In anticipation of the theatrical release of AJ Schnack's beautiful, deeply moving KURT COBAIN: ABOUT A SON (which nearly launched me into a hysterical bawling fit when I saw it for the first time in Sarasota), AJ pulled a Matt Dentler and came up with a clever way of spreading the word throughout the blogosphere (why do I use these words when they make me want to throw up?). Rather than stuffing the film with Nirvana music, AJ made an original and ultimately very wise decision to use songs that provided the soundtrack to Cobain's own life. The result is a film that feels one hundred times more intimate and personal than a traditional documentary ever could, and shows us the real Kurt Cobain, a deeply sensitive, thoughtful, tormented young man who unwittingly became the voice of his generation. Having seen the film twice, it never ceases to shock me that the voice speaking those words was only twenty-five years old. There's an inherent wisdom, an exhaustion, a frustration, and a strange maturity that seems completely unfathomable for someone of that age. Was he really only twenty-seven when he died? How is that possible? Anyway, I can’t recommend KURT COBAIN: ABOUT A SON highly enough, and to show my support I'm rising to AJ's challenge to create my very own personal soundtrack of my life. This was a very difficult thing to do, but it was also incredibly rewarding, so thanks for the assignment, AJ! While I agree with Agnes that less is probably more in this case, I'm a bored loser so I decided to go all out like the one and only Tom Hall, whose clip-embedding tactic I have flat-out jacked for my own presentation purposes (just in case they don't play properly for some reason, click on the links to take you to the actual YouTube pages). I hope you're sitting down, folks, 'cause this one is a serious doozy...

1. Kiss "I Was Made For Lovin' You"

When I was around five or six, Kiss became my first musical obsession. Apparently this was a rather typical phenomenon amongst the youth of that particular era, but looking back on it with detachment, it seems kind of strange. Like, what’s a six-year-old doing being really into “Beth”?

2. J. Geils Band "Centerfold"

I had to pick one song from the era when “Casey Kasem’s Top 40” was a major weekly event in our household. I’m about 99.9% positive that this is the first 45 I ever bought. I even remember bringing it into school for show-and-tell. Of course, I had absolutely no idea what they were actually singing about. I guess my parents and teacher knew that, or they probably wouldn’t have supported my infatuation with the track. (Off the top of my head, two other songs that spring directly to mind from this period: Joan Jett & The Blackhearts' “I Love Rock ‘N Roll” and Madness’ “Our House.”)

3. Kool & The Gang "Fresh"

EMERGENCY was the first cassette I purchased on my own (when I was ten), and Kool & The Gang was the first concert I ever talked my parents into taking me to. So this must be included on my list.

4. LL Cool J "I Can't Live Without My Radio"

When I bought this tape and pressed play, my life changed completely. I had already found my calling for hip-hop and rap with Whodini’s ESCAPE, Run-DMC’s RUN-DMC and KING OF ROCK, and the Fat Boys’s FAT BOYS, but hearing the beat drop on “I Can’t Live Without My Radio”… it was a genuine all-time moment.

5. The Beastie Boys "Rhymin' and Stealin'"

The same goes for this record. My dad took me to see Whodini, LL Cool J, and Run-DMC at the Baltimore Arena in 1986, and when the Beastie Boys came out at the beginning and jumped around on stage, I couldn’t believe my eyes. But it wasn’t until I bought LICENSED TO ILL and heard this song that my mind was shattered into giddy fireworks.

6. Eric B. & Rakim "I Know You Got Soul"

I first heard this song at basketball camp. Someone was thumping it out of a ridiculously huge boom box and it sounded like the coolest thing I’d ever heard. The first thing I did when I went home was rush out to the store to buy it. PAID IN FULL introduced a new level of sophistication in rap music, and to this day remains one of the most striking, distinct records ever made, no matter the genre.

7. Slick Rick "Hey Young World"

Slick Rick is my favorite all-time rapper. While the 12” of “The Show” and “La Di Da Di” could easily have made this list, “Hey Young World” is the song I’ve played more than any other. In hindsight, I realize that I had a bug for melody even back then, but I was so committed to hip-hop at that age that I took a brash moral stance against songs with “singing” (which included my sisters’ creepy, morose musical fascinations such as The Cure, The Smiths, Depeche Mode, etc.).

