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Note: This is not an exhaustive or authoritative list. It’s my list. For something more authoritative, follow the Spin Doctors Archive on social media. Daniel has heard everything.

For an upcoming ECV Analog project, I have been doing a deep dive into the Spin Doctors, a ’90s phenomenon who have remained consistently excellent across seven studio albums and a couple of lineup changes since their debut EP dropped close to 35 years ago.

During the course of that deep dive, I told drummer Aaron Comess that I believed the band was due for a reappraisal by the wider public, especially since frontman Chris Barron is so likable and iconoclastic that it’s hard to imagine the internet wouldn’t fall in love with him.

Then, I logged onto Threads.

If you haven’t been on Threads in a while, let me tell you what: people fucking love Chris Barron on Threads. It’s like he’s the mayor over there. In addition to talking about the band (and popping into viral music threads to tell people they should listen to “Two Princes,” which is always good advice), Barron is best known for showing up unexpectedly in anti-MAGA and pro-social justice threads with his trademark “That’s a follow” response to the good guys. From what I can tell, he doesn’t engage with trolls and bigots, choosing positivity over dunking, which is frankly the best way for a public figure to deal with these things.

Because Barron has become so beloved on Threads largely because of his personality, I’ve seen a few people ask where to start getting into his actual work. Most recently, user Kiran Kumar posted about this phenomenon, and Barron quoted the post, asking, “Where should he start?“

Well…

Pocket Full of Kryptonite

The Pocket Full of Kryptonite album turns 35 years old this summer, and it is, front to back, one of the best albums of the 1990s. Most people know it for its two hugely popular singles, “Two Princes” and “Little Miss Can’t Be Wrong,” but the whole record is full of great songs.

By the time the Spin Doctors landed their record deal, they had been touring (and playing with Barron’s high school buddy John Popper from Blues Traveler, who has a harmonica solo on this record) for a few years already. Having developed a fairly deep bench of crowd-pleasers (which the band jokingly called their “whitebread hits”), the band was able to put together a debut album that rocked while still leaving some of their most popular live tunes off of it to use on later records.

The song “Jimmy Olsen’s Blues,” from which the album takes its title, is an undeniably hooky pop song that’s only funnier now that we have seen Skyler Gisondo’s Jimmy become a sex symbol in 2025’s Superman. “Refrigerator Car” and “Forty or Fifty” are those fan-favorite cuts that hardcore Spin Doctors aficionados will tell you are the actual best songs on the record. And I think “Off My Line” and “Shinbone Alley/Hard to Exist” are the ones that got stuck in my head the most at the time. Yet, “What Time Is It?” and “How Could You Want Him (When You Know You Could Have Me)?” are probably the most enduring non-singles, having been in the setlist almost nonstop since 1991.

That leaves…what? One song? And yet, lemme tell ya, “More Than She Knows” is a bop.

There’s a reason this record went platinum more than half a dozen times. You should listen to it all the way through at least once.

You can also find a 20th anniversary special edition out there. Physical copies are getting pricey, but a digital copy available on most streaming platforms, and it’s worth a listen because you can hear early versions of many of the album’s tracks (as well as some that would come out later).

The Musora Appearance

This is an odd place to head next, since it isn’t technically a commercial release, but it’s a great way to see where the band is right now.

In 2025, Musora brought the Spin Doctors into their studio as part of a YouTube series in which they ask bands to step outside of their comfort zone and cover a song on the spot. The band did an interview, a performance featuring some of their biggest hits and a couple of songs off their latest record, and then covered Prince’s “Purple Rain.” Along the way, Barron was incredibly unguarded and emotional, talking about his challenging childhood and the recent loss of his brother, Jeremy.

A lot of people who only knew the band from their wildly popular music videos (or saw that South Park episode where they made fun of “Two Princes”), and thought they were one-off goofballs, reappraised that opinion after watching the Musora appearance, seeing how seriously they took the music, how good the new tracks are, and how Chris was so emotionally honest and publicly vulnerable. Also, their version of “Purple Rain” was so good it made its way into the setlist for 2025 and 2026 concerts. You can get some of those at Nugs.net (the Hays, Kansas concert is a personal favorite of mine).

Other Songs That Aren’t Complete Albums

Look, I’ll be honest: There’s not a bad Spin Doctors album, in my opinion. That isn’t to say they’re The Beatles or anything, it’s just that they have only made seven studio albums, and they’ve got a ton of really solid songs, so there’s not an album without a lot of appeal. That said, it doesn’t seem useful to offer people an on-ramp and then just say “listen to all of it.”

