What songs take your breath away? I don't mean that in the sense that they're beautiful (although beautiful songs aren't excluded from the category). I mean that the song sounds like the band is leaving everything on the studio floor, and just listening to it is an athletic endeavor, even if you're sitting down.

Maybe there's a drum or rhythm guitar bit where you can't imagine how they're possibly playing that fast. Or the lead guitar that floats effortlessly along the top of it.Maybe the melody has taken you on an emotional journey in the span of three verses, four choruses and a bridge. Maybe the backing vocal just gets to you.

Here's a few that just blow me away:

Operation Spirit (The Tyranny of Tradition) - Live
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My Name Is Tom - The Jigsaw Seen
I'll Be Back - The Beatles
Unnoticed - Athenaeum
Straw Hat And Old Dirty Hank - Barenaked Ladies
Words Of Love - Mamas & The Papas
Go Your Way - The Attack
Gimme Shelter - Rolling Stones
Devil's Haircut - Beck
Sail On, Sailor - Beach Boys
I Should Never Have Let You Know - Matthew Sweet
Blow Away - George Harrison
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Turn To You - The Go-Gos
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Green Man - XTC

There are more that I'll think of, I'm sure.

Hank,

There's a great remix on the UK single of "Devil's Haircut" that I'm sure you'll love, a lot funkier.

But to answer your question, every track on the first two CD's (the third CD is demos) of the Lorraine Ellison: Sister Love box set from Rhino Handmade takes my breath away, the greatest emotional outpouring ever put on record, absolutely stunning work. I've bought three copies of the limited edition run, just to be on the safe side!

Other than that, the double whammy by The Hollies:
He Ain't Heavy
The Air That I Breathe

The thing that most recently took my breath away is McGuinn's guitar solo on "Change Is Now" from The Notorious Byrd Brothers. I was reading the book about The Notorious Byrd Brothers from the 33 1/3 series the other night, which at one point goes on and on about that solo, so I got my headphones on and had a moment (actually several).

i always felt that the who gave it everything they had on "won't get fooled again".

(Tryin to play a guitar solo with this band is like tryin to grow a) Watermellon in Easter Hay - Frank Zappa

Without You - Nilsson

In My Life - Beatles

Flowers Mr Florist - Alex Harvey
The Poet and I - Alex Harvey

Everybody's In Showbiz - Kinks

Dirge - Bob Dylan

Summerland - King's X

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"Anarchy in the UK"--Sex Pistols

I had no idea that the Go Go's had made a video for Turn to You.

I was very busy in the 80's.

Wow, I don't even know where to start. I can think of several guitar solos by Santana ("Super Boogie/Hong Kong Blues" on Viva Santana, "Hannibal" on Zebop!), Hendrix (Electric Ladyland's "Come On," "Red House" on Hendrix in the West) and John McLaughlin ("Noonward Race" from The Mahavishnu Orchestra's The Inner Mounting Flame) that just floor me.

The same with vocals like Philippe Wynne's on The Spinners' "Sadie" and Dusty Springfield on several cuts from Dusty in Memphis. Or James Brown on "Cold Sweat." Amazing.

Chip

With Rob Lowe, no less!

Jane's Mr. Spock wig is just creepy.

Besides fitting into the "breathtaking" category, I have always thought of these tracks as minor miracles:

"Roundabout"
"I Want You Back"
"Please Please Me"
"Waterloo Sunset"
"Ashes Are Burning"-Renaissance
"Thomas the Rhymer"-Steeleye Span, live version from "Sails of Silver"

"Celluloid Heroes" - Kinks

"Beck's Bolero" - Jeff Beck

"Eight Miles High" - Byrds

"We Got the Beat" - Go Gos

"Going Down to Liverpool" - Bangles
(Yes, I know it's a cover of a Katrina & the Waves song, but to me, it's the definitive version).

