# What songs are insulting to the city or place that they’re about? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Tags:** music\ **Created:** [October 16, 2026, 5:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-songs-are-insulting-to-the-city-or-place-that-they-re-about/1033878 "2026-10-16T05:53:18Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![drad\_dog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/aeb1de/32.png) [@drad\_dog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drad_dog)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2026, 1:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-songs-are-insulting-to-the-city-or-place-that-they-re-about/1033878/101 "2026-10-17T01:41:40Z")
Tobacco Road ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2026, 1:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-songs-are-insulting-to-the-city-or-place-that-they-re-about/1033878/102 "2026-10-17T01:48:54Z")
Bob Dylan (“Oxford Town”) and Phil Ochs (“You Should Have Been Down In Mississippi”) are not exactly raves about the state. Nina Simone was not especially fond of the American South, while Mississippi was apparently at the bottom of her list. _Alabama’s gotten me so upset Tennessee made me lose my rest And everybody knows about Mississippi Goddam_ ---
**Author:** ![Marvin\_the\_Martian](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/marvin_the_martian/32/2898_2.png) [@Marvin\_the\_Martian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marvin_the_Martian)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2026, 1:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-songs-are-insulting-to-the-city-or-place-that-they-re-about/1033878/103 "2026-10-17T01:49:05Z")
> [@Disinfectus](#): > > Stevie Wonder doesn’t exactly paint a flattering picture of Mississippi in “Living for the City” Doesn’t paint a very good picture of NYC in that song either… ---
**Author:** ![Disinfectus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/disinfectus/32/11085_2.png) [@Disinfectus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Disinfectus)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2026, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-songs-are-insulting-to-the-city-or-place-that-they-re-about/1033878/104 "2026-10-17T01:52:46Z")
You make a good point. ---
**Author:** ![teelabrown](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/teelabrown/32/8412_2.png) [@teelabrown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/teelabrown)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2026, 1:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-songs-are-insulting-to-the-city-or-place-that-they-re-about/1033878/105 "2026-10-17T01:58:46Z")
Ry Cooder wrote a funny and accurate song about Hollywood. A clip of the chorus from _Down In Hollywood_ pretty much sums up his opinion of the place: “Down in Hollywood You better hope that you don’t run out of gas Down in Hollywood They’ll drag you right out of your car and kick your ass In Hollywood They’re standing on the corner just waiting for a sucker like you Down in Hollywood Now if you want to stay healthy just keep 'em moving right on through” ---
**Author:** ![John\_DiFool](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_difool/32/19543_2.png) [@John\_DiFool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_DiFool)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2026, 2:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-songs-are-insulting-to-the-city-or-place-that-they-re-about/1033878/106 "2026-10-17T02:13:19Z")
> [@Chefguy](#): > > Southern Man, and Alabama, both by Neil Young. In response, Lynyrd Skynyrd wrote Sweet Home Alabama. Since the latter were from Jacksonville, Florida, I always wondered if the erm ‘inhalation’ for “That Smell” (mostly about drug addiction) was partially thanks to the northside paper mill, which I would often smell whenever we drove up I-95 as a kid (usually to the airport) ---
**Author:** ![Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba9def/32.png) [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Just_Asking_Questions)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2026, 2:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-songs-are-insulting-to-the-city-or-place-that-they-re-about/1033878/107 "2026-10-17T02:26:01Z")
> [@solost](#): > > _Stuck in Winnemucca_ > _Just my awful luck-a_ The local food does suck-a The children run a-muck-a (which has the poor song writing form of rhyming mucca with muck-a) The Monkees’ Pleasant Valley Sunday makes a case that 1960s life in suburbia is staid and boring. Well, we can’t all be aspiring rock stars living in a Malibu beach house, driving a custom car, living the bohemian life, having adventures with monsters, spies, aliens, and the devil himself, without apparently any money, now can we? 🙂 Though even today, 60 years later, I despise “rows of houses that are all the same”, which are every new development in Mesa, as well as probably everywhere. Manfred Mann’s Hollywood Town is another song that doesn’t have a lot of good to say about the town. ---
**Author:** ![Jack\_Burden](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/958977/32.png) [@Jack\_Burden](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jack_Burden)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2026, 3:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-songs-are-insulting-to-the-city-or-place-that-they-re-about/1033878/108 "2026-10-17T03:03:01Z")
No shortage of Texas songwriters detailing how much Dallas sucks, most classically Jimmie Dale Gilmore “Well, Dallas is a woman who will walk on you when you’re down But when you are up, she’s the kind you want to take around But Dallas ain’t a woman to help you get your feet on the ground And Dallas is a woman who will walk on you when you’re down” And of course James McMurtry singing about Levelland which makes Lubbock look positively bumpy “Flatter than a tabletop Makes you wonder why they stopped here Wagon must have lost a wheel or they lacked ambition one” ---
**Author:** ![hogarth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hogarth/32/1773_2.png) [@hogarth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hogarth)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2026, 3:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-songs-are-insulting-to-the-city-or-place-that-they-re-about/1033878/109 "2026-10-17T03:20:34Z")
“Tillsonburg”: Stompin’ Tom remembers backbreaking work in the tobacco fields around Tillsonburg, Ontario. [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/uA3aO9n3k18/maxresdefault.jpg "Tillsonburg") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uA3aO9n3k18) ---
**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:** [October 17, 2026, 3:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-songs-are-insulting-to-the-city-or-place-that-they-re-about/1033878/110 "2026-10-17T03:35:13Z")
“Leaving Las Vegas” doesn’t seem very Vegas-friendly. ---
**Author:** ![Senegoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senegoid/32/6606_2.png) [@Senegoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Senegoid)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2026, 7:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-songs-are-insulting-to-the-city-or-place-that-they-re-about/1033878/111 "2026-10-17T07:16:59Z")
“Downtown L. A.” by J. J. Cale – Describes life in the skid row part of downtown. Johnny Cash has two songs with some choice shit-talking about Folsom Prison and San Quentin. ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2026, 7:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-songs-are-insulting-to-the-city-or-place-that-they-re-about/1033878/112 "2026-10-17T07:52:59Z")
Pete Townshend’s _White City_ is an entire _album_ about the quiet despair of the people living in council estates in the eponymous, then-run-down London district. Pretty much any single song from the album qualifies, but the title track (with music and lead guitar by David Gilmour), narrated by an aging WWII veteran who now lives alone in a single-room flat and longs for the days when he was one of the youths fighting in the streets, is particularly bittersweet. [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/_Op3S-xmnKg/maxresdefault.jpg "White City Fighting") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Op3S-xmnKg) ---
**Author:** ![TCMF-2L](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tcmf-2l/32/16553_2.png) [@TCMF-2L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TCMF-2L)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2026, 12:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-songs-are-insulting-to-the-city-or-place-that-they-re-about/1033878/113 "2026-10-17T12:54:30Z")
When British neo-mod / punk band The Jam moved from Woking to London they didn’t find it welcoming. As chronicled in the song Strange Town TCMF-2L ---
**Author:** ![hogarth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hogarth/32/1773_2.png) [@hogarth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hogarth)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2026, 1:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-songs-are-insulting-to-the-city-or-place-that-they-re-about/1033878/114 "2026-10-17T13:09:59Z")
**TOKÉBAKICITTE** – an extremely catchy song about some of the white trash, phonies and racist cops who live in Quebec. [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/4oclkgHvgM8/maxresdefault.jpg "Jérôme 50 - TOKÉBAKICITTE [Vidéoclip officiel]") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4oclkgHvgM8) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-songs-are-insulting-to-the-city-or-place-that-they-re-about/1033878.md?page=5)