The first proto-heavy metal band and a direct link between metal and blues. Heavy driven blues. Free sound extremely sparse compared with similar bands and this is part of their appeal.

I first heard this song on MTV, back when nobody knew who Longview were. The music (guitar, bass, drums) is great and the melody is awesome. The lyrics are simple and poetic at the same time and I get really nice images in my head when I hear this song, partly because it's very vivid and also due to the fact that they made a really cool video for it. Some people think this is a religious song just because it mentions God, but that's completely irrelevant. I can't say I know what it's about but I know it's a good listen.

An uncharacteristically rock 'n' roll oriented song for the PSB, this is undoubtedly one of their biggest-sounding anthems -- shame they squandered it on a b-side! Johnny Marr of The Smiths fame plays guitar. Available on the "Flamboyant" two-track single (the one with Neil Tennant's blurred face on it).

A huge hit in the U.K in 1985 and the debut single from a band with global potential still retaing elements of the quick fire genres that happened in those times edgy punk sentiments ,white boy funk and even the two tone /mod revival appeal ,all things to all people ,all the ingredients to make the perfect contemporary pop song,.Its rousing anthemic chorus should have been the springboard to stadium size success which somehow slipped away within a year or two,perhaps its catch all ambitions recalled the adage that you cant please all the people all the time .This one piece of brilliance still remains as a monument to all the should have beens and great white hopes.

Another song that needs no introduction. This is a classic rock ballad known to all, by one of the greatest bands ever. The music has this grand, anthemic feel to it which I really like. I don't think it's trying to be pretentious at all, as some people might think. It's a great ballad that uses orchestral music, with an amazing guitar running through it.

Enormous, gorgeous, hard-rocking (what a silly phrase) song about hedonism/surrender/desperation/"goin' for a ride." Like "Born To Run," "Baba O'Riley," and "Let's Go Crazy" thrown in a blender and soundtracking a black-and-white indie film.

I can´t remember the last time i was so excited by an english band. Guillemots seem to have everything that´s been lacking in a british pop band for the last couple of years. we´re here is a stringladen,anthemic pop song and when i´m listening to it everyone from a-ha, prefab sprout,scott walker is evoked but in the end it sounds only like the guillemots. Seriously lovely

I'm going to post 3 linked songs. Eventually. This one, Somebody to Love by the same band and then the recent cover of Somebody To Love by the Boogie Pimps.

Anyway I must have heard this before, but sometime within the past few years it popped up on a free magazine compilation. I probably associated the band with their 80s (?) incarnation - the band that did 'We built this City On Rock and Roll'. Each to their own, but I have to say I really didn't like that song at all - to me it was bland, radio and MTV friendly big haired, anthemic music for people who don't like music. Really sorry if it was your favourite, but as I say, each to their own. White Rabbit is to me is the total opposite.

The best way I can think of to describe the sound would be as being like a cooler, more rocking 60s version of 'Metal Postcard' style Siouxsie and the Banshees. The words are a druggie take on Alice in Wonderland, and it finishes with the singer (Grace Slick?) basically shouting 'Feed my head' over and over. Although I wouldn't condone the sentiment (Just say No, kids!), it's all very impressive. It couldn't be less bland, radio and MTV friendly.

If you like the Banshees, Bauhaus, indie in general or on the otherhand the darker Beatles stuff or the Velvet Underground you might enjoy this.

Probably the only anthemic pop song I will ever choose to listen to. Was drawn to it the first time I heard it, as a piece of chart music at the end of the 1990s.

The first two chords of the verse are audacious, most unusual in pop music, and are what makes the song for me. Without them, or with conventional choices, the song would lose its tension and power. The lyric can be considered cheesy, but it kind of aims high in searching out some kind of universal truth, and it works. When in the right mood, it is even elevating. The last part is lyrically very pathetic, a lame series of insulting name drops. But it probably got the record heard - this was their first single.

I recently read that this song was much admired by U2, and I'm not surprised as I can hear them striving for something like this. But they never get anywhere even slightly close.