Songs about Towns
Not songs about any old town, but specifically named places.
The milestone photo is used with permission of the owner. It's from http://www.transportcafe.co.uk/britain2.html, where it is called "a milestone amongst milestones." There are views of two other sides of the marker there. That transportcafe site has some wonderful photos of trucks/lorries, internationally, and anyone who's ever been interested in England or in trucks will find good things there: photo list and their main page: Truck Stops, Transport Cafes & Lorry Parks Serving Professional Drivers. There's a page about a truck stop for sale, in Essex. There's a cafe, and a photo of it from 1946 with the menu painted on the outside windows--spam and chips, and other good 1940's things! The cafe is remodelled, and for sale! There are photos of recent menus as well.
 | Deborah in IL said... Baby, if you've ever wondered Wondered whatever became of me I'm living on the air in Cincinnati Cincinnati WKRP |
130 comments:
When Billy the Kid was a very young lad
In old Silver City he went to the bad
I said "A" (A)
"L" (L)
"B" (B)
"U" (U)
*pauses*
"querque" (querque)
--Weird Al
(Mordygan)
Out in the west Texas town of El Paso
I didn't read the directions first!
I'll play this one instead ..
well, they say that Santa Fe is less than 90 miles away ...
-Albuquerque, Neil Young
I'm in a New York state of mind
Billy Joel
she's 41 and her daddy still calls her baby, all the folks around Brownsville says she's crazy ...
- delta dawn, helen reddy, tanya tucker .. maybe more
Well we’re living here in Allentown,
But they’re closing all the factories down,
Billy Joel
At Glens Falls, five thousand honest hands
Work at the consolidated paper plant
Five million gallons of waste a day
Why should we do it any other way?
My Dirty Stream, Pete Seeger
I've seen her in
Albequerque waitin' out a blizzard
Tim Mcgraw
And did he ever return
no, he never returned
And his fate is still unlearned
He may ride forever
'neath the streets of Boston
He's the man who never returned
"Charlie on the MTA"
~sung by the Kingston Trio but I'm not sure that's the proper credit for the song
picked up a boy just south of Mobile, gave him a ride, filled him with a hot meal, i was 16 he was 21, rode with us to Memphis and papa woulda shot him if he knew what he'd done ...
- gypsies, tramps and thieves, cher
I'm not dead
I'm in Pittsburgh
Where a man can lose his mind
--Frank Black
WOW! Very New-Mexico-heavy so far. The first four were all New Mexico's (well, if one counts El Paso, which one might as well do, and the song says "out to the badlands of New Mexico")...
So I will play...
You see Amarillo,
Gallup, New Mexico
Flagstaff, Arizona...
"Get Your Kicks on Route 66"
out on the road late at night, i see my pretty Alice in every headlight, Alice.. Dallas Alice.. and i've been from Tuscon to Tucumcari,to Tehachapi, Tonopah, driven every kind of rig that's every been made ...
- willin', little feat (spelling of town names possibly butchered)
I went from Phoenix Arizona
all the way to Tacoma
Philadelphia, Atlanta, L.A.
"Rock N Me" - Steve Miller Band
It was in the town of Shawnee
On a Saturday afternoon
"Pretty Boy Floyd," which I know from Woody Guthrie's singing
D.C., San Antone, and the liberty town,
Boston and Baton Rouge
Tulsa, Austin, Oklahoma City,
Seattle, San Francisco, too...
---"Heart of Rock'n'Roll"
Huey Lewis & the News
I came into town a one night stand
Looks like my plans fell through
Oh Lord
Stuck in Lodi again
-CCR "Stuck in Lodi"
I'm not entirely sure if they're singing about a town but Lodi is a town in Wisconsin and I've always liked to think that they were singing about that Lodi (I wouldn't want to be stuck there either :))
Busted flat in Baton Rouge, waiting for a train, feeling nearly faded as my jeans. . .
