Yesterday
1965 · From Help!
McCartney dreamt the melody, called it "Scrambled Eggs" for weeks, then let a string quartet make it immortal.
★ 9.5
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.
I Want You Back
1969
A child singing about regret over the springiest bassline Motown ever cut, and selling it completely.
★ 9.1
You've Lost That Lovin' FeelinThe Righteous Brothers
You've Lost That Lovin' Feelin
1964
Spector printed 3:05 on the label of a 3:45 record, and it became the century's most-played song on American radio.
★ 8.8
He Stopped Loving Her Today
1980
Jones thought nobody would play something so morbid; Sherrill spent eighteen months coaxing the vocal onto tape.
★ 8.3
Stardust (1927)
1927
Carmichael whistled the tune to his band at Gennett and cut it fast; Parish added the lyric two years later.
★ 8.3
Hallelujah
1994 · From Grace
Buckley learned it from John Cale's version and cut over twenty takes at Bearsville; the edit sounds like one breath.
★ 8.2
Tangled Up in Blue
1975 · From Blood on the Tracks
Dylan recut it in Minneapolis with his brother producing, then spent decades rewriting a story already told out of order.
★ 8.2
Heart of Glass
1978
A demo kicked around since the mid-seventies, rebuilt on a Roland drum machine that appalled their punk friends.
★ 7.9
Nothing Compares 2 USinead O'Connor
Nothing Compares 2 U
1990
Prince wrote it for a side project that went nowhere; O'Connor's tears in the video were real, and unplanned.
★ 7.9
The Thrill Is Gone
1969 · From Completely Well
Bert de Coteaux's twelve-piece string section, overdubbed a week later, carried King's minor-key blues onto pop radio.
★ 7.8
T for Texas (Blue Yodel No. 1)
1928
Cut in a converted Camden church in 1927, two takes, and the yodel that made hillbilly records big business.
★ 7.7
Blueberry Hill
1956
Nobody in the room had the lyrics, so Bunny Robyn spliced three broken takes into Domino's biggest hit.
★ 7.6
Me and Bobby McGee
1971 · From Pearl
Joplin taped the vocal days before her death; Kristofferson did not hear it until the day after.
★ 7.6
You Keep Me Hangin' On
1966
Dozier reportedly took the Morse code guitar figure from a radio news signal, and Ross demands her exit over it.
★ 7.6
Mystery Train
1955 · From The Sun Sessions
Two years after Junior Parker cut it at Sun, Moore's slapback guitar turned the same train into rockabilly.
★ 7.6
St. Louis BluesBessie Smith
St. Louis Blues
1925 · From The Complete Recordings
Armstrong's cornet answering every line Smith sings, with only a wheezing harmonium underneath, cut in New York in 1925.
★ 7.5
Thinkin Bout YouFrank Ocean
Thinkin Bout You
2012 · From Channel Orange
Ocean wrote it for Bridget Kelly's album, kept it instead, and the falsetto he reaches for does the rest.
★ 7.5
Someone Like You
2011 · From 21
Dan Wilson of Semisonic at the piano, Adele singing, nothing else added; five weeks at number one.
★ 7.5
I Can't Stop Loving You
1962 · From Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music
A Don Gibson country weepie, Marty Paich's strings behind it, and five weeks at number one in 1962.
★ 7.5
Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain
1975 · From Red Headed Stranger
Fred Rose wrote it in the forties; Nelson's Texas version had Columbia's boss asking why he'd sent a demo.
★ 7.3
More Than a FeelingBoston
More Than a Feeling
1976 · From Boston
Five years in Scholz's basement, a hundred-dollar Yamaha twelve-string on the intro, and Delp stacking harmonies over the top.
★ 7.3
The Boys of SummerDon Henley
The Boys of Summer
1984
Campbell built the track on a LinnDrum, Petty passed, and Henley wrote middle age onto somebody else's demo.
★ 7.3
Dazed and ConfusedLed Zeppelin
Dazed and Confused
1969 · From Led Zeppelin
Jake Holmes wrote it in 1967, the Yardbirds absorbed it, Page cut it at Olympic with a violin bow.
★ 7.3
There Goes My Baby
1959
Strings, timpani and a Brazilian baion; Wexler reportedly dismissed the playback as a radio caught between two stations.
★ 7.3
Alison
1977 · From My Aim is True
Costello glimpsed a supermarket checkout girl, Clover backed him before the Attractions existed, and one line titled his debut.
★ 7.2
Cortez the Killer
1975 · From Zuma
Young's tone in double drop D, a blown console that erased the last verse, and a Franco-era Spanish ban.
★ 7.2
In Dreams
1963
Seven sections in under three minutes, no chorus repeated, and a melody Orbison said arrived while half asleep.
