toomuchboy
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Post by toomuchboy on Nov 25, 2020 0:05:32 GMT -5
There were a handful of songs I hadn't heard before this rankdown. This and "How I Feel" were two that I had an extremely positive reaction to. This is why I participate in RDs, I'm always finding new songs I wish I'd heard years prior.
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bboat11
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Post by bboat11 on Nov 25, 2020 0:09:48 GMT -5
21. "God's Will"
Album: Martina (2 of 4) Year: 2004 Vocal Range: F#3 - C#5 Billboard Chart Peak: #16
Placement in the previous rankdown: 40 of 70 |
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Post by bboat11 on Nov 25, 2020 0:11:18 GMT -5
OH THANK GOD!!!! A new page! It must've been God's will 😂
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bboat11
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Post by bboat11 on Nov 25, 2020 0:17:59 GMT -5
I am absolutely FLOORED with how this song performed here. I expected it to be an easy bottom 10 placer, but instead it was a top 20 contender for much of the rankdown! "God's Will" is great......but I thought it was pretty universally believed that this was a blatant and inferior attempt to recapture the success and attention of "Concrete Angel" from a couple years prior. I mean, even 10 year old me realized that back when this era was current  After "How Far" failed to make the top 10 I was shocked that they went with a 4th single anyway, but even more shocked that this was the one they chose!! "So Magical", "City Of Love", and "She's A Butterfly" were right there sounding like huge smashes, but instead they all got passed over for the two sappiest and least radio-friendly songs on the album (this one and "In My Daughter's Eyes")... At least they got "This One's For The Girls" and "How Far" right, but as a whole this era was the beginning of Martina's label making pretty regular head-scratcher single choices. |
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taylor
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Post by taylor on Nov 25, 2020 0:31:08 GMT -5
I too was obsessed with "Reckless" when that was first announced as a single. I listened to it multiple times a day and had I had a personal chart at the time, not only would it have been a multi-week #1, but it would've also easily landed high on my 2016 Year-End.
I would've LOVED to see "God's Will" hit the Top 20 but I'm just glad it made it this far. It touched my heart from the moment I first heard it (way out when I was like 9), and to this day it never fails to reduce me to tears, especially that music video.
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bboat11
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Post by bboat11 on Nov 25, 2020 0:32:21 GMT -5
What other artist can make a bag of leaves a popular Halloween costume? #yourfavscouldnever  |
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schnetzka
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Post by schnetzka on Nov 25, 2020 7:33:18 GMT -5
I'm not religious but God's Will is just brilliant songwriting in my opinion. It takes you on a journey which is why I ranked it so high.
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austin
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Post by austin on Nov 25, 2020 9:19:31 GMT -5
I agree! I have always loved God’s Will.
I cannot get past her horrible vocals on “Reckless” - the way she says the word “too” grinds my gears like nothing else.
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.indulgecountry
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Post by .indulgecountry on Nov 25, 2020 14:26:33 GMT -5
Lol where did all these fans of "God's Will" suddenly come from? It finished more appropriately the first time around.
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Post by castleoblivion26 on Nov 25, 2020 14:28:01 GMT -5
I love "God's Will" but it is still middle of the road for me when it comes to Martina's singles. Surprised it did this well because I would have never thought it would. Not mad just surprised.
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bboat11
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Post by bboat11 on Dec 3, 2020 0:59:50 GMT -5
Hello everyone! I'm not sure how much attention some of you have been paying to the overall Pulse scene, but I am currently up for three Pulse Music Awards!! Best Country Poster, Best Straight Poster, and....wait for it....Best Stan for Martina McBride!!!!! This rankdown may not be over yet, but if you have felt like it has been a thorough and meticulous learning experience so far, and a fitting way to honor one of the most influential female country artists of all time, I would really appreciate some votes!!! Voting could literally not be any easier: Just click on this link and fill in the options you want for each of the categories! |
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Juanca
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Post by Juanca on Dec 6, 2020 0:19:34 GMT -5
28. Make Me Believe (30): The melody was nice, but I didn't find it strong enough to make the top half. Instrumental and vocals are pleasant, but again not strong enough.
27. Cheap Whiskey (19): This was one of my favorite discoveries amongst the most classical sounding Country songs. The lyrics were strong, the instrumentation was classic but powerful -give me strings!- and I also LOVED the background vocals in addition to Martina's. I didn't know it was Garth!!! Wow!! Great surprise! My favorite single off her debut.
26. Cry On The Shoulder Of The Road (28): I like the melody especially in the chorus, but the verses and the overall production were again pleasant but not strong enough to me.
