A selection of Bill Hader’s favourite songs
Die-hard fans of Saturday Night Live will know Bill Hader‘s face better than the back of their hands. The comedian, actor and writer spent eight seasons as an SNL cast member, later making his big screen debut in 2006’s You, Me and Dupree. From there, he went on star in a host of celebrated Judd Apatow movies, including Knocked Up, Superbad, Forgetting Sarah Marshall and Pineapple Express.
Offering a peek behind the curtain during his appearance on KCRW’s Guest DJ project, Hader picked six of his favourite tracks. After questioning why anyone would want to watch him listen to a song in a studio theatre at 11 o’clock at night, Hader named his first selection Frank Zappa and The Mothers of The Invention’s ‘Who Needs The Peace Corp’, a track that changed his listening habits forever.
“When I was a lad, I was really into really bad music,” Hader explained. “I was into the pop music of the time, which would be hair metal bands, and my dad, when I was 12, was like, ‘you have to stop listening to this shit’. And so, for my birthday, he gave me this thing, it was really instrumental in my life, and it was this box that had the Zep set in it, and it had Ziggy Stardust, it had some Pink Floyd records in it, and it had Frank Zappa – my dad loves Frank Zappa.”
Next up is XTC’s 1979 track ‘Making Plans For Nigel’. “I really like this era of punk music and British music,” Hader said. “I was listening to The Clash a lot and The Strangers, and it was at SNL, and Fred Armisen said, ‘well do you know XTC?’ and I said, ‘no, I’ve never heard of them’ and he said ‘they’re phenomenal’ and he played me this song and I got really into it… I would listen to this before every SNL episode, like, before I had to go out and perform, I would put this song on.”
Hader’s third selection couldn’t be further from the world of UK punk. Introducing ‘Hello In There’. Discussing his choice, Hader said: “My wife actually played John Prine [to me], and she’s like, ‘It’s folk music’, and I was like [groans]. I was really immature about it.” On listening to the track for the first time, however, Hader found himself falling for Prine’s dulcet tones. “This reminds me of family members of mine from Oklahoma, and you would talk to them, and there was like no bullshit anymore. I found it really heartbreaking and moving.”
For his fourth track, Hader brought the energy back up again with NoMeansNo’s 1989 track ‘It’s Catching Up’. “This band is hardcore band, but it’s like prog-punk; they have this cool break in the middle of this song, and it kind of, I think, rocks.” After explaining that the members of NoMeansNo are “the nicest guys ever,” Hader opened up about his appreciation for De La Soul’s ‘Jenifa Taught Me (Derwin’s Revenge)’. “I love this record, I listened to it constantly growing up,” Hader said. “To me, this was a really dirty song [laughs]. This was like, ‘Woah, my parents cannot know that we’re listening to this.'”
Check out the full list below.
Bill Hader’s favourite songs:
- ‘Who Needs the Peace Corp?’ – Frank Zappa and the Mothers of Invention
- ‘Making Plans for Nigel’ – XTC
- ‘Hello In There’ – John Prine
- ‘It’s Catching Up’ – NoMeansNo
- ‘Jenifa Taught Me (Derwin’s Revenge)’ – De La Soul *not on Spotify
- ‘Public Image’ – Public Image Limited.
For his final track, a self-confessed “guilty pleasure”, Hader explained that he was originally going to play a Scott Walker track before his girlfriend convinced him to select something a little more danceable. What he settled on was Public Image Limited’s ‘Public Image’, first released in 1978, just a year after UK punk’s “year zero” and already criticising the movement. A fine choice indeed.
Stream a playlist of the songs, below.
