Smells Like Teen Spirit
1991 · From Nevermind
Four chords, a mumble nobody could decipher, and the riff that ended one decade of rock and started another.
★ 9.9
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.
Browse all 2,393 songs or filter by genre, subject, artist, and year.
While My Guitar Gently WeepsThe Beatles
While My Guitar Gently Weeps
1968 · From The White Album
Harrison opened a book at random, saw "gently weeps", and Clapton came in uncredited to play the solo.
★ 8.0
Last Nite
2001 · From Is This It
Built on the bones of Tom Petty's American Girl, which Petty confirmed without complaint, and recorded in Gordon Raphael's basement.
★ 7.7
Loser
1994 · From Mellow Gold
Six and a half hours in Stephenson's house, a slide guitar loop, and a hook mocking Beck's own rapping.
★ 7.6
Clint Eastwood
2001
Albarn built it on a melodica and an Omnichord's first preset; Del cut his verses in half an hour.
★ 7.4
Ode to Billie Joe
1967
Gentry's demo vocal was kept, Jimmie Haskell added four violins and two cellos, and the intended B-side became the A-side hit.
★ 7.3
It's the End of the World As We Know It (And I Feel Fine)
1987 · From Document
A dream about a party where every guest had Lenny Bruce's initials, sped into Document's headlong disaster list.
★ 6.8
Pretty Vacant
1977 · From Never Mind the Bollocks, Here's the Sex Pistols
Matlock's riff, lifted off ABBA's "SOS", and the sound of a generation deciding not to care.
★ 6.7
Oxford Comma
2008 · From Vampire Weekend
Koenig found the punctuation via a Columbia Facebook group, then wrote a song about not caring at all.
★ 6.0
Brain Stew / Jaded
1995 · From Insomniac
A slow descending riff, Armstrong's insomnia, and a segue into Jaded that welded the two songs together permanently.
★ 5.7
A.D.H.D
2011 · From Section.80
Sounwave's woozy loop, Ab-Soul in the margins, and Lamar naming a generation's numbness on his debut album.
★ 5.5
Flagpole Sitta
1998
Named for a 1920s pole-sitting fad, cut in Seattle in 1996, and now inseparable from Peep Show's opening titles.
★ 4.7
Another Day in Paradise
1989
The last number one of the eighties and the first of the nineties, with David Crosby singing behind Collins.
★ 4.0
Up Against the Wall
2006
Seven minutes long, never a single, self-produced by the trio, and the longest slow burn on Writer's Block.
★ 3.7