To Poll Somebody - The Robin Gibb Memorial BEE GEES TRACKS POLL (voting thread) - FINAL DEADLINE IS FRIDAY, JUNE 15, NO FOOLIN'

http://www.collegenews.com/images/news/461px-Bee_Gees_1977.JPG

Everything written and/or performed by one or more of the Brothers Gibb is eligible, including solo tracks, tracks written for other artists, collaborations, and of course the Bee Gees discography itself.

* 30 Track Ballots, Scoring as usual: 1:40, 2:36, 3:33, 4:30, 5:28, 6:26, 7:25, 8:24, 9:23, 10:22, 11:21, 12:20, 13:19, 14:18, 15:17, etc.
* Please send all ballots to xtaplapacetl at yahoo dot com. DON'T ILXmail me your ballots.
* Voting ends <b>, Friday, June 1st at 11:59:59 PST.</b>

complete list of the nearly 1,000 songs written by the Brothers Gibb

Given the theme of the moment, watching the Bee Gees "In Our Time" documentary gave me inspiration for several later cuts I wasn't as familiar with.

These feature killer Robin solos:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gSg-y4AEL3A

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j6eaCpRs3gw

Also, I would rep for any of these, from Robin's solo album:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y1DLqOPpUL8

Sarah Silverman ‏@SarahKSilverman

RIP Robin Gibb. Wish I had gotten that message to him to hold on.

I dunno how it's going to stack up against the big-guns, but I still really love "You Win Again". Granted it's a little too mechanical sounding for my ears now, music-wise, but they still have a great ear for hooks, even that late in their career

You Win Again is one of my favorites. Will definitely be in my top 5 (or 3).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DBkLeI9PZcc

it's kind of awesome how their distinct way with harmonies still come through with voices as different as Dolly and Kenny's

This, along with You Win Again, is one of my favorite of their post-disco tracks..."Paradise"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ho35ySu18QA

this is going to be a niche poll

i'll rep hard for this one

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fW0S0-K3xlM

Islands is one of my all-time favorite ballads EVER..as a kid that song was all the convincing I needed that Kenny & Dolly were going to get married, lol.

oh shit heartbreaker

I totally forgot. what a killer song.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8jZpjdPkuV8

p p arnold was so hot.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o2oGZV851kU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f6_amz92gdI

had no idea this band had been covering the Bee Gees live for several years:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q7o-9JuzlD4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yvDCMxSAA8A

second one is John Frusciante solo

did you really have to sully this thread with the RCHP

here's a little Elvis palette cleanser:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wwwplStgzp4

I always like unlikely or unexpected cover versions. It's not like i'm a huge RHCP fan, although I don't share your animosity towards that group

I dunno is that really that unexpected? RHCP have been mining 70s funk & disco since the beginning, and the SNF sdtk is like the most well-known disco album in the world

funk, yes. disco? didn't know. Again, not a big fan.

I lived near a college campus in the 2000s and there's a certain species of 20something dude whose aural diet consisted of Linkin Park, Sublime, and RHCP. I never heard these guys listening to the Bee Gees

well there isn't that much difference between, say, the Ohio Players' "Love Rollercoaster" and disco-era Bee Gees imho

er difference difference

DISTANCE

stupid fingers

bee gees were so fucked up. those voices could be pretty fucked up. i'll hear some early track by them and think...what the hell were they thinking with those voices? don't get me wrong, i'm a fan, but talk about over the top.

feel like there are probably alien races on distant planets that could really vibe to those voices. they sound like aliens sometimes.

robin even prays for his extraterrestrial lover on this song. and will go to the depths of hell for them!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rn0yv5P9kW4&feature=related

still want someone to make this into a doom metal epic. nothing says 1969 like a thirteen minute sea dirge. (??!!)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ipJN5XIYza4

re "You Win Again," here's Freaky Trigger, published a couple years ago:

http://freakytrigger.co.uk/popular/2010/04/bee-gees-you-win-again/

well then

It's remarkable that until 1989's "One" (a song I like a lot) the Bee Gees had, like, NO American hits under their own name.

I hadn't heard of "You Win Again" until a few years ago. A huge hit everywhere around the world except here.

It was pretty big in Australia at the time, I remember.

It's remarkable that until 1989's "One" (a song I like a lot) the Bee Gees had, like, NO American hits under their own name.

