Songs That Bring A Smile To My Face
My Mixtape’s A Masterpiece is a weekly feature in which a guest compiles a playlist around some theme. This week, Brad Milne assembles 13 songs to improve your day. Read Brad’s thoughts on each song and listen along to the Spotify playlist on top and/or the YouTube playlist at the bottom of the post.
This is a list of not necessarily my favourite songs but tunes that always succeed at improving my mood. The older I have become, the more I have come to rely on music to help lift my spirits when life seems almost too much to take. This isn’t a ranked order by any means. Also note that these are not necessarily happy-go-lucky songs—just ones that never fail to put a smile on my face.
1. “You Make My Dreams” By Daryl Hall & John Oates
It’s a tune I started listening to every morning while I begin my daily routine. It has become like an instant mood stabilizer. I love it very much.
2. “The Power Of Love” by Frankie Goes To Hollywood
A song I am sure that I knew existed before I watched SIGHTSEERS from Ben Wheatley, but that’s when it got its hooks in me in the best way. It helps that it also reminds me of the film, which I adore, and by the end usually leaves me smiling like a goof.
3. “Dance Of The Clairvoyants” by Pearl Jam
It’s such a welcome sight to see the lads of the occasionally beleaguered band seeming to have a whole hell of a lot of fun working with one another again. They were always a straightforward rock n roll band, and this becomes blatantly obvious the further the calendar gets from the early ‘90s. This one is a bop, especially if you can divorce your mind from the lyrics…which at times are not the most optimistic.
4. “Graceless” by The National
Again, on its face, not the happiest of tunes—so what it’s doing on this list? The band feels happy and at peace with themselves, and killer lines like “God loves everybody don’t remind me” are so clever that they can’t help but leave you with a little smile on your face.
5. “Catch These Fists” by Wet Leg
The band that returned from the whirlwind haze of their self-titled debut album bringing back their coy lyrics armed with buckshot blasts of feminine rage for one of 2025’s best bops. It’s fun and still sort of sexy, but that’s missing the point. The song is a proclamation that they are done being thought of as anything but masters of their own destiny.
6. “Dirty Work” by Steely Dan
I was introduced to this song first by The Sopranos because, believe it or not, my musical tastes can be very pedestrian, especially during the time David Chase’s brilliant mafioso soap opera was coming to prominence. It is just a finger snapping, toe tapping good time.
7. “All These Things That I’ve Done” by The Killers
A morose and playful ditty from the lads from Vegas who had great success wailing about “Mr. Brightside” and trying to figure themselves out on the albums first single. Flowers and the rest of the boys in the band have a fun time imploring a lover “you gotta help me out,” on the chorus.
8. “Atlantic City” by Bruce Springsteen
The opening lines are some of the best lyrics ever sung in rock ‘n’ roll, while also some of the most idiosyncratic. Springsteen at his most thoughtfully earnest, even a little wounded, but, as he usually does on every tune, he never fails to make you a believer of his music’s truth.
9. “Riot Van” by Arctic Monkeys
I have loved this song since the bands debut dropped. Half-sung, half-spoken, and every word a reminder of misspent youth, fondly recalled over a wonderful afternoon relieving old glories over some beverages.
10. “In The Air Tonight” by Phil Collins
Long before it was being used to soundtrack a Mike Tyson punch out for a Todd Phillips movie, everyone knew it was a good time for your ears. The kind of power ballad that is always fun to hear, especially behind the wheel or in a passenger seat.
11. “Exile” by Taylor Swift (feat. Bon Iver)
This is arguably the melancholiest of the songs on the list, but there is something about it that brings me joy listening. Whatever you think of Swift as a singer you cannot deny she knows how to write great lines, including “looking like, you’d get your knuckles bloody for me.” Honestly who wouldn’t.
12. “Thru and Thru” by The Rolling Stones
I am hardly a Stones aficionado, but for my money it’s their best song. Hearing Keith growl the lyrics to this tune always makes me stupidly happy. His voice is not polished or revered by the masses, but it is raw and real, and you believe he means it.
13. “Lust For Life” Iggy Pop
This one makes the list because it’s a slap in the face of a song, and it practically implores one to dance to it even if it’s in only in your own living room. A plea to the listener to heed its words with every lyric and drumbeat.
