Bang the Drum All Day

This raucous song is pretty straightforward: Todd Rundgren don't want to work, he just wants to bang on the drum all day. In an interview with the DePauw University radio station WGRE, he explained: "The success of that song is completely organic. It's purposely cynical. The record label wasn't taking it seriously and didn't hear it as a single. It was just something that popped into my head while I slept." Rundgren added that he believes the song became popular "solely because of the line about banging on the boss's head," and said, "It's a party anthem, and at least once a year I get a request to use it in a commercial or a movie. I hate playing it live, though. I feel ape-like. My hands get tired, my ears get tired. But the audience loves it."

Rundgren is a distinguished songwriter, musician and composer, but this novelty romp is one of his most-played songs. How does he feel about the broad swath of the population that know him only for this song? In an interview with Bullz-Eye, he explained: "I like the idea that I've written a song that is well known to a broad segment of the population…and they have no idea why they know it! In the same sense that everybody knows 'Happy Birthday,' but they can't remember the first time they heard it, and they have no idea who wrote it. But you've penetrated the cultural consciousness in a way that transcends the typical pop song, and what it means is that if I never have another hit record on the radio again, that song is still going to be around likely twenty-five years from now. People probably don't remember Gary Glitter, but they know "Rock And Roll Part 2"! And in that sense, it has somewhat of a more protractile life span, I guess."

In a Songfacts interview with Todd Rundgren, he cited "Bang The Drum All Day" as one of the most important songs of his career, because "I made so much money off of it." He added: "Everybody likes to hear that 'Bang The Drum' song, but everyone's connection to that is that one line in the song where it talks about abusing your boss ('I pound on that drum like it was the boss's head'). I can identify with that, but I don't really enjoy playing the song that much because it's just a lot of screaming and flailing around."