Insomnia day continues here at First Draft. I’ve long thought that Colin Hay is an underrated singer-songwriter. His solo work is even better than the music he made with Men at Work in their 1980’s commercial heyday.

Colin Hay wrote Overkill for Men at Work’s 1983 album Cargo. It was a monster hit Down Under and charted in the US as well.

We begin with the Men at Work version followed by a solo acoustic rendition by the songwriter.

Colin Hay did a guest shot on the surrealist medical comedy Scrubs in 2002. He sang-you guessed it-Overkill:

Our next song, John Hiatt’s Alone In The Dark is a two-fer. It’s about both insomnia and loneliness. Since it’s a two-fer, we have two versions fer your listening pleasure:

It’s hard to top either Ry Cooder or Sonny Landreth on lead guitar so I won’t try.