OP asks for genres known for a single song, so I guess bluegrass won’t qualify, as most people are likely to know three: Foggy Mountain Breakdown, Dueling Banjos and The Ballad of Jed Clampett (if you wanna consider that bluegrass).
Another source of early exposure to the reggae sound could be Lennon’s guitar in She’s a Woman, depending on one’s age. Apropos of nothing, I had bits of that in my head a few weeks ago and it took a lot of searching to identify it.
That might be a generational one - Pearl Jam’s cover of Last Kiss is probably a lot more recognizable to people of my age.
I made a long post disputing blah blah blah… deleted it.
Happy Birthday… Birthday song Genre
Sometimes by MBV is featured prominently in Lost in Translation
Trio’s Da Da Da?
Naah. Shoegaze requires the rack of pedals, and the Chain were always minimalist in that regard, mainly using distortion and not the delay/reverb/chorus-heavy boards of the shoegaze bands. They were influential, sure, but not as much as early Cocteau Twins, I’d say.
“Leader of the Pack” came out in 1964, and a lot of the well-known “teenage death songs” came out before then. “Teen Angel,” by Mark Dinning came out in 1959; “Tell Laura I Love Her,” by Ray Peterson came out in 1960; “Dead Man’s Curve” by Jan and Dean came out in 1964; and the first (of a few) versions of “Last Kiss” was released by Wayne Cochran in 1961.
There were a few subsequent ones after 1964, but I’d suggest not nearly as many as 1964 or before. And a number remain quite well known.
I saw Pixies with Ride and The Bee Radleys. There’s your connection:)
didn’t they count Sandra as new wave for her first few albums? I know her version of “everlasting love” was described as "new wave-ish " they were even comparing her to belinda carlisle and jane whedlin of the go-gs …
I’d say either red red wine by ub40 or “informer” by one-hit-wonder snow …only because since the 80s were added to oldies stations they get played regularly
Classical Ballroom Waltz (or something like that): The Blue Danube.
Note: I knew the music but not the title. I had to look it up. I expect a lot of people would be the same.
I’ve never heard Shipping Up To Boston even though I have a few DM albums and have seen them in concert. However, while my feeling is that Fairytale of New York or even Rebels of the Sacred Heart by Flogging Molly are better known, that isn’t based on any exposure in the broader culture since the references that I do see to the former could be just the circles I hang out in and I only heard Rebels of the Sacred Heart on a college radio station, so it could just be a DJ that really liked it.
That’s interesting. Leader of the Pack sounds like it’s from the fifties. I still hear it occasionally on Oldies stations.
I used to hear Teen Angel. It’s been a long time.
I hate hearing ‘my’ music on classic rock stations. Hearing Whole Lotta Love, on the classic rock station I’ve been listening to since then 90’s (and with a lot of the same DJs), followed up by Bullet With Butterfly Wings, still feels weird to me.
If I heard Informer on the oldies station (which I’ve always considered 50’s and 60’s), I may vomit.
The Oldies format has gotten so complicated. Every decade has different bands. Sometimes they even narrow it to specific years.
I still remember the shock when the Bee Gees, Abba, Foreigner all went to the oldies.
I can’t think of any other semi-famous band that would qualify as Romani Punk like Gogol Bordello.
I would have gone with an Enya song. Probably Book of Days or something from Lord of the Rings.
I wonder if one of the two-tone songs from the 80s would be-well known. “A Message to You, Rudy” (as covered) by the Specials? Madness is best known for “Our House,” which is not what I would consider a typical ska number, but maybe “Baggy Trousers”? I don’t think that quite got enough airplay here in the US. “It Must Be Love”? Is that ska enough? “Mirror in the Bathroom” by the Beat (or the English Beat, as they are known here.) For third-wave ska, Save Ferris also had a hit with their cover of “Come on, Eileen”. “Time Bomb” by Rancid? Just thinking out loud. (Man, what was with third-wave ska? That stuff was like everywhere in the early-to-mid-90s, then seemed to have been supplanted by an even shorter swing revival fad, and then … I’m not sure I’ve heard a new ska song since that era. I’m sure there are plenty of bands doing it, I just haven’t noticed it in the general culture.)
I’m not familiar with some of those songs. I don’t think I’ve heard A Message To You Rudy (and listening to it quietly on youtube at work didn’t ring any bells), but that hardly means it isn’t/wasn’t popular.
Our House…ya know, I never, ever ever would have considered that ska. I’m not saying it isn’t, but for some reason I just never would have put it into that group. In my head, it was just a pop songs that happened to have horns.
As far as Time Bomb, I think I’d put The Impression That I Get in front of it. I feel like The Mighty Mighty Bosstones were more accessible to the masses. They had less of an edge and, IMO, that got them a lot more commercial recognition since they were (and are) a lot more likely to be heard on adult contemporary radio stations. IOW, which song are you more likely to hear getting piped into the department store? Which song is the average 50 year old more likely to know?
Yeah, it was huge back then and I’m sure my friends and I were far from the only ones that felt like we stumbled on to this new, secret genre and gobbled up as much of it as we could.
As for swing, IMO, that was just riding the coattails of ska. Swing felt like a more polished version of ska. Plus, swing concerts were really fun. Going to a Big Bad Voodoo Daddy concert, seeing everyone in period costumes and swing dancing made for a good time. I always liked looking over to where the mosh pit would normally be to see fully choreographed/rehearsed dances or some girl’s legs randomly getting flung way up over the crowd as she flipped over her partner’s back.
Brian Setzer probably did a lot for it as well. I think he helped the swing revival as much as it helped him.
And don’t think for a second that those Gap commercials didn’t make an impact. It even got a mention on Friends when Chandler wanted the Swing Kids to play his wedding (and called out for only liking swing music because of the commercials).
Unrelated, but is that Gap commercial really from 1998? Did they do bullet time a year before The Matrix came out? (Edit, according to the wiki page on bullet time, yes, it did and it wasn’t the only one).
DeVotchKa? They did the soundtrack for Little Miss Sunshine and have had lots of crossovers - not as much as GB, but quite a lot.
Which is weird, because I had the album Don’t Know How to Party, and many of their songs on there verge on death-metal-like vocals. I’m only slightly exaggerating. And heavy metal type chugging riffs. Definitely not adult contemporary (but their later stuff did get more radio-friendly). I find “Time Bomb” personally much poppier than even something like “The Impression That I Get” (which gets somewhat heavy with the instrumentation and growly vocals in the chorus.) But I do think the Bosstones song probably was better known. (Yeah, “The Impression That I Get” got to #1 in Alternative Airplay, but “Time Bomb” peaked at #8. Looks like “Someday I Suppose” cracked the Top 20 on that chart, too, with a #19; even “Rascal King” made it to #7, above “Time Bomb”'s peak position.)