Song of the Week: "Down in the Hole" (theme from The Wire)

You can tell alot about a show from its theme music. The Sopranos has a great theme song, The Shield has some awful noise. The Wire has brilliant opening credits, the visuals and the music, in all its versions.

There is some debate on various sites about which version of the song "Down in the Hole" is superior, and I'm not sure I've mind up my mind yet. Purists often hate cover versions, so would prefer the Tom Waits' version (used in Season 2) as it is his song. The Waits version is the one I've got on my ipod but just because it was the only one in itunes.



But I actually don't mind a good cover version, as long as it brings something new to song (see a list of my favourites here). Some people (commenting on YouTube) favour the version used in the fourth series as it involves young people from Baltimore and sounds more like the sort of music listened to on the streets, but I don't hold much sway with this argument as that is taking the show is just being about the dealers (a gross simplification).



In the end, I've picked the Blind Boys of Alabama version because it was used in the first series, so is the original theme from The Wire, if not the original version of the song.