Dan Bejar is one of indie rock’s most singular voices — an artist who has spent three decades building a body of work that consistently defies easy categorization. Under the Destroyer moniker, the Vancouver-based songwriter has pivoted from baroque indie folk to glam rock, new wave, soft rock, and chamber pop without ever losing that unmistakable literary sensibility. If you’re just now discovering Destroyer’s catalog or you’re a long-time devotee looking for the definitive playlist, this deep dive into the 20 best songs of Destroyer is your guide. Every track listed here is real, carefully selected, and genuinely worth your time — so let’s get into it.
Kaputt
Released on the 2011 album Kaputt, the title track is Bejar at his most cinematic and seductive. The production — courtesy of Bejar and John Collins — wraps his elliptical, allusion-heavy lyrics in a fog of saxophone, soft synths, and whispered harmonics that feel lifted from an ’80s European art film. It’s the kind of song that rewards repeated listens on a quality pair of headphones; if you want to hear every nuanced layer in the mix, comparing headphones is a worthwhile exercise before diving deep into this album. The track sets the tone for everything Kaputt does right: luxurious, melancholic, and intellectually alive.
Chinatown
“Chinatown,” also from Kaputt (2011), is arguably the album’s most immediately accessible moment and one of Destroyer’s most beloved compositions. The saxophone lines curl through the mix with an almost narcotic ease, and Bejar’s vocal delivery is spectacularly unhurried — he sounds like a man narrating a dream he’s already halfway forgetting. The imagery he deploys arrives so casually you almost miss it, which is the point. Bejar’s genius has always been in smuggling the profound inside the mundane, and “Chinatown” is a masterclass in that approach.
Suicide Demo for Kara Walker
This is one of the longest and most ambitious tracks in Destroyer’s catalog, also from Kaputt (2011). Named after the celebrated visual artist Kara Walker, the song unspools like a literary exercise — a narrative that spirals outward with each verse, referencing art history, racial politics, and personal obsession without ever becoming didactic. Musically, it builds from a spare, elegiac opening into something considerably more enveloping, with layered instrumentation that earns its runtime. It’s the kind of track that reminds you why Bejar is so often compared to Dylan or late-period Van Morrison — except he sounds exactly like no one but himself.
Savage Night at the Opera
Still on Kaputt (2011), “Savage Night at the Opera” is Destroyer in full theatrical mode. The arrangement is bold, the title operatic in its ambition, and the execution delivers on every syllable of that promise. There’s an almost Bowie-esque quality to the way Bejar inhabits the lyric, not performing it so much as embodying it. The production has a sense of drama — swells and retreats, a rhythm section that knows when to hold back and when to surge — and it makes this one of the most memorable listens on an already exceptional record.
Blue Eyes
“Blue Eyes,” from Kaputt (2011), strips back the sonic palette to let a more direct emotional truth come through. It’s one of Destroyer’s most quietly heartbreaking songs, with a late-night, low-lit atmosphere that suits Bejar’s crooning perfectly. The song drifts between tenderness and irony in classic Bejar fashion — you’re never quite sure if the romanticism is sincere or satirical, and that ambiguity is precisely what makes it compelling. Listen to this one through quality earbuds late at night to catch every subtle breath and reverb tail in the recording.
Poor in Love
Another Kaputt (2011) highlight, “Poor in Love” leans hard into the soft rock and yacht rock aesthetics that defined the album’s cultural moment. The saxophone is front and center again, the tempo unhurried, and Bejar’s lyrical density is given room to breathe by a production that never crowds the ear. What’s remarkable is how Bejar takes a musical vocabulary typically associated with comfortable bourgeois escapism and turns it into something genuinely strange and searching.
Song for America
“Song for America,” from Kaputt (2011), offers one of the album’s more contemplative moments. Where other tracks on Kaputt luxuriate in lush production, this song has an almost skeletal quality — its spaces feel intentional, the silences as expressive as the notes. Bejar uses the title to gesture toward something vast and contradictory without ever reducing it to a slogan, which is exactly the kind of restless, anti-didactic writing that has made him so beloved among serious music listeners.
