# Help me find songs that refer to states!
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-find-songs-that-refer-to-states/260342
**Category:** Cafe Society
**Created:** [August 18, 2004, 3:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-find-songs-that-refer-to-states/260342 "2004-08-18T03:08:00Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Superdude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Superdude)
#### Post date: [August 18, 2004, 3:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-find-songs-that-refer-to-states/260342/1 "2004-08-18T03:08:00Z")
I’m trying to compile a list of songs. 50, to be exact. One for each state in the union. With one rule, though…the name of the state can’t be referred to SOLELY in the title. Here are the songs I currently have:
1. “Take It Easy” by the Eagles (“I’m standing on a corner in Winslow, Arizona”)
2. “Mary Jane’s Last Dance” by Tom Petty (“With them Indiana boys on an Indiana night”)
3. “Kentucky Rain” by Elvis (“On this lonely Kentucky back road”)
4. “Tattoo” by Faster Pussycat (“Should I find a little cabin up in Boise, Idaho?”)
5. “Take Me Home (Country Roads)” by John Denver (“Almost heaven, West Virginia”)
6. “Four Days” by Counting Crows (“Have you seen Ohio rise?”)
7. “Good Time” by Counting Crows (“I’m just another boy from Texas”)
8. “Rocky Top” - I think this song is public domain - (“Down in the Tennessee hills”)
9. “I’m a Ramblin’ Man” by Waylon Jennings (“I’ve been down to Mississippi, down through New Orleans”)
10. “Calling Baton Rouge” by Garth Brooks (“I spent last night in the arms of a girl from Louisiana”)
11. “Daylight Fading” by Counting Crows (“It’s getting cold in California”)
12. “Come Monday” by Jimmy Buffett (“Remember that night in Montana?”)
13. “You’re My Home” by Billy Joel (“Home could be the Pennsylvania Turnpike”)
14. “Never Been to Spain” by Three Dog Night (“In Oklahoma, not Arizona”)
15. “The Biggest Ball of Twine in Minnesota” by Weird Al Yankovic (“Finally, at 7:37 early Wednesday evening, as the sun was setting in the Minnesota sky”)
16. “Allentown” by Billy Joel “(Spent their weekends on the Jersey Shore”)
17. “Miami 2017 (Seen the Lights Go Out on Broadway)” by Billy Joel (“Before we all lived here in Florida”)
Can anyone help with the other 33 states? I need:
[ul]
Alabama
Arkansas
Washington
Iowa
Nebraska
North Carolina
South Carolina
New York (which should be easy)
Maine
New Hampshire
Vermont
Georgia
Delaware
Connecticut
Illinois
Michigan
Missouri
Virginia
Nevada
Utah
Orgeon
North Dakota
South Dakota
Wisconsin
Wyoming
New Mexico
Colorado
Massachusetts
Hawaii
Kansas
[/ul]
Using “Kentucky Rain” as an example, the name of the state can appear in the title, as long as it’s not JUST in the chorus, and so long as the title isn’t JUST the state name. In fact, the title doesn’t have to include the name of the state at all.
Little help?
---
### Author:  [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)
#### Post date: [August 18, 2004, 3:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-find-songs-that-refer-to-states/260342/2 "2004-08-18T03:14:06Z")
Sweet Home Alabama - Lynrd Skynrd
Ramblin’ Man - Allman Brothers (Georgia)
Blue Hawai’i - Elvis
---
### Author:  [@ZipperJJ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZipperJJ)
#### Post date: [August 18, 2004, 3:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-find-songs-that-refer-to-states/260342/3 "2004-08-18T03:18:43Z")
1. “Stuart” by the Dead Milkmen (“Take any city with a large, underground, homosexual population. Des Moines, Iowa. Perfect example.”)
2. “Raise Up” by Petey Pablo (“If you from North Carolina, com’on and raise up. Take your shirt off twist it round yo’ hand spin it like a helicopter”)
3. “Rocky Raccoon” by the Beatles (“Down in the black hills of North Dakota lived a young man named Rocky Raccoon”)
---
### Author:  [@FilmGeek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FilmGeek)
#### Post date: [August 18, 2004, 3:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-find-songs-that-refer-to-states/260342/4 "2004-08-18T03:24:35Z")
Apparently there is a song called “You’re Not in Kansas anymore” by Jo Dee Messina.
Also, there is the band, Kansas.
And that song from Oklahoma “everything’s up to date in Kansas City”, though they were talking about Missouri.
And Johnny Cash’s “Wanted Man” might fit a LOT of different bills.
