# songs with philosophical themes **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [September 5, 2011, 1:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-with-philosophical-themes/595264 "2011-09-05T13:44:51Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![blood63](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/97f17d/32.png) [@blood63](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/blood63)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2011, 1:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-with-philosophical-themes/595264/1 "2011-09-05T13:44:51Z")
I am looking for songs that express a particular philosophy. Two that I can think of are Imagine (John Lennon) and Closer to Fine (Indigo Girls). This is for teenagers so contemporary music would be best but I’ll take anything from any genre. Thanks in advance ---
**Author:** ![MostlyClueless](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba9def/32.png) [@MostlyClueless](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MostlyClueless)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2011, 1:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-with-philosophical-themes/595264/2 "2011-09-05T13:51:31Z")
[![](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/mRol4ByOh6g/hqdefault.jpg "origin of love (with lyrics)") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mRol4ByOh6g) I don’t know if you mean this kind of philosophy, but this song retells Aristophanes’ speech in Plato’s Symposium. This myth explains that human beings were once round, two-faced, four-armed, and four-legged beings. Angry gods split these early humans in two, leaving the separated people with a lifelong yearning for their other half. ---
**Author:** ![Maeglin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8baadc/32.png) [@Maeglin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maeglin)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2011, 3:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-with-philosophical-themes/595264/3 "2011-09-05T15:14:05Z")
[Dust in the Wind](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dust_in_the_Wind) comes to mind. ---
**Author:** ![cmyk](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmyk/32/3353_2.png) [@cmyk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmyk)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2011, 3:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-with-philosophical-themes/595264/4 "2011-09-05T15:43:04Z")
> [@Maeglin](#): > > [Dust in the Wind](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dust_in_the_Wind) comes to mind. That’s what I came in to say. There’s [Through the Never](http://www.sing365.com/music/lyric.nsf/through-the-never-lyrics-metallica/1b1ce9b4d58d48bc4825688d0034242e) by Metallica. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2011, 4:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-with-philosophical-themes/595264/5 "2011-09-05T16:34:26Z")
One Tin Soldier, made famous in Billy Jack? ---
**Author:** ![NineToTheSky](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/b5a626/32.png) [@NineToTheSky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NineToTheSky)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2011, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-with-philosophical-themes/595264/6 "2011-09-05T17:15:04Z")
Very definitely not contemporary, but definitely based on a philosophy is Yes’s Tales From Topographic Oceans. From [Wiki](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tales_from_Topographic_Oceans): > [@](#): > > The album’s concept, a two-disc, four-piece work of symphonic length and scope (based on the Shastric scriptures, as found in a footnote within Paramahansa Yogananda’s book Autobiography of a Yogi), was their most ambitious to date. The four songs of the album symbolise (in track order) the concepts of Truth, Knowledge, Culture, and Freedom, the subjects of that section of text. ---
**Author:** ![Steken](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e274bd/32.png) [@Steken](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steken)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2011, 5:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-with-philosophical-themes/595264/7 "2011-09-05T17:18:22Z")
_Any_ philosophy? Any at all? And who are these “teenagers” you mention? ---
**Author:** ![Oakminster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/77aa72/32.png) [@Oakminster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oakminster)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2011, 5:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-with-philosophical-themes/595264/8 "2011-09-05T17:22:55Z")
_God Bless the U.S.A._–Lee Greenwood _Simple Man_–Lynyrd Skynyrd _Long Haired Country Boy_–Charlie Daniels ---