8. Camper Van Beethoven "All Her Favorite Fruit"

Without overstating things, Camper Van Beethoven’s KEY LIME PIE is one of the most important albums of my life, for it was the first record I was forced to listen to repeatedly by my sister on our drive to school that snuck past my aversion to “singing” and hit a spot that genuinely affected me. It took a while for me to realize that not only did I not hate this album, I actually really, really liked it. To this day, it remains a personal favorite. The day that I dubbed it off her and started listening to it on my own was a pretty momentous one.

9. A Tribe Called Quest "Check the Rhime"

Another absolute life-changer of an album that I distinctly remember hearing for the first time. The day it was released, I rushed to the mall after school to buy it, only to discover that the first store I went to had already sold all of its copies. Frantically, I rushed to another store, which had it. When I put it in and pressed play and Q-Tip’s first lyrics came on, followed by that incredible beat drop, I almost drove off the road. This was already the greatest album I’d ever heard, and I was only thirty seconds into it. Now that the dust has settled on the Tribe era, I might choose MIDNIGHT MARAUDERS as my favorite album of theirs, but THE LOW END THEORY is more apt for this particular exercise.

10. Nirvana "Drain You"

In the era before the internet, when the only music searching I did was for hip-hop, it was a bona fide revelation to hear Nirvana’s NEVERMIND. That’s embarrassing to admit, perhaps, but the fact remains that this record opened my ears to the possibilities of rock-and-roll. All of my baggage went away and I gleefully dove into rock music the way I’d been soaking up hip-hop for the past several years. Nirvana helped turn me on to bands like The Pixies and My Bloody Valentine and Mudhoney and many, many others.

11. Green Day "Going to Pasalacqua"

Nirvana also sparked a brief, but intensive foray into pop-punk for me (I was never into hardcore or harder punk). For me, it was all about the melody, not the aggression. Bands like Green Day and Jawbreaker and Snuff were my personal favorites. This Green Day song was the pinnacle of that genre. While DOOKIE did a NEVERMIND and showed the masses what they were missing, I had already been a huge fan for quite some time. “Going to Pasalacqua,” more than any other song, inspired me to pick up a guitar and actually write songs of my very own.

12. Teenage Fanclub "Star Sign"

Teenage Fanclub is, without a doubt, my favorite band ever. Remember that I discovered these guys before I had heard Big Star or Neil Young, so it was a triple revelation to hear them back then. But even now that I’ve been educated on their influences, I still stand behind the Fannies, and while I could pick about twenty other songs, “Star Sign” epitomizes this band’s musical magic for me. If I were forced to listen to only one band’s catalogue for the rest of my life, Teenage Fanclub would be that band. (It should also be noted that this song is also used in KURT COBAIN: ABOUT A SON.)

13. Pavement "Summer Babe (Winter Version)"

This was another album my sister bought that inspired me to dub it without any shame. Something about the drumming and the lyrics and the melodies was just cooler than cool. The fact that I had no idea when this was recorded, or what these guys looked like, made it even cooler somehow. This particular song, and the entire SLANTED AND ENCHANTED record, was personally responsible for opening my ears to 1990s alternative/indie-rock (Luna, Superchunk, Silver Jews, Yo La Tengo, Cornershop, Built to Spill, Guided By Voices, etc.).

14. Beach Boys "You Still Believe in Me"

While we’re on the topic of embarrassing confessions, here’s another one: I didn’t discover PET SOUNDS until I was twenty-three years old and living in an attic in Athens, Georgia. This song absolutely destroyed me. The epic simplicity, the haunting harmonies, the desperate emotion… it remains an absolute landmark and one of the most moving expressions of personal sadness ever.

15. Leonard Cohen "The Stranger Song"

It’s nearly impossible to pick a favorite Leonard Cohen song, but this one will do just fine. Actually, this brings up a very relevant point, for I discovered Cohen in conjunction with my discovery of Robert Altman’s MCCABE & MRS. MILLER, which is one of my top five movies of all time. If I had to choose one artist/band’s catalogue from the 1960s, I would probably pick Leonard Cohen’s.

