Sometimes you have to look past a band’s hit songs to discover your favorites. In this current era of radio, it’s rare to have the opportunity to hear many of a band’s music beyond a few singles, unless you actually go out and purchase full albums and listen to full albums. Such habits started to go off-track around the turn of the century. But all the way from the late ’70s until now, many songs just have not been given their due, being overshadowed by other products of their own creators. This list fails to cover it all, but it covers some of my current and past favorites. Click the links to hear the songs in a new window. (Most of them are not in embeddable form, sorry.)

1. Everybody knows the chorus to “Everybody Have Fun Tonight” by Wang Chung, but “Lullaby” is what made me love the band. It’s one of my all-time favorite songs.

2. Same goes for “Hey You” by Bachman-Turner Overdrive. While the band had some big hits like “Takin’ Care of Business,” this one was a lot more inventive and fun.

3. Did you know that Spacehog put anything out after “In the Meantime”? Though “The Chinese Album” wasn’t very hot with the critics, it’s got all my favorite songs by the band, including this one, “Carry On.”

4. If it surprises you to learn that Fountains of Wayne had a good thing going even before “Stacy’s Mom,” then you were probably just learning the alphabet song when the band put out “Utopia Parkway” — its best album, with songs like “A Fine Day for a Parade” and “Amity Gardens.”

5. If you don’t like AFI’s weird emo sound, don’t write them off just yet. Before “Miss Murder,” this band was a sweet spreader of punk rock with “He Who Laughs Last.”

Follow the jump for even more ranty-ravey fun!

6. You may not even know who Ben Kweller is, but you should, because he’s a-mazing. He had a hit with “Falling” on his debut LP, but that wasn’t all the record had to offer. “In Other Words” is by far the superior tune.

7. Superdrag’s 1998 CD, “Head Trip in Every Key,” only bred one hit, and anyone who even recognized the band’s name would probably recognize “Do the Vampire,” a good song that got old after a few dozen listens. What didn’t get old was the record’s second track, “Hellbent.” And it didn’t stop there. The band’s 2002 release, “Last Call for Vitriol,” gave us “The Staggering Genius,” unfortunately without absolutely any fanfare.

8. You’d recognize Ok Go as the band that does the treadmill music video to “Here it Goes Again.” The band doesn’t really toy with changing styles, so if you like the hit, you’ll enjoy all the rest. Besides a lovely, yet rare, cover of “The Lovecats,” this band’s turned out an array of beautiful stuff, like “Maybe, This Time.”

9. Foreigner is a well-known band with plenty of hits. “Feels Like the First Time” has lived a long healthy life in commercials, and “Cold as Ice” has all but melted under its own heat. But whenever I want to talk about my favorite Foreigner song, nobody knows what I’m talking about. “Starrider” dredges up my mind’s taste for fantasy and lore. This epic masterpiece is what makes Foreigner one of my favorite bands.

10. Finally, as great as “Wynona’s Big Brown Beaver” is, every time I hear it, I feel sorry for all the other Primus songs that ended up smothered beneath it on that record, “Tales from the Punchbowl.” Les Claypool’s artful musicianship shines throughout, on songs such as “Glass Sandwich” and “De Anza Jig.” It doesn’t get much better than the mysterious and creepy “Over the Electric Grapevine.”

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