There’s something extremely comforting about a saxophone solo.
I think it has something to do with the television theme songs of my childhood. Rushing home after school in the late eighties, I’d settle down on my parents’ bedroom floor (so I’d have time to switch off the set when my mom got home, leaving her none the wiser) and watch somewhere between two and six hours of television. I would have certainly watched more, but my mom inevitably came home and forced me to run downstairs, glassy eyed, and stuporifically tell her all about the amazing book I’d been reading upstairs for hours on end. What this all means, in the grand scheme of things, is that these shows had a huge influence on my young mind, for better or worse, the extent of which I am only beginning to discover. Saxophone solos, for one thing.

It seems like every TV theme song of my childhood, Full House, Family Matters, Night Court, Growing Pains, Alf, Ninja Turtles, I’d put money on at least four of those six having some kind of crazy sax action in its theme song. And later on, when I was allowed to stay up, (the pretense of reading abandoned entirely) there was Saturday Night Live, with the craziest sax-driven theme song of all, played by that guy in the sunglasses who looked like a frog. In the early nineties that was about as cool as TV theme music got.

Listening to music recently, for some reason, I’ve become acutely aware of just how great saxophone solos can be. They make any song sound, in some very visceral way, right. Some will argue that the sax solo, like Gloria Estefan and Soviet communism, is best left to the eighties. But not me.

In joint celebration of year-end lists and childhood nostalgia, are my three current favorites, songs that bring me back to those carefree heady days of Candice Cameron and John Larroquette, while still being awesome in their own ways.

1. Hot Chip- Crap Kraft Dinner
From their first album, Coming on Strong, this solo comes in late and builds. I frequently listen to this song on repeat for hours, and still can’t get enough of it.
2. The Rolling Stones- Coming Down Again
This one’s particularly sultry. I don’t know what that “slipped my tongue in someone else’s pie” business is all about, but it doesn’t really change anything for me.
3. Chromeo- You’re So Gangsta
Chromeo might be my favorite Canadian band. Or duo or whatever. Anyhow, this way their first single, and it encapsulates everything that was awesome about ‘80s electro-funk.