16. Bob Dylan "4th Time Around"

Understanding Bob Dylan didn’t happen until my mid-twenties. While THE FREEWHEELIN’ BOB DYLAN was the record that made me see the light, I think “4th Time Around” is my favorite Dylan song. It’s melodic, clever, funny, sad, pretty, and so much more. (Note: The version I linked to is a little fey, but I figured I’d include it anyway. I suggest going to listen to the original again to remind your ears of how it was done so much better the “first time around.” Pun intended!)

17. Neil Young "Harvest"

I also thought Neil Young was whiny and annoying when I was growing up and I didn’t understand why people liked him. I guess the same could be said for Dylan, so maybe my Dylan awakening helped prepare for Neil Young, who is now one of my favorite artists ever. While I could pick many different songs (“Cortez the Killer” being a very close second), I have to go with “Harvest,” which is indirect and poetic lyrically, simple and direct musically, and flat-out heartbreaking. (Note: I couldn’t find a performance of “Harvest” on YouTube so watch this clip of “Out On The Weekend” instead.)

18. The Zombies "This Will Be Our Year"

Once again, it’s hard to pick one song off a record that feels like it’s just about perfect, but “This Will Be Our Year” is a truly great track. When I first heard ODESSEY AND ORACLE, it was an absolute revelation. This album taps directly into a very special place in my heart. For my money, I would choose ODESSEY AND ORACLE over any Beatles or Kinks album, which is why neither of those bands made this list. In the cutthroat world of the “AJ Schnack Soundtrack Challenge,” the creamiest cream must rise to the top.

19. Townes Van Zandt "Waitin' Around to Die"

Townes is another one I discovered later than sooner, but he certainly demands inclusion on this list, for he opened my window into the glorious vistas of country and folk and blues music. Again, it’s difficult to choose a favorite song, but this clip is one of the most powerful moments ever committed to celluloid, so it would be silly not to choose it for these purposes. If you’re only going to sit through one of these YouTube clips, make it this one.

20. Neutral Milk Hotel "Song Against Sex"

While IN THE AEROPLANE OVER THE SEA towers above almost any record I’ve ever heard, hearing this first song off ON AVERY ISLAND was a dizzying, electrifying, mind-blowing experience. It marked the beginning of a truly special moment in time, and I’m thrilled to have been a witness to it. Normally, I discover these moments after the fact and regret having slept through them, but this time, I was right there in the middle of it, embracing the spiritual magic of Neutral Milk Hotel in the very moment. Aside from falling in love, my first time taking ecstasy, and Terrence Malick movies, their show at Maxwell’s in the summer of 1998 (with Of Montreal and Elf Power) was the closest I have ever come to experiencing spiritual transcendence.

21. Elliott Smith "St. Ide's Heaven"

Yet another humiliating confession: GOOD WILL HUNTING turned me on to Elliott Smith. (I think I’ve safely proven my shameful lameness with this post, but hopefully you guys will still talk to me next time I see you.) Anyway, I remember driving west in the winter of 1998 to crash with my sister and my future bro-in-law in order to save up enough money to move to New York City. When I say that I listened to only this song during the eight-hour drive from Tucson to San Diego, I mean that. Over and over and over and over again. Only this song. To this day, it still hasn’t gotten old. When I did make it to NYC in the summer of ’98, that fall and winter I saw Elliott Smith at the Luna Lounge almost every single night I was in there (which was wayyy too much), cowering at a corner stool and drinking by himself. I always wanted to tell him how much “St. Ide’s Heaven” meant to me, but I never did. He seemed too fragile.

22. Michael Nyman "Molly"

I figured I’d conclude with this song for a few different reasons. First, Michael Nyman’s score for Michael Winterbottom’s WONDERLAND is, hands down, my favorite original soundtrack ever. A week doesn’t go by when I don’t listen to it at least once. The blending of grainy 16mm, almost documentary-like footage, with such sad, beautiful, majestic music remains a humongous influence on me (see: COCAINE ANGEL, albeit in a very roundabout way). But in a more general sense, this choice addresses the fact that I have begun to grasp the beauty of classical music in recent years. Of course there are the old masters, but I find myself listening to more recent voices like Gorecki, Arvo Part, Max Richter, and Johann Johannsson.

To complete the mission, I must now challenge two more brave souls: Alison Wilmore and Michael Lieberman.