Soul Bossa Nova

If I ran a game store I would play Soul Bossa Nova by Quincy Jones.

It took Quincy Jones twenty minutes to write Soul Bossa Nova in 1962 (source) and it has lived a robust life ever since. I think it's fair to say that most of us know the song from the Austin Powers series of movies as the outrageous 1960s, flower power theme song. I know that when I pretend to play it in my pretend store I get a lot of "Groovy, baby!", "Oh, behave!", and "Do I make you horny baby?" from my pretend customers. The song was also the theme song to a 1970s/80s Canadian game show. It has been featured in movies and video games, and it's been sampled by hip hop artists. I'm sure Mr. Jones wishes all of his twenty-minutes compositions were as well received.

Soul Bossa Nova was released on Quincy Jones'  shagadelic1962 album, Big Band Bossa Nova.

Soul Bossa Nova on Google Play

Big Bang Theory Theme

If I ran a game store I would play the song Big Bang Theory Theme by Barenaked Ladies.

The Big Bang Theory TV show is divisive among geeks. The ideas that it doesn't properly portray geek culture, that it laughs at geeks instead of with geeks, and that the show is unfunny are popular among our crowd. There are some who dislike the theme song because of its association to the show. If you dislike the theme song for this reason then shame on you. It's a quality song. Had it been released on an album without association to the show there would be zero balking. Instead, the song would play and geeks would be rocking to science-based music. It's an upbeat alt rock song describing the events of the Big Bang with a brief history of the world. I would very certainly play this song in my game store and direct whiners to the door.

The lore behind the song is that the show's executive producers were at a Barenaked Ladies concert in Los Angeles. The frontman, Ed Robertson, did an improvised freestyle rap about the Big Bang. The EPs liked the song. They asked Barenaked Ladies to pen the theme, but the band had been jilted before so they would only do it after learning no other bands had been asked. I call "baloney." The idea that the EPs were creating a show titled The Big Bang Theory and a band member randomly breaks into verse about the Big Bang is too much for me to believe. I'm thinking Mr. Ed Robertson got a call from his agent discussing who was in the crowd and why and he made the choice based upon that knowledge. But what do I know?

The Big Bang Theory TV show debuted on September 24, 2007 and a full-length version of the song was released as a single on October 9, 2007. The song was included on Barenaked Ladies' 2011 greatest hits album, Hits from Yesterday & The Day Before. There are sources claiming the song is/was titled History of Everything, but I was unable to find anything verifying that title.

Big Bang Theory Theme on Google Play

Spider-Man

If I ran a game store I would play Spider-Man by The Ramones.

In 1967, Grantray-Lawrence Animation produced an animated Spider-Man cartoon based upon the Marvel Comics character of the same name. The show lasted on the American Broadcasting Company for three seasons and after its initial broadcast it went into syndication, outlasting its 1967-1970 time frame by many decades. The longevity of the series exposed a generation or two of kids to the show and its hugely catchy theme song. The theme song, composed by Bob Harris and with lyrics by Paul Francis Webber, has gone on to become a standard with many bands covering it over the years. It's also been used in many of the live-action Spider-Man feature films.  The song's opening lyric of "Spider-Man, Spider-Man, does whatever a spider can" is arguably as synonymous with Peter Parker as the Spider-Man suit is. The version of the song I would play if I ran a game store is the version by The Ramones.

The Ramones covered the song late in their musical career, but it appears on various albums of theirs. Spider-Man was first released as a hidden track on the vinyl version of their 1995 album, ¡Adios Amigos!, originally marking the track as a rarity. It was also included in the 1995 compilation album, Saturday Morning: Cartoons' Greatest Hits. A live version was released on their 1996 compilation album, Greatest Hits Live. They included another live version on their 1997 album, We're Outta Here!. The next time the studio version appeared was in their 2005 box set, Weird Tales of the Ramones, on disc 3. The song was featured in the 1996 film, Bio-Dome, but was excluded from the movie's soundtrack.