(Although, yes, that was a popular approach under Barron’s Threads post.)

So, here are a couple of key or recommended songs from each album, followed by some thoughts on their official live releases:

Turn It Upside Down

This album went platinum but, given the enormous success of Pocket Full of Kryptonite, was still considered a disappointment. It didn’t have any singles with the success of “Two Princes” or “Little Miss Can’t Be Wrong,” which is an objectively insane standard to hold a record to, but it was the ’90s and the music industry was a different place.

The most radio-friendly song on the album might be “You Let Your Heart Go Too Fast,” which was the second single released. The launch single, “Cleopatra’s Cat” is an infectiously catchy and creative song, but not a conventional radio hit in any way. During a recent Rolling Stone interview, Barron said the band “got too fucking cute” releasing the song as the debut single off the record, which may be true, but it’s still a great listen.

Todd in the Shadows did an episode of his show Trainwreckords about Turn It Upside Down, which…eh. The album isn’t a trainwreck, but it’s an interesting outsider analysis of why it didn’t work commercially. One thing that’s interesting is that while he criticized the idea of using “Cleopatra’s Cat” as the lead single, Todd seemed to like the song itself and on his subreddit, numerous fans have since said they keep coming back to it.

Personally, I love the New York duology of “Laraby’s Gang” (featuring a reference to “Crazy Steve,” who is photographer Steve Eichner) and “Hungry Hamed’s,” which is a deeply relatable song about friends hanging out at an objectively terrible diner because it’s close by.

You’ve Got To Believe in Something

It’s hard not to recommend the title track, which has a great, driving hook reminiscent of the high-energy stuff from Pocket Full of Kryptonite, but most of the discussion around this record actually comes from different songs entirely.

“House” is something that has been a fixture in the Spin Doctors’ sets almost since the beginning. It’s a fun song that both is and is not about what it seems at face value, allowing for a deeper experience if you want, but not demanding much of the listener.

Personally, my favorite track on the record might be “Sister Sisyphus.” There’s something ineffable about it; it’s just a really likable song. Great guitar work, and I would love to hear Schenkman tackle that solo sometime in concert.

And the track that likely got the most radio play was “That’s The Way I Like It,” which is a cover of exactly the song you think it is. Spin Doctors played a version of this on the Space Jam soundtrack with Biz Markie, then decided to release a longer, studio version for the record. Funny enough, this was a “secret” track on the CD.

Here Comes the Bride

If you thought a cameo by Biz Markie on a secret track was weird, boy do I have news for you. Here Comes the Bride, produced in Aaron Comess’s home studio, is probably the band’s biggest, strangest creative swing (and maybe my personal favorite record to put on as background noise). This one isn’t as new-listener friendly for the most part and is probably best digested after you’re familiar with the band, but let’s dig in:

“Gone Mad” is a song that absolutely would have felt at home on rock radio right around the time of this record’s release, if anybody had noticed it. “Gorilla Boy” is a fun, funky little song that has some great backing vocals and a distinctive vibe that still feels recognizably like a Spin Doctors song.

Maybe the most immediately catchy song on the record is “The Bigger I Laugh, the Harder I Cry,” which just sounds like the title of a Bob Dylan song, but feels more like straight-ahead ’90s rock than most of the rest of this cool, crazy album.

Nice Talking To Me

“Margarita” is a certifiably great single, and it’s kind of shocking it didn’t make any waves. Another song built around a relatively simple concept that makes the most of it, while being super catchy. They do it terrific live, and it’s on some of the recent Nugs releases.

“Sugar” isn’t one of my personal favorites, but it feels so much like a song that SHOULD have been a hit back then, you can listen to it and absolutely convince yourself you’ve heard it a hundred times on the radio.

And “Can’t Kick the Habit” is a great ballad — maybe one of their best. Slower songs are something the band does really well on records but rarely goes too deep into during live performances, because it’s harder to get casual fans to sit still for this when they came for “Little Miss.”

There are a few examples over the years of tracks that got recorded more than once, and “Can’t Kick the Habit” is one of them — Barron re-recorded it as part of a solo record a few years later. His version is beautiful as well — a little less radio-friendly, but lyrically clearer, if that makes sense.