25. Phones Are Ringin' All Over Town (39): I didn't find the melody or instrumental that memorable, but I think I needed a few more listens to rank it a bit higher. I think I should've ranked it a bit higher if only for the lyrics and vocals.
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bboat11
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Post by bboat11 on Dec 20, 2020 0:01:26 GMT -5
Hey there you guys! I am soooo sorry for the continued delays with this rankdown! This time of year always gets so intense for me in real life, as a teacher trying to get his students ready for winter break, plus all the family stuff related to the holidays... Plus on Pulse the year-end rankdown season is starting, and this year Best of the Best/Revenge of the Best land right at the same time. And to top it all off, I had a HUGE project due for my master's program a couple days ago!!! I have barely been on Pulse at all the last couple weeks preparing for that. I haven't forgotten about this though! Now that that project is finished and submitted, and I have time again, I would like to prioritize finishing this rankdown :) It has been long enough!! If anyone is around to crack our way into the top 20, I'm fixing to do so right now!! |
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Post by bboat11 on Dec 20, 2020 0:14:51 GMT -5
 20. "Happy Girl"
Album: Evolution (3 of 6)
Year: 1998
Vocal Range: A3 - D5
Billboard Chart Peak: #2
Placement in the previous rankdown: 18 of 70
Placement in the album rankdown: 5 of 14
Live recording with Sara Evans on background vocals from their Girls Night Out Tour in 2000.
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taylor
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Post by taylor on Dec 20, 2020 0:17:06 GMT -5
I'm here! Glad to be see this kicking back into gear!
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bboat11
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Post by bboat11 on Dec 20, 2020 0:20:18 GMT -5
Kicking off the top 20, we say goodbye to one of the biggest hits to leave us as of this point! "Happy Girl" was a huge #2 smash hit. It's one of those #2 smashes that was so huge that it might as well have been a #1. It's been a staple of the live shows pretty much since its release. I even actually heard this on the radio the other day!!! I was SHOOK!!!! This song is noteworthy for its infectious positive energy, as well as the unique and memorable penny-whistle-mixed-with-fiddle melody that drives the instrumental backing to the song. It was the first song that we have seen that was in the top 20 for the entire submission process, however it did pick up several lower ranks which prevented it from ever really being a top 15 contender, including two bottom 2s from castleoblivion26 and Juanca . |
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Post by bboat11 on Dec 20, 2020 0:36:16 GMT -5
 19. "Ride"
Album: Shine (2 of 3) Year: 2008 Vocal Range: G3 - D5 Billboard Chart Peak: #11
Placement in the previous rankdown: 16 of 70 Placement in the album rankdown: 3 of 12
Ugh, her presence is soooooooo sorely missed at the CMAs... Anyone remember this high-energy performance from the 2008 CMA awards? This was during the peak of her arena-touring years, and she and her band killed this! You can even hear the crowd cheering so loudly that they nearly drown the music out as she walks to the other side of the stage during the second chorus. And how about the way she yells "Yeah!" at the pitch of F5 when she finishes the song?! Proof that she could do it, even though she never recorded herself going above an E5...Total: 472
Average: 22.48
Std Dev: 10.86toomuchboy - 7Juanca - 8austin - 10CoJoFan - 10fearlessarrow - 14fireflies - 16taylor - 16schnetzka - 18castleoblivion26 - 19
bboat11 - 20someguy - 21.indulgecountry - 21Troublemaker - 23kansasmeetsmo - 25Cody Wants Out... - 25codyj100 - 26Ginger Spice - 35tim - 36Kanenrá:ke - 38ClevelandRox - 38George Strait Junkie - 46
{Songs Remaining}
A Broken Wing
Anyway
Blessed
Concrete Angel
How Far
I Love You
I’m Gonna Love You Through It
Independence Day
Love’s The Only House
My Baby Loves Me
Safe In The Arms Of Love
This One’s For The Girls
Whatever You Say
When God-Fearin’ Women Get The Blues
Where Would You Be
Wild Angels
Wrong Again
Wrong Baby Wrong Baby Wrong |
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taylor
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Post by taylor on Dec 20, 2020 0:43:41 GMT -5
I absolutely love "Ride" and have it in my recurrent rotation to this day. It's one of those songs to turn to for a pick-me-up and swift kick of motivation. That music video couldn't be more 2009 tho |
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bboat11
