What are the five songs that define your life? It's easy to create a list of your favorite songs (even though they may change often), but far more difficult to trim a list down to just five songs; songs that have a deeply personal meaning to you or that motivate you or describe your life in some way. They may wind up being your favorite songs, but the interesting part is trying to narrow your list down to just five. It's harder to do than it sounds and it provides a good look into each person. Here's a look at the five songs for Bob Malone.
1. "Scenes From an Italian Restaurant" - Billy Joel. I heard this for the first time in 1980 - in the Sears stereo department at Willowbrook Mall. I was 14 and on the way home from my piano lesson (at the Hammond organ store on Rt. 46 -- just a mile or so past Fountains of Wayne!). I was deeply in love with classical music and wanted to be a concert pianist and knew practically nothing of popular music. This stopped me in my tracks -- it wasn't just a song, it was a piece of music. And if you grew up in the suburbs around New York, you all knew your own Brenda and Eddie. In five minutes, everything had changed. By 16 I was writing songs and playing clubs underage in a rock and roll band.
2. Side Two of Abbey Road - The Beatles. OK, yes, I'm cheating. Sue me! I can't narrow this list down to my five favorite Beatles songs, let alone five songs from all of musical history. But it is all kind of one long song if you want to get technical about it, and its got everything that made the Beatles such a monumentally groundbreaking band. And when you finish off your band and your final album with something as perfect as "The End," quitting while you're ahead is the best possible artistic choice.
3. "Ribs" - Lorde. "This dream isn't feeling sweet, we're reeling through the midnight streets, and I've never felt more alone, it feels so scary getting old." Sure, she was 15 when she wrote this -- what did she know about getting old? Apparently, a lot -- I was 47 when I first heard it, and I felt it all the way to the core of my crusty middle-aged soul. Like everything else on this list, it gives me the chills every time.
4. "The Fever" - Southside Johnny & the Asbury Jukes. Not the greatest Springsteen song of all time, but it is a great song -- even surrounded by a record mostly full of old classics, it holds it's own spectacularly well. And I admit this is a clever shortcut to expressing my Springsteen love and my Southside Johnny love all at once. But the most important reason this is here is that as a kid growing up in the New Jersey suburbs in the 1980s, where most of the music we heard was coming from AOR rock radio or MTV, I was not being exposed to any of the classic blues and R&B that I would come to love so much -- I learned about that music from the first three Southside Johnny records. It was Southside who led me to Ray Charles and Sam & Dave and Aretha Franklin and Sam Cooke and Bobby Blue Bland and Muddy Waters and Louis Jordan and ultimately the New Orleans music that ended up being such a huge part of my musical DNA.
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5. "One For My Baby" - Frank Sinatra. Sinatra, of course, did not write this song -- the great Harold Arlen and Johnny Mercer did -- but he owns it. And it wasn't the orchestrated version from "Only The Lonely" that made me fall in love with it, it was an unreleased demo he recorded with just his pianist Bill Miller. It made me appreciate the Great American Songbook in ways I was never able to before. It's for everyone who has found and lost their Ava Gardner and knows that no one else is ever going to fill that hole in their heart.
ABOUT BOB MALONE
Bob Malone has amassed a loyal international fan-base through twenty-five years of relentless touring and nine critically acclaimed album releases. He has also played keyboards for John Fogerty since joining his band in 2011. He's been a session player for Ringo Starr and Avril Lavigne, and his recording of "You're A Mean One, Mr. Grinch" was the theme in the 2018 Illumination/Universal movie trailers for The Grinch. Bob combines unforgettable songwriting, refreshing reinterpretations of classic tunes, and a one-of-a-kind hybrid of rock, melodic pop, blues, and New Orleans R&B, delivered with high-energy piano virtuosity and a voice all his own.
Solo and with his band, Bob has played Umbria Jazz Festival (ITALY), Glastonbury Music Festival (UK), Long Beach Bayou Festival (US), Blue Mountains Music Festival (AU), Cincy Blues Festival (US), Umbria Jazz Week (CHINA), plus headlining shows at Iridium (NYC), Garry Marshall Theatre (L.A.), 606 Club (LONDON), Dazzle Jazz & Blues (DENVER), and Clay Center For The Arts (CHARLESTON, WV). He's been featured twice at WWOZ Piano Night in New Orleans.
As a member of John Fogerty's band, he's played New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival, Radio City Music Hall, The Hollywood Bowl, Late Night with David Letterman, The View, Good Morning America, and "A Grammy Salute to the Songs Of Change" on CBS. He is featured on the 2019 concert album/DVD 50 Year Trip: Live at Red Rocks and John's 2013 studio album Wrote A Song For Everyone.
Bob's 2016 Mojo Deluxe album went to #1 on the IBBA UK radio chart and was one of the top 100 most played CDs on the Roots Music Report radio charts. His latest, Good People, was released in May 2021 and singles from it are already being played on WFUV NYC, KCSN L.A., and SiriusXM The Loft. His songs and his playing have been heard on NCSI New Orleans, Entertainment Tonight, Lucifer, and The Hallmark Channel.
Bob's music has been heard on NCIS New Orleans, Entertainment Tonight and many other shows. He has written symphony orchestra scores for Voices of Classic Soul (ex-Temptations, Four Tops, Platters, Drifters) and arranged big band and strings for a song recorded by Avril Lavigne for the Hallmark Channel.
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If you are a musician interested in taking part in our 5 Songs That Define Your Life series, please email us for more information.
It may not have generated the publicity that Bruce Springsteen received dedicating "The Promised Land" to Renee Good during of Light of Day Festival, but the great Jersey singer-songwriter Bruce Tunkel has made an even more powerful statement about the Minneapolis ICE victim.
(EAST FREEHOLD, NJ) -- ParkStage, the nonprofit Count Basie Center's outdoor concert venue collaboration with Monmouth County Tourism, has revealed its first wave of artists coming this summer to East Freehold Showgrounds - Sublime (Friday, June 19), The Head and The Heart with special guests Wilderado (Friday, June 26), and The B-52s with special guests The English Beat (Saturday, July 11).
(OLD BRIDGE, NJ) -- People Get Ready for the 'Keeping the Blues Alive' 2026 Tour, featuring the BBD Rhythm & Blues Band. They have two shows in January - Sammy D's Bar Wine & Spirits in Old Bridge on Saturday, January 24th and Lizzie Rose Music Room in Tuckerton on Friday, January 30, 2026. Additional shows run throughout February.
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