Beastie Boys
An opening track built entirely on cartoon-pirate bravado, splicing swashbuckler movie tropes with hip-hop boast rhetoric to…
outlaw bravado juvenile provocation pop-culture pastiche
Aphex Twin
Windowlicker is less a lyric than a vocal texture: a track built around fragmented, pitch-shifted, and heavily processed vocal…
vocal manipulation as instrument absurdism and misdirection sound versus meaning
The Stooges
A two-part come-on built from almost nothing: a repeated request to come over, then a chant insisting the night ahead will be…
adolescent desire minimalism as provocation repetition and ritual
St. Vincent
A domestic scene curdles into something closer to a portrait of intimacy as mutual damage. The song catalogs small betrayals and…
toxic intimacy identity dissolution emotional masochism
Depeche Mode
A blunt political provocation dressed as an arena anthem, aimed at a populace the singer accuses of complacency in the face of…
political apathy manipulation and propaganda religion and authority
A cartoonishly juvenile chant dressed up as a party anthem, built on a nursery-rhyme hook and a rambling anecdote about a…
adolescent bravado misogyny as performance comic self-deprecation