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Post by bboat11 on Dec 20, 2020 0:56:00 GMT -5
The Shine era was done soooooo dirty by country radio. "Ride" and "Wrong Baby Wrong" being among the only non-top 10 hits to make it this high in the rankdown says a lot, tbh. They both stalled out at #11 for seemingly no reason whatsoever, and it was super sad. When "Ride" broke onto the scene, I was PUMPED for the high-energy sound of the song, and the industry seemed to be pumped because it seemed like Martina was mixing up her sound and trying something different. And imo it worked soooo well! She has always been a natural fit for the classic-rock vibes of somebody like Pat Benatar and Journey, and this was the first time she had ever really explored that avenue with her own music. To this day it still sounds so natural and fresh for her. I swear she could have been a classic rock artist in an alternate universe. Also, this song is HARD to sing. I know that goes without saying for a lot of her songs, but still  The delivery of the "RIIIIDE" at the end of each chorus is obviously a difficult note, but imo that is not the hardest part of the song. The entire chorus melody in general is extremely hard to nail, mostly because it unrelentingly jumps all over the mid-range. It jumps constantly from upper-mid-range to lower-mid-range on lines like "Life is a roller coaster ride", "Faith is believing you can close your eyes and touch the sky", etc., and nailing all of those mid-range transitions without overshooting a note and going sharp on a high note or flat on a low note or losing track of the tempo is extremely difficult. The flashy high notes are where the fans recognize your prowess, but the amount of unrecognized talent that goes into making the rest of this song sound good is where Martina proves she is truly one of the most technically proficient vocalists in the history of the genre. |
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bboat11
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Post by bboat11 on Dec 20, 2020 1:23:52 GMT -5
LMAO the reason this rankdown takes so long is I always get distracted watching live videos of Martina 😂😂😂 That's what I've been doing the last 30 minutes instead of posting the next reveal... She's so fucking good...
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bboat11
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Post by bboat11 on Dec 20, 2020 1:30:42 GMT -5
 18. "I Love You"
Album: Emotion (4 of 5)
Year: 1999
Vocal Range: G3 - E5
Billboard Chart Peak: #1 (5 weeks!!!!!)
Placement in the previous rankdown: 21 of 70
Placement in the album rankdown: 4 of 13
This music video uses the pop remix of this song.
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bboat11
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Post by bboat11 on Dec 20, 2020 1:43:05 GMT -5
There we go!!! Martina has 5 #1 hits at Country radio, and we finally said goodbye to the first one at #18 with "I Love You". This was not only a #1 hit...it was a FIVE-WEEK #1 HIT!!!!!! That makes it the biggest hit of Martina's career, as well as comfortably within the top 20 biggest hits of the entire country music genre over the past 30 years. Not every artist has that! It was also the big soundtrack song for the movie Runaway Bride, which is a huge part of why it went on to gain such broad multi-genre appeal.
This song tends to be a little bit polarizing, as it was Martina's most blatant foray into the pop realm that was pioneered by some of her peers like Faith Hill and Shania Twain. Martina never seemed comfortable moving too far in that direction herself, so outside of this one song/album, she tried to keep it a little more country. She mentions in the liner notes to her Greatest Hits album that this song took forever to record because she just couldn't get it to sound natural. And you can tell that vocally this is quite unlike anything else she ever recorded, as she infuses a bit of a juvenile sweetness into her vocals that not everybody is a fan of.
Knowing that she never really thought the song fit her, it's not all too surprising that this song has not showed up very often in her setlist through the years despite being her biggest hit. Fortunately she had a big enough career that she was never stuck being forced to perform it all the time, unlike poor Lee Ann Womack with "I Hope You Dance" 😂
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someguy
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Post by someguy on Dec 20, 2020 8:50:22 GMT -5
That was a hard group of reveals to lose! “Happy Girl”, I believe, was the song that lost #1 by the smallest if margins to “There’s Your Trouble”. There was even a Country Weekly blurb about it lol.