**Author:** ![robardin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/43a26b/32.png) [@robardin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robardin)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2011, 8:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-with-philosophical-themes/595264/9 "2011-09-05T20:21:47Z")
I take it songs with a religious bent are not included or this would be too easy… Or political or social philosophy? Lessee, top of my head from my mental jukebox - reflections on the nature of life: [I Will Follow You Into The Dark](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j6XZsau7CSk), Death Cab For Cutie [Free Will](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6mEzgc_ne60), by Rush [Patterns](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qGTxDHcXIpw), by Simon & Garfunkel [If 6 Was 9](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xylaFXwoQS8), by Jimi Hendrix [Peace On Earth](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z5j6w1o8S5I), by U2 [Time](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MYiahoYfPGk), Pink Floyd If you add a political element, whoo, there’s a ton. [Eve of Destruction](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y2mTYK3M0G0) - Barry McGuire (1965) [Exodus](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jTNLOQLllwo), [Redemption Song](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3zyAVfH6VPg) - Bob Marley (1977, 1979) [Pride (In The Name of Love)](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r08GJC-0umI) - U2 (1982) (about MLK Jr., of course) [Talkin’ 'Bout A Revolution](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OVKLmpALMFc) - Tracy Chapman (1989) [(Keep On’) Rockin’ In The Free World](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y9SMXkpowo0) - Neil Young (1989) [Sound Of Da Police](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=95ZgkTHQBUI) - KRS One (1993) ---
**Author:** ![Steken](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e274bd/32.png) [@Steken](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steken)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2011, 8:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-with-philosophical-themes/595264/10 "2011-09-05T20:53:07Z")
Well OK then. Here I go. Heraclitus (ca. 535–ca. 475 BC) believed that “war is the father of all things.” Well shit, now that’s pretty fucking metal, right? Motörhead’s gotcha covered: [“Over the fields of corpses, / Over the broken and maimed, / Over the enemy’s banners, beaten and trampled and shamed.”](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kaLuB88VWog) Empedocles (ca. 490–ca. 430 BC) seems to have been a waaaaay more chilled out dude: Violence was very uncool, he wrote. Once again, paradoxically, it’s [Motörhead to the rescue](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EqFoqtpUFY8). Epictetus (55-135 AD) believed, as did the Stoics, that each individual can, and should, _do the right thing_ at all times, no matter the consequences, and without ever expecting earthly glory in return. If one did all this, and calmly followed the paths of reason and duty, one could never go wrong. Or as a great Stoic philosopher once put it, “You know you can’t be hurt, / You gotta believe in your star, / They’ll always treat you like dirt, / They can only push you so far, / They can’t take it away, / If you’ve got something to say. […] You mustn’t shout it out loud, / Don’t create a scene, / Don’t indulge in being proud / It only feeds their scheme.” [And that great Stoic philosopher was Lemmy from Motörhead](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1DxlhfzQ-Ug). Epicurus (341 BCE – 270 BCE), on the other hand, believed that hey, fuck duty, _pleasure_ is where it’s at. So… Motörhead, right? Oh yes: [“A million miles, a million girls / A million real good times!”](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZaFcx09BII4) Then… Ugh… I’m getting a bit tired… Let’s fast forward here… Medieval era… Thomas Of Aquinas… Blah blah blah… Ah, my man Voltaire (1694-1778)! This being the Age Of Enlightenment, he wrote of the Biblical God that his “image is of agony, [his] servants rape the land / obsequious and arrogant, clandestine and vain / two thousand years of misery, of torture in [his] name / hypocrisy made paramount, paranoia the law / [his] name is called religion, sadistic, sacred whore.” [Oh, wait, no, I got confused – that was Motörhead again](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mpqPR2Tv5Sc). But it sums up Voltaire’s thoughts beautifully, at least where it comes to the God of the Bible. Then there was Marx (1818-1883). He thought bankers were a nasty bunch of sons of bitches. Well, guess what? [So does Motörhead](http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/culturevideo/musicvideo/8174693/Motorhead-beat-up-bankers-in-Christmas-single.html). Who else? Who have I missed? Nietzsche, you say? Oh, you mean the guy who believed art should be wild, chaotic, ecstatic, irrational? Who said that “you need chaos in your soul to give birth to a dancing star”? Who believed that life is “a thousand times too short for us to bore ourselves”!? Who looked like fucking _[this](http://quotationsbook.com/assets/shared/img/5347/450px-Friedrich_Nietzsche_drawn_by_Hans_Olde.jpg)_, for God’s sake!!??? Clearly, I mean _clearly_, he was [the Lemmy Kilmister of his day](http://i2.listal.com/image/823907/600full-lemmy-kilmister.jpg). ---
