Top 10 Music - Blogfest

Today is the "Top 10 Countdown" blogfest, hosted by Alex J. Cavanaugh. Thank you Alex for hosting this 'fest. It was a lot of fun - if challenging!

This is not easy for me, so I am going to have to go with my top 10 favourite songs of the moment. I've decided to go with a different artist for each of the 10 songs, even though some artists are bound to have way more of my favourite songs to their name than others. I like variety, what can I say?

I am also calculating these in part according to my Last.fm charts, the "overall" kind.

Artist & Song Name	Why It Inspires Me
Lacuna Coil - Stars	This is one of the first songs I heard by LC (even if it is a cover!), and I just found it beautiful and haunting and wonderful. It inspires me in so many ways. Mostly it gives me amazing story ideas, not that I've actually written any of those ideas. It just makes me feel...inspired!
Madonna - White Heat	It's probably my favourite Madonna song. As a little girl it definitely inspired me, and I played it over and over again. I love the melody. It's interesting to me that a mere melody can conjure such inspiration. Never mind the lyrics, which for this song are pretty cool too.
Unwritten Law - How You Feel	Gorgeous beautiful song. One of my favourite lurve songs, or I see it as one anyway. It just makes me happy. It's not one of those "sad" love songs. It's uplifting and makes me want to get up and dance.
Catherine Wheel - Black Metallic	I found this song (and therefore this band) by accident one time. I am SO glad for that very happy accident. Catherine Wheel have an amazingly beautiful and inspirational sound. This song is epic, and again I find it inspiring.
Michael Jackson - Wanna Be Startin' Somethin'	Oh, man. This was one of the songs played at my 30th birthday (I devised the 6+ hour playlist myself) and it was an awesome moment when it started over the sound system. This song takes me back to childhood, and NEVER fails to make me want to dance.
Superette - Waves	Pretty, sad song. It definitely inspires in a bleak, grim kind of way. It tells a sad story. But I do so love the song.
Veruca Salt - Sundown	This song is definitely inspiring in a haunting, creepy way. It's not so much creepy as...it gives me chills. I can completely see the line "See the sun...going down" as a bit of a metaphor for all sorts of dramatic, shocking stuff in my writing. And to think this song is a demoey b-side from one of the band's singles!
VNV Nation - Darkangel (Gabriel)	Inspiring, haunting, darkly beautiful. Bleak, yet it strikes awe into my little heart. This is a song I listen to over and over. Then again, the same could be said about all the songs in this list.
The Smashing Pumpkins - Waiting	This song has always, for some odd reason, inspired images of snow-clad winter gardens and a wandering, lonely stranger. I don't know that stranger's story, but I know it's compelling. The kind of story that would make your jaw drop. And the garden itself is stunningly beautiful. Like this magnificent song.
Strapping Young Lad - Detox	Ha. I do love me some metal, but it's not my absolute staple when it comes to music. But this song, and this band, are amongst my favourites. They definitely inspire me with my writing. I picture post-apocalyptic sci-fi scenes when I listen to this band. I don't know why. I also picture some zombie-pocalypse scenarios, for no apparent reason. It's just the sound, and how it makes me feel.

It's ridiculous to have to reduce the immense number of songs I absolutely adore to a mere 10, but the above songs are definitely amongst my all-time favourites. I feel like the list represents pretty well the range of my musical taste, though there are of course plenty of my favourite artists not represented. I love my alternative/alt. rock, my metal, my 80s pop/dance and my more modern electronic music. Mostly it's the rock for me; gotta love a loud guitar. But yeah, you can see that I'm into a range of stuff.

So anyway, this was fun. Difficult, torturous, etc., but fun. :)

Edit: Oops. I forgot to say why they inspire me. :D Tacking that on now.