Bobby McGee by Kris Kristofferson
Standing on a corner in Winslow, Arizona,
such a fine sight to see
Take It Easy ~ The Eagles
I'm going to Kansas City
Kansas City, here I come
They got some pretty little women there and
I'm gonna get me one
From a town known as Wheeling, West Virginia
Rode a boy with a six-gun in his hand
And his daring life of crime
Made him a legend in his time
East and west of the Rio Grande
The Ballad of Billy The Kid ~ Billy Joel
no mention of New Mexico, but that is where Billy the Kid died
Well the south side of Chicago
Is the baddest part of town
And if you go down there
You better just beware
Of a man named Leroy Brown
Jim Croce
In Birmingham they love the governor
Now we all did what we could do
Sweet Home Alabama ~ Lynyrd Skynyrd
Well now she comes from Tallahassee
she got a high priced chassis
maybe she looks a little sassy
but to me she's real classy
she's my Tallahassee lassie
way down in F-L-A
I have nooooooooo idea who. It was on an old 50's compilation album I used to own...
Nighttime on The City of New Orleans,
Changing cars in Memphis, Tennessee.
City of New Orleans ~ Steve Goodman
I'm back in the saddle, my pony won't stand
Good bye, Old Paint, I'm a-leavin' Cheyenne.
Sandra
I ain't rich
But Lord I'm free
Amarillo by morning
George Strait
...and I've never been to Boston in the fall...
The Pirates Who Don't Do Anything
Veggie Tales
Hey Ramblin' boy why don't you settle down?
Boston ain't your kind of town.
There ain't no gold and there ain't nobody like.
I'm the number one fan of the man from Tennessee.
Please Come to Boston
Dave Loggins
In 1814 we took a little trip
Along with Colonel Jackson down the mighty Mississip'
We took a little bacon and we took a little beans
And we caught the bloody British in the town of New Orleans
Johnny Horton
At night I could
hear the blood in my veuns
Black and whispering in the rain,
On the streets of Philadelphia
"Philadelphia"
Bruce Springsteen
I woke up this morning
I had them Statesboro blues
The Allman Brothers version is in my head, but it's also credited to an old bluesman named Blind Willie McTell
you don't know me but you don't like me, say you could care less how i feel, how many of you that sit and judge me have walked the streets of Bakersfield?
- streets of bakersfield, buck owen & dwight yoakam
You might laugh, you might frown
Walking around Londontown
"Ldn," Lily Allen
Old child, young child feel alright
On a warm San Francisco night
The Animals
DOH! I meant to save that second one for tomorrow if no one had played it yet. Now I have to wait out for three, but at the rate people are playing, it won't be long! I guess this category's easy, but it seems all the towns are in the U.S. That can't be true...
If you're going to San Francisco, be sure to wear some flowers in your hair.
Scott McKenzie
Talkin' 'bout Mill Valley.
Talkin' 'bout Mill Valley, California, that's my home.
A song from my childhood (I grew up in Mill Valley back in the 60's and 70's)
Sorry about the two in a row! I had it up on my computer to send after someone else had played and Tamzin sent it for me (trying to be helpful - g).
A north country maid
Out to London had strayed
Although with her nature
It did not agree
She wept and she sighed
And so bitterly she cried,
"How I wish once again
In the north I could be."
"The Oak and the Ash", traditional
oooh!
She cut her hair close and she stained her face brown
And went for a soldier to fair London town
"Polly Oliver," traditional
There's a thousand pretty women
Waitin' out there
They're all livin'
Devil-may-care
I'm just a devil
With love to spare
Viva Las Vegas!
Elvis rocked it, ZZ Top rocked it, but I think someone else probably wrote it.
as her young man dies on a cold and grey Chicago morning another little baby child is born in the ghetto ...
-in the ghetto, elvis
His mother loved him dearly
And she would take him yearly
To the great cathedral in San Augustine
"Miguel," Gordon Lightfoot
Manchester England England
Across the Atlantic Sea
And I'm a genius genius
'Cause I believe in God
And I believe that God
believes in Claude
That's me!
from "Hair"
And my China doll down in old Hong Kong
Waits for my return
"Travellin' Man," Ricky Nelson
Stand back, Buenos Aires!
