10 bands you cannot live without

[TPB]

Love BB King and the old blues masters but I am all over the place and listen to many Genres as long as the music is good currently the last America album has been playing in the studio when I am painting
If it is well played I listen
Tim

[pjd1]

Beatles
Paul Maccartney and wings   Live  once
10 cc                                  Live Twice
Styx                                   
Eric Clapton                         Live Twice
Jimi Hendrix
Gary Moore                         Live once
Jeff   healey                        Live Twice
Eagles                                Live Twice
The Who                             Live once

[AndyR]

I think "cannot live without" is possibly over-stating it a bit for me now. Which was a bit of a surprise really. I've been appreciating silence a lot more recently - I wasn't expecting that. And then when I came across this thread I realised I could easily live without music if it became necessary. Thankfully, I don't see it becoming necessary at the moment.

Anyways, here's my 10:

The Bee Gees
Led Zeppelin
Queen
The Allman Brothers
Rush

AC/DC
Rory Gallagher
Judas Priest
Slade
Wishbone Ash

The first five wrote themselves in roughly the order I fell in love with them. Rory should be up amongst that lot, but I find he doesn't do what he used to do for me.

In fact, I found it very hard to fill the 10 after that. I'd have been happy to stop at 5 ... mainly because the next little tranch of favourites has about 10 more that are roughly equal, in my affections, to the other 5 I did add.

Interestingly, though... although those are my "10 bands I can't live without" ... I'm not listening to them much at all at the moment - I'm listening to others instead (Robin Trower, UFO, Jason Isbell, Stevie Ray Vaughan, ABBA, The Staves, Gentle Giant, Fleetwood Mac...)

[Ferryman]

I think "cannot live without" is possibly over-stating it a bit for me now. Which was a bit of a surprise really. I've been appreciating silence a lot more recently - I wasn't expecting that. And then when I came across this thread I realised I could easily live without music if it became necessary.

Interesting, and surprising. I would really struggle without music. When compiling the list of bands, they are all (apart from one) from my formative years. They are all part of my life, and listening to them brings back important memories. There are lots of bands that I really like that I didn't put on the list, because I could live without them. But I find myself constantly drawn back to the bands I listed and I listen to their music more than most other things, even though there is so much stuff available via the internet and streaming services. They were all part of my musical journey as well, I was trying to make it as a musician so these were the bands that influenced me at that time.

The one new band on there just happens to encapsulate the kind of music I have ended up listening to in recent years, and something I would like to emulate. It probably also emphasizes I am a bit weird........    

[StephenM]

Nigel said....
Interesting, and surprising. I would really struggle without music. When compiling the list of bands, they are all (apart from one) from my formative years. They are all part of my life, and listening to them brings back important memories. There are lots of bands that I really like that I didn't put on the list, because I could live without them. But I find myself constantly drawn back to the bands I listed and I listen to their music more than most other things, even though there is so much stuff available via the internet and streaming services. They were all part of my musical journey as well, I was trying to make it as a musician so these were the bands that influenced me at that time.

The one new band on there just happens to encapsulate the kind of music I have ended up listening to in recent years, and something I would like to emulate. It probably also emphasizes I am a bit weird........
[/quote]

Nigel, I totally hear you about music and memories... there are some songs that when I hear them I am instantly transferred to the very place and time I heard the song the first time.... it would be very hard for me to live without music...but if there was none to listen to I would (and do actually sometimes) sing, whistle, hum...etc...

[WarpCanada]

10. The Lost Dogs
9. The Call (or Michael Been's solo work)
8. Mark Knopfler (solo or in Dire Straits)
7. Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers
6. Leonard Cohen
5. John Hiatt
4. The Choir 
3. Johnny Cash
2. U2
1. Mark Heard


Cannot live without? Certainly. Every musician or band in the list above has either saved my life literally, or changed it.  Without the music in the list above, I don't even know what I'd do. 

[Blooby]

For today only (fueled by that leftover Jack Daniels)...

Led Zeppelin
Joni Mitchell
The Allman Brothers
The Who
Jimi Hendrix
Yes
Neal Morse-related (solo, Spock's Beard, Transatlantic, Flying Colors)
Miles Davis
Michael Hedges
The Grateful Dead

Honorable mentions: King Crimson, early Genesis, Phish, Tedeschi Trucks/Derek Trucks, Alice Coltrane, Little Feat, John McLaughlin

[Ted]

I went about this scientifically, because I have rated every song in my iTunes library from 1 to 5 stars. Also because I'm procrastinating something much more important that I have to do.

The average number of songs per artist is 15, so I excluded any artists with fewer than that in my library.

Based on the average song rating:
Adrian Belew
Cracker
Hank Williams
Joe Jackson
King Crimson
Meat Puppets
R.E.M.
The Presidents Of The United States Of America
Todd Snider
X

Weird. Half this list are artists I would not have picked off off the top of my head. (I don't like Hank Williams that much.) And two of my actual favorite artists are not on this list at all:

The Who (117 songs, average 4.3)
Elvis Costello (466 songs, average 4.2 stars)

This methodology has a bias against some of my favorite artists, because I have almost everything they've done – including their crap, and that drives down the average song rating. So, if I have two of an artists best albums, they might have a higher average song rating than an artist who I love so much that I even buy their lackluster stuff.

[Ferryman]

I always knew you were weird Ted 

iTunes has seen inside your head.........

Mind you, I can't argue with some of your choices!

[Ted]

I always knew you were weird Ted 

iTunes has seen inside your head.........

Mind you, I can't argue with some of your choices!

FYI: Magazine would have made my top 10 from the gut, if I'd done it that way (19 songs, average 4.3 stars).