Twenty one brilliant songs turning 50 years old this year

April

Sparks - “This Town Ain't Big Enough for the Both of Us" 

The Mael brothers recorded two albums with little effect before their breakthrough Kimono My House from which this single came from and it was Ron’s song structure and incessant keyboard riff and Russell’s high-pitched vocals on this great song that propelled this single and the album itself.

Steely Dan - “Rikki Don’t Lose That Number”

Steely Dan was a fully formed mature band even with their first album, but by Pretzel Logic, their third one, they were in full swing, presenting some of their best music before and after it, and this song, designated as a single is great not only as an introduction to the album but to Steely Dan’s opus in general.

June

Ace - “How Long”

Ace was one of the British seventies sophisti-pop/rock bands that were an acquired taste in the mid-seventies, but this single, the band’s debut single (from their debut album) made chart ripples in Britain at the time, with its quality and endurance reaching a peak some forty years and so during the coronavirus crisis.

July

Neil Young - “Ambulance Blues”

At over eight minutes, this song had no chance of making it as a single in 1974, but it is the strongest song from Young’s On the Beach album, one of his best and certainly one of the all-time classic albums, with some of the strongest lyrics Young came up with.

Eric Clapton - “I Shot The Sheriff”

While Bob Marley was still getting a big break, Clapton took this, one of Marley’s best songs and gave it the treatment that wasn’t too far away from the original itself, but was surely the one that caught the ears of the wider audience, doing wonders for Clapton himself, too.

Average White Band - “Pick Up The Pieces’

Up to this single and the album it came from, these Scottish guys were a "promising" pub rock band, a sub-genre that was mainly confined to Britain at the time. At some point, they decided to pick up R&B and funk, and this instrumental became not only their signature song but "the sign of the times."