#1 "After the Thrill is Gone" by The Eagles

Growing up in the seventies and eighties, we had about five choices when it came to my mom's stereo: Billy Joel. Queen. The Eagles. Linda Ronstadt. The Beatles. Occasionally Wings and Fleetwood Mac made it into the rotation too, but those first five were constant. They were all pretty radio-friendly and coupled with my dad's collection of 50's era 45's, my brother and I got a pretty good foundation when it came to listening material.

The Eagles were great. Their California/Country/Rock sound was pretty unique for its day and easy on the ears. Their first Greatest Hits collection was, at one time, the greatest selling album ever! I think that recently it's been eclipsed by Michael Jackson's "Thriller," but songs like "Take it Easy," "Peaceful Easy Feeling" and "Desperado" are influential and timeless staples on every classic rock station in the country.

"After the Thrill is Gone" is the last song on the second greatest hits collection The Eagles released back in the end of their heyday. Though it was from an album in the middle of their wildly successful run as recording artists, it is placed out of chronological order on the package, perhaps because of what seemed to be saying... "It's over." The lyrics can apply to anyone's relationship that has gone too long. It could also easily apply to the partnering of The Eagles two primary creative forces, Don Henley and Glenn Frey. The song talks about how your dreams change, and what do you do? It talks about losing what you once held "so close in your hand" and how love without passion "ain't no kind of lovin' at all." It's sung as a duet with the two men trading stanzas, but in the end they come together for one of my favorite lines, "You don't care about winning but you don't want to lose... after the thrill is gone." That's such a bitter line, and one that I've certainly found to be truthful in some of my own experiences. Love, friendships, and other bonds can become terribly competitive sometimes. You always want to come out on top and NEVER want to give in to the other person, but to repeat what Henley sings earlier in the tune, "That ain't no kind of lovin' at all."

"After the Thrill is Gone" is originally from the album "One of These Nights." To hear the song, click on the icon in the widget jukebox along the side of the blog.f

The Origins of The 300

I'm one of those people who really enjoys music. I like listening to it. I like reading about it, talking about it, sharing it with people, seeing it performed live, and can even play a little bit myself. And though I have a lot of interests outside of music, it seems that I could almost PUT music to every of those things. Because of this, songs have a regular space in my life.

Like most folks these days, I have an Ipod. I really didn't use it very much until I started running last year. I'm more of an album guy myself, and it seems like Itunes and mp3's are more geared toward individual songs. Because my Ipod is relatively small at only two gigs, I found I didn't have a lot of room for many whole albums. And because I tend to listen really intently and repeatedly to the things I have, I'm extremely familiar with my record collection... from the popular tunes to the deep tracks to the outtakes even. As a result, I found myself wanting to constantly change the storage on my mp3 player. After a while, it got kind of tedious so I started making mixes of individual artists to listen to. After enjoying those for a bit, I decided to make a huge mix of songs from my entire cd collection. I had recently converted all of those albums to digital files, so I made a new folder called "Gregg's Favs" and starting copying certain selections into it.

There was a bit of method to the madness. What should I pick? The things I liked? Do I ignore the cliche, radio-friendly numbers that I can hear anytime I tune into a station, or do I pick the things that I'd never hear anywhere... even if that means ignoring some of the hugely famous and popular songs that I too enjoy? And who was going to be listening to this mix? Just me, or would I play these songs for my wife or plug this in for a party or a house full of guests? Should I tailor some of my choices with an audience in mind?

At first I thought I'd take one song from every artist in my collection. As I started doing that, however, I thought, "I have over thirty original albums by Bob Dylan, but only four from Ben Kweller. Should they really get the same number of selections for my playlist?" So after giving every artist their due, I started going back and pulling multiple songs from the more prolific performers. I was sure to give cd's that I barely even listened to any more their just due as well. There had to have been a reason I owned them, or wanted them once, so they would be represented too. Over the months, the total number of selections kept getting bigger until I got to the nice even number where I am today: 300.

Listening to it once it was all done was fantastic. There was such a range of material. Some songs got my heart pumping while others had lyrics that made me pause. Some brought back memories from long ago while others enabled me to tell my sons, "Now THIS is a song!" The Ipod arranged the tracks in alphabetical order. I never knew what was coming next. And though I've never listened to all 300 songs back to back, I have enjoyed whole letters before. Sometimes I'd think, "The C's are really good," and then later I think the T's were a pretty powerful group. Considering it all now, it's not just a collection of enjoyable music to listen to, it's also a reflection of me.

Enjoy the list. I hope to comment on the tunes, the artists, share some reminisces or some other related info. Let's begin...