The 500 - #99 - There's A Riot Goin' On - Sly and the Family Stone

I was inspired by a podcast called The 500 hosted by New York-based comedian Josh Adam Meyers. His goal, and mine, is to explore Rolling Stone Magazine's 2012 edition of The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time.

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Album: #99

Album Title: There's A Riot Goin' on

Artist: Sly and the Family Stone

Genre: Psychedelic Funk, Psychedelic Soul, Deep Funk,

Recorded: The Record Plant, Sausalito, California

Released: November, 1971

My age at release: Six

How familiar was I with it before this week: A couple of songs

Is it on the 2020 list? Yes, at #82 - rising 17 spots

Song I am putting on my Spotify Playlist: Africa Talks To You (Asphalt Jungle)

In May, 1971, at the height of the Vietnam War, with racial tensions and political unrest rampant in the U.S., Marvin Gaye released his legendary 11th studio record What's Going On? (#6 on The 500). Six months later, Sly and the Family Stone answered Gaye’s question with their own release,...There's A Riot Goin' On. As the fifth record from the American funk and soul collective, the title was not a hopeful or optimistic response to the events of the day. But, it was an honest one.

The core members of The Family Stone include (l-r) Freddie Stone,
Sly Stone, Rose Stone, Larry Graham, Cynthia Robinson, 
Jerry Martini, and Greg Errico.

Listening to There's a Riot Goin' On in 2026, it's hard not to draw parallels to our own times. Scroll through the headlines on any given day and you'll find political polarization, protests, economic uncertainty, and people convinced that society is teetering on the brink. It's easy to believe we've never been this divided. And that's exactly why this album remains so powerful.

A crowd estimated at 1,500 gathered on the national mall
and marched to the U.S. Capitol demanding
ratification of the People’s Peace Treaty with
Vietnam on May 5, 1971.

As the saying goes, “history doesn't repeat itself, but it often rhymes”. With all the strife going on in the 1970s, Americans were conflicted over the Vietnam War, the Civil Rights Movement was losing some of its most inspirational leaders, and trust in institutions was crumbling. Families argued over politics at the dinner table. While young people protested in the streets, older generations worried the country was coming apart.  Not unlike today’s wars and economic, social and political upheaval, those events sure “rhyme”.

An estimated 4,000 men, women and children braved
the sleet and snow for the first women’s liberation march 
on March 6, 1971 from Hyde Park to Trafalgar Square, U.K.

It seems that Sly Stone considered the question posed by Gaye's groundbreaking concept record, looked at the swirling events of his time and answered with a title that captured the frustration, disillusionment, unrest and violence of the era. However, There's a Riot Goin' On isn't just about a riot in the streets. It's also about the turmoil that happens in our minds, our communities, and our country when people stop listening to one another.

However, the "riot" Sly describes in songs such as Family Affair, Runnin' Away and Thank You for Talkin' to Me, Africa is both personal and societal. On one level, these songs comment on a world marked by disillusionment, division, and the fading idealism of the 1960s. On another, they reflect Sly Stone's own struggles. At the time, he was battling drug addiction, and his relationships with his bandmates and his family members (who, in two cases, were one and the same) had become increasingly strained. As a result, the songs operate on two levels. They are observations about a fractured society, but also deeply personal reflections on a man whose own life was beginning to unravel.

Cover for the single, Family Affair, by Sly and the Family Stone.

More than 50 years later, There's a Riot Goin' On remains relevant, landing in the Top 100 of The 500 Greatest Albums for both the 2012 and 2020 Rolling Stones lists. In part, this is  because the tensions Sly Stone chronicled in 1971 echo today -- in a world marked by division, anxiety, inequality, and disillusionment.

However, one could argue that in the 2020s we don't have the same number of artists banging the drum for change. In the early 1970s, listeners could turn to Sly Stone, Marvin Gaye, Bob Dylan, Curtis Mayfield, Nina Simone, Gil Scott-Heron, Stevie Wonder, Joan Baez, and Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young for music that challenged injustice, questioned authority, and reflected a world in turmoil.

The Revolution Will Not Be Televised, the 1974 album by
poet Gil Scott-Heron.

