The Greatest Musical Moments In Batman History

This Saturday, 26 September, DC Comics is officially celebrating Batman Day, held by the company in honour of everyone's favourite 76-year-old night-stalking vigilante.

It's been an eventful seven-plus decades, too, with the modern scowl beneath the cowl sitting worlds away from 1939's pipe-smoking, woman-hitting, thug-killing Bruce Wayne, who used to yell insane things at criminals like "Quiet or papa spank!" and routinely shrug off the fact that he just threw some low-level bank robber to their death.

It should come as little surprise, then, to find out that, over the years, Batman has actually demonstrated something of a penchant for musicality, so to pay homage to the Caped Crusader in our own special way, we thought we'd take a look back into his history and highlight some of the greatest musical moments to have ever come out of Gotham City.

danny elfman's batman theme

These days, arguably even moreso than the "nana-nana-nana-nana" theme song of the 1960s TV show, if you think Batman theme, you're thinking of Danny Elfman's evocative, heart-stopping orchestral theme for Tim Burton's 1989 film starring Michael Keaton (who actually got second billing after Jack Nicholson, and he was the title character of the movie).

Used or adapted for pretty much every film in the Burton/Schumacher era - not to mention greatly inspiring the opening theme for Warner Bros' Batman: The Animated Series back in the '90s, also written by Elfman - the renowned composer's bombastic, brassy theme instantly recalls snow-dappled skyscrapers, gothic architecture, long nights spent debating whether Keaton was too short to play Batman, and latent sadness about Billy Dee Williams getting screwed out of his role as Harvey Dent after doing a fine job in the first movie only to have Tommy Lee Jones come in and ruin everything for everyone in Batman Forever.

Anyway, it's a great theme, and you should listen to it if for no other reason than to inject your day with an instant sense of heroism and adventure and Danny DeVito dying in a sewer.

"mayhem of the music meister!" — batman: brave & the bold

The deceptively brilliant kids' show, Batman: Brave & The Bold, asserted itself as one of the — strangely — freshest takes on the character when it premiered in late 2008 amid the world's peak lust for Christopher Nolan's gritty Gotham in The Dark Knight, instilling its lead character with Silver Age innocence (and costume) amid a mish-mash cast taken from throughout DC's history (modern Blue Beetle, Golden Age Green Arrow, etc).

The result is a true treat for children and adults alike, as the bright and bubbly art style and simple storylines are peppered with jokes and nods to older audiences — and the show demonstrated that it could do it all, even as a musical, with season one's "Mayhem Of The Music Meister!", which starred Neil Patrick Harris as the titular villain, capable of making others do his bidding with his hypnotic vocal work.

The entire episode is a Batman musical extravaganza, featuring everything from love ballads to chase scenes, and Drives Us Bats — a villain-filled, upbeat lament about Batman's consistent thwarting of their nefarious schemes — is an absolute joy, and it would be even if it didn't feature NPH's delicious money note during the lyric, "He's got no superpoweeeeeeeers, he's just a flying raaaaaat"... not to mention the references to '60s Batman staples such as the Batusi and Shark Repellent. Gold.

the batusi — batman (1960s tv series)

Welllll, since even the Music Meister mentioned it, we'd be remiss to at least not acknowledge the Batusi, the famed Bat-dance, which made its first appearance in the pilot episode of the 1960s' Batman TV show, starring Adam West and Burt Ward. 

The dance — named for then-famous jig the Watusi — is a polarising one among overly serious Bat-fans, who cannot abide anything but the gloomiest of portrayals of their cave-dwelling hero, but those who love and accept the '60s series for the campy, light-hearted take that it was will always hold a special place in their hearts for the unintentionally hilarious seduction of the Batusi, which wove its way into two episodes of the show for super-loose reasons, like when Batman walked up in the club like "what up, I've got a big car" and everyone is just totally fine with it because it's the 1960s and the world has not seen even close to that much free-flowing LSD since.

God bless you, Adam West. You acted the hell out of this.

prince's batdance — batman (1989)

If you thought the Batusi was just a bit questionable, you clearly missed Prince's contribution to Burton's original Batman flick. Not only do you hear the Purple One on the stereo when Jack Nicholson's Joker and his crew are destroying valuable pieces of artwork, much to the horror of Kim Basinger, but he actually put together a full accompanying track specifically for the film's soundtrack, simply titled Batdance.

Batdance would be the first of many collaborations between the Bat-films and then-popular musicians, giving way to Siouxsie & The Banshees' Face To Face (Batman Returns) and the dual prongs of U2 (Hold Me, Thrill Me, Kiss Me, Kill Me) and Seal (Kiss From A Rose), both of whom contributed to Batman Forever's soundtrack — and, in many ways, it's kind of the most amazing.

For example, the magnificent clip features Prince half-done-up like the Clown Prince of Crime, half himself, while a troupe of costumed dancers engage in choreographed fights and what appear to be involuntary muscle spasms for six-or-so minutes. Strangely, the synth-heavy, super-of-its-time track features a vocal refrain of "Bat-Maaaaan!" that runs uncomfortably similar to the vibe of that featured in the theme for the '60s show, especially since half the point of Burton's gothic take was to shirk off the perceived damage wrought by the bright and bubbly series to the character's ongoing credibility.

That said, nobody conveyed that idea to Prince, clearly.

"this little piggy" - justice league unlimited

For countless Batman fans, there is only one true voice for Gotham's dark guardian, and that is Kevin Conroy, who has lent his own pipes to the character for more than 20 years. He first took on the role in the '90s Batman: The Animated Series before dominating it throughout several consequent DC Animated Universe shows, including the 2000s Justice League and its successor, Justice League Unlimited (not to mention several animated films both inside and out of the DCAU, plus the Arkham games).

Despite the breadth of Conroy's Bat-performances, though, there is one that is often cited as next-level wonderful, and that is the job he did for Justice League Unlimited's season-one episode "This Little Piggy", in which Wonder Woman is transformed into a pig by Circe, a vengeful Greek goddess of magic, and Batman spends the whole episode trying to get her back.

The reason this adventure is such a consistently highly rated one among fans is two-fold - one, it gave real credence to the legitimacy of a Batman/Wonder Woman romantic involvement, which people shipped like you would not believe, and, two, Conroy's ever-stoic Bats finally drops his guard and gets soulful as hell with a jaw-dropping rendition of 1929 standard Am I Blue? to please Circe and ultimately have the spell on Wonder Woman lifted.

Check the clip below for Batman's finest hour, and stick around for the kicker when he and Wonder Woman are talking once she's been returned to human form for yet another thing that made WonderBat supporters everywhere drop their feelings all over the place.