Left of the Dial

Here's a list of 10 College Rock Songs That Ruled During Hair Metal and as a former young man of taste who was also a college dj, I will now give my quick thoughts on each one YOU'RE WELCOME, EARF!!

10. New Order, “Blue Monday”

Don't care

9. Joy Division, “Love Will Tear Us Apart”

There's something about this song that somehow means more & more to me and gets better every year I get older, even though I couldn't care less about any other New Order/Joy Division song. Just an incredible song, so simple and somber and of course tragically stuck in time forever due to Ian Curtis' suicide. It's always been there, I've always been aware of it, but with each passing year I listen to it more closely.

8. Echo & the Bunnymen, “The Killing Moon”

Don't care

7. The Replacements, “Left of the Dial”

There's nothing I can say about this song that can articulate its rightful place at the throne of Amerindie college rock; it practically defines the genre mid-life, and the guitar riff sliding back in after the break is probably my favorite Paul Westerberg moment of all time.

6. Pixies, “Here Comes Your Man”

Good song off a GREAT album; read all about the hysteric s that accompanies my buying it HERE. 🤣😜🤣😜 Here's a list of songs I like off the album better: Debaser/Wave of Mutilation/I Bleed/No. 13 Baby/Gouge Away.

5. Violent Femmes, “Blister in the Sun”

You can put any song off their debut on this list, and any list without that album being represented is absolutely invalidated.

4. Talking Heads, “Cities”

Never liked the Talking Heads. Also, nobody considers them to be "college rock" the same way as these other bands so I don't know why they're even on here.

3. Sonic Youth, “Teen Age Riot”

YAAASSSSSSSSS. Kinda the only Sonic Youth song I love, probably because it's their most "normal". While I've never particularly cared for their particular brand of dissonance, Teen Age Riot will always be in my own "summer teenage heartache song" Hall of Fame (see them open with it on my first trip to New York in 1992!!!) I will never, ever think of my first visit to NYC in the Summer of 1992 without thinking of Sonic Youth, or the fact that them opening with Teen Age Riot is one of my Top 10 live rock moments of all time 🤗🎸🎸🎸🕺

2. The Smiths, “Sheila Take a Bow”

Don't care

1. R.E.M., “Radio Free Europe”

Unassailable. See my notes above on the Violent Femmes debut, the same goes for Murmer and anyone who would argue that if you had to pick one song that stands for the entirety of the Amerindie college rock 80's scene in every possible and that song should be Radio Free Europe, then they would be correct. R.E.M., along with Husker Du in my mind, remains THE single most important and influential band of the entire genre.