Happy Monday and happy Autumn, folks! Last week, Clyde challenged me to come up with a whole playlist of songs that feature an electric 12-string. At first, I just thought I’d post a link to the Byrds’ greatest hits and leave it at that, but I decided that might be too much of a cop-out even for me. So instead, I sat down and came up with ten songs that feature electric 12!

1. The Byrds, “Turn! Turn! Turn!”: Honestly, any Byrds song could fill this spot. All of their best stuff features an electric 12 played by Roger McGuinn. This is the single most obvious song on this entire list.
2. The Beatles, “A Hard Day’s Night”: George Harrison occasionally rocked an electric 12 on some Beatles songs, including this one and the always-awesome “And Your Bird Can Sing.” It was a close call between those two songs, but I went ahead and put this one on the list because of the electric 12 guitar solo.
3. Led Zeppelin, “The Song Remains the Same”: For a dude who carried around a double-necked Gibson an awful lot, I don’t feel like Jimmy Page played much electric 12. He does on this track, though, and it’s great.
4. Tom Petty, “I’ll Feel A Whole Lot Better”: Tom Petty is often associated with twelve string guitars, though I feel like he mostly stuck to acoustics for that. Not for this one, though. Also, the “12 string” part of “American Girl?” Not actually a 12 string, but two six-string guitars played by Petty and Mike Campbell in such sync that it just sounds like a 12 string. Kinda amazing.
5. XTC, “Mayor of Simpleton”: Just a fantastic song from a fantastic band with a fantastic electric 12-string guitar part in it.
6. Pink Floyd, “Fearless”: Apparently David Gilmour occasionally deigns to use an electric 12 on some songs, including this Floyd number from Meddle. Such a damn good album.
7. The Hollies, “Bus Stop”: Another band that frequently used an electric 12. “Bus Stop” is possibly the greatest love story song from the British Invasion era.
8. The Decemberists, “Yankee Bayonet”: Apparently Chris Funk, guitarist for the Decemberists, frequently uses the electric 12 for his stuff. Very cool.
9. REM, “So. Central Rain”: That 12-string riff that starts the song off? So damn good.
10. Gin Blossoms, “Til I Hear It From You”: When I think of ’90s jangle-pop, the Gin Blossoms are what I’m thinking of. This song is a perfect example of why.