I would argue that kindred artists still exist. In hip-hop, Kendrick Lamar's Alright and Childish Gambino's This Is America wrestle with race, identity, and power. In folk and Americana, artists such as Jason Isbell (White Man's World), Hozier (Nina Cried Power), and Noah Kahan have used deeply personal songwriting to explore broader social and cultural issues. And we've still got Bruce Springsteen and Tom Morello banging the drum.

Album cover for the single, This Is America, by Childish Gambino

Jesse Welles has built a large following on TikTok by composing topical folk songs about current events, earning frequent comparisons to Bob Dylan and Woody Guthrie. Even newer acts, such as So Good (I Will Love You Until), have found audiences through our new social media platforms, proving that the singer-songwriter tradition is still alive.

Jesse Welles has built a large enough following 
for a successful tour.

The difference may not be the artists themselves, but the way we consume music and media. In the 1970s, artists needed to break through a limited number of radio stations or appear on one of the half-dozen television networks in order to land in record stores for commercial viability. Today, audiences are scattered across streaming platforms, social media feeds, podcasts, YouTube channels, and algorithm-driven recommendations. The plethora of sources is why a friend can rave about a brilliant streaming series that is in its fourth season...and you've never heard of it. Not because it isn't popular, but perhaps because you don't subscribe to a particular streaming service.

Some of the many subscription, streaming services available.

As our media landscape has fractured, so has our shared cultural experience. The songs, shows, and artists that once dominated water-cooler conversations are increasingly replaced by thousands of smaller, parallel conversations happening within digital communities. This fragmentation extends beyond entertainment into politics, social interactions, and even our understanding of the world. We are no longer just divided by ideology; we are divided by the stories, music and media we encounter every day.

That's one reason There's a Riot Goin' On resonated with me. Sly Stone's concerns about isolation, division and a society pulling itself apart feel as relevant as ever. The difference is that in 1971, millions of people were hearing the same warnings at the same time. Today, we still have our modern-day Slys, Marvins and Dylans, but instead of sharing one riot, the algorithm has handed us a whole bunch.

The 500 - #108 - Hunky Dory - David Bowie

I was inspired by a podcast called The 500 hosted by New York-based comedian Josh Adam Meyers. His goal, and mine, is to explore Rolling Stone Magazine's 2012 edition of The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time.

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Album: #108
Album Title: Hunky Dory
Artist: David Bowie
Genre: Art Rock, Pop Rock
Recorded: Trident Studios, London, England

Released: December, 1971
My age at release: Five
How familiar was I with it before this week: Fairly
Is it on the 2020 list? Yes, at #88, rising 20 spots

Song I am putting on my Spotify Playlist: Life On Mars?

As this ongoing nine-and-a-half-year album project suggests, I am fascinated by music. I’m drawn to the pull of a strong melody, the jolt of an unexpected and clever chord change, or the electricity that happens when extraordinarily talented musicians lock into something that feels almost transcendent. However, the thing that truly defines my love of music is most often found in the lyrics.

I’ve also realized that I’m drawn to songs that don’t give everything away. The ones that feel layered, allusive  and sometimes surreal. Songs where a line sends your thoughts somewhere else. Perhaps to an obscure reference from a book or to a moment in history, a lyric or even a songwriter's catalogue. I've sometimes joked that I like lyrics that make me do homework. Sometimes that statement means actual research, but often it is just describes the time I will spend turning the words over and over in my head.

Some songs stick with you long enough that they feel like lifelong companions. They are the ones that linger, shift, and change over time. Songs that ask you to participate with or ponder their ambiguity. There are songs that resonated with you at age 17 because you thought you understood them, but don’t really become clear until you’re 45. And then you hear them at 60, and everything takes on a new shape.

Among my favourites is Life On Mars?, from David Bowie's fourth studio record, Hunky Dory. The song  has everything I love about music. The melody borders on the theatrical, but it never quite settles. It features excellent musicians, as Bowie has always bolstered his art with legendary talent. This record includes the players who will soon become "The Spiders of Mars" on his next record. Ziggy Stardust (#35 on The 500) They include Mick Ronson, Trevor Bolder and Mick Woodmansey. The opening piano for Life On Mars? was improvised in the studio by keyboard virtuoso and rock journeyman Rick Wakeman.

