There are a lot of songs being nominated here that were released before sporting events played a lot of popular musics. It wasn’t until the 1990s that you’d hear a lot of pop music at arenas.
I came in here to mention Play. Notwithstanding the Wikipedia comment, I’m pretty sure I saw an interview with Moby in which he admitted that he intentionally wrote the album to have the greatest possible licensing potential.
Not quite the same thing, but Alice Cooper wrote and recorded “The Man With the Golden Gun” on the “Muscle of Love” album after seeing “Bond will be back in The Man With the Golden Gun” at the end of “Live and Let Die”. They (the whole band, not just Alice) were hoping to convince them (Harry Saltzman and Albert Broccoli) to use it as the theme for the next movie. It didn’t work, but it is a good song.
The song was not written for sports in mind. The first half of the song (“Rock and Roll, Part One”) was clearly designed as dance music and it’s lyrics are all about rock and roll and dancing. It was supposed to be a single song, actually, but it was released in two parts as a single. Part 2 did well in the US and a few years later was picked up by sports teams.
Gary Glitter doesn’t strike me as being the type to be interested in sports, unless it was being played by young boys. :eek:
Tina Turner’s “Simply the Best” sounds like a possible contender.
There are the circuitous routes taken by We’ve Only Just Begun and C.W. McCall’s Old Home Filler-Up an’ Keep on a-Truckin’ Cafe, which were written as songs for advertising, but not as jingles.
Another song you figure must have been written with intent to sell out is We Built This City
How about ‘I’d like to buy the world a Coke’?
Considering how much they’ve licensed their name, logo and images over the years, it’s surprising Kiss never ventured into writing music with more universal appeal. They could probably create some kick-ass sports-crowd pleasers. I don’t think Lick It Up would be a very effective commercial jingle.
Wiz Khalifa’s Black and Yellow seems to fit the bill. The wiki mentions that is was written with Pittsburgh sports teams in mind. Not much of a reach to expect it’ll get played this football season. #1 billboard hit, if that means anything to anyone these days.
Close!
I caught an interview last year with Brian about precisely this issue. He said that during their mid-70s tours they noticed fans singing along with songs that they didn’t think were singalong songs. So the two of them determined (Freddie’s idea) to write some songs for their next album that would try to harness that need in their fans to participate.
Brian went on to say that they both went off one evening on the road to write and the next morning Brian showed Freddie ‘We Will Rock You’ and Freddie showed Brian ‘We are the Champions’ and the rest is history.
So, yes, they set out to write songs that would be huge stadium show singalongs. But not for the stated purpose of sports promotion. That came later and, I’m certain, has made them a great deal of licensing dollars.
Beuler? Beuler?
I actually produced an interview with a songwriter who has a song that is used in commercials and sporting events who tried to do so again.
What do I win?
Take Me Out to the Ballgame?
Several years ago the IRL (Indy Racing League) did hire Gene Simmons to write a song for them “I am Indy”. It has been ridiculed by open wheel fans.
I wonder if Elton John had Sassoon jeans in mind when he did “Sad Songs (pay so much)” They sure turned it into a commercial awfully quick.
Slade implores a team to just Give Us a Goal.