The 65 Best Songs of All Time

Apr 07, 2025

I dedicate this post as a birthday gift to my friend since our twenties, Matt Bordonaro.

This playlist will serve its purpose if you find one or two songs you loved years ago but have forgotten about, so you can put them back on one of your playlists. If you find a gem or two that’s new to you, even better.

Of course, these are only the 65 best songs of all time in my personal musical experience — and at this moment in my life. These are my 65 favorite songs of all time, and this is totally subjective, as it is with any list of “the best”.

(Also, this list does not include any love songs, as that would double the number of songs to be considered and because those are the most subjective songs there are — meaningful to two people in an intimate relationship.)

So these are the 65 songs I listen to most often — now, in April 2025 — and I suppose what they have in common is that they trigger something transcendent or even profound in my consciousness, in my soul. They resonate and reverberate through my being and they take me into a higher or deeper space.

Some of these songs — U2’s “Bad”, Enya’s “Watermark”, Peter Gabriel’s “A Different Drum” — have been among my favorite songs since my early twenties, back in the 1980s, and I’ve listened to them a thousand times across four decades. Some — like Chandler Moore’s “Lead Me On” and Lauren Daigle’s “Then I Will” — I’ve discovered in early 2025.

My favorite songs tend to be expansive songs (Mark Mancina’s “August’s Rhapsody”), deeply humanitarian songs (Michael Jackson’s “Heal the World”, Peter Gabriel’s “Biko”, Jewel’s “Hands”), profoundly empowering songs (Whitney Houston’s “One Moment in Time”, David Archuleta’s “Glorious”), songs with psychological depth (Peter Gabriel’s “Here Comes the Flood”, Enigma’s “The Child in Us”), Christian songs (Mozart’s “Laudaute Dominum”, Jonathan Helser’s “Fly” and “I’ve Seen I Am”, Michael W. Smith’s “Breathe”, Chandler Moore’s “Lead Me On”, CeCe Winan’s “Goodness of God”), and mystical or other spiritual songs that are lazily called “New Age” songs (Enya’s “Watermark” and “Evening Falls” and Yanni’s “Adagio in C Minor” and “Until the Last Moment”).

Four of these songs (by Mozart, Vivaldi, Pachelbel, and the five or six people responsible for “Be Thou My Vision”) predate the Folk Generation, and four are by John Williams of the Folk Generation (often called the Silent Generation) born from 1925 to 1942.

From the next three generations of musicians, 18 of these songs are by Boomers born from 1943 to 1959, 21 are by my fellow GenXers born in the 1960s and 1970s, and 18 are by Millennials born in the 1980s and 1990s.

Leading the Boomers, with four songs each, are Peter Gabriel, Enigma, and Yanni and, with three songs, Michael W. Smith.

Image result for michael w. smith performing

Peter Gabriel is my favorite musician, but a couple dozen of his songs that I consider great and find personally meaningful come in in my Top 150, not my Top 65.

Leading the Xers (and all the musicians on the list), with seven songs, is Enya, followed by Jonathan David Helser with five songs and U2 with three songs.

Leading the Millennials, with three songs each, are Lauren Daigle and Alicia Keys.

(I realize that some of these songs were written by a person from another generation than the singer, but I think that when a singer “owns” a song with their delivery, with their voice, it’s theirs.)

Alicia Keys Releases New Album Titled ‘Keys’ – Listen Now! | Alicia Keys, First Listen, Music ...

One song is here twice. I regard Yanni’s “Adagio in C Minor” as the third best song of all time, and it’s also stellar when Nathan Pacheco added lyrics and sang them. Since 2009 I’ve regarded Nathan Pacheco, a Millennial, as the world’s best living singer, and so I listen to his version of “Be Thou My Vision” as well.

If you’re on Spotify, the playlist is here.

On YouTube, the playlist is here.

Each song listed links to its YouTube video.

All my best,

Mike

Stories for a New Florence

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