The Police, "King of Pain"
"King of Pain" is the first song I can recall reading the lyrics sheet for in order to try and figure out what was going on in it (the lyrics sheet didn't help much). While I'm fully on board with digital delivery for music, and I'm happy to not fill my house with CDs and stuff, I do think that there are certainly small pleasures lost without the physical packaging.
The Dead Kennedys, "Hellnation"
Frankenchrist was the album that actually got me into the Dead Kennedys. I think most folks put it as the weakest of the studio albums these days, but some of the slower numbers on the record allowed me to kind of catch up to the record. I hadn't really listened to any hardcore, and the blistering pace of things took some adjustment to really start being able to parse the music. I needed the same adjustment for extreme metal as well. At any rate, I'm grateful for this record introducing me to the band, even if it's not the one I listen to the most these days.
Portastatic, "untitled"
This little throwaway is from the end of Portastatic's 1997 album The Nature of Sap.
Scherzo, "Suffering and Joy"
The title track of Scherzo's only album, this is an extremely Lookout Records release. There are a ton of these records from this period, and they're enjoyable if somewhat disposable. This is one of the better ones, though.
Superchunk, "Phone Sex"
By the time Superchunk pulled in to Here's To Shutting Up, their eighth studio album, they very much sounded out of gas. I think a fair bit of it was stylistic choices from McCaughan, choosing to emphasize a quiter type of song. But the songs just don't hit without the propulsive energy of their earlier records, and this ends up being my least favorite Superchunk record.