A to Z Music Challenge - G is for Garth Brooks, Ginuwine, Johnny Gill, Marvin Gaye, Green Day, Garbage, George Clinton, G Love and Special Sauce, Ellie Goulding, The Gin Blossoms, The Goo Goo Dolls, The Go Go's and The Grateful Dead

Just when I think I'm approaching an "easy" letter with just a few people worth mentioning, I realize how wrong I am.


Garth Brooks
Though I'm not a huge fan of country music in general, there's just something about this guy that makes me love him.  Sure, he is one of the most successful country performers ever, but I think it's the fact that he took all those years off to focus on his family that makes me love him the most.


Ginuwine
He hasn't done much lately, but for a while there in the late 90's and early 2000's, he was in heavy radio rotation.  He was probably the purest r&b singer of that time period.


Johnny Gill
Yeah, I know he was most famous for being in New Edition, and they are obligatory in the N post coming up.  I decided he deserved his own shout out though because of how damn good some of his solo releases were.  I don't know many women who wouldn't want this song sung to them, and it will forever remind me of junior high slow dances.


Marvin Gaye
I don't need to say much about him.  He helped make r&b everything it is today.  He is music history.

Green Day
I'm a little annoyed at Billy Joe right now, but glad he's finally in rehab even if it interfered with my concert plans.  We all know he needed to go, let's be honest.

I will admit to giving my husband a lot of grief about them over the years.  Originally a punk band, it's getting harder and harder to stay punk as they get older.  When American Idiot was turned into a musical, I joked with him that they'd officially sold out, but I didn't really mean it.  The music of our generation is as worthy of celebration on stage as all those who came before.  (just don't tell my husband I said that)

Garbage
Shirley Manson just does it for me.  I don't know what it is, but she does it.  They tend to play a little harder, a little faster, a little darker...and for someone like me, that's just fine.  This song...well, it's just me.


George Clinton and the Parliament Funkadelic
It's hard to listen to anything this guy pumps out without instantly being in a better mood. He takes different types of music and marries them in a hazy harmony of magnificence.


G Love and Special Sauce
This is the music that gets into my head and fools me for a few minutes into thinking that San Diego isn't over a thousand miles away.  It's mellow, it's messy, it's the kind of music that just happens.  It's the stuff you listen to as you watch the waves roll in. This one was with Jack Johnson.  Can you smell the salt in the air?


Ellie Goulding
She's new, she's fresh, she's adorable.  This song has been the ringtone on my phone for over six months.

The Gin Blossoms
One of those bands with a tragic suicide in their history, I wonder how different things would be for them if Doug Hopkins was still around.  They reformed a few years after his suicide and have recorded since then, but to me it was never the same.


The Goo Goo Dolls
They were super popular for a few years then fizzled out as many bands do, but they made the list because they are firmly cemented on one of my favorite soundtracks of all time, City of Angels.


The Go Go's
Can you hear them?  They talk about us.  Telling lies, yeah that's no surprise.

Their lyrics were ones that everyone can relate to, and the fact that they were wildly successful as an all-girl band made me look up to them like you wouldn't imagine as a little girl.


The Grateful Dead
I'm too young to fully get it.  I'm not a stoned hippie, so it doesn't all make sense.  All I know is that their music was like something I'd never heard before because it seemed to somehow integrate just about every style of music that exists.  Like some of the other bands of that time, you didn't just listen to songs, you were immersed in an entire performance.