# Songs about unusual topics **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [November 5, 2011, 1:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-unusual-topics/601952 "2011-11-05T13:27:49Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![jovan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/0ea827/32.png) [@jovan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jovan)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2011, 8:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-unusual-topics/601952/61 "2011-11-07T08:41:51Z")
**Genesis – The Return of the Giant Hogweed** About killer (giant) hogweed invading England. Contains lines like: “Strike by night, they’re defenceless, they all need the sun to photosynthesize their venom!” As a matter of fact, most early Genesis songs would be worthy nominations. Prog rock is good for unusual topics, but since that’s one of the features of the genre, in context most aren’t that weird. ---
**Author:** ![Koxinga](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/4af34b/32.png) [@Koxinga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Koxinga)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2011, 9:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-unusual-topics/601952/62 "2011-11-07T09:22:18Z")
How 'bout Metallica’s “Creeping Death,” a song about Passover. ---
**Author:** ![Cazzle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cazzle/32/75_2.png) [@Cazzle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cazzle)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2011, 9:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-unusual-topics/601952/63 "2011-11-07T09:49:39Z")
[Sweater](http://m.youtube.com/#/watch?v=b1qEJCw8PZw) by Eskimo Joe, about a sweater inherited from his grandfather. Thematically… [Where’s me jumper?](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jxmZZBJQAKM) by Sultans of Ping F.C., about losing his new sweater (jumper) at a disco. [URL = [YouTube](http://m.youtube.com/#/watch?desktop_uri=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DOm7IBJf7-fc&v=Om7IBJf7-fc&gl=AU)] Dr. Worm by They Might Be Giants, about a worm that plays the drums (“I’m not a real doctor but I am a real worm, I am an actual worm”). ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2011, 3:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-unusual-topics/601952/64 "2011-11-07T15:19:38Z")
> [@Monty Burns](#): > > A musical about Malibu Stacy. Why not do one about the King of Siam or the ordinary pussycat? Memory, a song about remembering. ---
**Author:** ![mcgato](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ac8455/32.png) [@mcgato](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mcgato)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2011, 4:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-unusual-topics/601952/65 "2011-11-07T16:10:28Z")
Just to throw Warren Zevon into the mix: Werewolves of London Excitable Boy Roland the Headless Thompson Gunner There are probably more. ---
**Author:** ![cjepson](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a9adbd/32.png) [@cjepson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cjepson)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2011, 4:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-unusual-topics/601952/66 "2011-11-07T16:56:17Z")
> [@jovan](#): > > **Genesis – The Return of the Giant Hogweed** > About killer (giant) hogweed invading England. Contains lines like: “Strike by night, they’re defenceless, they all need the sun to photosynthesize their venom!” Nitpick: It’s either “photosensitize their venom” or “photosensitize their victims”. The song is actually based on a true story; the sap of the[giant hogweed](http://www.nobanis.org/files/factsheets/Heracleum_mantegazzianum.pdf)(_Heracleum mantegazzianum)_ contains a chemical that causes photosensitization of the skin (i.e., hypersensitivity to sunlight) that can last for months. ---
**Author:** ![Small\_Clanger](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9fc348/32.png) [@Small\_Clanger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Small_Clanger)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2011, 5:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-unusual-topics/601952/67 "2011-11-07T17:51:37Z")
[QUOTE=fruitbat] My favorite Robyn Hitchcock built a decades long career with song on unusual topics. . . He just stumbled a bit on the subject matter. [/QUOTE] I know this is shooting fish in a teacup, but see also _Where are the Prawns?_ (turns out they’re “down by the sea”) _Leppo and the Jooves_ I’m fairly sure that Robyn doesn’t approve of this guy _Leppo_, but aprt from that I’m really not sure what this is about. _Queen of Eyes_ Part woman part insect(?) femme fetale I don’t think he likes her much either. _Trams of Old London_ Actually _is_ about trams, in London, in the old days. _Uncorrected Personality Traits_ About what happens to spoilt babys, but I’m pretty sure he’s wrong about Marylin Monroe being a man. ---
