If I accomplish anything in my short time on this earth, it’s hopefully going to be that I turned a shitload of people on to Doctor Who and made all of our readers into comic book nerds. That’s all I want for my legacy. It’s in that spirit that I present to you, the best songs about comic books as chosen by me — universally acknowledged authority on both music and comic books. You’re welcome.(Ed Note: Hannah is only acknowledged by herself as an authority on anything.)
1. Batdance – Prince
Honestly, this song makes it for the incredible video alone. All those strange Batmen dancing harkens back to the true Adam West-filled past of our favorite caped crusader. There’s absolutely no dark, husky voiced, tortured vigilante in this song — only a dude with a weird utility belt who fights villains like The King of Cats (real).
(Ed Note: The Purple One, in all his infinite wisdom, has elected to keep his videos off YouTube thus robbing future generations of “Batdance”. Here’s the muted video. Our apologies.)
2. Ghost Rider – Suicide
Unlike the movies would have you believe, Ghost Rider is actually a pretty badass character and totally worthy of a song by an influential punk band like Suicide. Just like the awesomeness of the comics, the song talks about the motorcyclist who sold his soul to Satan and constantly screams at shit. Badassness all around.
Ghost World – Aimee Mann
Let’s take a detour into the world of indie-comics by way of ultimate indie-goddess, Aimee Mann. Ghost World is like Daria, but somehow full of more adolescent ennui and fuck all. If you haven’t read Ghost World then you really, really need to. I cannot stress this enough. Listen to this song while reading Ghost World and wearing some flannel, and your life will be about as complete as it’s gonna get.
That’s Really Super, Supergirl – XTC
Another one of my life goals is to get everyone to love XTC as much as I do, so this really works out quite nicely. While, yes, this song name checks Supergirl, it’s less about the actual Supergirl and more about male insecurities. It’s also off a spectacular and classic album, Skylarking, that was produced by Todd Rundgren, so it wins all the prizes.
DC Comics and Chocolate Milkshakes – Art Brut
Eddie Argos is a huge fan of comic books, specifically DC Comics, which he wrote about beautifully here. Actually what he wrote about was being in a state of arrested development so intense that you can’t get a credit card, but still buy comics. As the sages of old said, “Rent always loses to comic books.”
Challengers – The New Pornographers
Fact: Challengers of the Unknown is a book that’s basically the Fantastic Four, but not actually the Fantastic Four. Needless to say, when I discovered that this was a comic book reference, I somehow found it possible to love this beautiful track even more — which was hard since I already loved it with all my heart and soul.
Superman – R.E.M.
A good superhero comic uses the superpowers of the character to explore something intrinsic about society while also being unbelievably amazing. R.E.M. did that in their early 90s heyday with “Superman” when they postulated that Superman’s powers probably were used to stalk ladies, which, let’s be real, is so something that Superman would do.
Iron Man – Black Sabbath
I tried so hard to not put this on the list for no other reason than technically it’s not about Iron Man the iconic Marvel character, but about a dude who kills for fun (which is still applicable to Tony Stark to some degree). That said, it’s use in the first Iron Man movie makes it basically the greatest comic book character theme song ever, so it’s included. There — are you happy now?