Because
You oughta know what you're gonna get in me
Just a little touch of star quality!
from "Evita"
i want to kiss you in paris, i want to hold your hand in rome...
- justify my love, madonna
From Kensington to Billingsgate
One hears the restless cries
From every corner of the land,
"Womankind arise!"
Political equality
And equal rights with men
Take heart, for Mrs. Pankhurst
Has been clapped in irons again!
-"Sister Suffragette" from "Mary Poppins"
While you live
Your troubles are many
My poor Jerusalem
To conquer death
You only have to die
You only have to die
from "Jesus Christ Superstar"
Hey, musicals are a great source! ;)
one night in Bangkok and the world's our oyster, i can feel the devil walking next to me.
- one night night in bangkok
Not Louisiana, Paris, France, New York, or Rome, but
Gary, Indiana
Gary, Indiana
Gary Indiana
My home sweet home!
from "The Music Man"
Albuquerque, Albuquerque
Where the people are kinda jerky
Weird Al wrote it as part of a lengthy teaser encore when he performed here a few years ago. He was building up to doing his Albuquerque song, but started (and sometimes finished) seven or eight songs before he actually did that one. It was a huge bonus for the Albuquerque audience.
Well, there is a house in New Orleans
They call the Rising Sun
And it's been the ruin of many a poor boy
And God I know I'm one
The Animals,
tho Bob Dylan wrote it
and i told her i ain't so sure about this place, it's hard to play a gig in this town and keep a straight face, seems like everybody's got a plan, it's kinda like nashville but with a tan.
- lullaby, shawn mullins
Our first stop is in Bogota
to check Columbian fields...
"Train to Bangkok" - Rush
space may be the final frontier but it's made in a Hollywood basement.
- californication, red hot chili peppers
As I stood by my window
And looked out on those
Brooklyn roads
Neil Diamond
i ran away, went looking for you, back to Culver City and the old neighborhood...
- why i don't believe in god, everclear
It's Istanbul, not Constantinople,
No you can't go back to Constantinople
"They Might be Giants"
(Bob Dylan didn't write House of the Rising Sun. It's traditional. Bob Dylan claimed a few things he didn't write, but I don't think he even claimed that one. He did have the infuriating and should-be-illegal habit of just putting "Words and Music by Bob Dylan" on a whole album regardless of the mix of songs.)
Flew in from Miama Beach, BOAC
Didn't get to bed last night
Back in the USSR ~ the Beatles
Well the first of December was covered with snow
So was the turnpike from Stockbridge to Boston
"Sweet Baby James," James Taylor
I got a guitar on Christmas day
I dreamed that Jimmy Page would come to Santa Monica and teach me to play
AM Radio
Everclear
sitting in a park in Paris, France reading the news and it sure looks bad ...
- california, joni mitchell
From Leningrad to Lexington
The farmer loves his land
Love in Any Language
Sandi Patti performed it, but I think someone else wrote it
blue jean baby, L.A. lady, seamstress for the band ...
- tiny dancer, elton john
Down the Via Dolorosa in Jerusalem that day
The soldiers tried to clear the narrow street
Via Dolorosa
Sandi Patti again
I would walk all the way
From Boulder to Birmingham
If I thought I could see,
I could see your face.
Emmylou Harris
The streetlights are on in Chicago tonight
And lovers are gazing at stars
The stores are all closing
And Daley is dozing
And the fat man is counting the cars
....
Our drivers are friendly and courteous
Their good manners you always will get
For they all are recent graduates
Of the charm school in Joliet
Lincoln Park Pirates
Steve Goodman
he's rollin' into Baghdad wondering how he got this far, he's just another poor boy off to fight a rich man's war. Bobby had an eagle and a flag tattoo on his arm, red white and blue to the bone when he landed in Kandahar ...
