And don’t forget Marty Robbins’s “El Paso”: http://www.martyrobbins.net/lyelpaso.htm
I was in Halifax a couple months ago, stayed at a small hotel on Barrington St. It took me a while to realize why it sounded familiar.
GLWasteful and Frank, do we know if I Love L.A. was meant to be satirical? I remember the video, with seemingly random crowds of Angelinos shouting “we love it!” If it is a joke, many of the participants don’t seem to realize it.
I believe they were putting their hands up for the cameraman on the back of the Caddy convertible. The “We love it” was part of the song. I would say the song is both satirical and affectionate.
Well, I always heard it as satirical, and he’s said as much. I know that he also really does love LA. I’d call it a satirical homage. As to whether the participants got it, I don’t know. I’m guessing that the mayor’s office got it, inasmuch as they edited it severely (as was previously noted) when they used it for the Olympic theme.
“Georgia on my Mind”
It is the offical state song.
Its not played anymore than other songs, and I would offer, possibly less often.
Local PBS stations play it when they sign off for the night. The visual is video from various GA landmarks.(Yes. Im 24 and its the only station that still does it, last I checked.)
I like the Ray Charles version. (Is there anyother?) But then again, its not played that often for me to grow tired of it. I like it for what it is, and because it is… held in reserve. I don’t own a copy, nor do I try to track down a chance ot hear it either. It is a nice song, for when you do luck up on it.
What no comments on that “Saginaw” song, that has a handfull of saginaw locales?
Besides Marty Robbins, as pointed out by Elendil, there’s also “Take the Money and Run” from the Steve Miller Band
The only one I can think of is Indigo Girls “Jonas and Ezekiel”:
I left my anger in a river running Highway Five
New Hampshire Vermont border
by College
farms
hubcaps
and falling rocks
voices in the woods and the mountaintops
I live on the border right around the corner from Route 5 and near the College so it speaks to me.
Of course it’s not too obvious so it doesn’t get played for that reason.
I know the Leo Kottke version of the witty “Saginaw, Michigan”.
The Decemberists “Los Angeles I’m Yours”
Which includes the line “An ocean’s garbled vomit on the shore,
Los Angeles, I’m yours”
Neko Case’s “In California” although the title says “California” the song is about living in Los Angeles.
I don’t listen to a lot of local radio but I’ve never heard either of them played.
I like it, myself. But if it’s any consolation, I’ve heard it has more to do with Billie Jean King’s tennis team than with the city. Though some people choose the city.
There was the song A Letter From St. Paul by the Silencers in the '80s.
This song always struck me as being really strange. What does a Scottish band know about the Twin Cities? Not much it seems. The lyrics went something like “I’m still stuck in Minneapolis. Everyone is the same here - no happy medium.” That doesn’t even make sense.
I doubt the song gets much airplay anywhere these days.
I Left My Heart in San Francisco is one of about four songs that anyone’s ever heard of at my old dive, Trad’r Sam, so yeah, it’s overplayed quite a bit there.
And any time more than three drag queens are in a room, there seems to be a local law that one of them has to channel Ethel Merman and belt out San Francisco, Open Your Golden Gate.
Ugh… At least the radio stations seem to have the good sense not to play it.
There are about seven gazillion songs about New York City, and none of them is particularly overplayed. If you had to name one “city song” for New York, it would probably be Sinatra’s “New York, New York,” which gets virtually no airplay on any station that I listen to. I will hear Billy Joel’s “New York State of Mind” once in a rare while, but certainly not enough to be bothersome.
New York, New York gets play roughly 167 times a year on 880 CBS AM. After every Yankee Game. When they win, we get Sinatra’s version. When they lose we are subjected to Liza’s version.
Jim
There’s the flat-out boogie of “Oh, Atlanta” by Little Feat.
I couldn’t tell you the last time I heard it played on the radio around here. Damned shame, really. It’s one of the best songs ever to feature a city’s name, but you never hear it here any more. :mad:
Huh. come to think of it, they play ILMHinSF after every Giants game, and Jon Miller will usually incorporate it into the postgame show. Amusing.
I thought it was about the Soccer team?
Anybody out there ever hear a song about Canandaigua NY?
Madonna’s latest album has a track called I Love New York. Other places, apparently & poetically, “make her feel like a dork”. facepalm I’m telling you, it’s a good thing I love her, because if she keeps this up no-one else is gonna.
Dar Williams’ O Canada Girls mentions both Winnipeg and Montreal (and is an homage to Joni Mitchell).
“Skyway” by The Replacements is about the skyways in the twin cities.*
The Tom Waits song “9th and Hennepin” is about the old red light district in Minneapolis. He also has a song called “Postcard from a Hooker in Minneapolis”.
I’ve heard references to places in Minnesota in songs by The Hold Steady.
There’s a song by Trip Shakespeare called “Toolmaster from Brainerd”. Brainerd is a small city an hour or two north of the Twin Cities.
There’s a hidden track on the Atmosphere album Seven’s Travels that is about how great Minneapolis (and Minnesota in general) is, the lyrics are here
*As an aside, last week I overheard something interesting. I was at the Minnesota History Center looking at the exhibit about music, and in an area that made a few mentions of the 80’s punk scene here there was a kid saying to his friends something to the effect of “haven’t you heard of The Replacements? Johnny Westerberg’s dad was the singer.” I guess the kids go to school with Paul Westerberg’s son.