If the River Was Whiskey

Both the title track “If the River Was Whiskey” and “The Drop” are songs that feel a little bit like “Jimmy Olsen’s Blues.” Not in terms of style — this is a straight-up blues record with fairly little funk for a Spin Doctors record — but in the sense that they both feel like they were constructed around a clever turn-of-phrase. And in both instances, the lines they’re built around are undeniably clever phrases that turn out a fun song as a result.

I recently lucked into an early recording of a live blues session from 1994 (unavailable online, I’m sorry), in which you can hear a raucous, driving version of “The Drop,” which made me appreciate it even more. Live version of that song absolutely slap in a way that a fully-produced studio take doesn’t quite capture.

In general, it’s worth listening to Barron’s solo work (in particular the album Pancho and the Kid) if you like the If the River Was Whiskey songs. Like Whiskey, Pancho wears Barron’s Bob Dylan influences on its sleeve, and delivers some terrific, rollicking tracks as a result.

This record also features the definitive recording of “‘Bout a Train,” a bluesy rocker that also appeared on You’ve Got to Believe in Something, but which the band didn’t feel they had perfected the first time around.

Face Full of Cake

This is the band’s 2025 album, and if you watch the full Musora interview/performance rather than just the “Purple Rain” portion, you’ll see some songs off of it. Still, worth mentioning since it’s what the band is currently touring in support of.

This is probably their most commercially accessible and widely-noticed album since Turn It Upside Down, and the three singles from the record are all bangers, so we’ll go with those: “Rock ‘n’ Roll Heaven,” “Still a Gorilla,” and “Boombox.” I personally have a soft spot for “Double Parked,” though, so give that one a listen, too.

…Now, the live albums —

Up For Grabs/Homebelly Groove

These two albums are an oddity, becuase they’re basically two versions of the same live record. The Spin Doctors were a big touring band before they got a record deal (their Rolling Stone cover called them “rock’s road warriors”) and they got a reputation as a great live act. Up For Grabs actually came out before Pocket Full of Kryptonite did, making it their technical debut album (although nobody thinks of it that way).

There were plenty of live bootlegs circulating in the band’s early days, and it makes sense: they’re a great live act, and both “versions” of this album are great — although most longtime fans (and drummer Aaron Comess) will say they prefer the Up For Grabs version.

Songs From the Road

This is another live record, recorded following the release of 2013’s If the River Was Whiskey. Packaged with a DVD that marks one of the only live Spin Doctors performances officially released in any kind of decent resolution, it’s also a great option for new fans who want to get a deeper look at the Spin Doctors’ catalog all in one place. The only issue is that guitarist Aaron Schenkman left the band for a few years, and any songs recorded without him were not performed during this tour, which means a handful of really great songs are left out — but material from Pocket Full of Kryptonite, Turn It Upside Down, and If the River Was Whiskey is here with an energetic, live performance.

…And Barron’s Solo Work

You can get a bundle featuring a bunch of Barron’s officially-released solo work on Bandcamp for next to nothing, and I’d highly recommend it. Pancho and the Kid is, I believe, the only one you can get on physical media (although getting it on LP is pretty expensive, so you’d probably want to try digital or a CD first). That record is great, though, and “Brokenhearted Serenade” is worth the $8 to buy it digitally all on its own. “Why Must the Show Go On?” is a great track, too, and feels a lot like a Spin Doctors song for those looking for something a little more funky than most of the acoustic stuff on the record.

Bandcamp has some exclusive stuff that isn’t on other platforms (as far as I can tell), but you can also buy three other records on Amazon Music that aren’t on Bandcamp, so it’s kind of a hodgepodge. It isn’t easy to find Shag or Angels and One-Armed Jugglers on physical media, but it isn’t impossible.

As far as those records? A standout on Angels and One-Armed Jugglers is “Saving Grace” which, like the title track, feels a bit like Barron doing Dylan again. With “Saving Grace,” it feels a little more like he’s making it his own, though, and it’s a bit rockier. I really like “Too Young to Fade,” and I know there’s a lot of fans who have a soft spot for “The World Accordion to Garp.” That one has a circus-inspired, tuba-heavy opening that reminds me a bit of Springsteen’s “Wild Billy’s Circus Story,” so I can’t complain.

Shag is a record I didn’t know existed until I started this list, and I’ve been listening to the whole time as I wrote it. So, after a first listen? Give “Cop That Robber,” “Rolling Stone,” and Barron’s solo version of “Gorilla Boy” a spin. The latter is a pretty good indicator of how much different the versions can be on the re-recorded songs and “Rolling Stone” is just…charmingly low-fi and bluesy.

…Okay, what’d I miss?