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{{trope}}
{{quote|''"These songs have no purpose! They're like drive-by musicals! If you want to have singing, fine! But make sure they have a point, or are, you know, fucking entertaining!"''|'''[[
Mainly a product of [[The Musical]].
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This trope most often occurs when a composer wrote a really keen song. Or if there is a big star in the movie who must have a solo. Or the director has a favorite song that he wants to put in the movie. Unfortunately, there is really no way to inject the song into the story in the traditional "burst into song" way. So, the writer often gives us the immortal line "That reminds me of a song," or something similar and the character sits down at a piano or hops up on the stage to sing a little ditty that has....'''no''' plot significance whatsoever. ("Let's rehearse the ___ number" or "Let's film our music video" or "Let's dance to ___" and then doing exactly that are also popular.)
At its most basic, this is a song sung [[
In Indian film, an upbeat song that has no relation to the plot is called an [[Item number|Item Number]].
Frequent [[Justified Trope|justifications]] include having some or all of the characters be actors or actresses, or setting one of the scenes at a nightclub or similar. A small-scale variation on the [[Show Within a Show]].
It still shows up here and there, often as the [[Breakout Pop Hit]], but is mostly a [[Discredited Trope]]. Modern musicals are specifically ''not'' supposed to do this anymore, except as a parody. For a more advanced version of this trope, one that is so out-of-nowhere that it borders on a [[Mind Screw]], yet is never treated as anything the least bit weird by the characters and never mentioned again, see [[
See also [[Silly Song]], where the characters don't even try to justify the singing.
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== Anime ==
* In the [[Hilarious Outtakes]] of the ''[[Berserk]]'' dub, Griffith's voice actor has a tendency to [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bXYiFFM7WH4 burst into song]. Strangely enough they somehow fit the situation.
** "Why did you do that to him?!?" [[Oklahoma!|"Cause I'm just a girl who can't say no, can't seem to say it at allllllllll..."]]
== [[Film]] ==
* Extremely common in movie musicals from their inception to around the time movie musicals began to be [[Serious Business]] before disappearing almost entirely. For example, in both ''[[Holiday Inn]]'' and ''White Christmas'', a full ''third'' of the songs fall into this category. The other two thirds belong firmly in either a spectacular [[Show Within a Show]], or an actual song that furthers the plot, heaven forbid.
** ''[[
** The movie ''That's Entertainment!'' has a ''[[Montage]]'' of characters in various films declaring "I've got an idea! Let's get the [insert group of characters] together and put on a show!"
* There is a scene in ''[[The Breakfast Club]]'' where, ''in the middle of their big emotional group therapy session,'' everyone up and starts dancing to the song "We Are Not Alone". It's a good song, lyrically, it's at least thematically appropriate to the scene in question, but [[Mood Whiplash|what the hell]]?
** In the broadcast version, that is completely random. In the uncut version, Bender shares his marijuana with the others. Cue dancing.
* ''[[Dancer in
* In an infamous scene in ''[[
* The dreaded "Lets Go To The Movies" song from the '80s film version of ''[[
* There's a particularly tedious song in ''[[Newsies]]'' that seems to be included (Roger Ebert said it best) "just so that they could say there's an Ann-Margret number in the movie."
** Actually, there are ''two'' such songs ("My Lovey-Dovey Baby" and "High Times, Hard Times"). For some reason it was the catchy "High Times, Hard Times" and not the utterly pointless "My Lovey-Dovey Baby" that got the Razzie for "Worst Song".
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** The same method is used in ''A Hard Day's Night''. John lampshades this by yelling "Let's put on the show right here, yeah!" before The Beatles rehearse a musical number. He was bummed that it ended up looking like he was serious.
*** However, a lot of ''A Hard Day's Night'' does avert this, since the whole movie is building up to their TV performance, [[Justified Trope|so it made sense for them]] to be "rehearsing" musical numbers. This is due in part to the band not being fans of this trope.
* Both [[Lampshaded]] and [[Subverted]] in ''[[Monty Python and
** In ''[[Spamalot]]'', the musical based on the movie, King Brian is substantially less successful. In fact, several songs in ''Spamalot'' fit in this trope: the Finland song and "Diva's Lament (What Ever Happened to My Part?)" most notably.
* Used to great effect in the film ''Cabaret,'' where the only off-stage song is a young boy who just begins to sing a capella in a cafe's garden, "Tomorrow Belongs To Me."
* This one would be a borderline [[
* Even [[Alfred Hitchcock]] succumbed to this: the 1956 remake of ''[[The Man Who Knew Too Much]]'', which showcases Doris Day singing "Que Sera, Sera" ''multiple times'', ultimately using it {{spoiler|in a game of Marco Polo so our protagonists can locate their kidnapped offspring}}.