- rich man's war, steve earle
I'm an alien
I a legal alien
I'm an Englishman in New York
Sting
But the band's on the bus
And they're waiting to go
We've got to drive all night
And do a show in Chicago
Or Detroit
I don't know
We do so many shows in a row
The Load Out - Stay
Jackson Browne
Walking in Memphis
But do I really feel the way I feel
Marc Cohn
Maybe it was Memphis
Maybe it was sultry, summer (or maybe southern) nights
Maybe It Was Memphis
recorded by Pam Tillis
London Bridge is falling down
Falling down, falling down
London Bridge is falling down
My fair lady
^_^
Long distance information
Give me Memphis Tennesee
Help me find the party tryin' to get in touch with me
[Memphis seems to have the most songs if this list is a good sampling.]
I'm proud to be an Okie from Muskogee,
A place where even squares can have a ball
Merle Haggard
And the Wichita lineman
Is still on the line
Glen Campbell
Nashville cats
Play clean as country water
Nashville cats
The Lovin' Spoonful
By the time I get to Phoenix, she'll be rising
....
By the time I make Albuquerque she'll be working
woke up quick, at about noon, just thought i had to be in Compton soon ..
- boyz in the hood, eazy-e
Do you know the way to San Jose?
(Bacharach/David, but sung by Warwick!)
Galveston oh Galveston
I still hear your sea winds blowing
And children lived in Leningrad
...
But children lived in Levittown
And hid in the shelters underground
Until the soviets turned their ships around
And tore the Cuban missiles down
Leningrad
Billy Joel
To the town of Agua Fria rode a stranger one fine day
Big Iron
Marty Robbins
Don't you know we're riding
On the Marrakesh Express?
Crosby, Stills, and Nash
From the bottom of the ocean
To the mountains of the moon
Won't you please come to Chicago
No one else can take your place
Chicago
Graham Nash
Heading out to San Francisco
For the Labor Day weekend show
Come Monday
Jimmy Buffet
Deborah, your Buffet post reminded me of this!
I don't want to land in New York City
Don't want to land in Mexico
Don't want to land on no Three Mile Island
Don't want to see my skin aglow
Don't want to land in Comanche Sky Park
Or in Nashville, Tennessee
Don't want to land in no San Juan airport
Or in the Yukon Territory
Don't want to land no San Diego
Don't want to land in no Buzzards Bay
I don't want to land on no Ayatollah
I got nothin' more to say
"Volcano" - Jimmy Buffet
Baby, if you've ever wondered
Wondered whatever became of me
I'm living on the air in Cincinnati
Cincinnati WKRP
He went to Paris
Looking for answers
To questions that bothered him so
Jimmy Buffet
Brother married Becky Thompson
They bought a store in Tupelo
Ode to Billie Joe
Bobbie Gentry
But I shot a man in Reno
Just to watch him die
Folsom Prison Blues
Johnny Cash
I was sick and tired of everything
When I called you last night from Glasgow
Abba, "Super Trouper"
Waterloo
Couldn't escape if I wanted to
Waterloo
Knowing my fate is to be with you
Abba (They're not really talking about a town, but it's a town name, so... So.)
I've been to Nice
And the Isle of Greece
Where I sipped champagne on a yacht
I moved like Harlow in Monte Carlo...
"I've Never Been to Me," which I know from The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert
And daddy won't you take me back to Muhlenburg county
Down by the Green River, where Paradise lay?
Paradise
John Prine
In the heat of a summer night
In the land of the dollar bill
When the town of Chicago died
And they talk about it still
As I walked out in the streets of Laredo
Coming in from London from over the pole
Flying in a big airliner
Chickens flying everywhere around the plane
Could we ever feel much finer?
Coming into Los Angeles
Arlo Guthrie
Take the last train to Clarksville
And I'll meet you at the station
I like the island Manhattan.
Smoke on your pipe an put that in!
West Side Story
Miche!!! Good one. Just the other day I was walking around the house singing "Why don't you go back to San Juan? I know a boat you can get on. Bye Bye!" but it slipped my mind in the excitement of this game.
The count has passed 100 legitimately now. Deborah pointed out there are duplicates in there. I'll clean it up.
