The Best Fourth Songs On History's Greatest Albums

Sorry, Manowar, maybe next year...

​As we come up on the July 4th weekend, Rocks Off considered a myriad of blog ideas to commemorate the holiday. Most patriotic songs, album covers, artists? Sorry, Lee Greenwood, Richard Pryor, and Ted Nugent, but it's all been covered. On this weekend of independence, we chose to instead remember the best fourth songs on some of the best albums ever made.

Rocks Off scoured all the top-albums lists we could find, from the Pitchfork 200 to Rolling Stone's Top 500 list, which was very divisive when it debuted in 2003. Pretty sure we bought three copies. One to burn, one to treasure, and one to mark off every album we owned on the list with a highlighter and to keep track of the ones we still needed.

We finally picked up that Graham Parker album not too long ago.

For some American listeners, and a few in the Dominican Republic, the fourth song on an album represents the "cleanup" hitter in the lineup of an album's track-listing. The first song usually sets the tone, the "Craig Biggio" if you will, and the fourth is the "Jeff Bagwell" or "Lance Berkman," at least when they weren't hurt, if you follow Houston Astros logic.

We picked the 25 best fourth songs of some of the best albums ever, which include some heavy hitters indeed. How could "Stairway To Heaven" and "Iron Man" both be fourth songs? "Thriller" was even a fourth song. This makes for a pretty bitchin' playlist, we must admit. What are your favorite fourth songs?

Led Zeppelin, Led Zeppelin IV: "Stairway To Heaven"

Nirvana, Nevermind: "Breed"

Weezer, Weezer (The Blue Album): "Buddy Holly"

Arcade Fire, Funeral : "Neighborhood #3 (Power Out)"

Michael Jackson, Thriller : "Thriller"

Neil Young, Harvest : "Heart of Gold"

Elton John, Goodbye Yellow Brick Road: "Goodbye Yellow Brick Road"

Beck, Odelay!: "The New Pollution"

Metallica, Metallica(The Black Album): "Unforgiven"

Prince, Around the World In a Day: "Raspberry Beret"

Black Sabbath, Paranoid : "Iron Man"

Rolling Stones, Goat's Head Soup : "Doo Doo Doo Doo Doo (Heartbreaker)"

The Clash, Combat Rock: "Rock The Casbah"

Pink Floyd, Dark Side of the Moon : "Time"

U2, The Joshua Tree : "Bullet the Blue Sky"

The White Stripes, White Blood Cells: "Fell In Love With a Girl"