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Today is the day to get all nutso about eights, or, maybe to just get nutso, if you have Olympic and/or Jonas Brothers and/or Boredoms-drum-extravaganza fever. (Woe to the person who’s suffering from all three.) All the eight-related hoopla got me to thinking about how the eighth track on many an album is a hit-or-miss proposition; particularly on longer albums in the CD era, it serves as something of a midpoint, and albums become unfocused and maybe stick their not-as-good tracks in there. For example: track eight on Appetite For Destruction, for example, is the OK-but-not-great “Think About You,” while track eight on Nevermind is the relatively irritating to my ears “Drain You.” And not to be all lazy-Google-research about this, but the phrase “track 8 is my favorite” only has 22 hits on the search engine; spell out the word “eight,” and you’re down to four.) Anyway, I decided to root through my collection and find some outstanding examples of an album’s eighth track–eight, in fact. They’re unordered, although the last one on the list is probably my favorite (and I found an amazing live version of it, to boot). Feel free to add your own!
Michael Jackson – “PYT” (from Thriller, 1982)
Helium – “Superball” (from The Dirt Of Luck, 1995)
Love Is All – “Spinning And Scratching” (from Nine Times That Same Song, 2006)
Aerosmith – “Lick And A Promise” (from Rocks, 1976)
Mother Love Bone – “Captain Hi-Top” (Apple, 1990)
PJ Harvey – “50Ft Queenie” (from Rid Of Me, 1993)
Janet Jackson – “Miss You Much” (from the CD version of Rhythm Nation 1814, 1989)
Afghan Whigs feat. Marcy Mays – “My Curse” (from Gentlemen, 1992)
