Hottest 100 songs by dead people and Radiohead

I don't know what it is about triple Js hottest 100, I just love it. The debate, the trivia, the memories of share house parties listening to the countdown, it's all good fun. The Twitter during the last twenty songs was particularly a good laugh.

The Hilltop Hoods were my highlight though. Highest ranked Aussie song. Only one of two (?) hip hop songs in the list. A relatively new song amongst all the sudden boom of nostalgia for 90's alternative music.

Back in the day, I ran a small Brisbane live music venue. Rock and pop was king in Brisbane, but through my love of two great hip hop bands, Resin Dogs and Brothers Stoney, I was determined to bring more acts to The Alley to showcase the genre. The night was to be called “Mics Sound Nice" and we kicked off with a cracker, Brothers Stoney and Koolism. Went off. They were followed by The Herd and a couple of the Obese crew, Reason and BiasB. All top shows with a packed room.

One thing I'll say about the hip hop scene, it's dominated by nice guys who are a pleasure to work with. Loved Dan and Hau from Koolism. Bias was like the landed gentry of hip hop. The Herd once backed up for me after a Livid festival. When they walked through the door they looked so worn out I thought they'd be flat out lifting the mike, but they were bouncing off the walls during their set. Len and Lazy from the Brothers and another local, Gav from Miss Brown were always there to help out with advice. In fact one day Len recommended I drop into a national DJ battle to check out the live act that was traveling with them. Pretty good, he reckoned.

The night did not start well. After working during the day I had channel surfed between the rugby, league and AFL only to watch the broncos, wallabys and lions all lose. The lions loss was particularly galling as it was to my second most hated team, Port Adelaide. Not really wanting to go out after that, I managed to drag myself to the Valley to check the guys out. The crowd was pretty thin but they bounced on stage. "our boys thrashed you weak lions tonight, how do you like that Brisbane".

Bastards.

Once they started their set though, all football was forgotten. They had killer beats and a raw bounce to their delivery. Monday morning I rang PJ, their manager and booked a date, any date.

Their show was madness of the best kind. I have no idea how many I packed in but it was too many. The Alley was literally a concrete box so it was oppressively hot. But they absolutely smashed it. There was no security or crowd control but everyone was there to have a good time and listen to some top tunes, nothing else. I doubt there was a better gig at The Alley and we saw a lot of good gigs.

They broke big on the Js after that but still honored a commitment to come back and headline a three day hip hop festival I ran. They all came, The Herd, Reason, Koolism, Bias, funkoars, cause they were all top blokes. That's why I'm so happy that the Hoods got in the top twenty. They are that good and they deserve it.

PS. All through the Lions glory years I never let the Hoods forget that we were winning premierships while they were choking. Of course in the fourth quarter of the Port-Lions final when it was obvious that we couldn't come back I got a phone call from the boys. They rang me from an Adelaide pub. All I got was "ready, one, two, three, FUCK OFF BEESO".

Bastards.

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