Ten is the randomest number that you'll ever do

Sing along! Ten is the randomest number, ten is the randomest number, TEEEEN is the randomest number that you'll ever doooo! Another set of embarrassingly positive judgments. Maybe I just don't have all that much music that I hate?

01. Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds, “Nobody’s Baby Now”
Not bad, but one of the weaker tracks from Let Love In. The dress/best/breast rhyme makes me cringe a little. 6/10

02. Reverend Glasseye, “Penitentiary Highball”
Polly pretty Polly won’t you stay the night with me? We’ll climb upon the highway and we’ll climb the old birch tree. Well I never met no one sweeter more persistent or more fair. Polly jumped he flipped her down—with those beads wrapped in her hair. A perversely beautiful murder ballad. 9/10

03. Manic Street Preachers, “Black Garden”
Swallows crowding the sky and slowly dying and whatnot. Pretty great. 8/10

04. Joy Division, “Digital”
Day in! Day out! Day in! Day out! Scary desperation. 8/10

05. Calexico, “The Book and the Canal”
Atmospheric little instrumental. Works best in the context of the album. 6/10

06. The Smiths, “Girl Afraid”
The best part is in the middle where he sings the refrain slowly: no I’ll never maa-ake that mistake again. Great song. 8/10

07. David Bowie, “Lady Grinning Soul”
A gorgeous one-night-stand song. 9/10

08. Madness, “The Rise and Fall”
Kinksesque nostalgia. Possibly the band’s best non-single. 8/10

09. Maddy Prior & June Tabor, “The Game of Cards”
Quite unreasonably pretty duet. Why can’t they ever get singers like this on American Idol? 8/10

10. Tom Waits, “You Can’t Unring a Bell”
Oh just watch me. I think if I can unplow a field and unpublish a book, unringing a bell shouldn’t present much difficulty. 8/10