Dean Town

"Dean Town" is the third track on The Beautiful Game and runs 3:33. It is an instrumental. Joe Dart plays a wildly syncopated melodic line on bass over a disco-style drum groove, and Cory Wong plays guitar. The Bandcamp credits list all four core members as composers of the album without a per-track split; a Guitar World headline attributes the melody to Woody Goss and credits Dart with making it famous, but the article body was not read, so treat that as unconfirmed.

Wikipedia describes the piece as based on and inspired by Weather Report's "Teen Town" (1977), with Jaco Pastorius's bass line as Dart reinterprets it. The Toppermost site calls it a blistering bass workout inspired by that track. Nothing found explains the title, though a wordplay on "Teen Town" is an obvious guess. Bassist Dave Speranza published a transcription on October 20, 2016, noting staccato eighth notes played like sixteenths and variations in Dart's first pass. Stratton later released multitracks, including the isolated bass; the drum tracks carry heavy bass bleed, and Stratton's overdubbed handclaps give the backbeat.

Setlist.fm lists "Dean Town" at 89 plays across 151 setlists as of November 2026, fifth among Vulfpeck songs. At Madison Square Garden on September 28, 2019, it was the 17th and last song of the main set, after "Christmas in L.A." and before a two-song encore. A review of the Greek Theatre show on July 14, 2019, noted Dart "making his digits dance." A fan mashup of the track with "Teen Town" by Andrew Whitbeck circulated in January 2017. The song also appears on the compilations Vulf Vault 002 and Vulf Vault 004: Dart. A Tradition essay calls it the band's most iconic song.