/DC This was Bryan Johnson’s introduction to the world as the frontman of AC/DC after the death of Bon Scott, and he arrived all guns blazing and armed to the teeth with one of the greatest riffs of all time and the killer flow (and high register) to back it…

Rolling Stone’s 500 Greatest Songs: 260-231

260. “Mississippi” – Bob Dylan I was first exposed to this song when I was new to buying music off of iTunes. Rolling Stone had listed it as one of the greatest songs of the ’00s, but the version I purchased was actually a live acoustic recording. It’s still really good, and after listening to…