I’ve Got a Little List… of Popular Patter Songs

If you’re familiar with Gilbert and Sullivan, you know what a patter song is. They didn’t start the fire, so to speak, but the flame burned brightly in their capable hands.

For years, I’ve enjoyed songs that I’ve mentally categorized as “list songs.” As it turns out, I’m not the only one to lump certain songs in that category. Many of the ones I enjoy have cultural references, but others are seemingly random.

These songs include everything from Antônio Carlos Jobim’s “Waters of March” to ’80s songs like R.E.M.’s “It’s the End of the World as We Know It (and I Feel Fine)” and Billy Joel’s “We Didn’t Start the Fire.” As I continued to reflect on my fascination with these songs, I realized it was more than the list quality that attracted me. I also enjoyed the rhythm and pace of the songs. Again, I’m not the only one who has thought of this. The second part of a recent two-part episode of Hit Parade compared the aforementioned R.E.M. song to “We Didn’t Start the Fire” and to Bob Dylan’s “Subterranean Homesick Blues.”

Upon more reflection, I asked myself if these songs weren’t just modern patter songs. Once again, I wasn’t the first person to think along these lines. You can find a whole list of patter songs on Wikipedia, including several of the songs I’d been thinking about.

This is where we can get into debates about what exactly constitutes a patter song. The Wikipedia list includes “Mediate” by INXS, a relatively serene song when compared to much of what I consider patter. “Waters of March” also moves at a relaxed tempo, but if “Mediate” can make the list, why not Jobim’s jazz standard?

If you haven’t yet thought of patter songs in terms of popular music, here are some of my favorites.

I’ve Been Everywhere by Geoff Mack

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BhO8_eokosg

The song starts out deceptively slow, and then it really picks up. It wasn’t until I started doing research for this post that I discovered “I’ve Been Everywhere” was originally an Australian song, which has been covered by artists from around the world who substitute place names from their own countries. Pick whichever version is your favorite. I will always love Johnny Cash’s cover the best.

It’s the End of the World As We Know It (and I Feel Fine) by R.E.M.

If no other song in this list truly counts as a patter song, surely this does. Given its pace, there’s no doubt this is a challenging song to sing. Maybe there should be prizes at karaoke bars for people who make it through the song without stumbling!

Bonus tip for parents: friends of ours once told us that it’s fun to sing the chorus when your toddler is having a meltdown.

We Didn’t Start the Fire by Billy Joel

In this song, Billy Joel delivers a fast-paced history lesson covering 1949 to 1989. Although it’s a speedy song, when Chris Molanphy compared it to “It’s the End of the World as We Know It” in Hit Parade, he pointed out that Joel sings 96 fewer words in a song that is “nearly a minute longer.” No wonder it sounds easier to sing!

I Want You by Savage Garden

This doesn’t qualify as a list song, but the verses definitely have a patter quality. If you’re ever in an anime trivia contest, it may help you to know that this was used for the end theme of JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure: Diamond is Unbreakable.

You Get What You Give by New Radicals

This one’s a fairly normal pop song, but the band put in eight lines at the end that could be considered patter:

Health insurance rip off lying
FDA big bankers buying
Fake computer crashes dining
Cloning while they’re multiplying
Fashion shoots with Beck and Hanson
Courtney Love and Marilyn Manson
You’re all fakes, run to your mansions
Come around, we’ll kick your ass in

The song is catchy, but the video is disturbing.

One Week by Barenaked Ladies

This song has two sets of completely unrelated lyrics. The core is about discord between a man and a woman. The patter lines were improvised, giving us lyrics like this:

Like Kurosawa I make mad films
Okay I don’t make films
But if I did they’d have a samurai
Gonna get a set of better clubs
Gonna find the kind with tiny nubs
Just so my irons aren’t always flying off the back swing
Gotta get in tune with Sailor Moon
Cause that cartoon has got the boom anime babes
That make me think the wrong thing

Subterranean Homesick Blues by Bob Dylan

“Subterranean Homesick Blues” has influenced many songs on this list: “It’s the End of the World as We Know It” (according to Molanphy), as well as the two immediately below this one. The video is a must-see. (By the way, from what Molanphy reported on Hit Parade, this comes in at about 129 words per minute verses R.E.M.’s 153 words per minute and Joel’s 104 words per minute.)

Bob by Weird Al Yankovic

It’s hard for me to pick a favorite song by Yankovic, but this is definitely high on my list. His Dylan impression is flawless, and the lyrics are brilliant.

Mediate by INXS

As I mentioned in the introduction, this song is slow enough that I’m hesitant to call it patter, although it certainly is a list song. Regardless, the video is clearly influenced by Dylan’s “Subterranean Homesick Blues.”

Águas de Março / Waters of March by Antônio Carlos Jobim

You can find excellent versions of this song in its original Portuguese, in English, or in both languages. The lyrics are mostly a list of words and phrases, making it, I imagine, hard to memorize:

A fish, a flash
A silvery glow
A fight, a bet
The range of a bow

The bed of the well
The end of the line
The dismay in the face
It’s a loss, it’s a find

In Portuguese, the phrases mostly begin with “it’s,” such as “It’s a fish, it’s a flash, it’s a shining silver.”

There’s no doubt that “Waters of March” is a list song. I would argue it also falls into the patter song category — at least when sung in Portuguese.

Did I miss any of your favorite popular patter songs?