There was a huge response to last week’s critics’ roundup of the best songs about cities, tunes that provided a global travelogue from Liverpool to Nairobi, documenting cityscapes, romance, politics and innumerable aspects of life in urban centres. The comments and suggestions confirmed the fascination many of us have for the way great cities come alive through music, and that everyone has a personal take on it. RaySmuckles, for example, thought the list was extremely comprehensive, while grumbling about the inclusion of They Might Be Giants’ “saccharine” New York City, on the grounds that rhyming “city” with “pretty” made him “incredibly angry”.
In general, many commenters enthused about the list while providing suggestions of their own, such as Elli Thomas’s worthy inclusion:
Indeed, it soon became clear that we could compile an equally stellar list of songs our critics left out. How on Earth, for example, could we have omitted such belters as the Clash’s London Calling, Warren Zevon’s Werewolves of London (omitted in favour of his Desperadoes Under the Eaves), Dr Feelgood’s All Through the City or – as noted by several readers – the Lovin’ Spoonful’s classic 1966 Summer in the City? Perhaps we were lost in the streets.
Inevitably, some took us to task on what they felt were particularly glaring omissions, such as the Doors’ LA Woman, Jim Morrison and co’s thundering 1971 essay on of the City of Angels’ seamier, lonelier side (“cops in cars, the topless bars, never saw a woman so alone…”), which was on our longlist but didn’t make the final cut. Several readers recommended songs about the capital, notably the Kinks’ mighty Waterloo Sunset and Ralph McTell’s Streets of London, a haunting tale of homelessness in the Big Smoke that still rings true today and was, we were reminded by @e-phemera, given a raucous makeover – and one or two naughtier lyrics - by punk rabble rousers the Anti-Nowhere League.
I’m still kicking myself for forgetting Simple Minds’ epic instrumental Theme for Great Cities, and there were several shouts for Pete Wylie’s love song to his hometown, Heart as Big as Liverpool – although the Wah! man never did get around to recording mooted B-side Liver as Big as Hartlepool.
Several of you noted the ironic shortage of urban music - hip-hop and especially grime - in our list, and put us right with the likes of Will Smith’s Welcome to Miami and Wiley’s typically modest I Am London.
Other suggested songs came from across the genres, throwing up new wave era rockers Graham Parker and the Rumour’s ace Watch the Moon Come Down (about New York) and prog rock beasts Rush’s 11-minute urban opus, The Camera Eye. Several selections were obscure but wonderful, such as Moonlight on the Malago, penned by late Wurzels’ frontman Adge Cutler before what reader FatboySmiff calls the cider-drinking band’s more well-known “ooh arr direction”. The song details how a string of Cutler conquests – from “flirty little Flora from the fish ponds” to “dirty little Dora from Downend” – were lured to submission by the sight of the moon falling on the river that runs through Bristol. Ooh and indeed arr.
Another unknown pleasure (to me, at least) was Orchardville and lorna86’s terrific suggestion of early-90s Irish mulleted rockers Energy Orchard’s stirring debut single, Belfast, which inexplicably peaked at No 52 in 1990. Singer Bap Kennedy’s evocative lyrics about the metropolis during the Troubles surely make this a lost classic city song (and their version of Van Morrison’s Madame George, a Belfast song on our list, is mighty fine as well).
Belfast by Energy Orchard (Energy Orchard, MCA: 1989). A song that really does capture Belfast and what it was like to live there during the troubles. None of the bad taste that the faux sentimentality nor pity that Simple Minds, Belfast Child left in the mouth. AB.
The difference between songs about towns and cities caused some right ol’ confusion. There was a lot of love for English folk singer Ewan MacColl’s 1949 classic Dirty Old Town – and the covers by the Dubliners and the Pogues – and rightly so. Salford, which it addresses, has enjoyed city status since 1926, although the grimy factories and gasworks that MacColl sang about have mostly been knocked down to make way for swish hotels and shopping malls. A misleading title might have been the reason the Specials’ mighty Ghost Town slipped past us: as reader covsky reminded us, the bleakly brilliant 1981 chart topper is about Coventry, a city.
Ffs Ghost Town by the Specials is about Cov.
The fact it has been omitted from the above leaves the above redundant.
Similarly, if we’d included the much-suggested Nutbush City Limits by Tina Turner, we may have found ourselves facing a steward’s inquiry. The 1973 funk and soul stomper is fantastic, obviously, but the lyrics describe the big-lunged singer’s childhood home as “a little old town in Tennessee, that’s called a quiet little community”. In fact, as a sign outside the southern US settlement makes very clear, Nutbush is an “unincorporated” rural community, and does not actually have any “city limits”.
Reader suggestions playlist
1 The Doors – LA Woman
2 The Lovin’ Spoonful – Summer In The City
3 The Pogues – Dirty Old Town
4 Graham Parker & the Rumour – Watch The Moon Come Down
5 The Kinks – Waterloo Sunset
6 Sufjan Stevens – Detroit, Lift Up Your Weary Head!
7 Rush – The Camera Eye
8 The Clash – London Calling
9 Warren Zevon – Werewolves of London
10 Dr Feelgood – All Through the City
11 Ralph McTell – Streets of London
12 Simple Minds – Theme for Great Cities
13 The Specials – Ghost Town
14 Ike & Tina Turner – Nutbush City Limits
15 Energy Orchard - Belfast
16 Wiley – I Am London
17 The Mighty Wah! – Heart As Big As Liverpool
Good list, extremely comprehensive. I find New York City by They Might Be Giants a bit saccharine though. Plus it rhymes "city" with "pretty" which makes me incredibly angry for some reason.