As a fan of a wide variety of popular (and not-so-popular) music from the 1950s (and sometimes even earlier) up through the present, one of my bucket list projects for years has been to put together a list of my 100 favorite songs of all time. At some point I decided that, once I got around to figuring that out, I could put it out on a blog, for the infinitesimally small proportion of the Internet world that might be interested. So, here we are. While the Top 100 will be a major focus, I also plan to post on a variety of other musical (and occasionally non-musical) topics, in which you may or may not be interested. (If a particular posting doesn’t ring your bell, you’re only a few clicks away from a dancing cat video on YouTube.)

Monday, August 17, 2026

Dave Marsh

Opinionated rock critic and prolific author Dave Marsh died this past Friday at the age of 76.

 

While I enjoyed his two early Bruce Springsteen bios (Born to Run: The Bruce Springsteen Story and Glory Days: Bruce Springsteen in the 1980s), for me they pale in comparison to The Heart Of Rock & Soul: The 1001 Greatest Singles Ever Made, which is one of my favorite books of all time. It’s still in print, available from Amazon and presumably elsewhere.

 

Marsh’s opinions of various musical acts were always fun to read, whether you agreed with them or not. According to his Wikipedia entry, he wrote that “Queen may be the first truly fascist rock band,” characterized Journey as “a dead end for San Francisco area rock,” and dismissed the Grateful Dead as the “worst band in creation.” I do have to give him bonus points for his evaluation of Air Supply as the “most calculated and soulless pseudo-group of its kind.”

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7 comments:

  1. AnonymousAugust 19, 2026 at 8:33 AM

    Always enjoyed listening and reading Marsh.
    Last week Sirius featured the top 52 instrumentals of the 60s. The song had to have hit the top ten.
    Here are the top ten:
    10. Last Date
    9. The Stripper
    8. Stranger on the Shore
    7. Grazing in the Grass
    6. Romeo and Juliet theme
    5. Calcutta
    4. Telstar
    3. Wonderland By Night
    2. Love is Blue
    1. A Summer Place theme

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    1. Mike RhoadsAugust 19, 2026 at 7:51 PM

      Definitely a mixed bag. My favorites from that list are 8 (obviously), 7, and 10, in that order. Others that occur to me are Green Onions, Walk Don't Run, Wild Weekend, and of course Wipeout and Pipeline.

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    2. Mike RhoadsAugust 20, 2026 at 9:35 AM

      BTW, there's a great article about Asbury Park in the current edition of Bethesda Magazine, of all places.
      https://bethesdamagazine.com/2026/08/19/from-bethesda-magazine-rediscovering-asbury-park-new-jersey

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  2. AnonymousAugust 20, 2026 at 7:44 AM

    Those you mention all made the top 52. I thought Mr. Bilk would have finished in the top 3, but I may have been biased (due to your influence;)). Also, I was surprised Telstar finished so high, but #1 was no surprise at all.

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    1. Mike RhoadsAugust 20, 2026 at 9:31 AM

      I had assumed the list was ordered by chart success, not artistic merit. (Summer Place was #1 for 9 weeks, Mauriat for 5.)

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    2. AnonymousAugust 25, 2026 at 8:27 AM

      Correct.

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  3. AnonymousAugust 25, 2026 at 8:27 AM

    The small condo in Long Branch where we escape a couple a days a week to hit the beach, from the "active adult community" where our main house is located, is just a few miles north of AP, where we spend quite a bit of time frequenting happy hours (we are long gone before people decades younger arrive). Marion did, however, recently attend a Dylan Scott concert with her daughter at the Stone Pony outdoor stage.

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