Wanted man in California,
Wanted man in Buffalo
Wanted man in Kansas City,
Wanted man in Ohio
Wanted man in Mississippi,
Wanted man in ol’ Cheyenne
---
### Author:  [@FilmGeek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FilmGeek)
#### Post date: [August 18, 2004, 3:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-find-songs-that-refer-to-states/260342/5 "2004-08-18T03:33:50Z")
The Missouri Waltz should get triple points. It’s the state song, and it has the word pick-a-ninny in the lyrics. :rolleyes: :rolleyes: :rolleyes:
Hush-a-bye, ma baby, slumber-time is coming soon
Rest yo’ head upon ma breast while Mammy hums a tune
The sandman is callin’ where shadows are fallin’,
While the soft breezes sigh as in days long gone by.
’Way down in Missouri where I heard this melody,
When I was a Pick-a-ninny on ma Mammy’s knee
South Dakota by Girlysound
Man I feel lucky tonight
I’m gonna get stoned and run around
Born in South Dakota
Hey we’re going to a rodeo town
I’m gonna get drunk and fuck some cows
Born in South Dakota I was born in South Dakota
I was born in South Dakota
---
### Author:  [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)
#### Post date: [August 18, 2004, 3:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-find-songs-that-refer-to-states/260342/6 "2004-08-18T03:43:24Z")
Simon and Garfunkel’s “America” (“Michigan seems like a dream to me now.”)
And what about “Devil Went Down to Georgia”, or “Georgia on My Mind”?
---
### Author:  [@Misnomer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Misnomer)
#### Post date: [August 18, 2004, 3:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-find-songs-that-refer-to-states/260342/7 "2004-08-18T03:44:31Z")
You already mentioned Billy Joel, so I’m surprised you didn’t think of _New York State of Mind_. 🙂
(Or _New York, New York_, etc.)
---
### Author:  [@Rubystreak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rubystreak)
#### Post date: [August 18, 2004, 3:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-find-songs-that-refer-to-states/260342/8 "2004-08-18T03:46:13Z")
In the Grateful Dead’s “Friend of the Devil,” there’s:
“Ran into the Devil, babe, he loaned me twenty bills.
Spent the night in Utah in a cave up in the hills.”
In Billy Joel’s “Stop in Nevada”:
“She left a little letter, said she’s gonna make a stop in Nevada
Goodbye…goodbye.”
In Simon & Garfunkel’s “America”:
“‘Kathy,’ I said as we boarded a Greyhound in Pittsburgh,
‘Michigan seems like a dream to me now…’”
Here’s two in Bruce Springsteen’s song “Nebraska”:
“From the town of Lincoln, Nebraska with a sawed-off .410 on my lap,
Through to the Badlands of Wyoming I killed everything in my path…”
---
### Author:  [@TJdude825](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TJdude825)
#### Post date: [August 18, 2004, 3:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-find-songs-that-refer-to-states/260342/9 "2004-08-18T03:49:16Z")
[Here’s](http://www.allthelyrics.com/lyrics/animaniacs/other_songs_200834/nifty_fifty_united_states_and_capitals_yakko_ani-89190-lyric/) a song from the Animaniacs that lists all the states (and their capitals). I think the tune is “Turkey in the Straw.” But that’s probably cheating.
And there’s “Going to California” by Led Zepellin, but you already got CA.
---
### Author:  [@TJdude825](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TJdude825)
#### Post date: [August 18, 2004, 3:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-find-songs-that-refer-to-states/260342/10 "2004-08-18T03:50:58Z")
_rereads the OP and retracts post_ :smack:
---
### Author:  [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)
#### Post date: [August 18, 2004, 4:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-find-songs-that-refer-to-states/260342/11 "2004-08-18T04:05:25Z")
“City of New Orleans” by Arlo Guthrie. (“Illinois Central Monday monring rail”)
“Portland, Oregon” by Loretta Lynn & Jack White mentions the state four times.
For Virginia there’s the state song, “Carry Me Back to Old Virginny”.
---
### Author:  [@Fern\_Forest](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fern_Forest)
#### Post date: [August 18, 2004, 4:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-find-songs-that-refer-to-states/260342/12 "2004-08-18T04:29:22Z")
> [@silenus](#):
>
> Blue Hawai’i - Elvis
I like “My Hawaii” better but I forget who sang it. I think they started with an A. “In these Islands of Hawaii I’ll return to find this dream divine.”
I want to say “The Association” or “The Animals” but neither appears to be it.
