{"id":16081,"date":"2012-10-16T15:03:08","date_gmt":"2012-10-16T19:03:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/?p=16081"},"modified":"2012-10-16T17:44:46","modified_gmt":"2012-10-16T21:44:46","slug":"one-song-awesome-or-the-cheap-trick-effect-revisited","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/one-song-awesome-or-the-cheap-trick-effect-revisited\/","title":{"rendered":"One Song Awesome or, the Cheap Trick Effect Revisited"},"content":{"rendered":"

Cheap Trick\u2018s \u201cSurrender\u201d is the greatest late-\u201970s pure power pop\/new wave song ever. This from someone who also believes it\u2019s possibly the \u201cSecretariat\u2019s 30-length Belmont Stakes victory<\/a>\u201d relative to any other song in any band\u2019s career. This is a testament to the song\u2019s strength as much as it is my lukewarm appreciation for anything else Cheap Trick has released.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Mr. Mod said this in the recent power pop song argument<\/a>, which was funny to me, because I\u2019d been thinking about examples of this in my own music appreciation and thought there might be a post in it. Consider this\u00a0a new RTH Glossary<\/strong> term, which we’ll call\u00a0One Song Awesome<\/strong>\u00a0or the\u00a0Cheap Trick Effect<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Examples, that is, of that one exception to the rule of personal taste. To be clear, I\u2019m not talking about one-hit wonders: artists that really did only have one good or one successful song. I\u2019m talking about substantial groups with a dedicated following who I really don\u2019t like at all \u2013 except for one totally awesome track that kills<\/strong><\/em>. Everyone\u2019s list would be different, of course. People might even have the same group on their lists, but not the same song (see Cheap Trick, “Surrender” vs. “I Want You to Want Me”).<\/p>\n

Here are some of mine:<\/p>\n

T. Rex:<\/strong> “20th<\/span>\u00a0Century Boy”<\/p>