?

what criteria are you going by here?

non-SNF Top 10 US Chart placings:

I've Gotta Get a Message to You - #8
I Started a Joke - #6
Lonely Days - #3
How Can You Mend a Broken Heart - #1
Jive Talking - #1
Nights on Broadway - #7
You Should Be Dancing - #1
Love So Right - #3
Too Much Heaven - #1
Tragedy - #1
Love You Inside Out - #1

bee gees were so fucked up. those voices could be pretty fucked up. i'll hear some early track by them and think...what the hell were they thinking with those voices? don't get me wrong, i'm a fan, but talk about over the top.

― scott seward, Monday, May 21, 2012 6:24 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

You and Daltrey both, man:

"Look at great huge Maurice Gibb, singing like Donald Duck on 'Stayin' Alive.' And that's a great song. Bruce Springsteen could sing that lyric."

I meant the eighties, Shakey.

ah. yeah the 80s were a weird time for them - they had gotten overexposed and they knew it, were sort of smart to retreat behind the curtain a bit imo

on a different note, this whole album is underrated:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F8QpGS9i91c&feature=related

I hadn't heard of "You Win Again" until a few years ago. A huge hit everywhere around the world except here.

Also, that's not just the band flailing around chasing a ZTT-ish sound or anything -- it's Arif Mardin, who loved the stomps Maurice had recorded in his garage studio in Miami for the demo and asked him to sample them for the final version. According to the band anyway, there are no *real* drums on it at all.

I am 100% in love with and will rep for Spicks & Specks forever....I love Barry's voice in this

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2-e8QjU2WRM

It'll be in my top 5 for certain

haha roger daltrey should be careful when accusing others of singing goofily

Hoping to see a lot of love for both Emotion by Samantha Sang and Boys Do Fall in Love by Robin Gibb itt.

first ballot received!

I will submit one in the next day or so

d/ling Sing Slowly Sisters, never heard this before

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5PLeNdfkoBI

well the sound quality is really shitty, but can't say I'm digging Sing Slowly Sisters. reaaaaaaally maudlin and monotonous.

Shakey, search "The Flag I Flew" and "A Very Special Day" -- I think you might hear the forest thru the trees.

yeah i can't get past the sound quality.

there's no youtube for it, but would like to put in a kind word for "Completely Unoriginal", perhaps their funniest moment

what, funnier than the attempt to use a moog on "Sweet Song of Summer"?

what's funny about that?

This song is awesome.

which one

"Sweet Song of Summer." The middle eastern melismas in that song are off-the-charts crazy.

I've been stockpiling things to say about "Mr. Natural" in the results thread (assuming it places). I came to it late -- but am finding its chorus to be just a masterfully written, arranged and sung.

yeah I like Sweet Song of Summer, it's like their doomy-y prog track

I've been reading the Gibb Songs website the last few days: http://www.columbia.edu/~brennan/beegees/index.html

One of the things discussed in some detail is the demos Barry and the boys did for Dionne and Kenny Rogers. Which it turns out I have on a bootleg. Some highlights:

"Islands in the Stream" -- while not exactly the Sam Cooke-like version described by Robin, the chorus on the demo is just stunningly beautiful. Apparently, Kenny was super lazy, hadn't bothered to learn any of the songs and just ended up singing what Barry did on the demo -- but the harmonies on the chorus by Dolly (who was added later, I believe) transforms it from Bee Gees ethereal to something decidedly more country.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MGx4sBseM-Q

Also great is the demo for "Midsummer Nights": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=__sMkNlBplk

still want someone to make this into a doom metal epic. nothing says 1969 like a thirteen minute sea dirge. (??!!)

Never realized this was a longer, unreleased take on this. The Gibb Songs site calls it his "masterpiece." Must hear it!

Posted this to ILM somewhere before, but I think it's worth posting again, and I couldn't find the other thread anyway, this being the Mix magazine Classic Tracks article about the recording of "Stayin' Alive": http://mixonline.com/mag/audio_bee_gees_stayin/index.html

fyi I am love love loving Mr Natural - gonna have it nicely represented in my ballot methinks

2 days to go, a whopping 2 ballots received...

oh shi I forgot -- I will do mine tonight!

2 days to go, a whopping 2 ballots received...

Yikes. I plan to do one, but I've been ABBAing it up the past few days.

Yeah, I really think running this at the same time as the ABBA poll was a bad mistake.

if only Robin had gotten our message about holding on a little longer eh

I'm happy to extend the deadline if people are gonna like actually vote and stuff

wd do

So would I but there's like 40 years of stuff there! So my contribution would be spotty at best.

okay, DEADLINE OFFICIALLY EXTENDED TO JUNE 8th

yay thanks Shakey! <3

Will do this I swear

I have an obligation to drum up support for this.

thanks - I had this week slated for boning up on Fleetwood Mac's obscurities for next week's poll (and maybe ABBA for this week's), and didn't wan't to rely on the mostly-familiar material I already know - and their discography is huge.