* In several ''[[Marx Brothers]]'' movies, Harpo and/or Chico would get one of these as an excuse to play their characteristic
* ''[[Singin' in
* Parodied in ''[[Cannibal!
* The Floor Show in ''[[Rocky Horror Picture Show]]''.
* Richard Tauber's films were just a string of these. No
* The Mamushka scene in [[
== [[Literature]] ==
* This trope is a staple of [[
* Tolkien's contemporary [[Gormenghast|Mervyn Peake]] was also in the habit of doing this, using whatever literary device was most expedient in order to drop his nonsense rhymes onto the page - usually apropos of absolutely nothing.
* All over ''[[Redwall]]'', to the point where it seems each book has to have at least one song and a feast.
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* Shaun Micallef shoehorned in a strange parody of this at least once (in ''World Around Him''). He did it by suddenly referring to the Pointer Sisters and neutrons. And then he claimed that that reminded him of a song, and promptly launched into a verse of said song, complete with dancers.
* [[Glee]] is ''made'' of this trope.
{{quote|
** Subverted hilariously when Rachel and Sunshine burst into a rendition of [[Lady Gaga|"Telephone"]] in the girls' bathroom. A few stanzas in, Sue comes in and tells them to shut up. By this point in the show, viewers are so used to random musical numbers being ignored by all the other characters that someone actually reacting to one is a [[Crowning Moment of Funny]].
* ''[[Whose Line Is It Anyway?]]'' has a game called Show-Stopping Number where the players act out a scene as normal, but whenever the host hits the buzzer, they have to take the last line spoken and turn it into a Broadway-style song. So of course, Drew always tries to find the most awkward line possible.
* Done quite a lot, and with a lot of self-awareness in ''[[Monty Python's Flying Circus]]'', as a policeman will break into a song in a courtroom, for instance. I never wanted to be a barber anyway...
* Roughly 50% of the monologues on ''[[Saturday Night Live]]''.
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== [[Music]] ==
* Parodied in Weird Al Yankovic's long and rambling narrative song "Albuquerque", where he's reminded of a song while his face was being torn to shreds by one dozen starving crazed weasels... which sounds remarkably similar to a guy screaming while getting his face torn to shreds by one dozen starving crazed weasels.
{{quote|
DAARGH! Get 'em off me! Get 'em off me! Ohhh! No, get 'em off, get 'em off! Oh, oh God, oh God! Oh, get 'em off me! Oh, oh God! Ah, Aaaaaaahhhhhhhhhohhhhhhhhhh! }}
* "Simple Song" by Miley Cyrus.
== Musical Theater ==
* In musicals written before ''[[Oklahoma!]]!'' this was ubiquitous almost to the point of every single show using this excuse to put in a song.
* In ''[[Me And My Girl]]'':
{{quote|
"Okay!"
[[Hilarity Ensues|Lambeth Walk ensues.]] }}
** Pretty much any song in this musical not referring directly to Hareford sounds like it could be in any other story. "I am happy and in love with my girlfriend." "I am seducing you and you are having none of it." "When you are in love you are sometimes sad but must follow your feelings." "Love is wonderful, isn't it?" Curtain.
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* ''[[The Music Man]]'' -- "Shipoopi"
** It becomes a [[Running Gag]] for Harold to distract the school board by feeding them the first line of a song and watching them sing the rest as a barbershop quartet. Here's the cue for them to sing "Lida Rose":
{{quote|
* A subversion of this would be Stephen Sondheim's ''Follies'', in which half the songs are numbers that the women used to sing in their days in the Zeigfeld Follies, but are used to point up the melancholy of the story.
* In ''[[Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (
** Of course, since this is a Sondheim musical, this also has a dramatic function: the Beadle insists on staying, while Mrs. Lovett is desperately trying to make him leave, as his hanging around threatens to expose the [[I'm a Humanitarian|humanitarian]] operation she's running.
* "Wunderbar" from ''Kiss Me, Kate''.
** "Too Darn Hot" as well, but only in the film: the live show features it later, and incorporates it into the story.
* Subverted in ''Brigadoon'', where the protagonist is literally reminded of a
* In the third [[Dream Sequence]] in ''[[Lady in
{{quote|
'''Chorus''': Tchaikowsky!
'''Ringmaster''': Tchaikowsky! I love Russian composers! }}
* "I have a song to sing, O!" from ''The Yeoman of the Guard'' starts out like this, but by the [[Dark Reprise]] becomes heartbreakingly significant for Jack Point.
