Top (Ten) Songs: Season 4 (Crazy Ex-Girlfriend)

Finally getting around to a Top Ten Songs for Crazy Ex-Girlfriend’s final season. I thought the season 4 songs were a little all over the place (lots of numbers for more minor characters, quite a few gimmicky songs, not as many slam dunks for Rebecca,) but even though, musically, it’s not my favorite season, there are still some top-notch songs in here (including a few from those more minor characters!) Here are my favorites.

“No One Else is Singing My Song” – Great song for Rebecca, Nathaniel, and Josh to separately wallow in their self-pity of all feeling “uniquely” lonely in the exact same song. The joke is an obvious one, but the song does it well. I especially like how the rhythm on “No one knows the rhythm enough to sing along” really does change with every chorus, and the “entire company” part at the end is terrific. Not to mention, everyone sounds awesome here.

Best lyric: “It’s late and getting colder.” – “You’re only getting older.” – “And you’re next to someone who is fast asleep.” – “That’s so specific!”

“Don’t Be a Lawyer” – I can’t believe Jim has been an office character this whole time and only now in season 4 shows off his pipes and his moves in this killer number. Rocking a Bel Biv Devoe beat and Bobby Brown dance moves, this song enumerates all the reasons why becoming a lawyer is is a horrible decision. It’s full of clever rhymes (“Your only expertise / Is runnin’ up fees, / Speakin’ legalese like a dick”) and harsh truths about the profession (there’s no money to be had in any discipline of law that isn’t completely soulless,) and the whole thing is beautifully topped off when the CW lawyer who interrupts the song to issue a disclaimer swandives out the window in despair.

Best lyric: God, there are so many! I’m gonna have to go with, “Sure, your parents might think you’re a failure, / But no one’s ever said, ‘First, let’s kills all the tailors.’”

“I Want to Be a Child Star” – Although Rebecca’s half brother Tucker only appears in a single episode, this song makes it a memorable one. The show nails the look and feel of a preteen pop star, and Tucker’s enthusiasm for the inevitable spiral that’s sure to accompany his desired fame really sells the dark humor. The lines describing a child star’s rise and subsequent flameout are just too real (hang in there, kids from A Series of Unfortunate Events! Stay grounded and stay safe.)

Best lyric: “I want to sue my parents for emancipation / After they get caught stealing from me. / I want to be on the set / Of The Walking Dead / When I lose my virginity.”

“Trapped in a Car with Someone You Don’t Want to Be Trapped in a Car With” – This is a song that, while amusing, didn’t strike me too much when the episode first aired. However, the soundtrack has made me fall in love with it. I love the peppy Beach Boys-style number about dealing with an annoying car-ride companion, especially how the song shifts through a few different genres (because the car ride “goes on so long” that the “group” evolves from ‘60s pop to experimental hippie stuff to more commercial fare.) Also, like “Maybe She’s Not Such a Heinous Bitch After All” from season 3, there are some fantastic jokes in the background lines.

Best lyric: From the hippie section – “Why do we even have cars at all? / In the scheme of things, this Earth is small. / Or do I really need to travel somewhere / Or can I get there in my mind?”

“What U Missed While U Were PopUlar” – So fun and so true. At their high school reunion, George schools Josh on what all the nerdy kids were up to while Josh was busy being prom king. From the morning news team’s “hardcore” reporting to the band kids’ makeout sessions, the song covers various nerdy-kid niches and really celebrates that plenty of kids who aren’t popular still have plenty of their own kind of fun in high school. I also like the point it brings up that these kids also developed resilience, while Josh, who had it easy in high school, has been struggling more in adulthood.

Best lyric: “You were cool while we were not, / But our massage circles were super-hot. / We massaged while you were popular / And got massaged while you were popular.”

“Hello, Nice to Meet You” – First of all, even though I enjoy Skylar Astin, new!Greg remained odd for me, and I never thought he really felt like Greg. That said, I do like this song, a cute bouncy number in which Rebecca and Greg try to put their old baggage aside and pretend they’re meeting for the first time. The juxtaposition between the sweet meetcutes and the frank references to their checkered past together is done really well.

Best lyric: “I mean, is anyone we meet / Really that new to us? / We’re all the same species / That grew in a uterus.”

“Sports Analogies” – Oh, I love this one! A Rat Pack-style number of Josh and Nathaniel getting past their differences through the universal male language of sports analogies. Lots of terrific tidbits here. I always laugh when we cut to them in the big-band setting for the second chorus and both of them now have a scotch and a cigarette in each hand, and the jump from the sad bridge back into the peppy final chorus is a delight. It’s a song that makes me wish Nathaniel and Josh had more opportunities to sing together.

Best lyric: “Sports analogies, sports analogies.” – “We found the common ground in all men’s personalities.”

“Real Life Fighting is Awkward” – I almost forgot about this one, since it isn’t on the season 4 soundtrack. It’s in the background rather than being sung by any actual character, but it’s too much fun to be left out! The “Kung Fu Fighting”-esque ditty provides a perfect backdrop to Josh and Greg’s awkward fight. I love the intercut fantasy sequences of them fighting in an action film, kung fu film, musical, and sci-fi film, juxtaposing the slick, stylized moves with their clumsy grappling in real life.

Best lyric: “Real life fighting is awkward. / There are no cool side effects. / Punching doesn’t sound like anything. / You often hurt yourself / More than you hurt the other guy!”

“Love’s Not a Game” – Nice old-fashioned ensemble showstopper, not to mention a rare chance for White Josh to take center stage. His feigned outrage at the group betting on Rebecca’s “Three Guys, Three Dates” situation is just a fakeout, and he instead leads a peppy number a la Guys and Dolls. The melody is catchy, the lyrics are fun, the costumes are vibrant, and the dancing is terrific. But the irony is great too, the repeated repetitions that they’d never be so callous as to bet on their friends’ love lives, when of course they’re doing just that.

Best lyric: “Love’s not a game, / Love’s not a game. / That being said, let’s make it rain!”

“Eleven O’Clock” – This is, of course, Rebecca’s “eleven o’clock” number in the series finale. While I think “Rebecca’s Reprise” at the end of season 2 has a bit more of an emotional punch, this is still neat, cycling through snippets of a number of songs from Rebecca’s journey over the course of the series. I especially love the slide into “You Stupid Bitch,” and the conceit with the various costumes from earlier numbers is cool.

Best lyric: “It’s eleven o’clock, / And by eleven o’clock, / Shouldn’t I have earned a frickin’ ever after? / I’ve done the workbooks, taken the pills, / What more could I do? / How do I still not know myself / After all that I’ve been through?”