As St. Patty’s Day nears, recall the drunk jams

Here’s an analogy. Pittsburghers are to the Steelers as college students are to beer. That is… Here’s an analogy. Pittsburghers are to the Steelers as college students are to beer. That is to say, column A likes column B. A lot.

And what better time than now, with St. Patrick’s Day, the mothership bonanza of booze, around the corner, than to recount the best drinking songs?

Of course, any college student, even those who refrain from alcoholic beverages, could tell you that there are few things drunk people like to do more than sing. Usually poorly. Always loudly. With that, I present to you the top five sing-along songs that drunk people love to sing.

5. “Wonderwall” by Oasis. This tune, among drunk listeners, becomes an incredibly moving ballad. The song’s selling points are its choruses, in which Liam Gallagher holds several words for extended periods of time, making drunks everywhere howl along, usually with an arm around a buddy, swaying slowly, often with a can, bottle or (for the ambitious drinkers) an entire pitcher or half-empty keg held up in the air.

Plus, Gallagher’s English accent kills. In fact, when I first heard the song in my mother’s minivan on the radio sometime around 1995, I noted the then-unknown accent and figured the band must’ve been, for some reason, from California. Nonetheless, I sang along, the hopelessly drunk 9-year-old that I was.

Song Quality Increase when Drunk: 25 percent. This hit’s a classic, dead drunk or stone sober.

4. “Livin’ on a Prayer” by Bon Jovi. This song was released when most of us were just about born and tells the story of Tommy and Gina, two working-class Americans with big dreams.

Tommy slaves away at the docks, but the union is on strike. Gina is a waitress trying to make ends meet. Oh, bless their hearts. This tale, quite relatable for us homegrown kids goin’ to a humble state school, is, in itself, enough to raise a glass. But it’s Jon Bon Jovi’s soaring voice and inspirational lyrics that really tap the keg.

“Oh (sung with fists clenched) we’re half way there / Oh-oh (sung with face twisted, half because you really mean it and half because this note is so hard to hit) livin’ on a prayer / Take my hand, we’ll make it, I swear.” Truer words were never screamed by drunk freshmen at an ’80s-themed party in a South Oakland basement. Plus, “Livin’ on a Prayer” was the theme to John Kerry’s 2004 presidential campaign, and we all needed a drink after that one.

SQID: 38 percent. Tommy and Gina just don’t have the same effect while sober.

3. “Build Me Up, Buttercup” by The Foundations featuring Colin Young. This one’s for all the romantics. “Build Me Up, Buttercup,” with it’s uber-catchy call-response chorus, is a hit when played toward the end of the night, when guys who are mostly drunk think to themselves, “If she hasn’t been impressed by my sweet dance moves, she’ll just die when I get on my knees and sing her this tune. It’ll be totally original!” Unfortunately, every guy in the room has this same thought at exactly the same moment.

SQID: 32 percent. This tune builds me up whatever my level of sobriety is.

2. The Theme Song from “The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air.” While not exactly a whole song (though there was a three-minute version released in the Netherlands), few would deny this classic.

Yes, we all know the words. Yes, the show was one of the best sitcoms of the best decade of sitcoms, the ’90s. And yes, we all do imitate the mom voice on the line, “You’re movin’ with your auntie and uncle in Bel-Air.” These facts are as sound as the theory of gravity.

And if you time it just right, you could make your exit of any said bar or party to “Yo, home to Bel-Air!” while Carlton-dancing right out the door.

SQID: 65 percent. When sober this is the theme song to a TV show. When drunk, this represents our entire childhood.

1. “Don’t Stop Believing” by Journey. Ah, yes, the ultimate last song of the night. In unison, everybody now, “Just a small town girl / Livin’ in a lonely world / She took a midnight train goin’ a-ny-where.”

Though it’s not smart to make drunken people wait, this song masterfully puts off the chorus for several minutes, allowing the swell of beer-fueled folks to reach the ceiling before Steve Perry unleashes those five syllables that make everyone scream along with unbelievable passion. Unbelievable, that is, if all singers were sober. SQID: 79 percent. Journey gets cooler by the pint.