BlogRadio: songs that sound like other songs

I haven't put new songs in the radio for awhile. This time, we'll listen to songs that share more than a passing resemblance to other songs. Samples and Weird Al parodies are off limits, as is that tenuous-ass claim that that one George Harrison song sounds like that one Phil Spector song. Which, that was always bullshit, as far as I'm concerned.
Anyway. These are songs that I think sound like other songs, presented in pairs for purposes of facile dismissal. Note: I'm not saying these are bad songs in any way. I quite like most of them.

FIRST: The Pretenders- Back on the Chain Gang vs. The Ladybug Transistor- In December. First, let it be said that I do not like the Pretenders. This may be because I am not a girl. But the trumpet that starts at about 2:20 into The Ladybug Transistor song straight up bit the guitar line from Back on the Chain Gang. It isn't hard to spot, either. My question is, do bands realize when they do this? I mean, aside from like linebacker-rock bands like Nickelback and Filter, and obviously label-assembled shit machines like Hinder or Panic at the Disco (your punctuation sucks almost as hard as you do, idiots), you've got figure that bands have at least some semi-well informed musical knowledge. And The Pretenders were pretty big for awhile there. I'm just saying that it seems like someone in the band would've realized when they were playing that line "Oh, shit, can't use that one." Unless it's an intentional artistic statement, like the songs are somehow related lyrically. But I don't really see it.

NEXT: Tom Waits- Martha vs. Wilco- Blasting Fonda. Again, how can you hear these two songs and not think they're designed to sound alike? See, this is why music journalism is worthless: I've read dozens of interviews with Jeff Tweedy, and I've never seen anyone ask him about this. I just have a hard believing that Tweedy isn't familiar with Tom Waits' catalogue. And even some of the lyrics are similar: "...in days of olden" vs. "those were days of roses". That's a more poetic example, sure, but here at least I can see kinda drawing some lyrical parallels between the entire songs. Incidentally, this is one of my favorite Wilco songs evs.

LAST: The Beatles- With A Little Help From My Friends vs. Oasis- She's Electric. Ok, I just put this in because I want to talk about Oasis for a minute here. The comparison is, obvy, when Oasis bites the descending harmony and chords to end the song. But more importantly, lots of people who think about these things think that "Be Here Now" was the album where Oasis really lost the plot. Even Noel Gallagher admitted this to Q magazine, that that album was where they became a little too enamored of the finer things in life, and went off the deep end (maybe literally?). But that's busted, because "Be Here Now" is a fantastic rock 'n' roll album, and the point where Oasis, I think, crystallized the elements that had been present, but slightly sublimated, in their previous two albums. "Definitely Maybe" definitely rocks, and contains some like history-making singles. It lauched Britpop onto the world stage, broke Oasis in America (always the goal of any up-and-coming British band), and made them huge rock stars. But it does have a couple of crap songs on there, and it's almost monolithic sound can make it feel slow and drag in parts. "Morning Glory" is, I think, a very overrated record. There's 12 tracks, ok, and two of them are just like waves crashing and static, and the first two songs kinda suck. Even "Some Might Say" got to big for its britches, and the lyrics mean absolutely nothing. "Hey Now!" is boring. So that leaves like six tracks which were great, which is hardly enough to make for an all-time album, unimpeachably fantastic though they were. It fittingly ends with "Champagne Supernova," which, lyrically, segues nicely into "Be Here Now." (The cover art for the single of "Don't Look Back In Anger" does, too, and ranks, for me, among the best cover art of all time.) "Be Here Now" is just an enormous album. It is when Oasis decided to just take over the world, by force, if necesary. In the first track's video, they arrive at the gig (in front of a building they've no doubt destroyed with the power of their rock) in helicopters for dog's sake. The production is their best yet, with like dozens of tracks on every song (side note: 1997 is, I think, the year when many bands became fully aware of the possibilities the age of digital recording and mixing allowed them. Think "OK Computer," "Ladies and Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space," "Be Here Now," "Aquemini," "Version 2.0"... there are dozens of examples.), and a mix that's clear enough to hear them. The melodies and choruses are just titanic, and this is not at all diminished by the times when they step back a little for "Don't Go Away" and the quieter parts of "All Around The World." The criticism is that because the tracks are longer than normal, this is Oasis being self-indulgent. But look: the hooks on "Definitely Maybe" and "Morning Glory" come so rapidly and so often that they never really get a chance to explore them musically, and never get to kind of sit in a groove. On "Be Here Now" they spread out a bit, play longer solos, and just have the confidence to take their time. Could "All Around the World" be four or five minutes instead of nearly 10? Well, I suppose, but that's more like halfway around the world, and Oasis did nothing half-ass on this album. It's my favorite Oasis album, and there's nothing like it.



UPDATE: Goddammit. I don't know why it keeps putting the tracks in the opposite order. I can't seem to fix this.