**Author:** ![emmaliminal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7bcc69/32.png) [@emmaliminal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/emmaliminal)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2011, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-unusual-topics/601952/68 "2011-11-07T18:04:32Z")
Shocked, \*shocked \*that no one has mentioned [The Presidents of the United States of America](http://www.amazon.com/Presidents-United-States-America/dp/B000002B9P/). They love non-sequitur songs about animals and stuff. Mean cats, lizards that get trapped in your house, boll weevils, etc. Some of it might be kinda euphemistical (c.f. “Peaches”) but not all. Same era: the Propellerheads’ [decksandrumsandrockandroll](http://www.amazon.com/Decksandrumsandrockandroll-Propellerheads/dp/B000006BZ5/). My favorites are “Velvet Pants” (about people-watching and the music scene, I think) and “History Repeating,” which is just as pomo as pomo gets (“They say the next big thing is here / That the revolution’s near / But to me it seems quite clear / That it’s all just a little bit of history repeating”) and also from around then, Pizzacato Five, with “Twiggy Vs. James Bond” on “[Made in USA](http://www.amazon.com/Made-In-USA/dp/B000XEGLQA/)”, and most of their “The Sound of Music”, and most of the rest of what they do. A lot of it’s in Japanese, but if the translators aren’t lying to me, it’s only occasionally about luuuuurve etc. If you’re willing to go for more obscure folk music and old music hall stuff, I know a song about [cucumbers](http://www.amazon.com/A-Little-Bit-Of-Cucumber/dp/B00481WIHK/) one about [garden pests](http://www.amazon.com/Yucky-Bugs/dp/B0013RYR9O), and one of my favorites is about [the joy of working in sewers](http://www.mudcat.org/detail_pf.cfm?messages__Message_ID=481037). Lots more where those came from. ---
**Author:** ![Superdude](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/superdude/32/13450_2.png) [@Superdude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Superdude)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2011, 6:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-unusual-topics/601952/69 "2011-11-07T18:30:16Z")
> [@An\_Gadai](#): > > [Mark Everett](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Oliver_Everett), the actual singer for Eels is alive and well. Elliot Smith, although he had been in at least one bad hitherto, was famous as as solo artist. :smack: I knew that. I really did. Thanks for correcting my brainfart. ---
**Author:** ![Sigmagirl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c89c15/32.png) [@Sigmagirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sigmagirl)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2011, 6:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-unusual-topics/601952/70 "2011-11-07T18:34:23Z")
[Chloe](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wmt65852WLg) (1935) is a song about loving a girl even though she’s lost in the Great Dismal Swamp. Remade memorably by Spike Jones. ---
**Author:** ![Tess\_Trueheart](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/779978/32.png) [@Tess\_Trueheart](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tess_Trueheart)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2011, 5:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-unusual-topics/601952/71 "2011-11-17T05:33:58Z")
(hope this isn’t too late to bump) “I found a wallet, I found a wallet, [inside were pictures of your small family](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FOL7l4v7JoA)…” - Regina Spektor (About rifling through a found wallet, how she carries her own money, and how she takes the wallet to Blockbuster for them to call the guy.) “My head is a box filled with nothing, and that’s the way I like it… They don’t play me on the radio, [and that’s the way I like it](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EstY-8NWSgE)…” - Ben Lee (Happy, but not all the lines make sense, and the chorus to cheer you up includes “Open your heart and catch my disease.”) “Cigarettes and chocolate milk:[these are just a couple of my cravings](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xfhOhJGleGk)…” - Rufus Wainwright. (Exactly what it says on the tin… at least at first.) ---
**Author:** ![Fish\_Cheer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fish_cheer/32/17179_2.png) [@Fish\_Cheer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fish_Cheer)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2011, 5:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-unusual-topics/601952/72 "2011-11-17T05:53:30Z")
[“City of New Orleans”](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_of_New_Orleans_%28song%29) by Steve Goodman is about a train. ---
**Author:** ![Lust4Life](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ecc23a/32.png) [@Lust4Life](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lust4Life)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2011, 12:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-unusual-topics/601952/73 "2011-11-17T12:35:08Z")
Excerts From a Teenage Opera Keith West, about a small shopkeeper who has a heart attack so doesn’t open his shop. My Lady D’Arbanville by Cat Stevens, apparently about a mans dead g/f who he won’t admit to himself that shes lying dead next to him. Black Sabbath by Black Sabbath which is about a …guess! ---
**Author:** ![Bakhesh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/3da27b/32.png) [@Bakhesh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bakhesh)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2011, 1:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-unusual-topics/601952/74 "2011-11-17T13:07:53Z")
> [@An\_Gadai](#): > > Half Man Half Biscuit have a surfeit of songs on bizarre topics, here’s [Dickie Davies Eyes](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZCvs2w_Mjeg). Yeah, you could fill the thread with their songs. Another is ‘Joy Division oven Gloves’. Also, what about Spizz Energi’s “Wheres Captain Kirk?”, where the singer is unexpectedly being beamed aboard the Enterprise, and getting introduced to all of the crew, expect Captain Kirk, who is missing. At the end, the singer realises that he IS Captain Kirk ---
