Twelve songs that will have you smiling in no time

Music is a most personal thing – what brings bliss to some is noise to others. But whatever your musical preferences, we challenge anyone to sit through these 12 tunes without breaking out a grin.

Gene Kelly performs in the 1952 film Singin’ in the Rain. AP

It doesn’t take much for a good tune to lift our spirits. Of course, music to some is just noise to others, but for any taste, Rob Garratt bets it’s impossible to sit through these 12 tracks without breaking a smile.

James Brown,

I Got You (I Feel Good)

As well as being a watershed moment in the development of funk, The Godfather of Soul’s highest-charting single is an expression of unadulterated euphoria unrivalled on record.

R.E.M.

Inventive rock band R.E.M. created an earworm so infuriatingly upbeat that, despite being one of their biggest hits, they disowned the track and barred it from appearing on best-of compilation In Time. Lead singer Michael Stipe famously appeared on Sesame Street to perform a parody called "Furry Happy Monsters".

Madonna

Who doesn’t like going on holiday? For her third single the Queen of Pop bottled that blissful feeling of expectation that comes at the outset a long-needed getaway, banking her first gold record in the process.

The Beach Boys

Brian Wilson’s greatest achievement, splicing a multitude of moods and musical ideas into just three-and-a-half-minutes, is a trippy expression of bliss torn straight from the Flower Power era.

Stevie Wonder

Who with a beating pulse can resist the big-hearted horn riff that drives this soul masterpiece? Conceived as a tribute to the great Duke Ellington, it marks a watershed moment in Wonder’s wonderful oeuvre.

Cream

Rock supergroup Cream might be known for indulgent, epic blues freak-outs, but the trio focused their energies into this enduring psych-pop nugget, a reworking of a 1931 Skip Jones song, in which Jack Bruce is very, very glad about something.

Chic

Driven by that infectious bassline – one of the most sampled in history – and with a relentlessly upbeat chorus, this song delivers its good time promise time and time again. As heard at midnight on New Year’s Eve, 2014, in concert in Dubai.

The Byrds

This throwaway country-rock nugget has a twee and carefree, sun-kissed lope that calls to mind long lazy days and youthful dalliances. An utterly silly open letter to a fictional spaceman.

Katrina and The Waves

My editor may have had to insist on the inclusion of this feel-good 1980s pop anthem, but listening back for research purposes, I admit it was hard to control my feet.

Gene Kelly

Proof it’s not just sunny ways that can inspire joy, this classic musical number, from the 1952 film of the same name, is the most irresistible kind of kitsch.

Pharrell Williams

Maybe, like us, you’ve heard Pharrell’s cartoon superhit so often it does anything but make you happy, and instead causes the breakout of an anxious rash. However you only need to remember the multitudes of gleeful YouTube covers and dance routines it inspired to acknowledge, like us, that there’s no way to leave it off this list. Williams will be remembered for it.

Beethoven

The rousing, closing climax to Beethoven's Ninth Symphony features that life-affirming vocal refrain – the words based on a poem by Friedrich Schiller – still heard sung from concert halls to football stadiums today. It is the original, uplifting pop chorus anthem.