Fleetwood Mac -- Go Your Own Way, the way the intensity builds and builds. By the end of the song, Mick Fleetwood's incredible drumming and Buckingham's searing guitar just build to an amazing climax. Then there's that last stab at the guitar Lindsay makes just as it's fading out -- perfect ending. When I've got headphones on and the volume cranked, it almost always makes the back of my neck tingle.

Also,
A Horse With No Name - America
Northern Sky and Place To Be -- Nick Drake
Do It Again and Reeling In The Years -- Steely Dan
Stealing Rosemary -- Bangles
September Gurls -- Big Star
Ticket To Ride -- Beatles
Who Knows Where The Time Goes -- Fairport Convention
Between Clark and Hilldale -- Love
Voodoo Chile -- Hendrix
Roundabout -- Yes

And so many more...

"Tomorrow Never Knows" - The Beatles
"You Can't Always Get What You Want" - The Rolling Stones
"Where The Streets Have No Name" - U2
"Cry" - Godley & Creme
"Halley's Waitress" - Fountains of Wayne
"It's All Been Done" - Barenaked Ladies
"Bittersweet Symphony" - The Verve
"Free As A Bird" - The Beatles (I never thought I'd hear those voices singing together again!)

Also from The Beatles: The mono versions of "Eleanor Rigby" and "Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds" - These two tracks, more than any other, cemented my preference for the mono Beatles lps over the stereo versions.

When Dusty Springfield hits the chorus of Just One Smile from Dusty in Memphis it makes me stop breathing, gives me goosebumps, and, if I haven't had my coffee brings a tear to my eye.

"Reflections" by the Supremes
"I've Just Seen a Face" by The Beatles
"Vacation" by the Go-Gos
"I Still Haven't Found What I Am Looking For" by U2
"Groovy Kind of Love" by The Mindbenders (and also the Phil Collins version too)
"Dancing in the Streets" by Martha Reeves and The VanDellas
"Air That I Breathe" by The Hollies
"Can't Get It Out of My Mind" by ELO
"Bohemian Rhapsody" by Queen
"It's Only Rock and Roll (And I Like It!)" by The Rolling Stones

Wake Me Shake Me (when it's over) -- The Four Tops

Boy Blue -- ELO

I Can't Give Back the Love I Feel For You -- Jeff Beck Group

and the most courageous live performance, ever, in the world ....

I'm Going Home (by helicopter...) -- Ten Years After

So happy to see this song in this list! I bounce back and forth between Alone Again Or and The People Must Be The Times ( Betweem Clark & Hillsdale) as the most amazing songs by Love. Great choice!

Be My Baby - The Ronettes (Phil Spector)
Never Need More Than This - Ike and Tina Turner (Phil Spector)
You've Lost That Lovin' Feeling - Righteous Brothers (Phil Spector)
Reach Out - Four Tops
A Change is Gonna Come - Sam Cooke
Misirlou - Dick Dale and the Del-Tones
Toussaint L'Ouverture - Santana
Anarchy in the UK - Sex Pistols
The Hair Anthology Suite - The Checkmates Ltd. (Phil Spector)
Sloop John B - The Beach Boys

Yep, that's one of the moments on Memphis that I was referring to earlier.
Chip

The last passage ("on the hill we viewed the silence of the valley...) of the studio version of YES - "Close to the Edge" performs exactly as Jon anderson intended. That's supposed to represent all of the scenes of your life passing by you at once in the end.

The "Eclipse" portion of "And You And I" always works to uplift me. I especially like that live portion they recorded as the show opener at Cobo Arena in 1976. It's on last year's Rhino "The Word Is Live" boxed set.

"I Hear A Symphony" by the Supremes has a nice build to it's inevitable climax.

"My World Is Empty Without You" is an unfairly overlooked gem, especially the mono version for radio that emphasized the strings in the bridge (instead of the honking horns). Simply mesmerizing in it's polish. It should have been the seventh #1 for them, and I think it's been getting revived a lot these days.

The piano and guitar solos in Layla.