Top 1000 Songs #40-#31

#40 - "One" - Metallica - Ride The Lightning - #5/5 - Metallica's greatest song, "One" features great lyrics and blistering guitar-work throughout, but the highlight is towards the end when the machine gun guitar and drums kick in and the solos go insane, building to one of the best metal songs of all-time.

#39 - "Last Dance With Mary Jane" - Tom Petty And The Heartbreakers - Greatest Hits - #16/17 - It never appeared on any of the band's official albums, but "Last Dance" is one of Petty's biggest hits and best songs, with an unforgettable guitar hook and a great story told throughout the lyrics. It's not quite their best song, but it's damn close.

#38 - "Bohemian Rhapsody" - Queen - A Night At The Opera - #5/6 - The rock opera classic that defined the over-the-top direction classic rock was taking in the 70's, "Rhapsody" is practically an entire play within itself, with nearly ever genre of rock covered at some point during one brilliant trek of a song.

#37 - "Sweet Emotion" - Aerosmith - Toys In The Attic - #7/7 - Aerosmith's best song by a hair over "Walk This Way", "Sweet Emotion" wins out due to superior lyrics, as the band turns in their best lyrical performance of their career.

#36 - "Back In Black" - AC/DC - Back In Black - #9/9 - One of the first great rock songs to merge rap and rock music, "Back In Black" was a landmark song because it marked the band's rise from the ashes after the death of lead singer Bon Scott. The song is the key moment on their best album and helped to launch them to great success that survives to this day.

#35 - "Welcome To The Jungle" - Guns N Roses - Appetite For Destruction - #8/8 - One of the best hard rock songs of the 80's, "Jungle" is an intense song with many different brilliant parts that all work together to create a rock epic taht the band never topped.

#34 - "Blitzkrieg Bop" - The Ramones - The Ramones - #5/5 - The least complicated song to ever achieve true greatness, "Bop" is short, straight to the point and would be one of the first songs that you'd learn on any instrument or as a singer. That being said, it's a great song and the first shot to ring out and signify the launch of punk rock as a movement and a wake-up call to a rock n roll bogged down by the likes of Boston and Kansas.

#33 - "War Pigs" - Black Sabbath - Paranoid - #3/3 - Ozzy's great protest song, "War Pigs" doesn't pull any punches as it calls to task the people who start wars and the people who benefit from them at the expense of those that fight them. "Satan laughing spreads his wings" isn't exactly a subtle description, recalling another classic line from Dylan's "Masters Of War", "Even Jesus can't forgive you for the things that you do". One of the greatest protest songs of all time.

#32 - "Who Are You" - The Who - Who Are You - #7/9 - Long before it was the theme song for CSI, "Who Are You" was a song written about Keith Moon's drinking habits. A song that was written while he was still alive... and still in the band, leading to an epic blow-out when he sobered up enough to figure it out. The last truly great song from one of the most important and best bands in all of classic rock.

#31 - "Johnny B. Goode" - Chuck Berry - Greatest Hits - #1/1 - The guitar solo that kicked off rock n roll launches this song, kicking off Berry's best song and creating several genres in the process as Chuck sped up a blues riff and changed the world forever. Just be sure he doesn't take all the credit, as it is well-known that he stole the song from Marty McFly.