“Which indie rock band’s 2002 album Kill the Moonlight includes the song ‘The Way We Get By’?” The answer is Spoon. Kill the Moonlight is Spoon’s fourth studio album, released on August 20, 2002, by Merge Records. “The Way We Get By” serves as its lead single and became one of the Austin band’s most recognizable songs.
The track’s hook is built around a rollicking piano line, handclaps, and a compact, rhythm-focused arrangement. Songwriter Britt Daniel developed it during the album sessions, and its lyrics draw on memories of scraping together money to attend shows, alter one’s mind, and find release through music. References to Iggy Pop and The Stooges connect the song to punk and proto-punk culture.
Kill the Moonlight helped define Spoon’s stripped-down approach: sparse parts, sharply placed sounds, and tension created through space rather than heavy production. The song later reached listeners beyond indie-rock radio through television and film, including The O.C., Shameless, Stranger Than Fiction, and The Puffy Chair. The album is sometimes confused with Spoon’s later breakthrough Gimme Fiction, but “The Way We Get By” belongs specifically to the 2002 record.