73 thoughts on “FMD 09-18-2020: TV Theme Songs”

    1. Would you hate me if I told you that watching that intro is the most St. Elsewhere I’ve ever seen?

    1. My first experience with the Mannix theme song was as a result of wanting context when someone (typically Crow) spat out “Mannix!” during music breaks on MST3K movies.

    1. I thought of it right after I posted Cheers, which is odd since I’ve seen way more of Frazier. Toddler Skim would sing along with just one thing when she started realizing how much she liked singing: “...scrambled eggs.”

  1. No Random 10 for me this week.
    I've been mostly listening to the band Haim, as they generally hit the sweet spot of music with wide family appeal. Like OK Go (but with better depth to their catalog outside their singles*).
    I am having a hard time figuring out exactly what they sound like. Quite chameleonic without giving one the impression that their sound is too broad**. And they swear in about 10% of their songs, so I'm trying to do close listening while working before I re-burn a CD for the family vehicle that doesn't require skipping when the little ones are with.

    I am pretty sure my favorite song of theirs is "Falling". The version of the album I downloaded had a live cut of this as a bonus track, and I much prefer that to the album cut.
    A few youtube concert clips even better than that, to demonstrate:
    Love the scuzzy, kindof sloppy guitar soloing here: (start at 4:16 if this doesn't)

    And the grunting/barking singing here (5:36):

    *When I tried listening to the OK Go songs that didn't have awesome videos, I got bored of their music.
    Did I need the videos to later like the song? Do their good songs get the good videos?

    **The kids informed me last month that some cruddy nondescript song on the radio was sung by 21 Pilots. From their other singles, I thought I knew what the band sounds like. (Kindof poppish NüMetal without aggro and misogyny... no scent of Limp Bizkit. They weren't my thing, but I could respect them.) But now I don't know what 21 Pilots even is. Are they also Imagine Dragons? Some lame reheated northern reggae band?

      1. Why capitalized? It's not an abbreviation, but their last name.
        Wikipedia has their entry "Haim ... stylized in all caps as HAIM"
        The only bands I've accepted preferred atypical capitalization styliziation on are fIREHOSE and HEALTH. I believe it was Tune-Yards that broke me from trying to adopt every band's preferred stylization.

          1. Their preference, I don't have to accept it.
            Just like I don't have to accept the capitalization (or lack thereof) in song titles, album titles, etc.
            If the band's name were an abbreviation, it'd be a personal style choice between including periods and spaces:
            NWA vs N.W.A. vs N. W. A. vs N W A
            I feel that none of those is incorrect (unless dealing within a publisher's style guide)

            I don't seem alone in my usage:
            The band's website, Twitter, and Facebook all use all caps.
            Rolling Stone, NPR, and Wikipedia use title caps.
            On YouTube, the band has two official accounts: HAIM and HaimVEVO.
            And the official music videos themselves show a shift to at least ignoring all caps:
            Haim videos: "Don't Wanna", "Hallelujah", "Now I'm in It", "Summer Girl"
            HAIM videos: "I Know Alone", All music videos from the first two albums (but not all of the audio tracks.

  2. Theme songs for me come in two categories:
    1. Instrumentals
    Little House on the Prairie
    The Practice
    Boston Public
    Sunday Night Baseball
    (remembering ones I burnt to disc at some point)

    2. Anime
    Attack on Titan
    Fullmetal Alchemist, Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood (Too many to link to)
    Durarara (reminds me of SY's "Dirty Boots"
    Aldnoah Zero (Season 1 more than Season 2)
    Noragami (Season 1 and Season 2 equally great)
    Space Brothers (I never got far into the show, so I only know the first one)
    Moribito (OK, this one is cheesy and kindof sucks. I wouldn't have d/led it if I hadn't watched the show with my daughter.)

  3. some favorite TV theme songs, in no particular order:

    Game of Thrones
    Welcome Back, Kotter
    Frasier
    Mission: Impossible
    M*A*S*H
    Barney Miller
    Rockford Files
    Jonny Quest
    The Monkees
    The Jeffersons
    All in the Family
    The Beverly Hillbillies
    ST:TOS and TNG
    Laverne & Shirley
    The Muppet Show
    Peter Gunn
    The Twilight Zone
    Hawaii Five-O
    The Simpsons
    Sanford and Son
    Cheers

    1. oh, and Room 222.

      I had forgotten that the setting for that show was Walt Whitman High. My wife is a graduate of an actual Walt Whitman High, albeit not in LA.

      and The Mod Squad

    2. A week later I just found this post. I was surprised that All in the Family and Laverne&Shirley were not mentioned earlier in this thread. Those 2 plus Good Times and Gilligan's Island were the theme songs that have been singing on and off for 40 years. I think a very iconic theme song is the one for X-Files. For about 2 years I used to meet a couple softball buddies at DB Searles in St. Cloud for drinks and then we would go to the man cave at a friends house and all watch X-Files together.

  4. The Office
    MacGuyver (as with the content of the show itself, this is mostly nostalgia talking)
    Peter Gunn (never seen an episode, but I found the vinyl at Goodwill a couple of years back, and the whole soundtrack is awesome)
    Archer (both opening and closing titles)
    The A Team

    But my absolute favorite is the opening theme to Cowboy Bebop.

      1. I can confirm that "Tank!" is the theme from the TV show, though I think those graphics differ subtly from my memory of the TV show, so it's possible it was used for the movie (in nearly the same presentation, only re-drawn).

        I've got to get back to finishing that series.

        1. Same. I've started it four times, enjoyed it very much every time, only to sort of put it down about three quarters through and forget to pick it back up again.

          I'm about due for try #5.

  5. I think my favorite TV song (not really a theme song) was "Where, Oh Where, Are You Tonight" by Buck Owens on Hee Haw. I can't really rationalize it, but man, I would watch that show just with the hopes that song would pop up somewhere.

    1. I searched the world over,
      And thought I found true love.
      You met another and
      Phht! you were gone.

      I watched that show regularly as a kid and probably have heard that song a few hundred times. TIL it's about his cow, Bessie.

Comments are closed.