# Most Unexpected / Obscure Song Heard In A Restaurant or Other Public Setting **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Tags:** music\ **Created:** [November 5, 2012, 5:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-unexpected-obscure-song-heard-in-a-restaurant-or-other-public-setting/639971 "2012-11-05T17:18:13Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![It\_s\_Not\_Rocket\_Surgery](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/it_s_not_rocket_surgery/32/312_2.png) [@It\_s\_Not\_Rocket\_Surgery](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/It_s_Not_Rocket_Surgery)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2012, 5:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-unexpected-obscure-song-heard-in-a-restaurant-or-other-public-setting/639971/1 "2012-11-05T17:18:13Z")
What completely unexpected or surprising song have you heard in a restaurant, in a store, listening to on-hold music, or somewhere else that plays “piped-in” music or Muzak? I was in Breuggers Bagels last week. Breuggers tends to play some interesting music, but mostly stuff from the 90s (e.g. lots of Ben Folds and Indigo Girls types). So I was taken by surprise when they played [Cuckoo Cocoon](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qBx-zjFHVT8) by Genesis. ---
**Author:** ![Bridget\_Burke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7cd45c/32.png) [@Bridget\_Burke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bridget_Burke)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2012, 5:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-unexpected-obscure-song-heard-in-a-restaurant-or-other-public-setting/639971/2 "2012-11-05T17:19:55Z")
Sitting in a Dunkin Donuts many years ago, waiting to start my day’s temping. A sleek instrumental of Leonard Cohen’s “Famous Blue Raincoat” came over the sound system… ---
**Author:** ![Labdad](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/439d5e/32.png) [@Labdad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Labdad)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2012, 5:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-unexpected-obscure-song-heard-in-a-restaurant-or-other-public-setting/639971/3 "2012-11-05T17:55:30Z")
Also many years ago, before the days of satellite radio, etc, the Muzak playing in a depatment store in Clearwater, FL included an instrumental version of the Youngbloods’ [“Darkness, Darkness”](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kLVWxuMsiDQ). Even more unusual: it wasn’t half-bad! ---
**Author:** ![DivineComedienne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/c67d28/32.png) [@DivineComedienne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DivineComedienne)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2012, 6:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-unexpected-obscure-song-heard-in-a-restaurant-or-other-public-setting/639971/4 "2012-11-05T18:06:04Z")
At a medium range family-type restaurant one night, “Cocaine” ---
**Author:** ![lost4life](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/c4cdca/32.png) [@lost4life](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lost4life)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2012, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-unexpected-obscure-song-heard-in-a-restaurant-or-other-public-setting/639971/5 "2012-11-05T18:09:29Z")
Not too unusual being that it’s been used in commercials, but I still found Iggy Pop’s **The Passenger** an odd choice for a Krogers. ---
**Author:** ![zoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zoid/32/336_2.png) [@zoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zoid)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2012, 6:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-unexpected-obscure-song-heard-in-a-restaurant-or-other-public-setting/639971/6 "2012-11-05T18:12:55Z")
I was in Jewels (Chicago grocery) not too long ago and heard [Head Like a Hole](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cV2EUUF47Ms). I must say it struck me as odd. ---
**Author:** ![tomcar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7993a0/32.png) [@tomcar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomcar)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2012, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-unexpected-obscure-song-heard-in-a-restaurant-or-other-public-setting/639971/7 "2012-11-05T18:15:57Z")
Eno and Cale’s Spinning Away ---
**Author:** ![TV\_time](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/f17d59/32.png) [@TV\_time](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TV_time)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2012, 6:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-unexpected-obscure-song-heard-in-a-restaurant-or-other-public-setting/639971/8 "2012-11-05T18:17:12Z")
“The Cat Came Back” it was done by three strolling minstrels in a very upscale place…really surprised me. ---
**Author:** ![Phoebestar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/13edae/32.png) [@Phoebestar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Phoebestar)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2012, 6:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-unexpected-obscure-song-heard-in-a-restaurant-or-other-public-setting/639971/9 "2012-11-05T18:20:23Z")
A Muzak version of James “Laid” at Wendy’s in 1995. ---
**Author:** ![FordTaurusSHO94](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/f07891/32.png) [@FordTaurusSHO94](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FordTaurusSHO94)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2012, 6:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-unexpected-obscure-song-heard-in-a-restaurant-or-other-public-setting/639971/10 "2012-11-05T18:22:07Z")
Walmart played Walk by Pantera one time while I was in there. ---