But this has the hallmarks of a great tracks poll - a long, storied career, lots of great stuff throughout, several distinct phases, and no consensus whatsoever as to which is the best.

I kind of love all their periods, hard to say which one I like the most

I've been digging into To Whom It May Concern and Life In a Tin Can of late -- their immediately pre-disco era. A lot of great songs on those.

Great solo and ensemble vocals on this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gH0oaeKLKu8

Really good trade-off vocals:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mFQi2d1z3Oc

I find myself really drawn to this super ethereal Maurice song -- I'm trying to decide who it sounds like:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EA0gXxwwxfg

Not sure if any of these will make my ballot -- but it just goes to show how unbelievably deep these guys' catalog is.

You Know It's For You is great - I wanna say there's something almost country-by-way-of-Neil Young about it?

I don't have Life in a Tin Can anymore, don't recall anything particularly standing out on that one.

"Method to My Madness" is on LiaTC -- also, "Come Home Johnny Bride" is a good country-ish Barry tune.

their flirtations with country are kinda scattered across a bunch of albums (starting with Odessa) - would probably make a pretty solid album if you compiled 'em all together

I'll just say with three ballots in (including my own) so far, there is definitely a consensus forming lol

Lol

Re. Life in a Tin Can, "My Life Has Been a Song" is really good -- awesome refrain from Barry. One thing I like about this era is the preponderance of sludgy, mid-tempo ballads that feature little more than Maurice's piano. It kind of affirms for me how much these guys got by purely on melody and emotion -- something I think they returned to in the later stages of their career, as they began writing for other folks.

It's weird to me that this was their lowest point commercially. None of the material is particularly out of step with the times - lush, mellow "easily listening" ballads were huge, and they obviously had their ear to the ground re: R&B and funk stuff too - and it's not like their melodic or compositional gifts lagged at all. I suppose the breaking up/not breaking up shenanigans didn't help matters... Even so, for some reason 2 Years On and LiaTC were the two from that period that I didn't unreservedly love at first blush. I wonder if anyone will be voting for anything off "A Kick In the Head is Worth Eight in the Pants" lol

I love how Robin basically sounds like a Moog synth on the bridge around 1:50) on this one
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Bcd-zmB4vk

such a great song - smooth and mellow at the outset, weirdo ethereal bridge in the middle, then shifts into gospel funk overdrive at the end

Yeah that whole album is great

Yeah, I love how "Throw a Penny" blows right into "Down the Road."

feel like some of their best moments are their most morbid and self-pitying
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xh1NNAsuF4M

very Spector-esque

2 ballots are so lonely

voted!

2 less lonely ballots in the world etc

Honestly, my ballot has been changing on a daily basis. I keep discovering new songs that are bumping the more obvious ones.

I'll be out of town this weekend, but I'll assemble and cast my ballot early next week!

4 ballots

And so the rush begins...

gonna rep for some deep-60s cuts here

one of their most blatantly Macca/Ray Davies cuts but christ what a melody, just irresistable:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sudd9Sv2Bgg

the song that sold my wife on the bros:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JFnvk8x0-f8

The first of may came up on my iPod this morning, so gorgeous

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T4gU-I3w2Uo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=29mGd-0-lfE

I continue to be utterly stunned at how deep their catalog is. Does anyone else even come close?

George Clinton

or the Beach Boys maybe...? I dunno.

yeah there aren't any real analogues with comparable multi-decade strings of hits

great opening post

You People Haven't Lived Until You've Blasted The Bee Gees' "Nights On Broadway"

I must have listened to Nights On Broadway 10 times the day Robin died. Such a killer song. One of my alltime top 5 ever.

(added bonus that it was SNL Barry Gibb Talk Show theme)

how many ballots? double digits or bust

we're at a whopping 6 ballots, including my own

:(

Mine is still forthcoming.

I've just submitted an undersized ballot - I figure anything is better than nothing given the poor response so far

4 days to go, get them ballots in

Poor Shakey Mo is going to get an avalanche of 50 ballots on Friday.

Bee Gee Polling Disaster 2012

Don't make poor Robin (in heaven) cry ILX!

apropos of nothing ... 2 Years On is better than I remember it, but it does seem to lack any real standout tracks

Well, other than "Lonely Days" (which, fwiw, won't make my ballot).