Spider-Man (Weird Tales of the Ramones version) on Google Play

Christmas Island

If I ran a game store I would play the song Christmas Island by LAKE.

Christmas Island is the ending credits song to Cartoon Network's immensely popular TV show, Adventure Time. The song is performed by an indie-hipster waif band from the Pacific Northwest and it sounds every bit of it. If the song weren't connected to the show there's no way it would be considered as a song to be played in game stores, but the cache of the show is too strong. People of all ages and fandoms are attached to Adventure Time (including me). The song has a very strong nostalgic feeling even though the show is an ongoing show. You just know that decades from now this song will still pull people back to the teen years of the century.

Christmas Island isn't the ending credits song to Cartoon Network's immensely popular TV show, Adventure Time. Instead, Island Song by Ashley Ericksson is the ending credits song. To be even more precise, an alternate lyrics version of Island Song by Ashley Ericksson is the ending credits song, but this version has never been released for sale or download. The only way to get the actual ending credits version with its alternate lyrics is to rip the song from Adventure Time DVDs or YouTube videos* or otherwise pirate it. Ashley Ericksson is a founding member of LAKE. Island Song and Christmas Island are the same song (slightly different lyrics), but Island Song is her solo career version and Christmas Island is her band career version. Island Song was never released for sale or download. Christmas Island was relased on LAKE's 2009 album, Let's Build a Roof. If I ran a game store I would play Christmas Island by LAKE and let the fans scratch their heads when the song sings about "a place beside the sea" instead of about "the butterflies and bees". For me, the hassle of getting a high bit-rate mp3 of the song used in the show is a barrier.

* The full version of the song is not played in broadcast or streaming episodes of Adventure Time. Only the DVDs play the song in its entirety.

Christmas Time on Google Play

Here's a YouTube video of the alternate lyrics version of Island Song by Ashley Ericksson as used in the closing credits of Adventure Time:

Peter Gunn Theme

If I ran a game shop I would play the song Peter Gunn Theme by The Blues Brothers Band.

I don't think there are too many game store denizens that remember the 1950s TV show Peter Gunn, but there is certainly a generation of gamers that remember the song from the arcade game Spy Hunter and The Blues Brothers soundtrack. The song very nearly defines spycraft. It has been covered, knocked off, and sampled to ingrain it into the landscape of spy tropes.

The Peter Gunn Theme is unusual because it's all one chord, with an instantly recognizable bass ostinato that plays unchanging throughout the entire song. The original version was composed by Henry Mancini. It was released on his 1959 album, The Music from Peter Gunn. That album won Mancini two 1959 Grammy Awards, for "Album of the Year" and "Best Arrangement". In 2010 the Library of Congress added the album to the National Recording Registry as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant." The song also garnered him with a 1959 Primetime Emmy Award nomination in the category of "Best Musical Contribution to a Television Program".

The Blues Brothers Band version was released on the 1980 album, The Blues Brothers: Music from the Soundtrack. It is a very clean recording, true to the original but adding weight in the right places. This version doesn't evoke a black and white TV serial but instead insists on a 1970s muscle car cruising the shadows at night. It's less gentleman spy and more rogue cop with a bad attitude and an over-sized pistol. Or maybe it's about two greasy, criminal brothers who try to project cool through their Ray Bans.

Peter Gunn Theme on Google Play

The Blob

If I ran a game store I would play the song The Blob by The Five Blobs.

It's the title song to the 1958 film, The Blob. The film was made as a serious entry into the horror and sci-fi genres. It was received as such, but over time it has been categorized as a B-movie. Somehow when The Five Blobs made the song they knew the destiny of the film's legacy and gave it a campy romp of a title track. The song comes off like a quirky Latin tango with a short list of lyrics. The singer is actually one guy, Bernie Nee, overdubbing himself to sound like five guys and the songwriters are Burt Bacharach and Mack David. The Bacharach touch is obvious once you know it's him. The song The Blob spent three weeks in the 1958 Top 40, giving Bacharach one of his earliest hits.

The Blob on Google Play