Downtown
“Downtown” from Kaputt (2011) is a gorgeous drift of a song — impressionistic, slightly blurred at the edges, like a city seen through a rain-streaked window. Its production sits in the same warm, saxophone-saturated register as the rest of the album while managing its own distinct emotional space. It feels genuinely cinematic, the kind of track that soundtracks a quiet late-night walk without needing to explain itself.
The Laziest River
“The Laziest River” is one of those Kaputt (2011) tracks that rewards patience. It meanders — deliberately, gorgeously — across its runtime, the instrumentation oozing rather than driving. Bejar’s lyrics here are particularly dense with imagery, and the lack of urgency in the musical arrangement creates space for them to land. It’s the kind of track that music critics tend to reward on second and third listens, and it holds up as one of Destroyer’s most singular pieces.
It Just Doesn’t Happen
Moving into Destroyer’s later period, “It Just Doesn’t Happen” from Have We Met (2020) represents Bejar working with producer John Collins in a decidedly different mode. The production here is digital, slightly cold, built on synthesizers and drum machines rather than live instrumentation. But Bejar’s lyrical voice remains unmistakable, and there’s something genuinely moving about the way the song acknowledges disillusionment without surrendering to it.
Crimson Tide
Also from Have We Met (2020), “Crimson Tide” is one of the more abrasive and experimental tracks in Destroyer’s recent catalog. The production is deliberately murky — guitars dissolve into noise, rhythms stutter and glitch — and Bejar leans into the chaos rather than smoothing it over. It’s thrilling in a different way than Kaputt‘s lushness; this is Destroyer in an almost confrontational mode, asking whether beauty and discomfort can coexist in the same groove. The answer, as rendered here, is a confident yes.
Sun in the Sky
Poison Season (2015) found Destroyer expanding into orchestral territory, and “Sun in the Sky” is among its most emotionally direct moments. String arrangements cascade over Bejar’s vocal, giving the song a grandeur that’s earned rather than imposed. Where some artists use orchestration as decoration, Bejar integrates it structurally — the strings aren’t embellishing the melody, they’re sharing its weight. It’s one of the most immediately moving songs in the entire catalog, accessible even to listeners new to Destroyer’s world.
Midnight Meet the Rain
From Poison Season (2015), “Midnight Meet the Rain” has the quality of a film score cue — evocative, atmospheric, and brimming with a sense of arriving somewhere without quite knowing the destination. The orchestral production that defines the album is deployed here with particular restraint, letting the song breathe. Bejar’s phrasing is characteristically unpredictable, landing on syllables where you don’t expect emphasis, creating a rhythmic intrigue that distinguishes him from nearly every other singer-songwriter working today.
Archer on the Beach
“Archer on the Beach,” from Poison Season (2015), carries itself with the weight of a closing statement. There’s a finality and expansiveness to its arrangement — the song sounds like it’s processing something enormous, grief or wonder or both simultaneously. It’s the kind of track that benefits from attentive listening; if you want to discover more songs with this kind of emotional depth, browsing through quality music from around the world is a great place to start.
Dream Lover
Another standout from Poison Season (2015), “Dream Lover” is Destroyer at his most romantically vulnerable. The production is warm but tinged with nostalgia, and Bejar’s vocal performance here is among his most affecting. Unlike some of his more cerebral lyrical work, “Dream Lover” operates on pure emotional frequency — it’s a song about longing, delivered with enough restraint to trust the listener to feel it without being directed.
European Oils
Going back to Destroyer’s Rubies (2006), “European Oils” marked a pivotal moment in Bejar’s aesthetic evolution. The album was widely praised as a breakthrough, and this track showcases why — the production has an almost reckless energy, guitars jangling and surging behind Bejar’s most densely literary lyrics to that point. It’s rawer than the Kaputt material, more overtly rock in its architecture, and it holds up as one of the essential Destroyer performances of the mid-2000s.
