12 Rods
Part of 2
from Split Personalities, V2, 1998
On their early recordings, 12 Rods had a predilection for epics. Their pugnacious rants of self-contempt and outsider angst often topped six minutes. But it's the shortest track on Split Personalities, their full-length debut, that proves most dynamic. "I've been lapped by my losing streak and I'm going for the gold," sings Ryan Olcott, before launching a vocal-chord-shredding scream into the abyss. The three seconds of silence that follow enrapture nearly every ear they encounter. It's a moment that induces chills and the prickling of neck hair. When the tension finally breaks it feels like one's brain has been deprived of more than a moment's worth of oxygen. The pulsing synths and commanding bass resume their course, roaring to the finish line. --Lindsey Thomas
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Mark Mallman
Kissing the Knife
from The Tourist, 1998
If you can momentarily overlook his infamous 52.4-hour marathon gig, his Meatloaf-esque bravado, and, yes, his feral wolf mask--in other words, if you can forget the theater of it all--you might be able to remember that Mark Mallman can be downright maudlin. "Kissing the Knife," off his first solo album, is a ballad bildungsroman of a country boy tangling with life and death in the big city of contradictions. Written before the glam-parody group the Odd were quickly conceived, praised, and disbanded as a joke, this pop ballad is wise enough to be a classic, yet reckless enough to declare, "I can taste freedom in kissing the knife." --Rex Sorgatz
Dillinger Four
O.K. F.M. D.O.A.
from Midwestern Songs of the Americas, Hopeless, 1999
An excoriation of jaded punk-rock snobs that seems important to those of us who don't give a shit about scene politics, probably 'cause the chorus is as tuneful as a Bay City Rollers soccer chant. --Dylan Hicks
Atmosphere
The Abusing of the Rib
from Stuck on AM 2: Live Performances on 770 Radio K, No Alternative/770 Radio K, 1999
Baby got baggage. Rapping softly in the studios of KUOM-FM, Slug surveys the personality of a female lover who's "been put through hell," and sees a landscape of scorched earth, landmines, and other men's footprints. "Forget about the fact that many trails have been tracked/Maybe it's a plus that there's a path," he concludes, stepping back from insecurity. "If this was some uncharted land, I'd have to be a smarter man." A teenaged Eyedea offers gravelly backup, and Slug ends with what sounds like a spoken prayer for hip hop: "What do you love?" --Peter S. Scholtes
Low
Sunflower
from Things We Lost in the Fire, Kranky, 2001
Darker, weirder, and slower than anything else on this list, Low require you to change the way you listen in order to hear how hard they rock. But "Sunflower" repays your curiosity, from its opening line, "When they found your body," to its deepening mystery about a ransom and sunflowers given to the night. The rustic chamber-rock bridge is the best thing Steve Albini ever set to tape, and those inflection-free husband-wife harmonies are hard not to forever associate with the drive into Duluth, the band's hometown. --Peter S. Scholtes
Brother Ali
Forest Whitiker
from Shadows on the Sun, Rhymesayers, 2003
An outsider five different ways comes into his own and goes national with a track about how ugly he is, how beautiful he is, how little he cares what you think, either way. From Ali's perfect opening mantra ("Whatever comes up comes out/We don't put our hands over our mouth") to producer Ant's rippling organ sample, this is some feel-good hip hop that actually feels good. --Peter S. Scholtes
The Jayhawks
All the Right Reasons
from Rainy Day Music, American/Lost Highway, 2003
The singer sits alone on his bed, strumming an acoustic guitar and singing an ode to the source of his freedom. Listen to it once, and you'll hear a love song. Listen a few more times, and you'll hear a man disappointed by love and love songs. The cry in Gary Louris's voice as he confesses, "I'm loving you for all the right reasons," and "you helped me write this song," and "goodbye," suggests he's unsure of his reasons, his romance, and his muse, which is why this could be "Amazing Grace" on opposite day: He was found, but now he's lost. --Jim Walsh
Kid Dakota
10,000 Lakes
from The West Is the Future, Chair Kickers, 2004
Holy are the things that make Minnesotans feel small. Not just the scope of God's creation, but the dimensions of a 1,220-pound state fair pig, a super-sized cherry-spoon tchotchke, a 4.2-million-square-foot mall. For Kid Dakota singer-songwriter Darren Jackson, the Midwest itself is a mythopoetic dream of vastness--a great Paul Bunyan footprint that once pulled manifest destiny back from the coasts. In his ode to the frozen state, he gives in to all that space, as Alex Oana's orchestral, no-pedal-left-behind production dissolves into an airy fingerpicked guitar melody. Meanwhile, Jackson ponders his place in the big empty: The idea that he may be just a number in the Land of 10,000 Lakes? It makes him feel calmer. And weaker. --Melissa Maerz
Mason Jennings
Ballad of Paul and Sheila
from Use Your Voice, Bar None/Architect, 2004
It's not cool to keep fighting, but cool is overrated, anyway. Paul and Sheila Wellstone, R.I.P. --Peter S. Scholtes
In addition to all the people whose bylines appear in "Minnesota's 50 Greatest Hits," thanks to Paul Bringardner, Daniel Corrigan, Patty Dean, Randy Hawkins, Greg Linder, Aaron Money, Jason Nagel, Jean Silverberg, Doug Spartz, and Pat Whalen, all of whom offered ideas and suggestions helpful to the article's preparation.
