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Heart has always been a rock and roll band, and this list is about the songs that hit hardest. Ann and Nancy Wilson built their reputation on records like “Magic Man” and “Barracuda,” but the band kept making heavy music long after the seventies. Albums such as Jupiters Darling, Red Velvet Car, and Fanatic proved that the Wilson sisters never stopped looking for new ways to rock. With only ten spots, plenty of favorites had to be left out. These are ten Heart songs that turn the volume up and keep it there.
# 10 – How Can I Refuse – Passionworks
“How Can I Refuse” opens Heart’s 1983 album Passionworks, and it remains one of my all-time favorites. The record sits in a strange and fascinating place between the band’s seventies sound and the massive commercial comeback that would arrive two years later. Produced by Keith Olsen, Passionworks was the first Heart album with Mark Andes on bass and Denny Carmassi on drums. The song was released as the lead single, reached number one on Billboard’s Top Rock Tracks chart, and peaked at number forty-four on the Hot 100. The chord changes, melody, and sheer force of the performance make this one a perfect way to open the list.
# 9 – Fanatic – Fanatic
“Fanatic” opens Heart’s 2012 album of the same name with a dark, dirty guitar riff and Ann Wilson coming in like she has something to prove. The band reunited with producer Ben Mink after working with him on Red Velvet Car, and much of the album was recorded in hotel rooms and studios up and down the West Coast. The title track sounds completely modern without losing the weight and drama that always made Heart sound like Heart. That pulsating twenty-first-century groove gives Ann’s vocal plenty of room to get louder and more intense as the song moves forward. This is exactly the kind of later-period Heart track that deserves more attention.
# 8 – Oldest Story In the World – Jupiters Darling
“Oldest Story in the World” appears near the front of Heart’s 2004 album Jupiters Darling, coming right after the opening track “Make Me.” Old-school Heart fans who missed this album should go back and hear it because the record reaches toward the band’s seventies spirit without pretending it is still 1977. The production sounds fully twenty-first century, but the guitars, melodies, and Ann Wilson vocal bring back some of the raw personality that made the early records so exciting. “Oldest Story in the World” carries heartbreak and survival inside a tough rock arrangement that never feels forced. If you missed Jupiters Darling, pick it up and give this song another chance.
# 7 – WTF – Red Velvet Car
“WTF” came from Heart’s 2010 album Red Velvet Car, a record that put the band back in the Billboard 200 Top 10 for the first time in decades. Ben Mink produced the album, and “WTF” hits immediately with a drum fill that gets shoved aside by one of those dark, heavy guitar riffs that makes you reach for the volume knob. Ann Wilson’s vocal grows more intense as the song unfolds, matching lyrics filled with frustration and anger. The track sounds rawer than much of Heart’s eighties work but still carries the musical maturity of a band that had been doing this for decades. This is rock and roll, baby!
# 6 – Bébé Le Strange – Bébé Le Strange
Heart’s 1980 album Bébé Le Strange has always been one of our favorite records in the band’s catalog. It was Heart’s fifth studio album and the first one made without founding lead guitarist Roger Fisher, which immediately changed the chemistry of the band. We almost went with “Rockin’ Heaven Down” for this spot because that song absolutely qualifies for a list like this. In the end, the title track won because those vocal harmonies in the chorus are just too addictive to ignore. “Bébé Le Strange” is weird, tough, melodic, and unmistakably Heart.
# 5 – Heartless – Magazine
“Heartless” is one of Heart’s darkest and most intense early rock songs. Magazine had a notoriously complicated release history, with Mushroom Records issuing an unfinished version in 1977 before Heart reworked the material for the revised 1978 album. The track begins with an eerie synthesizer atmosphere before the guitars and rhythm section push it into something much heavier. Ann Wilson sounds furious, and Nancy Wilson’s guitar helps keep the whole performance tense from beginning to end. “Heartless” turns betrayal into four minutes of beautifully controlled rock and roll anger.
Read More: 11 Best Heart Songs Sung By Nancy Wilson
# 4 – The Wolf – Heart
Heart’s 1985 self-titled album shocked some longtime fans because the image, production, and record-company machinery all changed at once. Four decades later, though, strip away the reverb, sound effects, and hairspray and there are still some excellent rock songs on that record. “The Wolf” closes side one, was written by Ann Wilson, Nancy Wilson, Howard Leese, Mark Andes, Denny Carmassi, and Sue Ennis, and gives the band a chance to sound meaner than the giant singles surrounding it. The album became Heart’s Capitol Records breakthrough, reached number one on the Billboard 200, and eventually went five-times platinum in the United States. Give “The Wolf” another listen because underneath all that 1985 production, this is pure rock and roll, Heart-style.
Read More: 10 Most Underrated Heart Songs
# 3 – City’s Burning – Private Audition
For years Private Audition was difficult to find on CD and could go for ridiculous money online, so let that be a lesson—hold on to your CDs the same way you should have held on to your baseball cards. “City’s Burning” opens the 1982 album and was written by Ann Wilson, Nancy Wilson, and Sue Ennis, with the Wilson sisters, Ennis, and Howard Leese producing. Ann later explained that the song was inspired by the murder of John Lennon and imagines a couple reacting very differently to the terrible news. The track reached number fifteen on Billboard’s Top Rock Tracks chart and was later revisited by Heart on 2016’s Beautiful Broken. In our opinion, this is one of Heart’s most underrated songs and an absolute scorching rocker.
Read More: Top 10 Heart Albums
# 2 – Barracuda – Little Queen
Released on Heart’s 1977 album Little Queen, “Barracuda” is one of the band’s defining songs and one of the decade’s great hard-rock riffs. Ann Wilson, Nancy Wilson, Roger Fisher, and Michael DeRosier wrote the song after the band became furious over a crude rumor and how Mushroom Records marketed the Wilson sisters. Ann’s vocal sounds like she is aiming every word at somebody specific, while the guitars turn that anger into something huge. The single reached number eleven on the Billboard Hot 100 and never really left classic-rock radio. If you played in a garage band in the seventies, there is a pretty good chance somebody in the room wanted to try this one.
Read More: Complete List Of Heart Band Members
# 1 – Crazy On You – Dreamboat Annie
“Crazy on You” closes this list because few Heart songs capture both sides of the band as perfectly as this one. Released in the United States in 1976 on Dreamboat Annie, the song begins with Nancy Wilson’s rapid acoustic guitar before Roger Fisher’s electric guitar and the full band charge in behind Ann Wilson. The single reached number thirty-five on the Billboard Hot 100 and helped introduce Heart to American rock radio. Ann’s vocal keeps building until the whole song feels like it might come apart, but the band never loses control. I love this song, and I know you do too—that’s why it is number one here.
Read More: Complete List Of Heart Albums And Discography
Updated September 15, 2026
10 Most Rocking Heart Songs article published on ClassicRockHistory.com © 2026
All good songs but where are the truly heavy tracks like “The Night”, “Black on Black”, “Devil Delight”? Maybe “most rocking” means something different than “hardest rocking” or “heaviest”.
Thanks for coming to the site Ken and thanks for your comment. In the end, it’s all subjective and what we are really doing is just celebrating the great music of Heart. Your picks matter just as much as mine, thanks for sharing them.