★ 7.1
Scarborough Fair
1966
Simon learned it from Martin Carthy in London; Garfunkel wound an anti-war lyric through the ballad as counterpoint.
★ 7.0
She's Not ThereThe Zombies
She's Not There
1964 · From Begin Here
A minor key, a Hohner Pianet solo, and a debut single Argent wrote to fit Blunstone's upper range.
★ 6.9
Caroline, No
1966 · From Pet Sounds
Twelve players at Western, an empty water jug for percussion, and Murry Wilson speeding the tape a semitone.
★ 6.9
Pictures of You
1989 · From Disintegration
A house fire left Smith with photographs of Mary salvaged from his wallet, and one became the single's sleeve.
★ 6.9
Ruby TuesdayThe Rolling Stones
Ruby Tuesday
1967 · From Between the Buttons
Brian Jones on recorder, Wyman fingering a double bass while Richards bowed it, and the Stones' most delicate number one.
★ 6.8
Mary Jane's Last Dance
1993 · From Greatest Hits
Originally called Indiana Girl, until Petty decided he couldn't sing that line; Stan Lynch's last sessions with the Heartbreakers.
★ 6.7
The Dance
1989
Tony Arata's lyric works as a breakup song or an elegy, and Brooks' video chose the elegy.
★ 6.6
Heartbeats (The Knife)
2002
Pitchfork's fifteenth-best song of the 2000s, the Dreijer siblings' synth pulse, later stripped to one acoustic guitar by Jose Gonzalez.
★ 6.6
In Between DaysThe Cure
In Between Days
1985 · From The Head on the Door
Smith's six-string bass, acoustic guitars strummed to a blur, and the Cure's sunniest song about feeling old.
★ 6.6
Remember the Time
1991 · From Dangerous
Teddy Riley's new jack swing under a nostalgia lyric, with John Singleton staging the video in ancient Egypt.
★ 6.5
Walkin' After Midnight
1957 · From Patsy Cline
Written for Kay Starr and shelved, resisted by Cline, then sung to victory on Arthur Godfrey's talent show.
★ 6.5
Bang Bang (My Baby Shot Me Down)Nancy Sinatra
Bang Bang (My Baby Shot Me Down)
1966
Tremolo guitar from arranger Billy Strange, a murder-ballad chorus, and the reading Tarantino chose for Kill Bill's credits.
★ 6.5
Flume
2008 · From For Emma, Forever Ago
Three months alone in his father's Wisconsin hunting cabin, and falsetto stacked until one voice becomes a choir.
★ 6.4
More Than This
1982 · From Avalon
Ferry's voice drops out almost two minutes before the end, leaving a synthesizer to finish the thought.
★ 6.4
Plush
1992
The riff arrived in the back of a U-Haul, and DeLeo's ragtime chords carried grunge to a Grammy.
★ 6.3
My Heart Will Go OnCeline Dion
My Heart Will Go On
1997
Cameron resisted a pop song entirely, then kept Dion's demo vocal, one take, in the finished film.
★ 6.3
Stormy Weather (Lena Horne)
1943
Arlen and Koehler wrote it for the Cotton Club in 1933; a decade later Horne made it hers on film.
★ 6.2
MissingEverything but the Girl
Missing
1995
Todd Terry's remix pushed a subdued album cut into New York house, then held the Hot 100 for a year.
★ 6.1
She Thinks I Still CareGeorge Jones
She Thinks I Still Care
1962
His biographer says Jones grumbled about all the 'just becauses'; Jones denied it, then sat six weeks at country number one.
★ 6.1
Remember (Walkin' in the Sand)
1964 · From Leader of the Pack
Shadow Morton had never written a hit when he cut this demo, seagull effects and all, to prove he could.
★ 6.0
She's Got YouPatsy Cline
She's Got You
1962 · From Sentimentally Yours
Owen Bradley produced the December 1961 session; Cline works through an inventory of keepsakes while Floyd Cramer's piano answers.
★ 5.9
Miss Misery
1997 · From Good Will Hunting (Original Soundtrack)
An earlier version with different lyrics sat unreleased until Good Will Hunting sent Smith to the Oscars in white.
★ 5.9
Come See About Me
1964
Nella Dodds's cover reached shops first, so Motown rushed theirs out; the Supremes took it to number one.
★ 5.9
Stormy Weather (Ethel Waters)
1933
Written for Cab Calloway, who missed the Cotton Club bill; Waters premiered it there in 1933 and owned it.
★ 5.8
Whiskey Lullaby
2004
Two verses, two voices, and Jerry Douglas's Dobro; Bill Anderson and Jon Randall wrote country's bleakest modern ballad.
