NPR Music - Our No. 1 songs: 2006

Episode Date: August 25, 2025

The songs that take us back to 2006.Note: This is a recurring feature in celebration of the show’s 25th anniversary. A shortened version of this episode ran earlier in the year.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

All right, it's all songs considered. I'm Robin Hilton. Stephen Thompson, as always here. Stephen, welcome. Hello, Robin. So if you're new to the show, it's NPR's long-running music discovery podcast. We're actually celebrating our 25th anniversary. We started as a podcast in 2005, but we were an online-only streaming music program starting

in January of 2000. We're talking about our number one songs from each of the past years. And, you know, as a reminder, these are not the number one songs from the Billboard charts or the most ubiquitous or even the most defining songs of each year. These are the songs that helped define all songs consider specifically the show and the songs that sort of take us back and that meant a lot to us. On this episode, we're talking about the year 2006. Stephen, where do you want to start?

Well, one of the things that we've talked about in these segments is sometimes we'll talk about, you know, quote unquote, a song that started at all. You know, we kicked off the 2000 segment. You played the first piece of music that was ever played on all songs considered. I'm going to play a different song that started a wonderful tradition. So it's Laura Gibson. I'm blanking on the song name. But she did it when she did the first ever tiny desk.

This is the first song Your bed Shining Along gray Tell me Seasons almost This is the first song Ever played at the tiny desk

Yeah In 2008 But the song Is from a Laura Gibson record From 2006 Called If You Come to Greet Me And I fell in love with this record When it came out

And really every song on this record, I could have dropped the needle almost anywhere. But Hands in Pockets was kind of the, in a way it's like the single. And it's how she led her Tiny Desk concert. And how incredible that she even agreed to come and play the Tiny Desk. We've been thinking a lot about the history of the Tiny Desk lately. and one of the things that I keep thinking about is the fact that there were so many things that had to sort of fall in place. No one was really thinking at first with Laura Gibson. Let's just bring Laura Gibson.

It wasn't like, let's start this series and we'll call it Tiny Desk. No one was thinking that yet. We were just sort of having fun. And what if she had said no? If she had said no, we probably never would have done it. That would have been the end of it because it ended up being sort of a proof of concept that we weren't even anticipating. But when it went so well, then we were like, well, let's keep doing it. So we brought Big Chestnut in.

Yeah, you brought the second. I asked the first person to the Tiny Desk. You asked the second person to the tiny desk when you brought Vic Chestnut. I remember Bob and I were sitting there and he said, if this was a series, what would we call it? And I, because I knew he'd been in a band called Tiny Desk Unit. I said, well, what if we called it Tiny Desk concerts? We had no idea.

No idea. We were just having fun. And then this thing happened. But I will say, like, even from Laura Gibson, I definitely had the sense, like, oh, this is beautiful. Yeah. Well, back in 2016, we did a version of the show where we talked about 16 number one songs from our first 16 years. And the song we picked for 2006 for that show was Fidelity by Regina Specter, which is incredible. I have no problem picking that as a number one song from

that year. But this is the one I'm going to go with. And I think there's a pretty good chance that you're going to know what it is, but I'm not sure how many other people will. Oh, I know. what this is. Dr. Blind, just prescribe the red one. Dr. Blind by Emily Haynes from her album, Knives Don't Have Your Back. Oh my God.

Yeah, Emily Haynes and the soft skeleton is the... She's phenomenal. And Metric's still putting out records. Yeah. She continues to be a force. I love solo Emily Haynes, maybe even more than metric. Oh.

Because she's just able to like tap into this exhaustion in her voice that doesn't always come through in metric stuff. This record is so good. So again, that's Emily Haynes and the soft skeleton, the song Dr. Blind from the album, Knives Don't Have Your Back. Whole record worth revisiting. Let's just take a quick break here,

and when we come back, we'll talk about some of the other songs that take us back to 2006. We're talking about our number one songs from 2006, as we celebrate the 25th anniversary of all songs considered and look back at some of the, music that's mattered most to us and the show over the years.

Stephen, what else do you want to play? Yeah, well, I mean, this is going to sound like a cheat because the song didn't become enormously popular and successful until 2007, but it came out in an earlier form in 2006 and just absolutely knocked me over. Oh, yeah, falling slowly. So Marquette Or Glova and. Glenn Hansard. So I didn't realize that this came out before the film once and everything came out.

So they, you know, once unfolded over the course of several years, making that film. It was a very low-budget movie. And Glenn Hansard and Marquetta Urglova had been working on songs for it in the years leading up to it. Glenn Hansard, in particular, started kind of performing this song in concerts and actually put it on a record that the two of them did together the year before once came out. And it's billed to Glenn Hansord and Marquetta Urglova. And when once was submitted for Oscar consideration, they had to prove to the Academy, we really wrote this song for this movie, even though we put it on this album we put out last year.

Right. This should be eligible for the best original song, Oscar, covering the calendar year 2007. This song finally won an Oscar in 2008. Right. Yeah. Do you remember what he said when he won? Make art. Make art.

I remember that so vividly. I knew you would, too. He put the statue in the air like a raised fist and said make art. And I thought one of the few years were a truly, truly great song wins an Oscar for Best Original Song. So many bad songs have won Best Original Song. Not that year. You should have seen me. I had felt this deep emotional connection to Glenn Hansard's music, to that song, to the frames.

And when that song won the Oscar in 2008, I jumped around like the Packers just won the Super Bowl. No feeling like it. It is such a great feeling to have a song that you love more than anything be celebrated in that way. And then for him to crush the moment. And if you remember, he gives this great speech. She's about to start speaking. They get played off. Right.

And they bring her back. Right. Well, Marquetta Orgelova didn't get to talk. So we're going to let her finish her speech. And then off the cuff, she says, gives another amazing speech. Really one of, maybe my favorite Oscar's memory. Well, we're going to say this probably every time we do one of these segments that there are so many things that we could pick. The Decembris.

Oh, this is the year of the Crane Wife. The Crane Wife came out. And under the boughs unbowed. I'll clothe in a snowy shrug. She had no heart. We got so hard All under the bowels on bow. We got Amy Winehouse.

Oh my gosh. We're going to rehab. That track came out that year. They tried to make me go to rehab. I said, no, no, no. Yes, I've been black, but when I come back, no, no. The time ain't sound fine. Just try to make me go to rehab.

I won't go Grizzly Bears I think it's Vecatimist I listen to it so much and I don't know that I ever really knew how to say it

Vecatimus that came out that same year but here's one that I know we both love and I thought for sure you were going to pick it and this can be the last one that we play

for 2006 oh come on Stephen you love this band oh is this the raconteur yeah oh yeah Brendan Benson

Brendan Benson By the way, we didn't play any Brendan Benson songs from the years that some of his great music came out when he paired up with Jack White from the White Stripes for this project and it was one of the first things that Jack White did after the White Stripes

broke up oh god this was incredible this was the rock into her steady as she goes from Broken Boy Soldiers. Yeah, phenomenal song. All right, so much more we could play but we'll go out on this one. Thanks, Stephen.

Thank you, Robin. And for NPR music, I'm Robin Hilton. It's all songs considered.