**Author:** ![Hypno-Toad](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b2d939/32.png) [@Hypno-Toad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hypno-Toad)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2012, 6:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-unexpected-obscure-song-heard-in-a-restaurant-or-other-public-setting/639971/11 "2012-11-05T18:53:02Z")
I remember noting that the Muzak version of “Gangsters Paradise” was playing in the grocery store at which I worked. I normally wouldn’t have heard it but I was in the break room. ---
**Author:** ![John\_DiFool](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_difool/32/19543_2.png) [@John\_DiFool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_DiFool)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2012, 6:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-unexpected-obscure-song-heard-in-a-restaurant-or-other-public-setting/639971/12 "2012-11-05T18:56:28Z")
Monday Night Football once (I want to say late 80’s/early 90’s) played the opening riff off of The Church’s “Tantalized”-yes, it was after their brief fling with fame in 1987, but still… ---
**Author:** ![Eutychus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Eutychus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eutychus)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2012, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-unexpected-obscure-song-heard-in-a-restaurant-or-other-public-setting/639971/13 "2012-11-05T19:09:58Z")
Can’t remember exactly where I was, but I heard a Muzak version of Frank Zappa’s “Peaches En Regalia” ---
**Author:** ![Ponch8](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ponch8/32/9883_2.png) [@Ponch8](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ponch8)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2012, 7:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-unexpected-obscure-song-heard-in-a-restaurant-or-other-public-setting/639971/14 "2012-11-05T19:18:36Z")
> [@Hypno-Toad](#): > > I remember noting that the Muzak version of “Gangsters Paradise” was playing in the grocery store at which I worked. I normally wouldn’t have heard it but I was in the break room. That could have been “Pastime Paradise” by Stevie Wonder, which Coolio sampled for his song. ---
**Author:** ![Equipoise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/equipoise/32/151_2.png) [@Equipoise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Equipoise)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2012, 7:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-unexpected-obscure-song-heard-in-a-restaurant-or-other-public-setting/639971/15 "2012-11-05T19:30:28Z")
At a Boston Market, Bob Holroyd’s fantastic cover of Peter Gabriel’s “Games Without Frontiers” (featuring my gal Hap singing the Kate Bush part). I heard Hap played before a Vienna Teng concert, and again before a Charlotte Martin concert. At a Regal theater recently before a movie, Rodriguez (from the soundtrack to Searching For Sugar Man). ---
**Author:** ![FordTaurusSHO94](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/f07891/32.png) [@FordTaurusSHO94](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FordTaurusSHO94)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2012, 10:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-unexpected-obscure-song-heard-in-a-restaurant-or-other-public-setting/639971/16 "2012-11-05T22:11:08Z")
I could swear ESPN used Manson’s “The Beautiful People” when they would go to commercial breaks during NASCAR races in the 90s. ---
**Author:** ![Robot\_Arm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robot_arm/32/18280_2.png) [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2012, 10:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-unexpected-obscure-song-heard-in-a-restaurant-or-other-public-setting/639971/17 "2012-11-05T22:36:50Z")
_Rio_, by Duran Duran. Seriously. But the ultimate has to be from a piece by Harry Partch called _Barstow_. Partch (1901-1974) was an avant-garde, classical composer. He spent part of his life as a railroad hobo during the Depression. He developed his own 43-note scale, and custom built instruments to play it. The text for _Barstow_ came from eight pieces of graffiti he found on a highway railing in Barstow, California. Each is introduced with a short, repeated musical phrase and the words “number one”, etc. So what public setting did this turn up in? Dr. Demento used to use it in his Funny Five countdown at the end of each show. So, Dementites and Dementoids, click [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rRXDYgYQYXM) and see if anything sounds familiar. This is, in a sense, the opposite of what the OP is asking. I heard the Dr. Demento clip first. The surprise was in discovering that something from a public setting was, in fact, unexpectedly quite obscure. ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2012, 10:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-unexpected-obscure-song-heard-in-a-restaurant-or-other-public-setting/639971/18 "2012-11-05T22:41:47Z")
At a Chipotle restaurant, I once heard Blue Oyster Cult’s “Godzilla”. Given Chipotle’s “happy food” stance, the lyric, “History shows again and again how nature points up the folly of man” is kind of appropriate. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2012, 10:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-unexpected-obscure-song-heard-in-a-restaurant-or-other-public-setting/639971/19 "2012-11-05T22:54:37Z")
All on Muzak: Weezer - _Island in the Sun_ John Mayer - _Clarity_ Pink Floyd - _San Tropez_ Now granted, they all work as background music, but none of them are exactly huge hits. ---
**Author:** ![Hello\_Again](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/85e7bf/32.png) [@Hello\_Again](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hello_Again)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2012, 10:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-unexpected-obscure-song-heard-in-a-restaurant-or-other-public-setting/639971/20 "2012-11-05T22:54:59Z")
I was a ski resort in Canada and heard “I Won’t Be Your Yoko Ono” by Dar Williams on the lift line. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-unexpected-obscure-song-heard-in-a-restaurant-or-other-public-setting/639971.md?page=2)