**Author:** ![NDP](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ndp/32/55_2.png) [@NDP](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NDP)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2011, 10:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-with-philosophical-themes/595264/11 "2011-09-05T22:03:35Z")
[The Mighty Quinn by Bob Dylan](http://http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O2bxiU_Z6mc&feature=related) (covered by [Manfred Mann](http://http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K13hH0pJx5s&feature=related)) [Ain’t Wastin’ Time No More](http://http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n8KaiRKXZdE) by the Allman Brothers Band ---
**Author:** ![cmyk](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmyk/32/3353_2.png) [@cmyk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmyk)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2011, 11:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-with-philosophical-themes/595264/12 "2011-09-05T23:45:00Z")
This unofficial video of Tool’s [Lateralus,](http://m.youtube.com/index?desktop_uri=%2F&gl=US#/watch?v=wS7CZIJVxFY) underlining the vastness of time, space, nature and our place and awareness of it by incorporating the Fibonacci sequence in the construction of the song itself… Love it. If only Lemmy of Motörhead had anything to offer. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2011, 10:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-with-philosophical-themes/595264/13 "2011-09-06T10:40:07Z")
Dead Can dance is good for this sort of thing. [Fortune Presents Gifts Not According to the Book](http://www.songmeanings.net/songs/view/3530822107858595530/), for instance, as all about the medieval concept of [Fortune’s Wheel](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wheel_of_Fortune), AKA “shit happens” ---
**Author:** ![Horatio\_Hellpop](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e5b9ba/32.png) [@Horatio\_Hellpop](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Horatio_Hellpop)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2011, 11:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-with-philosophical-themes/595264/14 "2011-09-06T11:21:50Z")
Blue Oyster Cult, “Godzilla”: History shows again and again how nature points up the folly of man. THAT is DEEP! Tom Cochrane, “Life is a Highway.” Pretty much says it all. ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2011, 12:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-with-philosophical-themes/595264/15 "2011-09-06T12:03:53Z")
A couple of obvious ones: [Turn, Turn, Turn](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fHvf20Y6eoM), the Byrds. [Tomorrow Never Knows](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6a3NcwfOBzQ), the Beatles ---
**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:** [September 6, 2011, 1:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-with-philosophical-themes/595264/16 "2011-09-06T13:23:33Z")
Springsteen’s “Glory Days” and Joel’s “Piano Man” are both about lost dreams. ---
**Author:** ![RikWriter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/49beb7/32.png) [@RikWriter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RikWriter)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2011, 1:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-with-philosophical-themes/595264/17 "2011-09-06T13:44:50Z")
All This Time by Sting. ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2011, 2:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-with-philosophical-themes/595264/18 "2011-09-06T14:51:45Z")
> [@Maeglin](#): > > [Dust in the Wind](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dust_in_the_Wind) comes to mind. Dang, I was sure your link was going to be to [this](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BvYRqsRZ7vE)! ---
**Author:** ![kelly5078](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/6f9a4e/32.png) [@kelly5078](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kelly5078)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2011, 4:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-with-philosophical-themes/595264/19 "2011-09-06T16:22:19Z")
Rush always tried to be philosophical. ---
**Author:** ![cjepson](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a9adbd/32.png) [@cjepson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cjepson)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2011, 4:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-with-philosophical-themes/595264/20 "2011-09-06T16:48:08Z")
How about "[The Inner Light"](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pRSPMpfb5VA) by George Harrison and a few other guys? [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-with-philosophical-themes/595264.md?page=2)