Click to listen to Lady Gaga's "Born This Way"

"Don't be a drag/Just be a queen," Lady Gaga chants in this instant-classic club anthem, over the Eurodisco beats of producers Fernando Garibay and DJ White Shadow. She shouts to the gays, lesbians, bis, disabled, and monsters of all races, with the hilariously dippy line: "You're black, white, beige, chola descent/You're Lebanese, you're Orient!"

Gallery: Lady Gaga's Best Looks

Despite the obvious tip of the cap to Madonna's "Express Yourself" (which was just Madge's knock-off of the Staple Singers' "Respect Yourself"), it's steeped in decades of gay disco tradition — it sounds a lot like Patrick Hernandez's 1978 classic "Born To Be Alive." "Born This Way" sums up all the complex Gaga mythos, all her politics and Catholic angst and smeared lipstick, in one brilliant pop blast.

Rob Sheffield Blogs: 'Born This Way' is Much Better Than 'Express Yourself'

“Baby Got Back”

While watching a Budweiser commercial during the Super Bowl, Sir Mix-a-Lot thought the skinny female models in the ad didn’t represent reality. So he wrote this ode to ample bottoms, featuring its famous to-the-point lyric: “I like big butts and I cannot lie.” MTV banished the video, featuring shaking booties and sexually suggestive fruit, to 9 p.m. or later. “I thought my career was over,” he told Rolling Stone. “Then I called Rick Rubin, and I told him the video was banned, and he was like, 'Great!' We sold another 2 million records.”