The 4 types of TV theme songs

[Sal]

This is in response to a couple of recent posts which asked about your favorite series and how much you like or dislike their themes. I'll give my answers to them here while pointing out that for every series that had a memorable theme, you can basically put them into 4 general groups. This is how I would classify the 4 different groups:



1. You love both the show and its theme.

The best shows always seem to have the best themes. So it should come as no surprise that a lot of my favorites show up in this first group:


Happy Days
The Monkees
The Partridge Family
The Brady Bunch
Gilligan's Island
Green Acres
The Addams Family
Mr Ed
I Dream Of Jeannie
The Beverly Hillbillies
Love American Style
The Courtship Of Eddie's Father
Laverne & Shirley
One Day At A Time
The Big Bang Theory
Friends



2. You love the show but dislike the theme.


Sometimes they don't always get it right. These shows would have been better off as part of today's lineups where the theme song is simply an afterthought:


Dobie Gillis
The Munsters
Donna Reed Show
Family Affair
The Cosby Show
Night Court
The Honeymooners
The Love Boat
Chico and the Man
The Dukes Of Hazzard
Alice
The Simpsons
Frasier
Malcolm In The Middle

3. Hate the show but love the theme.


This is where I will watch a show just to hear the theme and then quickly bail out after the first commercial break:


Dallas
Full House
Saved By The Bell
Hannah Montana
Growing Pains
Family Guy
It's Garry Shandling's Show

4. Hate both the show and the theme:

The worst of both worlds:

The Patty Duke Show
The Fresh Prince Of Bel-Air
Gimme A Break

[Sal]

Originally Posted by Alan Brady's Hair

I like most of the older ones. It certainly seems that they used to give more attention to theme songs.

I was looking through my Top 100 sitcoms, and I noticed that there are also little categories of theme songs:

1. Instrumentals: obviously, just setting a mood for a show.
-Leave It to Beaver: happy-go-lucky, so you know that any scrape the Beaver gets into will turn out okay;
-Hogan's Heroes: very confident, letting the audience know that these guys are soldiers on assignment rather than prisoners;
-Seinfeld: in a word, quirky.

The Honeymooners is really interesting, because it sets a lush, romantic mood that's exactly the opposite of the show's content. Is it pure irony, or are they actually saying that Ralph and Alice really do have everything need as long as they're together? I don't know.

2. Vocals that set a mood:
-Bosom Buddies: I've never really understood the choice of "My Life," as it just sort of vaguely implies that the show is about independent young men;
-All in the Famil: Again, "Those Were the Days" just implies that these are a couple of nostalgic people, with the quality of the performance maybe implying that they're not very able people.
--Happy Days: you're in the Fifties.

3. Story songs, telling you what the show is about:
-Beverly Hillbillies, Gilligan's Island, F Troop, the original Partridge Family theme, the Nanny, Fresh Prince.

4. I'd also argue that there's a type in between 2. and 3. above, that generally tells you what to expect without much detail. Examples of that might be I Love Lucy, Dobie Gillis, Gidget, The Mary Tyler Moore Show, the second Partridge Family theme, Cheers.

I think the theme for WKRP in Cincinnati is right on the line between categores 3. and 4., depending on whether it's the short or long version of the song.

I think "All In The Family" might fall into your third category when you think about the character of Archie Bunker. All he wanted was to live in an America that was like when he grew up in the 40s and 50s right after the war. But with all the changes and social unrest that came along in the mid-1960s and the turmoil that carried into the 1970s, he realizes that it is impossible and he becomes bitter, cranky, opinionated and bigoted, so when he and Edith sing the theme, they become nostalgic for the old days because they both know that the past was a lot better than the present.