I like the title track -- particularly the "Only you/Can see me" part.
I also came to "The 1st Mistake I Made" via a cover version by Phil Seymour of The Dwight Twilley Band for some tribute. For the longest time I couldn't figure out what album it was from because Seymour's version was called "The First Mistake I Ever Made." But I think that's one of Barry's better country ballads.

Weekend listening to the 60s stuff made me fall for this great little pop song of Robin's:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qfDBdn9Frgc

yeah the harmonies on Indian Gin are great

I'm trying to cram as much listening in before I submit my ballot. Was hoping to unearth some great obscurities but don't have time to check out 1000 songs now so will stick mostly to their own releases and a few well-known songs performed by others (didn't realize there were so many).

This will probably be my #20, because I have a soft spot for wildly misleading first singles that don't even hint at the musical direction the band later takes. This doesn't sound even remotely like the late-60s balladeers that first became popular (at least outside of Australia), much less the '70s disco superstars they would later become...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-TdqIyRd51k

was that their very first single? Their early Aussie stuff is like some weird mirror image of the American 60s folk scene

According to wiki, yes. Cracked the top 100 in their homeland.

can we talk for a second about what a funny/bizarre/compelling oddity Maurice's "Lay it on me" from 2 Years On is, especially in light of his age/alcoholism at the time...

Don't you drink with me 'cos you know that I'm a loser
And I'm proud of that fact as you can plainly see
Never did what people said, I should've
I'm just a low down critter who never did any good
I'm just a low down critter who never did any good

I spend my life working up a sweat to be a bad boy
Getting girls into trouble every day
Going from town to town, now I tell you I've been around
I'm just a low down critter who never did any good
[ From: http://www.elyrics.net/read/b/bee-gees-lyrics/lay-it-on-me-lyrics.html]
I'm just a low down critter who never did any good

Lay it on me
Yeah

Don't you drink with me 'cos I tell you that I'm a loser
And I'm proud of that fact as you can plainly see
Going from town to town, now I tell you I've been around
I'm just a low down critter who never did any good
I'm just a low down critter who never did any good

votey vote vote vote

this is depressing

Don't panic. I said I'd vote 'n I will. I finally located my copy of To Whom It may Concern this morning.

I'm still not in yet either. I've narrowed it to 34 songs!

8 ballots in

*crickets*

Will vote a bit later today. My ballot will just list song titles though, since it seems daft to try and distinguish between different artist versions in most cases. Hope that's acceptable, Shakey.

In the meantime, I just stumbled across this exhaustive commentary on all things Gibb:
http://www.columbia.edu/~brennan/beegees/version2.html

Narrative starts here and then you can click through year by year:
http://www.columbia.edu/~brennan/beegees/62.html

The web 1.0 was such a wonderful place.

Sorry I can't vote in these ballots unless I really immerse myself in the artists, and I've just done the ABBA immersion thing and am still coming up for air. Need to be spaced out more for me to contribute.

Then get spaced out, man

Best bit of advice I've had this year.

Finally sitting down and working on this. Hard to go deep when there are so many hits, but hard to concentrate on hits when the catalogue is so fucking deep!

Really feeling "Nobody's Someone" the last couple days. It was a leftover from Odessa (a leftover!). All class, this song.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ziso7sQyyFs

I repped hard for Paradise upthread, but one more from Living Eyes is going to make my ballot: Cryin' Every Day

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-S4_bJlamT0

okay voted. How many does that make now?

bumping for more votes. I don't want this poll to die prematurely.

sorry I've been absent today, been home sick.

I got 3 ballots today, so that brings the total to 10

you started a poll which started the whole board yawning

Not yawning, it's just that an unexpected poll of a 1000-song discography didn't leave me much time to explore the deep cuts. I'll get a ballot in b4 midnite PST.

ballot sent.

ABBA did okay with 19, so maybe just leave the deadline open until you get somewhere close to that?

rly disappointed in ILM right now.

buncha jerks

Did you get the 30 vote ballot I sent? I emailed you a few times -- but don't want to keep spamming you.

