Top 5 Chill-inducing songs (or song moments)

Euphoric chills (but NOT chill-out!):
It may be a cliche, but knowing that doesn't stop the shivers for me when the kick drum starts up in "Born Slippy."

Faith No More's "Caffeine" performed live in MTV studios (in quite a WTF moment)
Blackalicious' "Make You Feel That Way" (music vid)
Jeff Buckley's "Grace" (he & band performing live on 120 Minutes GAWD awesome)
Nirvana's version of "Where Did You Sleep Last Night" (MTV Unplugged)
Pearl Jam's "Porch" (also MTV Unplugged)

1. "Eighties" by Killing Joke - I've invariably spun the yarn about it here before, but the memory of first hearing this song (now TWENTY years ago) is indelible. Everything I'd ever wanted out of music in one perfect, malevolent blast. I had to hear it again AT ONCE and bought the 12" single within the half-hour of first hearing it.

2. "Ball of Confusion" by Love & Rockets - First heard it in the summer of `85 at Danceteria, a long dormant disco which was probably in its death throes at the time. I'd was vaguely familiar with the Temptation's version of the song, then along came this booming, guitar-heavy rendition that completely blew me away. Only trouble is that I didn't man age to find out who it was for a few weeks, leading me on a frantic record store search that seemed to go on forever (this was well before the ease of the internet). Imagine my surprise that it was those same cats in Bauhaus. It hasn't aged as well for me, but I do remember the chill and the who is THIS?!?! sensation oh so clearly.

3. "Calling Dr.Love" by Kiss - My first "favorite band". More so than any of their other songs (with the possible exception of "God of Thunder" and "Detroit Rock City"), "Calling Dr.Love" just seemed to provide the weighty oomph that matched their visual mystique. Those mammoth opening chords, those high pitched choruses and Ace's celestially squiggly solo in the middle still give me..."the chill".

4. "Jocko Ho mo" by Devo - Righ in line after Kiss, the second band I ever got too excited about. Though their albums -- if you ask me -- gradually succumbed to de-evolution themselves, this triumphal mission statement at the end of side one of Q:Are We Not Men? had both the jerky guitars of punk rock and and indefinable otherness that stopped me in the tracks (specifically in the latter half where an otherworldy sound competes with chugging guitars and the famously repeated mantra (if you have to ask, I shan't be the one to enlighten you).

5. "Song to the Siren" by the Cocteau Twins - First heard by way of a mixtape a friend of mine sent me from his semester abroad in England. Wrongly labeled as the Cocteau Twins, "Song to the Siren" stood out like a shimmering ice sculpture of incomparable beauty in between tracks by the Jesus & Mary Chain, Peter & the Test Tube Babies and Stranglers. Unable to find the vinyl, I played the tape to death...only to hear it again some months later (as the intro tape to, of all people, Robert Plant's solo performance at the Nassau Colliseum). Finally tracked it down. It's ghostly exquisite appeal remains undiminished for me rI

As for detail of my own. Your description of the effect "Eighties" had on you makes me want to start a new thread: "songs that took an insane amount of listens before you could get them out of your system.."

2. New Order-Blue Monday (heard it a million times in a million different clubs, and typically Simon R makes a jokey comment on his blog about wanting to sing "WE. ARE. ELECTRONIC PEOPLE" when it came on in NYC at Miss Kittin and sums up exactly how it feels everytime it's played, total collective scene vibe, like this is our music and our history and our evening.

3. Underworld-Born Slippy (when they do it live and everything drops out except the massive synth wash, goes beyond music and into something magical, crowd cheering in that contemplative rave way that makes you feel quite teary when you think about it weeks or months or years afterwards, the night sky above you, and a fleeting moment of absolute belonging)

4. Josh One-Contemplation (King Britt Funk Mix) (Slow burning, and sort of retro and acidy but with more of a modern sense of groove to it, less sci-fi. Just a relentless deep bassline and a vocal going "open your mind", makes me think about the redemptive powers of house music, gets the crowd locked in a groove, dancing to it feels completely right, in a way few other records do.

5. Together-So Much Love To Give-Not even a song I guess, just a trick to make you hug and high five and hug people in the club, so many happy memories of this one too. ah, 2002!

(this thread makes me realise, if I'd ever forgotten, what special and individual memories so many individual tracks have for me, I could name at least one friend or 5 stories for all 5, probably more than that.)

2. mtn goats "international small arms traffic blues"; especially the opening melody.

3. can "mushroom" - I THOUGHT I'D KEEP MY DESPAIR

4. nirvana "radio friendly unit shifter" - what exactly is he trying to pull off as a guitar solo here?

5. captain beefheart 'dachau blues' because, well.. dachau, dude.

2. Mercury Rev - Chasing a bee. That bit. You know, when the guitar makes that noise and your bowels evacuate.

3. Happy Mondays - Bummed. All of it, from "You're rendering that scaffolding dangerous" onwards. I didn't know what it was but it scared the shit out of me. Then they became lovable puppets.

4. Altered Images - Dead Pop Stars. Seriously creepy.

5. The Mekons - Ghosts of American Astronauts. Beautifully haunting.

or
goosebumps

Fleetwood Mac, "Brown Eyes" -- the way the vocal harmonies trail up after the "sha-la-lah," the way Fleetwood's drums never quite engage, the arpeggiated proto-slow rock genius guitar line. All spell chills.

Slowdive, "Primal" -- the outro that cannot possibly get any more intense, but does. Hearing this at the "shoegaze night" I DJ-ed last year as the last song, at ear-splitting volume, was indescribable. I thought my skin was going to turn inside-out.

Chameleons, "A Person Isn't Safe Anywhere These Days" -- the way it *hits*, a surge of delay-twinged dual guitar beauty, then even more brutally gut-wrenching on the "men of steel" refrain. Experiencing this live on their 2002 tour was one of the highlights of my concert-going life.

Aphex Twin, track 3 disc 1 of SAW II -- one of the saddest and most touching pieces I've ever heard.

the break in Rain Parade's "Broken Horse," when the clouds part and the guitar makes a slo-mo somersaulting leap for the heavens

Donnacha Costello's "Dry Retch" and Spoonfed Hybrid's "Heaven's Knot," both of which seem to suspend time for as long as they last.

every second of John Tilbury's recording of "For Bunita Marcus"

the arching counter-harmonized melody that opens Kaleidoscope (UK)'s theme song. and the major-minor chord change in the chorus of their (well, Fairfield Parlor's) "The Locket." the one leading into the second "Mirror me, Mirror be..." i don't even know why - they're both unremarkable progressions. but they always give me pleasurable goosebumps.

The Doors, "Twentieth Century Fox"
CCR, "Born On The Bayou"

can't think of anything else right now. for the record, I'm
not rockist, there are plenty of hip-hop tracks likethis

2) Air - 'All I Need'
3) Seal - 'Kiss From A Rose'
4) Portishead - 'Glory Box'
5) Jeff Buckley - 'Hallelujah'

YEsssssssssss!!!!!

1. Prince 'Purple Haze' climax
2. Nino 'The Gun' break with the 'i see you around me' or whatever it is sample and that extraordinary brass and synth riff
3. DJ Shadow 'Changeling' ending
4. Manitoba 'Jacknuggeted' when the acoustic riff bursts in
5. Archigram 'Carnaval' when it all goes a bit loopy near the end