We got married in a fever
Hotter than a pepper sprout
We been talkin' 'bout Jackson
Ever since the fire went out
Johnny Cash and June Carter
They sing of her beauty in Virginia City too
"Darcy Farrow" (sung but not written by John Denver)
Make me an angel
That flies from Montgomery
John Prine
In a bar in Toledo
Across from the depot
On a barstool she took off her ring
(You Picked a Fine Time to Leave Me) Lucille
Kenny Rogers
It's a long way from L.A. to Denver
It's a long time to hang in the sky
It's a long way home to Starwood in Aspen
My sweet Rocky Mountain paradise
John Denver
Who needs a house out in Hackensack?
Is that all you get for your money?
Moving Out (Anthony's Song)
Billy Joel
Jojo left his home in Tucson, Arizona
For some California grass
Get back, get back,
Get back to where you once belonged
The Beatles
For Deborah:
All the little chicks with the crimson lips know
Cleveland rocks!
Cleveland rocks!
Livin' in sin with a safety pin,
Cleveland rocks!
Cleveland rocks!
:)
and I'm pretty sure it was either Green Day or maybe Presidents of the United States of America who recorded it.
Way down in Columbus stockade,
Wanna be back in Tennessee
Cisco Houston and Sonny Terry, in my head
I think it was probably collected during the Depression by one of them or some other collector
New York is where I'd rather stay
I get allergic smelling hay
I just adore a penthouse view
Darling I love you but give me Park Avenue
Green Acres theme song, this verse sung by Eva Gabor
Said "Californee is the place you oughta be"
So they loaded up the truck
And they moved to Beverly
Hills, that is...
(Beverly Hillbillies themesong)
It's the little old lady from Pasadena
Go, granny
Go, granny,
Go Granny Go
Jan and Dean, Beach Boys, both
Put your makeup on
Fix your hair up pretty
Meet me tonight in Atlantic City
(I think) Bruce Springsteen
How about Billy Joel's WE DIDN'T STAR THE FIRE?
I won't list all of the lyrics :) but the song includes:
Panmunjeom
Dien Bien Phu
Brooklyn
Budapest
Little Rock
Berlin
and of course
Woodstock!
In Amsterdam or Brussels
The men have great, big muscles
But they're nicer, much nicer in Nice
-From "The Boyfriend"
I'd be safe and warm
If I was in L.A.
"California Dreamin," The Mamas and the Papas
And also:
McGuinn and McGuire just a-gettin' higher in L.A.,
You know where that's at...
and
I used to live in New York City
Everything there was dark and dirty
(We listened to The Mamas and the Papas on the way to visit Kirby last weekend.)
She was a level headed dancer on the road to alcohol
And I was just a soldier on my way to Montreal
Spanish Pipedream
John Prine
John and Linda live in Omaha
Joe is somewhere on the road
We lost Davy in the Korean War
Still don't know what for
don't matter any more
Hello in There
John Prine
"Cathy" I said, as we boarded a Greyhound in Pittsburgh
"Michigan seems like a dream to me now"
"It took me four days to hitchhike from Saginaw"
I've gone to look for America
Paul SImon
I always wanted a real home
With flowers on the windowsill
But if you wanta live in New York city
Honey you know I will
Carole King
Hard Hearted Hannah the vamp from Savannah,G-A.
Woke up, i twas a Chelsea morning
And the first thing that I heard...
Joni Mitchell
Let's go to Luckenbach Texas
With Waylon and Willie and the boys
and if I could build a hundred homes and live in each awhile,
I'd build them all along the coast
from Sandhurst down to Kyle
Dave Goulder
And if that's not lovin me
Then all I've got to say is
God didn't make the little green apples
And it don't rain in Indianapolis in the summer time
.....
And it don't snow in Minneapolis when the winter comes
Maybe I'll go to Santa Fe
Maybe to San Antone
The Eagles, "Midnight Flyer"
When I came to see if that had been played, I discovered this one didn't seem to have been either:
We'll open up a restaurant in Santa Fe
Sunny Santa Fe would be nice
from "Rent"
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