★ 5.8
Margaritaville
1977
Norbert Putnam moved the sessions to Miami for the beachfront air, and Buffett turned one ruined afternoon into the chorus.
★ 5.7
Tennessee WaltzPatti Page
Tennessee Waltz
1950
Stewart reportedly wrote the lyrics on a matchbox cover, and Page's double-tracked vocal held number one for nine weeks.
★ 5.7
Rosanna
1982
Jeff Porcaro's half-time shuffle carried it to Record of the Year, and drummers have been chasing that groove since.
★ 5.6
Whiskey River
1973 · From Shotgun Willie
A Johnny Bush song Nelson borrowed for Shotgun Willie, then used to open nearly every concert since 1974.
★ 5.6
Blue Christmas
1968 · From Elvis' Christmas Album
Millie Kirkham's soprano wailing over the Jordanaires at Radio Recorders, 1957, with Scotty Moore answering every line.
★ 5.6
Maybe
1957
A Manhattan church studio, Richard Barrett's piano figure, and a sixteen-year-old lead vocal that opened the girl-group era.
★ 5.5
Tuesday's GoneLynyrd Skynyrd
Tuesday's Gone
1973 · From Pronounced Leh-nerd Skin-nerd
A Mellotron faking the strings, producer Al Kooper credited as Roosevelt Gook, and Van Zant's rambling farewell.
★ 5.4
When I Was Your Man
2012
Voice and piano, nothing else, Mars playing it himself at Levcon and singing a regret he cannot take back.
★ 5.3
Need You Now
2009
Four writers, one late-night phone call, and a chorus that took Record and Song of the Year at the Grammys.
★ 5.2
Time is On My SideIrma Thomas
Time is On My Side
1964
A B-side cut in April 1964, with Jimmy Norman adding lyrics at the session; Jagger later copied her ad-libs.
★ 5.1
You Wear It Well
1972 · From Never a Dull Moment
A letter to an ex, sung over acoustic guitar, fiddle and McLagan's Hammond, and another UK number one.
★ 4.9
No More "I Love You's"
1995
Roland Barthes' A Lover's Discourse fed the 1986 original; Lennox and Lipson rebuilt it into a Grammy winner.
★ 4.9
Carry Me Ohio
2003 · From Ghosts of the Great Highway
Kozelek grew up in Massillon, Ohio, and this is what he sends back: an apology set to ringing acoustic guitars.
★ 4.9
Goodnight Irene
1950
Lead Belly died months before Gordon Jenkins's orchestra carried his waltz to thirteen weeks atop the American charts.
★ 4.9
It Must Have Been Love
1987
Written to order as a Christmas single, then reworded for Pretty Woman and two weeks atop the Hot 100.
★ 4.8
It's All Coming Back to Me NowCeline Dion
It's All Coming Back to Me Now
1996
Steinman wrote it out of Wuthering Heights for Pandora's Box in 1989, and Dion made it enormous.
★ 4.8
Red Red Wine
1983
UB40 knew only Tony Tribe's reggae cover, saw "N Diamond" on the label, and guessed a Jamaican singer.
★ 4.5
Other PeopleBeach House
Other People
2012 · From Bloom
Cut to 24-track analog tape at Sonic Ranch in Texas, gauzy organ, Legrand singing a relationship dissolving.
★ 4.5
U Remind Me
2001
Cut at Tree Sound in Georgia with Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis producing, it won Usher his first Grammy.
★ 4.4
All By Myself
1996
Eric Carmen's verse borrowed from Rachmaninoff's Second Concerto, and Dion nailing the high F Foster dared her to try.
★ 4.4
Valerie
1982
Every instrument on it is Winwood alone; the 1982 single stalled, and Tom Lord-Alge's 1987 remix reached the top ten.
★ 4.3
Always Something There to Remind MeNaked Eyes
Always Something There to Remind Me
1983
Bacharach and David's 1964 ballad rebuilt in synthesizers at Abbey Road, and by Byrne's account the vocal took one take.
★ 4.2
Ocean Avenue
2004
Sean Mackin's violin cutting through the guitars, and an avenue that is really a boulevard in Atlantic Beach, Florida.
★ 4.1
If It Isn't Love
1988
Jam and Lewis rebuilt the group as grown men, Johnny Gill's first single with them, Tresvant on lead.
★ 4.1
Desert Rose
1999
An Arabic descant improvised by Cheb Mami without hearing Sting's lyric, and both halves came out about longing.
★ 4.1
When I Call Your Name
1989
Gill wrote it with Tim DuBois, Patty Loveless sang the harmony, and the CMA named it Single of the Year.
★ 4.0
Jamaica Say You Will
1972
Clarence White on acoustic guitar, and the demo that led David Geffen to found Asylum Records and sign Browne.
★ 4.0