---
### Author:  [@C3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/C3)
#### Post date: [August 18, 2004, 4:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-find-songs-that-refer-to-states/260342/13 "2004-08-18T04:43:30Z")
You missed three states in your list: Alaska, Rhode Island, and Maryland (I’m from Maryland, that’s why I noticed).
I don’t have any really good song suggestions, but the state song of Maryland is “Maryland, my Maryland” (sung to the same tune as “Oh, Christmas Tree” aka “O, Tannenbaum”). Also, isn’t there a Counting Crows song that mentions Maryland? Or does it just talk about Baltimore? Does that count?
---
### Author:  [@Atticus\_Finch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atticus_Finch)
#### Post date: [August 18, 2004, 4:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-find-songs-that-refer-to-states/260342/14 "2004-08-18T04:52:53Z")
For Rhode Island, I would like to nominate “Road to Rhode Island” from _Family Guy_. (“We’re off on the road to Rhode Island…” - Sung to the tune of “Road to Morocco”)
---
### Author:  [@lee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lee)
#### Post date: [August 18, 2004, 4:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-find-songs-that-refer-to-states/260342/15 "2004-08-18T04:57:25Z")
R Kelly
R (1998)
When A Woman’s Fed Up
"what that woman meant to you
is what the mirror said to me whoa
she was raised in illinois
right outside of chicago
some of the best cookin’ you ever had "
---
### Author:  [@SolGrundy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SolGrundy)
#### Post date: [August 18, 2004, 4:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-find-songs-that-refer-to-states/260342/16 "2004-08-18T04:57:51Z")
There’s a song called “North Dakotachrome” by a Davis, California band called “Lawsuit.” It’s all about puns on state names. Some of the lines:
“Who runs around when I’m lonely and bored?
Whose foot’s on the clutch when the gas pedal’s floored-a? (FLORIDA)”
“I got a note from Ish again (MICHIGAN), he says ‘how are ya?’ (HAWAII)”
“She said she knew him, sure, (NEW HAMPSHIRE), she new him back in OKLAHOMA.”
“I knew your kind (NEW YORK), I dwell aware (DELAWARE),
But the MAINE thing’s for me not to care
a line, a line (CAROLINA) can tuck you (KENTUCKY) into bed”
Maybe doesn’t count for the OP, but it’s a clever song.
---
### Author:  [@stuyguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/stuyguy)
#### Post date: [August 18, 2004, 5:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-find-songs-that-refer-to-states/260342/17 "2004-08-18T05:04:17Z")
There a great song called Rhode Island (Is Famous for You). It mentions a boatload of the states.
Here’s a sample:
Copper comes from Arizona
Peaches come from Georgia
Lobsters come from Maine
The wheat fields are the sweet fields of Nebraska
And Kansas gets bonanzas from the grain
Ol’ whiskey comes from ol’ Kentucky
Ain’t the country lucky?
New Jersey gives us glue
And you - you come from Rhode Island
And little ol’ Rhode Island is famous for you
The whole thing can be found [here.](http://www.swe.uni-linz.ac.at/staff/bob/country/states/RI.html)
---
### Author:  [@koeeoaddi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/koeeoaddi)
#### Post date: [August 18, 2004, 5:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-find-songs-that-refer-to-states/260342/18 "2004-08-18T05:04:50Z")
_Don’t Take Me Alive_ - Steely Dan “I shot my old man back in Oregon…”
_Walking Back to Georgia_ - Jim Croce
_Steady On_ Shawn Colvin “It’s like ten miles of two lane/On a South Dakota Wheat plain.”
---
### Author:  [@SolGrundy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SolGrundy)
#### Post date: [August 18, 2004, 5:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-find-songs-that-refer-to-states/260342/19 "2004-08-18T05:28:02Z")
And a real attempt at the list:
Alabama - traditional “Oh Susanna” (“Sweet Home Alabama” doesn’t count because it’s in the chorus.)
“I come from Alabama with a banjo on my knee”
Vermont - “Sugarbush Cushman” by Poi Dog Pondering
“Sugarbush Cushman lived by the Ruud pond
Way up north in Barre Vermont”
---
### Author:  [@StarvingButStrong](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/StarvingButStrong)
#### Post date: [August 18, 2004, 5:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-find-songs-that-refer-to-states/260342/20 "2004-08-18T05:31:57Z")
“North to Alaska” by Johnny Horton
“Massachusetts” by Bee Gees “when the lights all went out in Massachusetts”
[Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-find-songs-that-refer-to-states/260342.md?page=2)