Elliott Smith’s solo profession started in a basement on a hill, with little greater than an acoustic guitar and a four-track recorder. By the point he recorded his ultimate, posthumously launched album, From A Basement On The Hill, he was in a studio on a significant label’s greenback, rendering his songs in Technicolor with keyboards and strings. However the beating coronary heart of his work, from the primary tune he recorded to the final, was his capacity to wring musical magnificence out of such ugly material as dependancy and despair – issues Smith, born on August 6, 1969, wrestled with till his tragic dying, on the age of 34, on October 21, 2003. It’s straightforward to type a private relationship with Smith’s songs, and that’s exactly why it’s so onerous to rank them. In truth, we wouldn’t be stunned in any respect in case your number of one of the best Elliott Smith songs was completely different from our personal.
20: Both/Or
The deliberate title monitor to Both/Or didn’t really make the minimize for the album, although it’s stronger than a number of the songs that did. It does, nonetheless, seem on New Moon, a group of outtakes from the mid-90s that’s as important as any of Smith’s studio albums. Just like the Søren Kierkegaard textual content from which the tune takes its title, Smith’s lyrics wrestle with futility – on this case, the futility of coping with somebody who doesn’t know what they’re speaking about. “We’re all in the downpour you carry around for/Trashing a lifestyle you’ve never known,” he sings.
19: Son Of Sam
Determine 8 could also be Smith’s hardest album: noisy and cluttered the place its predecessors have been hushed and spare. Totally different from its predecessors, it must be met by itself phrases. However there’s no query that Smith’s newfound love of power-pop and electrical guitar did nothing to dampen his knack for catchy melodies, as “Son Of Sam” demonstrates.
18: True Love
This long-unreleased tune, which lastly noticed the sunshine of day on the Heaven Adores You soundtrack, isn’t as breezy because the title would have you ever suppose. You don’t must pay attention too carefully to lyrics comparable to “So I bought mine off the street” and “All I need is a safe place to bleed” to get the sense that Smith isn’t actually singing about love, however a really completely different sort of drug. However, oh how heart-wrenchingly stunning this tune is – as mild as a balloon on a breeze.
17: King’s Crossing
“King’s Crossing” seems like a nervous breakdown. Smith’s lyrics take us inside his tortured thoughts, the place he wrestles together with his worsening heroin dependancy and paranoia in regards to the music trade. That turmoil is mirrored within the music, which folds in ghostly backing vocals, hypnotic pianos and queasy guitars. It’s one in every of Smith’s most unsettling songs and definitely, amongst his most formidable, making you marvel what From A Basement On The Hill would have gave the impression of had Smith been alive to complete it.
16: Tomorrow Tomorrow
Whereas Smith’s status as an excellent lyricist is effectively documented, it additionally bears repeating that he was an outstanding guitarist, and “Tomorrow Tomorrow” options arguably his most arresting, intricate efficiency. Like Richard Thompson’s “1952 Vincent Black Lightning,” it’s the sort of tune that makes lesser guitarists need to tear their hair out in frustration and stays among the best Elliott Smith songs.
15: I Figured You Out
“I Figured You Out” was to Smith what “Lift” was to Radiohead: a pop tune that was simply too good. Disowned by its creator (“Sounds like the f__kin’ Eagles,” he groused), given to buddy Mary Lou Lord after which lastly launched on the Twentieth-anniversary expanded version of Both/Or, “I Figured You Out” exhibits that, even earlier than his major-label part, Smith was discovering methods to flesh out his lo-fi sound.
14: Candy Adeline
Any worries that Smith had bought out by signing to DreamWorks Data for XO have been eased by the album’s opener, “Sweet Adeline.” For a couple of minute and a half, it seems like each different Smith tune up till that time, solely in increased constancy – after which the refrain hits, delivering a rush of crashing drums and cascading pianos. Smith was nonetheless Smith, simply with extra at his disposal than ever earlier than.
13: Someone That I Used to Know
“I had tender feelings that you made hard/But it’s your heart, not mine, that’s scarred,” begins this kiss-off to a former flame (to not be confused with Gotye’s hit of the identical title). He’s not bitter; simply prepared to maneuver on. Determine 8 was a loud and at instances overstuffed album, however a number of the greatest Elliott Smith songs come from moments like this, when he pares issues all the way down to the naked requirements – simply him and his guitar.
12: Waltz #1
Smith’s pals have mentioned that “Waltz #1” was written after the songwriter listened to Elton John’s “Goodbye Yellow Brick Road” for 18 straight hours whereas excessive on mushrooms. The consequence could also be Smith’s prettiest tune. “Waltz #1” is seemingly untethered from standard tune construction and even gravity itself; it’s dreamlike and weightless, like a excessive you possibly can’t come down from.
11: Can’t Make A Sound
Signing to a significant label and dealing in a studio enabled Smith to document songs that he couldn’t have pulled off in a basement. Living proof: “Can’t Make A Sound,” a dizzying, Beatles-esque pop quantity that builds on its acoustic foundations into an exciting climax, full with strings and a blistering electrical guitar. It’s a tune that some critics likened to “A Day In The Life,” however even when it doesn’t get there, it will get far sufficient to go away you breathless.