According to Wakeman:

"One of the most memorable and enjoyable experiences I had in the studio was the week I spent with David Bowie and his band in Trident Studios recording Hunky Dory. David gave me free reign to play what I liked on the piano to his wonderful songs and that was particularly prevalent when it came to Life On Mars? when he just said 'do what you like' and I did."  (Link to conversation and an acoustic piano version by Wakeman)

Underneath that wonderful melody, the chord progression quietly subverts expectation. Instead of neatly resolving, it keeps shifting, moving through changes that feel just unfamiliar enough to keep you off balance. The result is something both beautiful and unsettling. A complete breakdown of the "line cliches" and "functional harmony" in Life On Mars? can be found here, if you're a nerd (like me) for that kind of stuff.

So, by my entirely subjective and deeply unofficial checklist of “incredible music,” we’ve officially checked the first three requirements.

• Engaging Melody
• Clever Chord Progressions
• Excellent Musicianship

And the lyrics? Well, to fully appreciate what Bowie was trying to accomplish we need to rewind the clock to 1967 when he was a struggling musician. In fact, he had only recently rebranded himself as Bowie, given that his birth name, David Jones, could easily be confused with pop music celebrity Davy Jones of The Monkees.

Monkee and '60's heartthrob Davy Jones. 

Bowie had just released his first, self-titled record which was lauded by critics but remained commercially unsuccessful. His publishing company, Essex Music, had just received a copy of Comme D'Habitude by Claude François -- a song that eventually became Frank Sinatra’s smash recording of My Way.

Album cover for Comme D'Habitude by Claude François.

Bowie was approached to write the English lyrics to the melody and demos of his version, Even A Fool Learns To Love, can still be found online. However, the French publisher rejected Bowie's version and it was Canada’s Paul Anka whose words made their way to crooner Sinatra. The song became an English language hit in March, 1969.

Album cover for My Way, as performed by Frank Sinatra

By 1970, Bowie was touring the United States, travelling from New York to Los Angeles by bus, a journey that nudged him back into writing. This time, he leaned away from rock and roll toward something more theatrical. Back at Trident Studios in London, he revisited his failed attempt at My Way, slowly reshaping those ideas into Life on Mars?, which Bowie jokingly dubbed "My Way On Mars" in a later interview.

Album cover for the single, Life On Mars? released 18
months after Hunky Dory, when Bowie had become much
more famous.

In fact, Bowie gives a cheeky nod to Sinatra on the back cover of the Hunky Dory album cover. The words "*inspired by Frankie" appear next to the track listing for Life on Mars?

Back cover and close-up of dedication on Hunky Dory.

Which brings me back to those lyrics that still entrance and fascinate me decades after first hearing them. They sidestep easy interpretation and drift through a series of surreal, loosely connected scenes that blend everyday frustration with strange imagery and seemingly disconnected references.

The original handwritten lyrics to Life On Mars?

At its most literal, the song follows a bored, frustrated young girl who escapes escalating hostility in her family home by retreating to a movie theatre. Once there, she finds herself alone and realizes that the world on the screen is "a saddening bore" -- just as strange, disconnected, and unsatisfying as her own.

Opening lyrics to Life On Mars?

However, there is so much more present in those words. The lyrics are a mirror and a cultural commentary that work as well today as they did in 1971. The lines are sometimes fragmented, humorously exaggerated, and, sometimes, seemingly meaningless. The images pile up, jumping from one idea to the next, until the story stops feeling literal and starts to feel emotional. By the time Bowie asks, “Is there life on Mars?”, it doesn’t sound like a question about existence on a different planet, it sounds like a question about whether there’s anything more than this very moment we find ourselves in.

Album jacket for single of Life On Mars?

And tucked inside all that surreal imagery is one of my favourite Bowie winks. It's the line that the film his protagonist watches is “about to be writ again.” It’s a sly, almost throwaway moment, but it reveals the whole engine of the song. Bowie isn’t just describing a film that feels repetitive, absurd, or over‑scripted and he’s not just acknowledging his own act of writing and rewriting. He has left the door open for us. The question at the heart of the song is one we get to ask and answer again and again.

Is there something more than this?

And maybe that’s the real brilliance of Life on Mars?. The song isn’t finished. It’s still being written... by Bowie, by culture, by you and me – by anyone who presses play and lets those first piano chords tilt the world just slightly off its axis.

The 500 - #122 - "The Harder They Come" Soundtrack - Jimmy Cliff and Various Artists

I was inspired by a podcast called The 500 hosted by New York-based comedian Josh Adam Meyers. His goal, and mine, is to explore Rolling Stone Magazine's 2012 edition of The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time.