* "Those Magic Changes" from ''Grease'' has nothing to do with '''anything''' else that happens during the show; it's just a random "hey, let's sing a song" moment.
** They fix it in [[The Movie]], where instead of having Doody randomly play a song, a live band performs it in the background as a warm-up number for the National Dance-Off in Rydell High's gymnasium.
* "Thank You For The Music" in ''[[Mamma Mia!]]!'', though this could also be applied to the song "Super Trouper."
** Dude, "Super Trouper" is Donna's [[Crowning Moment of Awesome]]
* "Move, Move, Move Right Out of My Life" and the rest of the talent show from ''Dreamgirls'' does very little other than serve a nifty opener.
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* ''[[The Pirates of Penzance]]'' had a short bit where everyone stops to sing a little song extolling the virtues of poetry. This is right in the middle of a rather dramatic bit where the Major-General is attempting to deceive the pirates about being an orphan, so that they won't marry all his daughters and take them away.
** G&S get away with this one, though, on the account of said little song being [[Crowning Music of Awesome|fucking awesome]].
* Parodied in ''[[Drood (
* ''[[Spamalot]]'' parodies this with "The Diva's Lament", which has the female lead singing about how she's been offstage for most of the second act. Of course this is also playing it straight since without it she would be off-stage for most of the second act.
** Though this one is not a [[
** The song [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8UM1W-40n4Q "Finland"], however, is a [[
* [[
* The protagonist of the musical ''Seesaw'', studying obscure passages of New York State law, is advised to read it in rhythm to make it easier to remember. In short order, "Chapter 54, Number 1909" has turned into a big production number.
* Dr. Kitchell in ''[[Bells Are Ringing]]'' wants to be a songwriter, and constantly takes innocent conversational phrases as cues to burst into song.
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== [[Radio]] ==
* Parodied in ''[[Mitch Benn]]'s Crimes Against Music''; Robin Ince either [[Lampshade Hanging|lampshades]] the silliness of his asking whether Mitch has a song about this week's topic, or just asks the question with so much sarcasm it amounts to the same thing.
* Parodied by [[Stan Freberg
* Lampshaded in an episode of [[I'm Sorry, I'll Read That Again
{{quote|
'''Crowd:''' What kind of people?
'''Bill:''' Showpeople!
'''John:''' ...He's gone nuts!
'''Graeme:''' No, he's leading up to a song.
'''Bill:''' And oh, how I love our business!
'''Crowd:''' What business?
'''Bill:''' Showbusiness! }}
:: This leads into the song "The Show Must Go On", which continues until David Hatch tells him to stop it.
== [[Video Games]] ==
* ''A Pirate I Was Meant To Be'', a brief musical number around halfway through ''[[
** But if you skip straight to the solution of that puzzle instead of hearing the song out, you're severely missing the point of these games.
* Replace "song" with "puzzle" and you've got ''[[Professor Layton]]'' in a nutshell.
** Especially since they use that exact
** And at the strangest times, too...
** Which gets severely lampshaded in later games.
* Lampshaded (kind of) in ''[[Sam and Max]] Hit the Road'', when an entire room of hunting trophies recite a limerick extolling the virtues of John Muir, and a huge flashing sign reading "EDUTAINMENT" swings through the scene.
** Conroy Bumpus's performance of "King of the Creatures", again accompanied by a chorus of hunting trophies.
* [[Jeanne D
* Gato's song in ''Chrono Trigger''.
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* ''[[Alvin and The Chipmunks|The Chipmunk Adventure]]'' had the three main boys as baits for a group of alligators at a volcano on a tropical island. Suddenly, the boys start singing "Wooly Bully" to entertain the natives and alligators as the [[Distaff Counterparts|Chipettes]] arrive for the rescue.
** Never mind the [[Fetish Fuel|infamous]] "Gettin' Lucky" scene...
* The very strange [[Hanna-Barbera]] adaptation of ''[[
{{quote|
** Well, he ''was'' a baby at the time. Remember how much fun ''you'' had making noise when you suddenly realized you were capable of speech. True of many other animals, too.
* There's also the infamous "Land of 1,000 Dances" scene in ''[[Fern Gully]]''.
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** The little-known [[Sequelitis|direct-to-video sequel]], ''[[Fern Gully]]: The Magic Rescue'' follows the tradition by including one of these musical numbers. In it, the Fairies ride a roller coaster (?!) and sing a song. The song goes, "[[That Makes Me Feel Angry|We're having fun! We're having fun!]] We're having [[Department of Redundancy Department|funner than the funnest fun!!!]]" (This should succinctly tell you ''everything'' you need to know about the ''[[Fern Gully]]'' sequel.)
