Best "cover songs" to get the crowd onto the dance floor?

The coverband I'm in sticks to mainly newer tunes and these have been killing it lately.

M83 - Midnight City
Of Monsters and Men - Little Talks
Groupelove - tongue tied
Black Keys - Lonely Boy
Anything Mumford and Sons has out there.


Some other staples that work every time but are a little older:

Cee Lo - Fuck You none of this forget you mess.
Jet - Are You gonna be my girl
Franz Ferdinand - Take Me out
Killers - Somebody Told Me

Also, we generally enjoy our set.
 
this is a good set list: it works.
set 1 you may be right,
2 beautiful sunday,
3 baby makes her blue jeans talk,
4 folsom prison blues,
5 break-up song,
6 next broken heart,
7 here for a good time,
8 brown eyed girl,
9 welcome to the future,
10 jenny jenny,
11 don't stop,
12 the middle,
13 wild one,
14 miss you..

set 2
1 message in a bottle,
2 hurts so good,
3 centerfield,
4 hungry like the wolf,
5 gold on the ceiling,
6 i fought the law,
7 moves like jagger,
8 take it easy,
9 heave away,
10 apartment song,
11 comfortably numb,
12 hey jealousy,
13 mustang sally,
14 you might think

set 3
1 she's so mean,
2 authority song,
3 alice,
4 sweet caroline,
5 bad case of lovin you,
6 your back yard,
7 somebody like you,
8 does your mother know,
9 white wedding,
10 sylvias mother,
11 summer of 69,
12 workin for the weekend,
13 margaritaville,
14 some kind of wonderful...
 
Locked out of Heaven - Bruno Mars

We're adding this song next week. I bet it will go over really well. Especially if we dance as well as these guys.




So funny, my band worked this out for a gig this past weekend. We're in the middle of set two and the dance floor's packed. We come to this on the lst and the band wants to skip it in case we "lose the crowd". I just started playing it and it went over like a house on fire. Beauty! Strange that we get so nervous about trying new stuff, but so cool when it all works out.
 
Can anyone remember the last time they've seen a bass player play that tight while dancing around? I'm not a big fan, kinda of like this song, it's on list of possible songs to learn, but truthfully I'll take bruno's band over teen pop recorded with only machines any day. If he keeps this up, young women might actually get into live bands again....now there's a novel concept.

We're adding this song next week. I bet it will go over really well. Especially if we dance as well as these guys.

 
Yes another band that does urgent I love it. We do it with the big live build up xxx


All the songs I dislike the most. In our case:

Urgent
Pour Some Sugar on Me
Any ACDC
Living on a Prayer
Any butt rock

Of course, many will dance to almost anything, including Pink Floyd's Money.

A few songs always clear the floor:
Over the Hills and Far Away
Closer to the Heart
Eruption
Carry On Wayward Son
Satch Boogie
Time (Pink Floyd)
YYZ (or any Rush really)
Anything worth listening to.

Personally, I like to clear the floor.

And nothing will get me on the floor myself. I do not dance, so I try my best to see things from the dancer's perspective.
 
Any song with an intro of 'This has to be our last one tonight'

Although .... we've also had some gigs where cheers were forthcoming after a really short acapella song called 'We're taking a 10 minute break'
 
Most of the lists mentioned here kind of put tears in my eyes, because I would love an audience that relates to them. In Germany (at least in my region) at the moment almost every audience wouldn't even know those songs and urge the bands to play "Schlager" or "Mallorca Dancepop" to party. Rock'n'Roll seems to be really dead for the younger ones here... :-(
 
Most of the lists mentioned here kind of put tears in my eyes, because I would love an audience that relates to them. In Germany (at least in my region) at the moment almost every audience wouldn't even know those songs and urge the bands to play "Schlager" or "Mallorca Dancepop" to party. Rock'n'Roll seems to be really dead for the younger ones here... :-(

Ouch, that sucks. Migrate somewhere else. Not that bad down here in the south with all the universities around. They seem to like punk rock :)
 
These are all great suggestions, and some very funny comments. Always good to know we love/hate the same stuff....always some moron with a lighter hollering "Free Bird"
 
Jenny Jenny would pair well with Jessie's Girl. Authority song by JCM is a good one too. We love The Middle, Everybody Talks, Rollin in The Deep rocks too.
 
Locked out of Heaven - Bruno Mars




So funny, my band worked this out for a gig this past weekend. We're in the middle of set two and the dance floor's packed. We come to this on the lst and the band wants to skip it in case we "lose the crowd". I just started playing it and it went over like a house on fire. Beauty! Strange that we get so nervous about trying new stuff, but so cool when it all works out.

Oh I hate it when somebody wants to skip songs on the list...just play em Danno!
 
For some reason, Peter Gabriel's Solsbury Hill is a pretty consistent dance floor filler for us, despite having some parts that are in in 7/8 time. Runnin' Down a Dream and Doctor My Eyes are another couple of our crowd's favorites. (Before I joined the band on electric guitar, they were a 3-piece all-acoustic lineup doing all softer classic rock stuff. We're still pretty light compared to a traditional classic rock band, but over time we're adding more and more danceable tunes.)
 
I dunno, sometimes you just never know what will get people up to twist and shout...o_O

Last night we had people 'dancing' to "Black Dog", "Electric Eye", and even "Aqualung". "Run Like Hell" consistently fills the dance floor. Kinda weird watching people dance to what I'd think were 'undance-able' tunes, heh. Everybody wins!! Fortunately, the 'dance-ability' of a tune doesn't enter at all into our criteria of selecting tunes :cool: We just totally self indulge and do our thing....
 
Last edited:
Totally unpredictable - one week we'll have people dancing away to the usual stuff us cover bands churn out - the next they will be booging to Enter Sandman!!

The only true fire guarantee of a dancing audience is later in the second set when they are all completely drunk. Golden rule - get the ladies up on the dance floor and the lads will follow!!
 
Back
Top Bottom