Seconded. Tank! is one of the best theme songs ever written.
Serious Hall of Fame:
Tuning through the radio dial
“…weather today in the greater Cincinnati area…” [TUNING] fragment of song: “,I love you so badly I could…” [TUNING] “…They’re solid plastic, so don’t settle for imitation…” [TUNING] “…but the senator, while insisting he was not intoxicated, could not explain his nudity.” [TUNING] fragment of classical music. Then into theme
Baby If you’ve ever wondered,
Wondered whatever became of me
I’m living on the air in Cincinnati
Cincinnati, WKRP
and etc.
Lovely stuff, particularly when the theme starts with the scratchy, heard-on-the-radio sound, which quickly swells into full studio audio. Neat tune, neat lyrics include “tired of packing and unpacking, town to town, up and down the dial.”
Must also add about Green Acres.
A band called The Waybacks has an instrumental medley that quotes a lot of country-flavored songs, snippets of TV themes such as The Andy Griffith Show, and then segues into Hendrix-style Purple Haze, though the lyrics sung are those to Green Acres. It’s spooky, but it works and is hilarious.
Thanks for the info, cochrane.
I’ve heard others say that it reminds them of “Christian Rock,” which I can sort of see.
The thing that stuck with me was how closely it matched up with Enterprise’s premise; mankind’s first real leap out into the stars, out innate faith (in ourselves) that we can overcome obstacles, reach our destiny, etc., etc.,.
I just thought it was very fitting for the show.
Now the Firefly theme…now that’s “Country.”
And I’ll toss in my agreement with Elza B about the Farscape later-season opening credits. Pretty cool stuff.
Two of the best campy intro songs were covered by Ted’s acapella group from Scrubs:
That one’s good enough to sing in the shower, but no theme song will ever surpass the true greatness of:
This may or may not be the complete song; there is debate about it. Googling for the complete lyrics will usually only uncover the first two versus. In the Scrubs cover of it, they did sing the refrain from the fourth verse, starting with “Now unleash the Dog of Wonder”. I remember being disappointed after googling the complete song and not seeing that line anywhere. It’s such a good line. It’s possible the Scrubs writers wrote it themselves.
To demonstrate how rare it is to find these lyrics, do a google search (using the quotes) on “now unleash the dog of wonder”. Two lousy hits; one is a transcript of that Scrubs episode, and the other is the now defunct homepage of Ted’s band. (Cached version here.)
I originally found all four verses, plus a discussion of whether or not they’re actually from Underdog, on this blog. A short and fun read for anyone who was a fan of Underdog as a child.
I have to agree. When my brother and I first saw it, he took exception to the use of “Lowrider” as the theme song, and said, “What happened, was the ‘Mexican Hat Dance’ already taken?” :rolleyes: