The Definitive 1000 Songs Of All Time 1955 to 2005: Number 760

Number 760

Dandy Warhols

"Bohemian Like You"

(2000)

Genre:Indie Rock

"The Dandy's formed in Portland in 1994, releasing Dandy Warhols Rule Ok? on the indie Tim/Kerr Records in 1995. Their next three albums for Capitol, The Dandy Warhols Come Down (1997), Thirteen Tales From Urban Bohemia (2000) and Welcome To The Monkey House (2003) put the band on the charts, on TV and in the sweet, sweet limelight with international hits like “Not If You Were The Last Junkie on Earth” and “Bohemian Like You.” In 2003, the band was chosen by David Bowie to be the supporting act on his Reality Tour and most recently, the band was featured alongside the Brian Jonestown Massacre in indie documentary film Dig!, winner of the Grand Jury Best Documentary prize at the 2004 Sundance Film Festival."

"Though they still tend towards pastiche, the Dandy Warhols' third full-length, Thirteen Tales From Urban Bohemia, presents a bakers' dozen of their most focused and cohesive songs. Where their earlier albums were eclectic to the point of being scattershot, this release manages to limit the band's style-switching to dreamy, sweeping epics like "Godless" and "Nietzsche," sussed, sleazy power pop like "Horse Pills" and "Cool Scene," and country and gospel ventures like "Country Leaver" and "The Gospel." The group's increasingly strong songwriting makes most of these experiments successful and distinctive, though the Dandys fall into their old habit of appropriating sounds they like wholesale with "Shakin'," a "tribute" to Elastica's uptight yet sexy riffs and rhythms. Not surprisingly, the most successful songs on Thirteen Tales From Urban Bohemia are the least derivative ones, such as anxious pop songs like "Solid," "Get Off," and the delicate, lovelorn ballad "Sleep." On those tracks, as well as the satirical single "Bohemian Like You" -- this year's model of their hit "Not If You Were the Last Junkie on Earth" -- the Dandys reveal themselves as a savvy pop band with a voice of their own. Though they're not all the way there yet, Tales From Urban Bohemia is a worthwhile step in their developing creativity". ~ Heather Phares

For David Bowie see Number 634

For Elastica see Number 866

What does Rolling Stone Magazine think about Dandy Warhols?.....
"Thirteen Tales from Urban Bohemia signals a departure for the Dandy Warhols, a Portland, Oregon, quartet best known for its spaced-out Brit pop. The Dandies can still harmonize you into a trance, but they've replaced the dreamy drone of 1997's . . . The Dandy Warhols Come Down with more diverse atmospherics. On "Country Leaver," vocalist-guitarist Courtney Taylor drawls his way through an archetypal country backdrop -- complete with whinnying horses; "Solid" and "Horse Pills" (no whinnying here) cover more abrasive, Velvet Underground-lined terrain. The cosmopolitan glam of "Shakin' " downshifts into the disenchanted indie rock of "Big Indian" and finally ends with the doleful harmonies and sweet, countrified resignation of "The Gospel." Coming from a band whose greatest hit was "Not If You Were the Last Junkie on Earth," this album suggests that it's possible to be elegantly wasted for fifteen minutes and survive to eloquently tell the tale". (RS 848)

Ouch ouch and ouch! Rolling Stone Magazine suggests they would make great toilet paper for the homeless. As long as the don't whine. Still, Rolling Stone have the freedom and the right (just as i do) to write what they think.... lucky for us it comes down to the individual.

Rolling Stone Top 500 Songs ranked this song at Number (Stop Whining!) and the Album ranked at Number (Whine whine whine thats all you ever do)

This song has a crowbarred rating of 65.5 out of 108