**Author:** ![Cumbrian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ce7236/32.png) [@Cumbrian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cumbrian)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2011, 1:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-unusual-topics/601952/75 "2011-11-17T13:57:40Z")
Gruff Rhys, of Super Furry Animals and a few solo records, is right up there with weird subjects for songs. Hometown Unicorn is about the first person in the UK to claim he had been abducted by aliens. Sidewalk Surfer Girl is about a woman who falls into a coma and, in the meantime, misses all the technological advances of 10 years, so wakes up to find that the internet and mobile phones exist. Sarn Helen is a song, entirely in Welsh, about the old Roman road that ran through Wales and how they’ve not had as good infrastructure ever since. Inaugural Trams is about a town planner creating an integrated trasnport system in the image of his lover’s face. Skylon! is a 14 minute epic, telling the story of how he wound up sitting on a plane next to an actress whose work he doesn’t like, foils a hijacking of the plane and winds up marrying her (obviously based on his own life story) The whole of his collaborative album with Boom Bip, under the name Neon Neon, is about John Delorean’s life story. Gruff is weird. Good. But weird. ---
**Author:** ![Soylent\_Juicy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/82dd89/32.png) [@Soylent\_Juicy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Soylent_Juicy)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2011, 3:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-unusual-topics/601952/76 "2011-11-17T15:03:24Z")
I immediately thought of these ones from Back in the Day: Streetband - “Toast”: [Streetband - Toast - YouTube](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WJmKStqugMc) BAMFF - “Crevice Tool”: [www.youtube.com/watch?v=WQZegdcTHfc](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WQZegdcTHfc) (Apologies if the links don’t work, youtube is blocked at my work so I can’t check 'em.) ---
**Author:** ![Bridget\_Burke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7cd45c/32.png) [@Bridget\_Burke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bridget_Burke)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2011, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-unusual-topics/601952/77 "2011-11-17T15:09:51Z")
The late Tommy Thompson of the Red Clay Ramblers wrote “[Regions of Rain](http://www.mikecraver.com/lyricsTT.html#regions)”–the chorus of which goes… > [@](#): > > It never stops raining in French Cameroon > So fly me away on a plane > As high and as dry as the winds on the moon > And far from the regions of rain And the verses describe being in deep shit, very far from home. The Ramblers played Old Time Music, sometimes verging on the ragged edge of Ragtime. But they also did theater & wrote some wonderful songs that went beyond the usual subject matter… ---
**Author:** ![koeeoaddi](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/koeeoaddi/32/408_2.png) [@koeeoaddi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/koeeoaddi)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2011, 3:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-unusual-topics/601952/78 "2011-11-17T15:14:45Z")
Peter Himmelman’s [Woman with the Strength of 10,000 Men](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wTU-ppinm1s), about a woman locked-in by ALS. ---
**Author:** ![amanset](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/8dc957/32.png) [@amanset](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/amanset)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2011, 3:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-unusual-topics/601952/79 "2011-11-17T15:30:56Z")
Earlier this year I really got into the Acid House Kings and on one of their EPs they have a guy called Don Lennon sing one of their songs. So I checked him out and he is great for this sort of thing. Personal highlights: “What SNL Stands For” > **[What SNL Stands For](https://open.spotify.com/track/4z5ot9BElBtFBMXsSD6got)** > > Don Lennon · Song · 2004 Basically, his views on Saturday Night Live “Last Comic Standing” > **[Last Comic Standing](https://open.spotify.com/track/3RUlbAHQBLLSb5MxIvdNVJ)** > > Don Lennon · Song · 2004 A discussion on the validity of various forms of comedy and the trials of being a standup comedian. “John Cale” > **[John Cale](https://open.spotify.com/track/4vk7a7qrjr6eTt866xlVqE)** > > Don Lennon · Song · 2002 A dream where he believes he is John Cale from The Velvet Underground “Matthews Comes Alive” > **[Matthews Comes Alive](https://open.spotify.com/track/10hqGzPGbJQVyMgzInZr9q)** > > Don Lennon · Song · 2002 [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/JGlVvfokSz8/hqdefault.jpg "don lennon matthews comes alive") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JGlVvfokSz8) Done in character as Dave Matthews about when the Dave Matthews Band had their first gig. ---
**Author:** ![elfkin477](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a9a28c/32.png) [@elfkin477](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfkin477)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2011, 3:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-unusual-topics/601952/80 "2011-11-17T15:42:52Z")
I like Spin B’s “Pop Song for Vegetarians to Sing”. It only has four words, repeated over and over again for 3 minutes. I suspect it was inspired by Queens Of The Stone Age’s “Feel Good Hit Of The Summer.” What? It even has “pop song” in the title. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-unusual-topics/601952.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-unusual-topics/601952.md?page=5)