10 Mistakes In Songs So Good They Kept Them In

2. "Just What I Needed" Loses Its Rhythm

Drummers get a bad rap sometimes, and listening to The Cars’ breakout 1978 hit Just What I Needed you can kind of understand why. There’s an old joke that all the lads behind the kit have to be able to do is count to four, but David Robinson almost singlehandedly sets discussions about the intelligence of his kinfolk back by a couple of decades with this bizarre foul-up.

On the face of it, there’s not much for him to get wrong here. It’s a simple beat in a mid-tempo pop-rock anthem in which all the attention is on the that punchy riff and the killer chorus melody. And yet somehow, Robinson manages to have an absolute nightmare.

For reasons that only he will ever properly know, halfway through the third verse the drummer starts hitting his snare on the first and third beat of every bar, as opposed to the second and fourth. The effect is downright odd, throwing the listener completely and shifting the whole vibe of the song instantly into much choppier waters.

The band liked the mix-up though, so much so that they decided to keep it - again, for reasons they will only ever properly know. Thankfully, it seems that everybody in Boston in the late 70s was a bit of a madhead, and even with a whole verse that is played completely wrong, the track was so popular on local radio that it earned The Cars their first record deal.