Well obviously tehre are other versions where they use another city and another river. I don’t live in Boston, so I can’t answer the OP question, although I can say that if I never hear “Rock N’Roll Band” again, it will still be too soon.
50 Cent did a song called “A Baltimore Love Thing” that’s about heroin.
One of the more famous is Streets of Baltimore. Gram Parsons did a version. I think Junior Brown did too. It’s a nice song, kind of sad.
But, I never hear them on the radio. I’m not sick to death of them yet.
Where I live now - Orange Avenue by Seven Mary Three. It didn’t seem to get more play than any other late-90s modern rock song.
OTOH, the only time I was in Key Largo I heard – well, you know what.
Now, my hometown, Fredonia, NY, doesn’t have a song that mentions anything in it (AFAIK,) but the CD of 2 early 10,000 Maniacs albums is called “Hope Chest - The Fredonia Recordings”.
Damn! I wish I lived in El Paso
Again, best taken as satire. And I Love LA also mentions NYC and Chicago in it’s first stanza. Not in a positive way, you understand, but still.
And I don’t think I have ever heard Goin’ to Kansas City played on the radio. I have heard it played by touring bands ad nauseum, and quite frankly, I wish like hell they would stop. I’m not really sick of it. I think it’s a nice enough little song and pretty representative of the genre.
And 12th Street and Vine doesn’t exist. Hasn’t for as long as I’ve been aware, either.
Yes. There was one for Pittsburgh that I remember hearing back in the '70s. It got played quite a bit.
As for where I am now, there’s the Chuck Berry song (later covered by Elvis) that mentions “Norfolk, Virginie” early on, “Promised Land”. But I don’t hear that much, and I’m not tired of hearing either version. Can’t think of any more for Southeastern Virginia.
To suit the character of our city, here’s a bilingual submission:
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Gino Vanelli, “I Just Wanna Stop” (which begins, “When I think about those nights in Montreal”).
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“Demain matin, Montréal m’attend” from the musical of the same name.
There’s others, but those are the two I’ve heard most often…
Then there’s the one from Oklahoma!, which is the first one I thought of:
I got to Kansas City on a Fridee
By Saturdee I learned a thing or two,
For up to then I didn’t have no idee
Of what the modern world was comin’ to.
Not that I live there or anything…
I will stick to “Born to Run”, for at least 10 years it was played to death in NJ/NY. I was sick of it and Bruce. As his popularity died down a little and as I saw him a few times live in small venues doing mostly old Blues covers, I learned a new and very strong appreciation for Bruce and “Born to Run”. It is a great song when it is not getting played at least daily.
Jim
Used to live near there. Really, no, you don’t want to wish you lived there.
As for my hometown, aside from 1920s-era vaudeville tunes like “Shuffle off to Buffalo”, there are scads of references to Buffalo in many Ani DiFranco and Goo Goo Dolls songs. Sonds mentioning the city that get airplay include “Rock and Roll Girl” by John Fogarty, and “Truckin’” by the Grateful Drad.
The Indigo Girls do indeed cover Steve Earle’s “Christmastime in Washington.”
For me, it’s not as much a song as a single line: “I shot a man in Reno, just to watch him die.” I don’t hear it on the radio too often, but it’s done to death on internet message boards.
Even better is “Good Morning Baltimore” from the musical version of “Hairspray.”
I grew up in Kalamazoo MI and had to perform A-B-C-D-E-F-G-H-I got a GAAAAAAL in Kalamazoo with every school choir I ever joined and so I hate the song with a passion.
Now I live in Madison and we have the dance tune “It’s Madison Time” (which I’m not sure was actually written about Madison WI). I like the song but I don’t think I’ve ever heard it on the radio.
[ulr=“Salt Lake City (song) - Wikipedia”]Salt Lake City by The Beach Boys.
“Midnight Special” contains the line: If you ever go to Houston, boys you better walk right, and you better not squabble, and you better not fight.
try that instead.
Canadian chiming in here.
The folk song “Barrett’s Privateers” has in the chorus the line “I’m a broken man on a Halifax pier”. I’ve never heard it on the radio, but during tourist season it’s constantly played in bars, by street musicians, etc. down on the waterfront. A friend of mine used to bartend downtown and people would always request it. It drove him crazy.
Also, the Barenaked Ladies did a song back in the 90s called “Hello City” which had several unflattering references to Halifax. Again, not really played on the radio, even back in the day.
Huh. I always thought it was “out in the hall.”
Here’s a sample verse:
And another:
I believe it was severely edited for the Olympics.
I’m a Philly guy, but I can live my entire life without every hearing Philadelphia Freedom again.
The Chili peppers did a song quasi-about LA: Magic Johnson
There was an 80’s band Translator that had a song LA LA about Los Angeles…
I think Freedom of '76 by Ween is a perfect skewering of both 70’s soul and Philly stereotypes. Then again I’m not from Philly so it doesn’t count for this thread.
Agreed. A college professor of my sister’s once started class by saying, “Sorry I’m late. The streets were jammed with broken heroes on a last-chance power drive.” 