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taylor
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Post by taylor on Dec 20, 2020 8:57:27 GMT -5
That was a hard group of reveals to lose! “Happy Girl”, I believe, was the song that lost #1 by the smallest if margins to “There’s Your Trouble”. There was even a Country Weekly blurb about it lol. God, I feel old now (despite being the youngest tractor here ). I remember Country Weekly. It was appointment reading for my late aunt and I, until suddenly the magazine discontinued. It was how we kept up with our favs before the age of social media (and also how we found out Reba had signed to NASH Icon!), and we loved seeing who would be on the cover each week. She loved doing the crosswords and so did I; those were so fun. It was such a great magazine (although that name change towards the end was a CHOICE); I'm still sad it's no longer in print. |
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someguy
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Post by someguy on Dec 20, 2020 9:42:17 GMT -5
That was a hard group of reveals to lose! “Happy Girl”, I believe, was the song that lost #1 by the smallest if margins to “There’s Your Trouble”. There was even a Country Weekly blurb about it lol. God, I feel old now (despite being the youngest tractor here ). I remember Country Weekly. It was appointment reading for my late aunt and I, until suddenly the magazine discontinued. It was how we kept up with our favs before the age of social media (and also how we found out Reba had signed to NASH Icon!), and we loved seeing who would be on the cover each week. She loved doing the crosswords and so did I; those were so fun. It was such a great magazine (although that name change towards the end was a CHOICE); I'm still sad it's no longer in print. Same!! I’m old, but I bought it most weeks. The June issue when Reba was on the cover for winning the most Golden Picks was amazing! |
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Post by tim on Dec 20, 2020 18:58:50 GMT -5
There’s just something about “Happy Girl” that I find to be so infectious and it never fails to put me in a good mood whenever I hear it. I remember hearing it a lot on the radio during the summer of ’98 right alongside other memorable songs that year such as George’s “True” and Jo Dee’s “I’m Alright”. Looking back at the chart period for this time it appears that it was the Chick’s “There’s Your Trouble” that kept Martina lodged in at #2 (edit: oops I see that someguy referenced this above!). Anyways, I’m glad to see this didn’t miss the top 20 here and more or less matched its previous rankdown position. Martina had a lot of momentum going into the next album era Emotion as she was coming off the heels of her incredibly successful Evolution album. “I Love You” no doubt benefited from this which likely helped propel this one to remain at the top of the country charts for five weeks (I really do miss those days!). Although this hasn’t aged quite as well as I’d like it to, it fit perfectly into the sound of the genre in 1998/1999 and there’s certainly a level of nostalgia that this brings for me which is why I put this in my top 25. I'm fully expecting to see my top ranking song exit at any moment now so the fact that it has even made it this far is a win for me. |
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Post by tim on Dec 20, 2020 21:55:27 GMT -5
I remember Country Weekly. It was appointment reading for my late aunt and I, until suddenly the magazine discontinued. It was how we kept up with our favs before the age of social media (and also how we found out Reba had signed to NASH Icon!), and we loved seeing who would be on the cover each week. I was an avid reader of Country Weekly myself! I always looked forward going to the store to pick up the latest copy and part of the excitement was just seeing who was on the cover. Speaking of, I remember reading once that their biggest mover was apparently George Strait which likely explains why he was gifted the cover spot many times over. And as you mentioned it really was the best way to keep up with whatever was going on in the country music world. I especially always liked their CMA Awards edition as they provided a lot of pre/post coverage including predictions. I wish I had kept all of my copies as I held onto them for a long time, but somewhere along the way years ago they were just kind of taking up space and I discarded them. I definitely regret doing so now. |
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bboat11
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Post by bboat11 on Dec 20, 2020 21:58:33 GMT -5
Alright, the reason I stopped last night is because up next we are going to say goodbye to an album!!!!! (And I didn't want to do an album write-up last night, lmao)
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Post by tim on Dec 20, 2020 22:05:36 GMT -5
Alright, the reason I stopped last night is because up next we are going to say goodbye to an album!!!!! (And I didn't want to do an album write-up last night, lmao) Which means my #1 is still safe (for now!). Hmm...I'm going to guess it's "Anyway". |
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Post by bboat11 on Dec 20, 2020 22:06:32 GMT -5
 17. "I'm Gonna Love You Through It"
Album: Eleven (3 of 3) Year: 2011 Vocal Range: F3 - D5 Billboard Chart Peak: #4
Placement in the previous rankdown: 23 of 70 |
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The delivery of the "RIIIIDE" at the end of each chorus is obviously a difficult note, but imo that is not the hardest part of the song. The entire chorus melody in general is extremely hard to nail, mostly because it unrelentingly jumps all over the mid-range. It jumps constantly from upper-mid-range to lower-mid-range on lines like "Life is a roller coaster ride", "Faith is believing you can close your eyes and touch the sky", etc., and nailing all of those mid-range transitions without overshooting a note and going sharp on a high note or flat on a low note or losing track of the tempo is extremely difficult. The flashy high notes are where the fans recognize your prowess, but the amount of unrecognized talent that goes into making the rest of this song sound good is where Martina proves she is truly one of the most technically proficient vocalists in the history of the genre.
