For this version of Diving Deeper, we leave the shallow end behind and step away from the hit-making machine. For hardcore fans, many of these songs may already feel like classics, but casual listeners have probably forgotten them…if they ever heard them at all.
We are focusing only on prominent, best-selling artists, because with lesser-known musicians nearly everything is already a deep cut by default. The idea here is to dig beneath the familiar singles and radio staples to find the album tracks that deserved a little more daylight.
- “’39” – Queen
Brian May turns sci-fi into something strangely intimate, proving Queen could be just as effective when they stepped away from theatrical bombast. - “Ain’t Nobody But Me” – Supertramp
Snappy, cynical, and rhythmically sharp, this is Supertramp with a little more bite than their biggest hits usually reveal. - “Atomic Punk” – Van Halen
Raw, strange, and almost primitive by Van Halen standards, with Eddie sounding less like a technician and more like somebody trying to set the guitar on fire. - “Bring on the Night” – The Police
Sleek and atmospheric, with Andy Summers and Stewart Copeland giving the song a spacious, hypnotic pulse that deserves far more attention. - “Call Me Back Again” – Wings
McCartney goes full-throated soul singer here, delivering one of his most forceful vocal performances of the decade. - “Candy’s Room” – Bruce Springsteen
Short, tense, and explosive, this is Springsteen compressing an entire romantic obsession into less than three minutes. - “Doctor Wu” – Steely Dan
Sophisticated without becoming sterile, this has everything that makes Steely Dan fascinating: ambiguity, melodic elegance, and something vaguely sinister lurking underneath. - “Fade Away and Radiate” – Blondie
Dreamy, eerie, and unexpectedly atmospheric, with Robert Fripp’s guitar helping turn Blondie into something much stranger than the hit singles suggest. - “Gone Shootin’” – AC/DC
Loose, bluesy, and almost relaxed by AC/DC standards, with Bon Scott sounding perfectly comfortable inside one of the band’s best grooves. - “I Can’t Help It” – Michael Jackson
Quietly sophisticated and effortlessly smooth, this Stevie Wonder composition reveals the more restrained musical side of Off the Wall. - “Knocks Me Off My Feet” – Stevie Wonder
A beautifully understated love song that shows how much emotional force Wonder could generate without resorting to grand gestures. - “Memories Can’t Wait” – Talking Heads
Nervous, claustrophobic, and slightly unhinged, this is Talking Heads at their most psychologically unsettling. - “My Love, My Life” – ABBA
Proof that beneath all the immaculate pop craftsmanship, ABBA could deliver genuine melancholy without coating it in sugar. - “One More Cup of Coffee” – Bob Dylan
Mysterious and almost cinematic, with Scarlet Rivera’s violin helping create one of the strangest atmospheres in Dylan’s catalog. - “One Summer Dream” – Electric Light Orchestra
Lush and wistful without becoming overblown, this is Jeff Lynne allowing the orchestration to serve the mood rather than dominate it. - “Shadow of a Doubt (A Complex Kid)” – Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers
Compact, energetic, and immediately likable, this is exactly the kind of deep album track that could easily have been a hit in another timeline. - “Slip Kid” – The Who
Tough, restless, and rhythmically muscular, with the band sounding unusually grounded while still retaining that unmistakable Who intensity. - “Sunset People” – Donna Summer
Darker and stranger than her disco image suggests, this captures the glamorous-but-hollow nightlife atmosphere lurking beneath the dance floor. - “The Wanton Song” – Led Zeppelin
One of Zeppelin’s nastiest riffs wrapped in a dense, almost funky rhythm section…heavy without becoming ponderous. - “Who Says a Funk Band Can’t Play Rock?!” – Funkadelic
A perfect closing statement: funny, defiant, and musically convincing enough to make the title sound less like a question than a warning.
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