* Similar to the "song in ''[[Newsies]]'' that is just there so Anne-Margret can sing a song" example cited above, is the song in ''[[Anastasia]]'' that one [[Don Bluth]] fan summed up as, "[[Shopping Montage|ZOMG we're in Paris LOLers!]]". It's basically just there so Bernadette Peters can sing a song.
* Surprisingly, [[Disney Animated Canon|Disney]] has avoided this for the most part. Though some have argued that "Trashing the Camp" from ''[[Tarzan (Disney film)|Tarzan]]'' qualifies.
** Well, there's also "Everybody Wants To Be A Cat" from ''[[The Aristocats]]''.
** And ''[[Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (Disney film)|Snow White]]'''s "Whistle While You Work."
** ''[[Mickey, Donald, Goofy:
** We all know someone who feels "Human Again" from ''[[Beauty and
* In ''[[Yellow Submarine]]'', there is at least an excuse: [[The Beatles]] need to use [[The Power of Rock]] to defeat the [[Card-Carrying Villain|Blue]] [[
* There's a strange scene in ''[[The Jetsons]]'' movie where Judy and her [[Green-Skinned Space Babe|Blue Skinned Space Hunk]] start to sing a song in a Holodeck, and the entire plot is completely derailed so that we can watch a [[Disney Acid Sequence]] set to a Tiffany song. It's [[Better Than It Sounds]].
* "Silver and Gold" from the classic ''[[Rudolph the Red
* ''[[Gay Purr-ee]]'' is an animated musical by UPA, and in it the two lead characters are voiced by [[Judy Garland]] and Robert Goulet. You'd better ''believe'' it suffers hard from this trope.
* In the ''[[Rocko's Modern Life]]'' episode ''[[Musical Episode|Zanzibar]]'', whenever Rocko mentions something, the townspeople have a song.
{{quote|
'''Rocko''': [[Lampshade Hanging|It's going to be a song, isn't it?]] }}
* Parodied as part of an [[Overly Long Gag]] on [[Family Guy]], when a stadium full of football players and fans sang the song "Shipoopi" ''in its entirety''. [[Subverted Trope|It actually advances the plot]] when it gets Peter kicked off the team for showboating.
* Appears in the various incarnations of ''[[My Little Pony]]''; the most recent series, ''[[My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic
{{quote|
'''Twilight Sparkle''': Tell me she's not...
'''Pinkie Pie''': ''The darkness and the shadows, they would always make me fro-o-o-own...''
'''Rarity''': She is. }}
** Later, in "Dragonshy," Twilight asks the others to help Fluttershy across a crevasse, leading to Pinkie instantly bursting into a (very silly) song about jumping across crevasses. This only serves to shorten Twilight's rapidly fraying temper.
*** To be fair, the song ''did'' help Fluttershy cross the crevasse and [[Continuity Nod|helps her again in a later episode]].
** Lampshaded again in "Bridle Gossip":
{{quote|
'''Rainbow Dash:''' Here we go... }}
** It's something of a running gag that although sometimes other ponies will join in on the rare occasions that someone ''other'' than Pinkie Pie starts a
** Another lampshading in ''A Friend In Deed''. Part of Pinkie's "checklist" to making a new friend is "sing random song out of nowhere".
* ''[[Grandma Got Run Over
* The intensely weird [[Raggedy Ann and Andy A Musical Adventure]] is [[Exactly What It Says
* Parodied in the [[Phineas and Ferb]] episode [[The Wizard of Oz|"The Wizard of Odd"]]. Coming upon Buford the Lion-Tiger-Bear (oh my!), this exchange occurs:
{{quote|
'''Candace''': Well, at least it was short. }}
== [[Web Original]] ==
* Mocked by [[
** Critic later performs one himself in his [[Judge Dredd]] review, complete with ''can-can dancers in Judge Dredd helmets'': [
** He shows disdain for the endless singing in ''[[Quest for Camelot]]''. As he said, does everyone in the movie ''have'' to sing? And why sing when you're in pain?
** Hell, in his later review for ''The Pebble and the Penguin'' , he attempted suicide after one too many pointless musical numbers.
* The [[Necro Critic]] did this once in his review of [[Call Me Tonight]], where he mentions one of the most obvious traits of the anime, to the tune of Ode To Joy.
{{quote|
* [[The Spoony One]] did this in his [[Final Fantasy VIII]] review. Also to the tune of Ode To Joy.
{{quote|
{{reflist}}
[[Category:Theater Tropes]]
[[Category:Discredited Trope]]
[[Category:That Reminds Me
|