The Songs canon

Sourced and sung.

Every song chosen by hand, with the recording to play it.
Browse all 2,393 songs or filter by genre, subject, artist, and year.

Treasure

2013

Breakbot got a songwriting credit after the fact, and Mars turned late-seventies disco into a top-five American hit.

★ 4.9
FunkytownLipps Inc.

Funkytown

1980

A ten-note synth riff cut at Sound 80 in Minneapolis, Cynthia Johnson vocoded then unleashed at full wail.

★ 4.9
Get Up Offa That ThingJames Brown

Get Up Offa That Thing

1976 · From Get Up Offa That Thing

Brown put the writing credit in his wife's and daughters' names over IRS debts, then cut it live in two takes.

★ 5.3

Mr. Big Stuff

1971

Wardell Quezergue brought five artists to Malaco in a borrowed school bus; Stax passed, then Knight's put-down sold millions.

★ 5.6
P-Funk (Wants to Get Funked Up)Parliament

P-Funk (Wants to Get Funked Up)

1975

Mothership Connection opens as a pirate broadcast from space, with Maceo Parker and Fred Wesley newly defected from James Brown.

★ 5.7
LovefoolThe Cardigans

Lovefool

1996

A bossa nova sketch until the drummer swapped in a disco beat, and Persson made pleading sound like sunshine.

★ 5.8

Word Up!

1986

Blackmon's guttural bark over a whistle nodding to a Morricone western, plus three weeks at number one R&B.

★ 5.9
It's Your ThingThe Isley Brothers

It's Your Thing

1969

Sixteen-year-old Ernie Isley's bass on his first session, cut for the brothers' own T-Neck label, funk built on a shrug.

★ 6.2

1 Thing

2005

Rich Harrison looped a ten-second Meters breakdown, stacked go-go percussion on top, and Amerie chases the beat.

★ 6.3