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Album #: 122
Album Title: The Harder They Come Soundtrack
Artist: Jimmy Cliff and Various Artists
Genre: Rocksteady, Reggae, Ska
Recorded: Multiple Studios, Jamaica

Released: July, 1972
My age at release: 6
How familiar was I with it before this week: A Couple Songs
Is it on the 2020 list? Yes, at #174, Dropping 52 places
Song I am putting on my Spotify Playlist: You Can Get It If You Really Want

Just a few months ago, on November 24, 2025, the world said goodbye to Jamaican singer, musician, songwriter and actor Jimmy Cliff. In the days that followed, social media lit up with tributes. Friends, fans, and fellow musicians flooded timelines with memories, gratitude, and celebrations of a legacy that stretched far beyond the Caribbean island’s shores.

Born James Chambers, Jimmy Cliff began writing songs while still in primary school in Saint James Parish, just outside the tourist hub of Montego Bay. Recognizing the spark in his son, Cliff’s father took 14‑year‑old James to Kingston, the humming. creative centre of Jamaica.

It was there that he adopted the stage name Jimmy Cliff. He later revealed that he chose “Cliff” to symbolize the artistic heights he intended to climb. From the very beginning, he wasn’t content with being a local sensation. As a teenager, he dreamed of carrying his music far beyond the shores of the Caribbean island he called home.

Cliff in 1971 - age 27.

In 1964, after releasing several hit songs in Jamaica, he was chosen as one of the country's representatives at the 1965 New York World's Fair. He was featured in a promotion called This Is Ska! alongside fellow Jamaican artists Prince Buster, The Dragonaires, Byron Lee, and Toots And The Maytals, whose record Funky Kingston appears at #380 on The 500.

Postcard for the New York World's Fair, 1964.

The Jamaican exhibit at the World's Fair helped to introduce global audiences to the island's music, but it would be a 1972 crime movie, The Harder They Come, starring Cliff, that helped bring the genres of reggae, ska and rocksteady to the world.

Movie poster for The Harder They Come.

The Harder They Come follows Ivan, a young man who leaves rural Jamaica for Kingston with dreams of becoming a reggae star, only to discover a city shaped by poverty, corruption and exploitation. As he chases opportunities, through music, work and love, he’s pulled into the vibrant but unforgiving world of Kingston’s tough streets where ambition, injustice and survival collide with the pulsing backdrop of early 1970s Jamaica.

A promotional poster, featuring positive
reviews for The Harder They Come.

The film operates on multiple levels. It is, ostensibly, an action/crime flick, but it also offers a sharp social commentary on the urban poverty and systematic corruption that were byproducts of post-colonial inequality. Cleverly, the film pulls in audiences with the promise of excitement and then delivers a surprising social, economic and political critique. The movie was a massive success in Jamaica, but quickly found audiences around the world.

The film has been credited with "bringing reggae to the world", with Jimmy Cliff as the de facto ambassador. The soundtrack, which appears at #122 on The 500, features six tracks by Cliff as well as hit songs from other Jamaican artists, including  The Maytals, The Slickers, Desmond Decker, DJ Scotty, and the Melodians. The result was, according to music critic Robert Christgau, a soundtrack that "collected the best songs of artists whose music was either unavailable or not rich enough to fill a Long Play (LP) record."

Re-issue of The Harder They Come on vinyl (2024).

The record is now considered one of the best of all time and has been deemed "culturally, aesthetically and historically significant" by the Library of Congress (U.S.A.) and has been selected for preservation by the National Recording Registry (U.S.A.).

Rest in Peace Mr. Cliff. You absolutely crested the peak of that summit you hoped to climb as a teenager.

The 500 - #125 - Pearl - Janis Joplin

I was inspired by a podcast called The 500 hosted by New York-based comedian Josh Adam Meyers. His goal, and mine, is to explore Rolling Stone Magazine's 2012 edition of The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time.

