Here’s a nice assortment of pop songs, from gorgeous ballads, both piano and acoustic guitar, to easy pop rock, and clever lyrics. It’s a great lead-in to my Top 20… and now it’s getting harder and harder to rank them because they’re all great!
#25 – Billy Hang On (The Great Lakes)
Another one about survival, perhaps of a relatioship… “We’re at an all-time low, but some of the stars still glow. So Billy hang on, Billy hang on for me,” Emm sings. It’s heartfelt and beautiful. It’s the only track to make it to my Top 40 from The Great Lakes, Emm’s home-made album. It’s a classic Emm Gryner piano ballad sung and played with such emotion and beauty. Sadly, I can’t find a single source online for this beautiful song!
#24 – Survive (Northern Gospel)
Emm channels the smooth soft-rock of the 70’s in this easy-going pop confection about making it through life. Some nice rollicking piano and lush, soaring vocals on the chorus really propel this number along beautifully, complete with a fuzz-guitar solo, so effectively used by other 70’s pop staples like The Carpenters. Emm mines another Canadian reference, “The word came down like Victoria rain” and things look pretty bleak, especially in the romance department, but Emm challenges, “The trick is to survive, yes survive, but you gotta wanna keep yourself alive. Do I, do I?” This is the third and highest charting number from Emm’s 2011 album, Northern Gospel.
#23 – Young Rebel (Asianblue)
Stop start of the drums. Awesome Electric piano. Recurring eastern-influenced intro. Second of 5 appearance from 2002 album, Asianblue. This still seems like one of Emm’s earlier albums, but the maturity is definitely starting to show. One of my favorite of Emm’s albums. Emm sings about a guy who breaks rules and soars above the rest of us… he’s a bad boy, but she’s transfixed. It’s a theme that will show up again higher up on this list.
#22 – Sundown On Us (Torrential)
Man, this is a heartbreaker about a young woman who realizes that her long-term relationship is nearing its end. A gentle acoustic guitar-driven ballad. The first line, “It’s my birthday and you still haven’t kissed me,” just breaks my heart. Then the chorus, “Big day feeling small, is this the end of perfect love, feeling six feet tall. It can end just like it began. Is it sundown on us? Sundown on everything that was…? And where did that church organ come from at the fade out? If Torrential isn’t Emm’s break-up album, I don’t know what is.
#21 – Math Whiz (Torrential)
And knocking on the Top 20 is the last number from 2014’s Torrential, another break-up song, the delightfully geeky Math Whiz. In fact, it starts and ends with the same cascading synth that Sundown on Us ends with. If it wasn’t so god damn clever, it would be almost annoying as Emm crams every math metaphor to describe her breakup. But Emm’s pretty masterful with her lyrics, whether in their poetry or the simplicity… and the lovely acoustic guitar that drives this song is just perfect for the melancholy mood overlaying the pop melody. And as much as I hate auto-tuning, Emm’s use of the sound adds a nice background during the coda. Check out the promo video for the song above, and a lovely solo acoustic rendition below.
https://youtu.be/cfG4L0RacgM
And now we’re headed into my Top 20 Emm Gryner songs!