VOTE BABY VOTE (unless Shakey Mo is no longer accepting ballots, that is)!

so 13 ballots received so far (m@ttw3iner that includes yrs, but I was unable to send a confirmation e-mail for some reason)

I'll keep balloting open if more people are going to actually vote and just haven't had time to compile a ballot yet

i think maybe people respond to deadlines, though? like if you set a new date and put it in the subject line, people will know how much time they have and work on it. i know that at least for me, personally, i'm not gonna take the time if there's a good chance that the poll is just going to randomly close at any minute before i'm ready.

are you referring to yrself? cuz so far people have not responded to deadlines, but maybe the ABBA poll was distracting people or something

I mean if there's another pool of voters out there I'm fine with setting a new deadline, but if there aren't then I'm not going to bother

Is there anyone upthread who's said "I plan to vote, honest" but hasn't pulled their finger out yet?

i'm speaking broadly, if you extend the deadline without updating the thread title or saying what the new deadline is, a lot of people will just assume the poll closed already or they won't have time. if you care about maximizing the # of late ballots you get at this point.

yeah yeah I know, I can't update the thread title myself so I was asking if there are actually any other people who want to vote before I set a new deadline is all

(m@ttw3iner that includes yrs, but I was unable to send a confirmation e-mail for some reason)

Great. Kickback was probably bc I was emailing my ballot from my Evernote account. I just wanted to make sure my full 30 vote ballot made it in -- after all, cutting those masterpieces from High Civilization and Magnet were hard enough!

I'm not hearing much from prospective voters aside from some dude... sooooo, let's extend the deadline to this Friday, the 15th and that'll be it.

Can a mod put the deadline in the thread title plz? thx

If you don't start voting soon, people, I'm going to post sequential photos of me disrobing. NOBODY WANTS TO SEE THAT, BELIEVE ME!

this makes me v sad

Deadline added.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qtsAMnNlxEc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FKAvkPO7uxk

(^^^entire movie is absolutely amazing fwiw, but that is the only Bee Gees song in it. He does do "Bridge Over Troubled Water" later tho)

Robin's song about his dog >>>>>> Macca's song about his dog

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4sjSRfY8o2s

er, BARRY'S song

gonna vote in this & hope my deep cut #1 will place high b/c of bad turnout

entirely likely!

epic
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G0L_3SehWCk

four Andy Gibb songs on my ballot! I think all were Barry co-writes

14 ballots in so far

It will be weird if this actually gets as many ballots as Abba.

It will speak well of Shakey Mo's browbeating prowess, though nobody will ever match Armond Ratfucker.

Hey, I have been beating many a brow as well!

*Jumps on browbeater bandwagon*

only TWO days of voting left!!! OMG SO EXCITING

As it stands, is the #1 track expected or unexpected?

it is a lustrous pop pearl of the highest quality, buffed and polished to perfection

Oh great, that could be 50 different Bee Gees songs.

I guess more people should vote so the right pearl wins!

at this stage, more votes will make the lower ranks more diverse/interesting, rather than being a string of entries all separated by less than a single point. I don't expect the top 10 to change too much.

I'm sending in a ballot today. I just keep being introduced to new awesomeness by y'all.

JessF's ballot brings the total up to 15... still waitin on some dude

i'm trying man

your welcome for explaining to you how these things actually work and what would help w/ turnout though

domo arigato some dude-san

voted

16! a few more and we'll beat ABBA

we can do it you guys!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qdCzzHJDwfc&feature=fvwrel

oh shit it's the last day to vote

Did anyone ever realize that they wrote the opening song to "Grease"?! I didn't, but listening to it now I can hear them all over it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=phwOOmFYudU

hi

yeah Grease appeared on several people's ballots

Next: 4 Seasons Tracks Poll

Damn...if I had realized, it would probably have been on mine too.

I am hoping that more ballots will break up the number of ties in the lower ranks...

how many spots are on the countdown?

my original plan was to do 50

interestingly, there is not a single song that has appeared on every ballot

really? wow!

i'd vote but i only really know the 70s era. looking forward to getting an education though.

by "70s era" do you mean the Saturday Night Fever sdtk

yeah and your Main Course and Spirits Having Flown type stuff etc. i knew the Staying Alive sdtrk pretty well as a kid; wouldn't like to hear it now.

eh you should still vote imho

Barry co-produced "Grease" as well

we're at 17 ballots now... clock is ticking for anyone else plannin a last minute vote!

c'mon just two more votes and we'll at least TIE with ABBA

do it peoples!

you should be voting!

how deep is yr love of the Bee Gees, ilxors?

is there a thread of gibb bros (esp barry)-produced stuff that was recorded by other singers?

like this song, which is the shit

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fW0S0-K3xlM

on a similar note

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MGx4sBseM-Q

and to close the circle

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RUFBlkbqwko

I think this is that thread, it covers the most ground