10: Condor Ave
Much less a tune than a brief story set to music, “Condor Ave” is one in every of Smith’s most vivid narratives. The narrator’s girlfriend drives off after an argument (“I threw the screen door like a bastard back and forth”); half-awake, she crashes right into a drunk man alongside the street, killing them each (“I wish that car had never been discovered”). Legend has it that Smith was simply 17 when he wrote this tune, and he’d solely get higher.
9: Ballad Of Massive Nothing
Let’s make one thing clear: “Ballad Of Big Nothing” shouldn’t be a contented tune, although it’s straightforward to mistake it for one, with its deceptively upbeat refrain (“You can do what you want to whenever you want to”) and punchy instrumentation. Had Smith written it a number of years later, it may need had strings and a guitar solo. As it’s, the tune demonstrates how a lot he was in a position to do with so little, like so lots of the greatest Elliott Smith songs.
8: Roman Candle
Opening Roman Candle, the album’s title monitor is quieter but extra abrasive than something he’d recorded together with his band Heatmiser. The threats within the refrain, “I want to hurt him/I want to give him pain,” are directed at his stepfather, who Smith claimed to have been abused by when he was youthful. Listening to Smith’s voice, you possibly can hear him tremble with barely suppressed rage.
7: Miss Distress
His most well-known tune can be among the best Elliott Smith songs. “Miss Misery” gives pop perfection in two kinds: the downbeat early take included on New Moon and the fuller model heard in Good Will Searching. Although the latter’s nomination for an Academy Award made a reluctant star out of Smith, it’s onerous to consider a greater tune to bridge the hole between the 2 halves of his profession.
6: Fairly (Ugly Earlier than)
It’s tempting to take “Pretty (Ugly Before)’ at face value. The song itself is one of the most beautiful tunes Smith ever wrote. Lyrics like “There is no nighttime/It’s only a passing phase” might sound like an acknowledgment that even the worst of instances will come to an finish however, extra probably, the tune is referring to drug use, permitting Smith to remain awake for days and neglect his troubles, at the very least till the excessive wears off.
5: Needle In The Hay
Unforgettably used to soundtrack a suicide try in The Royal Tenenbaums (arguably Wes Anderson’s most good use of music), “Needle In The Hay” is a couple of slower type of self-annihilation: heroin dependancy. The tune is Smith’s bleakest, and one in every of his easiest; he strums his guitar determinedly, like a author driving his pen into paper, and sings like he’s struggling to get the phrases out. That’s all Smith must get underneath your pores and skin.
4: Say Sure
Like the 2 tracks that observe on this listing of one of the best Elliott Smith songs, “Say Yes” was one in every of three Both/Or highlights that additionally appeared in Good Will Searching. In contrast to the opposite two, “Say Yes” is an unabashed pop ditty – one of many sunniest that Smith ever recorded, even when it’s a breakup tune. “Situations get f__ked up and turned around sooner or later,” Smith sings, however, slightly than staying down, he’s dedicated to standing up and shifting ahead.
3: Angeles
Whereas “Say Yes” is the tune that concludes Both/Or, it’s “Angeles” that bids farewell to the primary half of Smith’s profession. Softly-sung vocals and fingerpicked acoustic guitar had been Smith’s modus operandi for a number of years, and he’d proceed to document songs this fashion for the remainder of his life, however ‘Angeles’ looks like a peak. Including to the tune’s sense of finality are the lyrics, which learn like an imagined dialogue between Smith and a doubtful trade head. Positive sufficient, the follow-up to Both/Or would see Smith signal a brand new document deal and go away Portland for Los Angeles.
2: Between The Bars
It’s a testomony to Smith’s songwriting mastery that “Between The Bars” seems like a love tune – which, in a twisted sense, it’s, sung from alcohol to an alcoholic. A lot has been made from how the “bars” of the title refer not simply to taverns, however to the barrier that consuming kinds between Smith and “the things you could do, you won’t but you might”. However the tune additionally kinds a barrier between the songwriter and who he as soon as was, numbing himself to his traumatic previous. With lyrics which can be each comforting and controlling (“Drink up one more time and I’ll make you mine/Keep you apart, deep in my heart”) “Between The Bars” stands as one of the vital devastating and greatest Elliott Smith songs.
1: Waltz #2 (XO)
The title of Both/Or, Smith’s most interesting album, instructed a dichotomy: Smith was both a lo-fi singer-songwriter or a composer of lush, orchestrated pop. “Waltz #2 (XO),” which heads this listing of one of the best Elliott Smith songs, reminds us that he may very well be each on the identical time. It’s such a lightweight and lovely tune that you simply would possibly miss the heaviness of the lyrics. The kiss and hug within the title is for Smith’s mom, whose marriage to Smith’s abusive stepfather fractured her relationship together with her son. “I’m never going to know you now,” he laments within the refrain, solely to stroll that again with an much more heartbreaking promise: “But I’m going to love you anyhow.”
Store Elliott Smith’s music on vinyl now.