Notorious Lightning
From Your Blues (2004), “Notorious Lightning” is a product of one of Destroyer’s most unusual albums — a record made entirely with MIDI instruments and digital orchestration rather than live players. The result is a kind of uncanny valley listening experience, music that sounds simultaneously synthetic and emotionally overwhelming. Bejar uses the artificiality as a feature rather than a bug, and “Notorious Lightning” is the track where that strange alchemy most completely succeeds.
Foam Hands
“Foam Hands” from Trouble in Dreams (2008) catches Destroyer in a more overtly guitar-driven mode. The album represented something of a transitional moment — Bejar was preparing to make the leap to the lush synthesizer sound of Kaputt, but this track retains a more direct rock urgency while still maintaining the literary density that defines his work. It’s a genuinely great rock song from a songwriter not always celebrated for that particular register.
Painter in Your Pocket
Also from Destroyer’s Rubies (2006), “Painter in Your Pocket” is among the more intimate and melodically lovely entries in Destroyer’s catalog. It reveals the quieter, more song-focused side of Bejar that occasionally surfaces beneath the maximalist tendencies — a reminder that for all his literary ambition, he’s also an exceptionally gifted melodist. The track lingers with a wistful, unresolved quality that suits its imagery perfectly.
The River
Closing this list with “The River” from Poison Season (2015) feels right — it’s a song of enormous scope and genuine grandeur, strings and voices and percussion combining into something that sounds like a summation. Bejar has spoken in interviews about his fascination with the idea of the river as metaphor — time, movement, loss, continuation — and the arrangement here embodies all of those themes without literalizing them. It’s a stunning piece of music from one of the most consistently rewarding artists in contemporary indie rock, and a perfect final statement for any Destroyer listening session.
Frequently Asked Questions
Who is Destroyer and who is behind the project?
Destroyer is the solo project of Vancouver-born musician and songwriter Dan Bejar, who has been releasing music under the name since the mid-1990s. Bejar is also a founding member of the indie supergroup The New Pornographers, though Destroyer has always been his primary artistic outlet and the project where his most distinctive lyrical and compositional ideas find full expression.
What is Destroyer’s best album to start with?
Most music critics and fans point to Kaputt (2011) as the ideal entry point. It is Destroyer’s most cohesive and sonically immediate record — a lush, saxophone-drenched meditation on late-night melancholy that drew widespread critical acclaim and introduced many new listeners to Bejar’s world. From there, Poison Season (2015) and Destroyer’s Rubies (2006) are natural next steps.
What genre is Destroyer?
Destroyer resists easy genre classification, which is part of what makes the catalog so rewarding to explore. Over the decades, Bejar has worked in indie rock, baroque pop, glam rock, new wave, soft rock, chamber pop, and art pop. The Kaputt era leaned heavily into yacht rock and synth-pop influences, while earlier records like Destroyer’s Rubies are more overtly guitar-driven indie rock.
Has Destroyer won any major music awards?
While Destroyer has not won mainstream commercial awards, the project has received significant critical recognition. Kaputt appeared on numerous best-of-the-year and best-of-the-decade lists from publications including Pitchfork, The Guardian, and Rolling Stone. Dan Bejar is widely regarded as one of the most important and original figures in contemporary indie music.
What are the most streamed Destroyer songs?
Among Destroyer’s most frequently streamed tracks are songs from Kaputt — particularly Chinatown, Kaputt, and Blue Eyes — as well as selections from Poison Season like Sun in the Sky. The Kaputt album remains Destroyer’s most commercially visible work and continues to draw new listeners through streaming platforms more than a decade after its release.
Is Destroyer still making music?
Yes. Destroyer has remained an active project through the 2020s. Have We Met was released in 2020 to strong critical reception, continuing Bejar’s tradition of reinventing his sonic approach while maintaining the lyrical and compositional sensibility that defines Destroyer. Bejar continues to perform and record, and fan anticipation for new material remains high.