In the context of why -- or if -- certain genres suck, somebody asked me, "What makes some music great?"

That's the question I try to answer with every post.

The truth is, it's all subjective, isn't it? For example, I'm not a fan of grunge, yet here's a song that stuck with me whether I was hearing it on the radio or not.

What makes this song great is what makes any song great. Music is made up of three basic building blocks: melody, harmony, and rhythm. The way those building blocks are combined in any given piece of music either works for you, or it doesn't. Whether you generally like a certain genre or artist is irrelevant to the discussion.

One example of this is David' Gray's cover of Soft Cell's "Say Hello, Wave Goodbye". Many have remarked that one David Gray song sounds pretty much like the next, and I have to agree -- even when he's covering another artist's work.

Yet, in the comments on the video, someone cites the crucial difference that harmony makes throughout the record, and that's true for me as well. Something about the contrary motion on the phrase "take a look" encapsulates the wild anger, the deep pain, the sense of loss and futility, that the song otherwise spends over nine minutes trying to get across. That's great music!

You may like a certain genre much more than you do others. For me, that's bluegrass, but if a song is bad, even the greatest singers and players in the world can't save it.

I wonder what Sinead O'Connor might do with Pearl Jam's "Black.