As an amature photographer and a volunteer for church activities, I usually try to make photo slideshow CD ROMs of various church youth activities. There is an option when I do make these CDs to put background music while the slideshow plays. That being the case, I always try to keep my ears out for good music. I’ve added to my ever growing list of positive songs. Here are some of them.

• The Guess Who – “Share the Land” – What an awesome song that no one knows. You’ll remember The Guess Who as the band who sang “American Woman” which Lenny Kravitz later covered. “Share the Land” has some cryptic lyrics like “Maybe I’ll be there to share the land; that they’ll be givin’ away; when we all live together…”
• Alphaville – “Forever Young” – This song is featured in a Saturn Ion car commercial – “Now Leaving High School…” It’s got some good lyrics to it, yet it’s got that silly technopop European sound. If they redid it acoustically, it would probably sound better.
• Bruce Springsteen – “The Rising” – Bruce has a strong heavy voice that really carries the song. However not enough people know this one for it to be relavent in today’s world.
• Jars of Clay – “Flood” – Great song. Located somewhere on the music charts between “Rock” and “Contemporary Christian.” Lyrics could be taken Biblically.
• U2 – “Beautiful Day” – The lyrics make no sense at all. But the chorus is pretty positive.
• Smashmouth – “Why Can’t We Be Friends” – Originally done by War, Smashmouth made it better (some would likely disagree with me on that).
• Beatles – “In My Life” – I’m sorry to admit that I hadn’t heard this song until just a few years ago. What a great song.
• Guns ‘N Roses – “Sweet Child of Mine” – good song, however it probably wouldn’t work well, especially with the hard guitar riffs.
• Go Go’s – “Vacation” – I heard this on a Johnny Knoxville episode. Kinda good song. I’m ashamed to admit this. I just might be a Go Go’s fan.
• The White Stripes – “We’re Going to Be Friends” – This would be a good song for an end of the year elementary school graduation slideshow.
• John Lennon – “Instant Karma” – I don’t necessarily agree with the karma philosophy of this song; however I really like the “We all shine on…” chorus.
• Joe Cocker – “With a Little Help from my Friends” – You’ve heard this song in the opening of the Wonder Years TV show. The Beatles did this originally, but Joe made it better. I don’t really care for the “Get high with a little help from my friends” lyric, but the way Joe sings it, it is undistinguishable.
• Better Than Ezra – “Good” – One of the more positive songs from a great band that no one knows.
• The Strokes – “Someday” I heard this song on an MTV promo. Great song. The singer’s voice is kinda distorted which makes it difficult to distinguish what he’s singing about.
• Electric Light Orchestra – “Mr. Blue Sky” – As heard on the Volkswagen convertable commerical. The downside is that probably not very many people have heard of this.
• Spacehog – “In the Meantime” – The radio stations played this song way too much when it first came out. Made Spacehog a one hit wonder. Still, it’s a good song when you really listen to it.
• Israel Kamakawiwo’ole – “Somewhere Over the Rainbow/What a Wonderful World” – It was in the movie, Meet Joe Black. Never heard of the artist. But the performance of Over the Rainbow is extraordinary.

There are many more songs which I could add to this list. But I won’t bother adding to them right now. Maybe later on…