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Album: #125
Album Title: Pearl
Artist: Janis Joplin
Genre: Blues Rock, Soul Blues
Recorded: Sunset Sound, Hollywood, California

Released: January, 1971

My age at release: 5
How familiar was I with it before this week: Several tracks
Is it on the 2020 list? Yes, at #259, dropping 134 spots
Song I am putting on my Spotify Playlist: Me and Bobby McGee

There are certain lyrics and fragments of poetry that have stayed with me from the moment I encountered them. They drift through my mind at unexpected times and, like familiar memories, return again and again. When they do I turn them over in my brain, pondering new layers of possible meaning. Somehow the words always offer more. Sometimes it is a nuance I missed, or an idea I hadn’t picked up on…perhaps because of my youth.

A handful have come from the lyrical mind of Neil Peart, whose lines were etched in my consciousness as a teen. Other examples have arrived courtesy of Bruce Springsteen, The Beatles, Leonard Cohen, and the sharp insights of poets T.S. Eliot and Robert Frost. Of course, Ol' Billy Shakespeare has a few nuggets cloggin' my noggin'. After all, who else writes words that can shadow you for a lifetime and still feel startlingly alive each time they surface?

One of several Peart quotes I have evaluated
differently over the past 38 years.

Another lyric that sporadically runs laps through my head comes from Kris Kristofferson's pen. I was first introduced to his writing through the scorching vocals of Janis Joplin on Pearl, her second and last solo record. Her 1971 hit, Me and Bobby McGee, is a compact narrative. It follows two drifters, the narrator and the free-spirited Bobby McGee, as they sing their way across the American South. Hitching a ride from a truck driver, they wind their way west to California. Somewhere near the Monterey County town of Salina, the pair part ways, and the narrator is left alone, with the aching melancholy and regret that only a powerful song can instill.

Record label for the single of Me and Bobby McGee by Janis Joplin.

Because the name “Bobby” sits comfortably in the gender‑neutral middle ground, the tune has been recorded by an impressive cast of artists over the years, including Gordon Lightfoot, Roger Miller, Jerry Lee Lewis, Charley Pride, Olivia Newton‑John, The Grateful Dead, Dolly Parton, Johnny Cash and Pink. Each performer shifts the emotional centre of gravity just a little, proof that a memorable story can find new interpretations with different tellings.

Gordon Lightfoot had a #1 hit in Canada in 1970 with
Me and Bobby McGee.

 Kristofferson’s penetrating refrain,  "Freedom's just another word for nothing left to lose" occurs at the end of the first verse and repeats throughout Me and Bobby McGee.

Typically associated with celebration and liberation, freedom can also result from the loss of everything -- possessions, relationships, obligations and expectations. It is a paradoxical form of liberation. It is a double-edged sword of liberty, cleaving you from all things, but leaving you alone.

Existentialist philosophers, such as Jean Paul Sartre and Albert Camus, wrote extensively about freedom, loss and what remains of self when all things are stripped away.

Kristofferson may have been cribbing from their works when he penned Me and Bobby McGee and wrote that powerful thought-provoking lyric that I still work to fully understand.

Sartre wrote; “Man is condemned to be free; because once thrown into the world, he is responsible for everything he does.” The narrator, like us, is responsible for every choice he makes. He can not blame gods, fate, society or circumstance for his life and his (and, by proxy, our) freedom is inescapable and terrifying.

By contrast, Camus reflected on freedom through the lens of absurd nihilism in his play Caligula. To him, a man becomes completely free when he recognizes that "life has no higher purpose, the universe is indifferent and any longing for meaning will not be resolved". The titular 'Bobby' is free because he/she carries nothing -- no money, no obligations and, most importantly, no expectations. The narrator, after losing Bobby, inherits that absurd freedom; however, it is a freedom soaked in grief – a "terrifying burden" of true liberation for the first time.

Like I said earlier, Me and Bobby McGee is one of many songs that contain a lyrical gem that has taken up residence in my brain...and refuses to pay rent. It'll probably be there until those synapses stop firing and, as Camus postulates, its meaning, like my many questions about life, will never be resolved.

On a cheerier note, my research into this incredible Joplin record revealed that the backing musicians who support her, The Full Tilt Boogie Band, hail from my neck of the woods. Five of the band's six members are from Stratford and Woodstock, Ontario -- both fewer than 60 kilometers (40 miles) from my hometown of London. The band comprises John Till (guitar); Richard Bell (piano); Brad Campbell (bass); Ken Pearson (organ); and Clark Pierson (drums). Only Pierson is not from Southern Ontario, being a Californian.

Back cover of Pearl, featuring The Full Tilt Boogie Band.