Top 100 Favorite Songs of the 2000's (Part XVII)

Hey all,

Two more to go in the countdown, and #2 is about a 180-degree turn from #3. Such is the nature of this list, which (if I've done everything right) has brought back some of this decade's best musical memories for you. On we go to the penultimate track...


2. Barenaked Ladies, "Falling For The First Time" [2000]

I'm so cool, too bad I'm a loser/I'm so smart, too bad I can't get anything figured out

What's intriguing about music is how you can find nuances and details where you least expect them. It's the major-seventh chord right after this opening line that's the most musically intriguing element of "Falling For The First Time," off BNL's 2000 album Maroon. It's not a detail that had to be there, but it enhances the song's charm every so slightly. "Falling" was the third and last single released from Maroon (the first was "Pinch Me," found elsewhere on this list), and commercially it was the least successful. But as you might have figured out by now, my countdown isn't necessarily a popularity contest.

The lead singer on this number is Ed Robertson, he of the gentle voice and acoustic guitar strumming (as opposed to the more rough-around-the-edges Stephen Page, who left the group earlier this year). Someday, in some other blog post, I'll probably do an entire breakdown of the similarities between Barenaked Ladies and one of my all-time guilty pleasure bands, Fleetwood Mac, but just suffice it to say Robertson is the Christine McVie of the Ladies. (And you say, "Who?" Exactly.) In any case, Ed lends just the right touch and inflection to these lyrics -- most of BNL's most famous songs deal with self-contradicting, self-deprecating wannabes, but none more endearingly than this song. Not to mention, it was their most blatant exploration of this particular theme since at least 1996's "Shoe Box."

And when I say self-contradicting, that's precisely what the lyrics do, as you can see from the sample I gave. Those are the first two lines of the song, and things only get wackier and wittier from there. But the real treat is the bridge, which features a rotating series of associative phrases, most of which build off the end of the previous one. This section comes around twice, with the first leading to another seventh chord and quick stop in the momentum, before drummer Tyler Stewart (just one of many underrated rock drummers to come around in the last 20 years) picks up the pace again for a final verse/chorus/middle-eight progression. From there, the song finally comes to a halt amidst a wall of feedback, a typically quirky BNL ending.

Now that I've covered the technical aspects of the song, let me explain to you exactly why "Falling For The First Time" is ranked so high.

Let me say, unapologetically, that I'm a romantic through and through. And so tomorrow's entry, my #1 favorite song of the decade and unquestionably one of the greatest breakthrough singles of all time (hint hint), was a song I listened to a lot at various points in various friendships, courtships, relationships, etc. over the years. But at many of the same times I listened to song #1, it was song #2 that served as my unofficial theme song. It's fun to pretend you're cool, you're smooth, you've got it all together, but the truth is all out there when you're a little white boy from New Jersey. (BNL's from Canada, so in keeping with that logic, you can easily understand the genesis of the song.) Anyway, most of the top songs on this countdown meant a lot to me on a lot of levels, and "Falling For The First Time" is no exception.


See you tomorrow, everybody!

-- pl