Story Based Songs

whats everyones favourite story based songs ? that is songs that have a story attached to them
mine would have to be stan by eminem. really blew me away when i heard it .

other favourites i have include
-Bruce Springsteen - Nebraska (some dude facing execution talkin about a killing spree he went on with some young one)

- Avril Lavigne - skater boy - (seriously! its about herself talkin to some girl that rejected her boyfriend in the past now hes a big star)

- Kenny Rogers - Coward of the County - a guy who was placid on the advice of his dying father cracks when his wife is gang raped.

- Johnny Cash - I Hung my Head - a guy who killed a horseman reflects on life before his execution( originally by Sting)

- Nirvana - Sliver ( young boy is taken to be babysat by his grandparents. wants to go home)

- Garth Brooks - Belleau Wood ( story of WW1 in the trenches on Christmas Day )

OutKast-Da Art Of Storytellin' Part 1.

Em, not too sure what it's about but I think it's got to do with them growing up and how these two girls they knew had completely fcuked up lives.

I think Tina Turner's Nutbush City Limits is based on her home town/life? Seger also covers that song too.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by sirhamish

I think Tina Turner's Nutbush City Limits is based on her home town/life? Seger also covers that song too.

---

Never knew Ike bet him too??

Well, you learn something new every day!

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by superfrank

Never knew Ike bet him too??

Well, you learn something new every day!

---

Actually, Seger had a rough upbringing, unlike Loose "middle class pretending to be working class" Windscreen**. He spent his growing years in a tenement, father deserted mum. Father took a job as a warehouse guard in California, got drunk and was found burned to death after a fire in said warehouse. A lot of Seger's songs are based on his life and goings on in Detroit. Most associate him with country rock ballads but - saw him in London 1980 - he can/could rock with the best of them. Rory Gallagher was a big fan.

(**Old NME slag for The Boss)

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by sirhamish

Loose "middle class pretending to be working class" Windscreen**. (**Old NME slag for The Boss)

---

As Paddy McAloon once said " Look at us now ( start driving) / SOme things hurt more much more than Cars and Girls " :cool:

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by CollegeTillIDie

As Paddy McAloon once said " Look at us now ( start driving) / SOme things hurt more much more than Cars and Girls " :cool:

---

C'mon CTID, you know I'm slow.Hard to figure you out sometimes.

Is that a good vibe or bad vibe you're sending???? :confused:

MARILYN MANSON - The Nobodies, which is a sort of comments on the Columbine highschool murders of which the murderers were so-called fans of Manson

PLACEBO - My Sweet Prince, was about an ex-boyfriend of singer Brian Molko

SMITHS - Girlfriend In A Coma, was based on a woman in the US who was in coma for years and the debate that kept the country in trance weither she could be taken off the breathing machines or not

SMITHS - Some Girls Are Bigger Than Others, really - Morrissey was asked what it was about and his reply was that he just wrote a song on the fact that he suddenly realised that all female bodies look differently and that he never noticed before

MANIC STREET PREACHERS - Tsunami.
a personal favourite of mine. About the Welsh sisters Gibbons who were born in a time when twins were still claimed to contain an 'evil one', so the girls were brought up in institutes and decided as a protest not to speak anymore. Once grown up they never knew how to behave in the outside world and ended up in criminality. After one of the died, the other one suddenly started speaking again. The song refers as well to the disappeared guitarist/lyricist Richey Edwards, he wrote all the songs together with his soulmate: bassist Nicky Wire. After Richey's vanishing Nicky had to stand up and 'speak again': write the lyrics out on his own. The tsunami is a metaphore for the strenghth of something that can tear your world apart when you think everything is in control, but also the strenghth that makes you stand up again. I named my cat after this song out of love for the band BTW, bad choice given what happened 6 months later in Asia :(

MANIC STREET PREACHERS - Ocean Spray, singer James Dean Bradfield hardly ever writes lyrics but this is one from his hands. When his mother was deadly ill she believed the fruitjuice Ocean Spray could cure her. James sings he hopes she'll stay awake so they can move on happily after all and drink Ocean Spray together.

U2 - Sunday Bloody Sunday, guess we all know upon which real story this is based :(



i'll post some more if I can think of more by heart...

I don't know if you are aware of this or it is what you were pointing out but "sunday, bloody Sunday" supposedly isn't about 1972 but the Bloody Sunday in Dublin during the war of independance (Croke Park killings e.t.c). Don't think Bono has ever said what its about but that is the widely held assumption.

the "when fact is fiction and TV reality" and "can't believe the news today" phrases make me assume they're referring to a rather modern issue, so I'd rather have thought it were about the killings in Maiden City in 1972. But guess only Bono will know...

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Gerrit

MANIC STREET PREACHERS - Tsunami.


MANIC STREET PREACHERS - Ocean Spray,

---

good choices!
forgot to put in 4st 7 from the holy bible its the story of a girl with anorexia told in the first person.

BOB DYLAN-Hurricane(I'll assume you seen the film or know)

BOB DYLAN-Who killed Davey Moore(about a boxer who was killed mid-bout)

BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN-Reno(about a mans visit to a prositute)

BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN-The river(about his brother and his brothers girlfriend and an unexpected pregnacy)

BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN-Johnny 99(about a man who gets fired from his job and robs a shop but in the process kills a man,his case then goes to court and he gets 99 years for his crime)

BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN-Highway patrolman(about a highway patrolman who is called to deal with a serious assault commited by his brother)Later adapted into a film

BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN-The ghost of Tom Joad(about the character Tom Joad from the book and film Grapes of Wrath

To name just a few

Paul Brady - Nothing but the same old story - great take on Irish emigrant.

Song called Go or Go Ahead by rufus Wainwright. He wrote it when he was in rehab for his crystal meth addicition. Lyrics are just so powerful. It's probably the only song ever that got me truly emotional. Listen if you ever get the chance.

Bruce Springstein-Born in the USA; he gets in a fight so is arrested and sent to Vietnam, get's backa nd his brother has been killed in Vietnam and all the jobs are gone

Bik Farlane and Terry O'Neil-Terrorist or Dreamer; starts of in Sackville street witht he Black and Tans, goes through th Easter 16 commerations in 1966 and the modern day Troubles in the North

The Year they Stole the Summer; Can'tr remember who this one is by-about when the loyalists burnt down Catholic homes

Fields of Athenry; we all know

Shebeen-Fields of Athenry Garvarghy Road-About Dumcree

The Verve Pipe-The Freshmen; About the lead singers girlfriend killing herself (but for years he felt guilty about this so claimed it was about a friends girlfriend)

MICHAEL W SMITH - Hello goodbye, about the little baby boy of a friend who died only a week after birth... :(

SIMPLE MINDS - Mandela Day, a salute to Nelson Mandela and his succesful struggle for freedom

SIMPLE MINDS - Belfast Child, we all know what this is about :(

INDOCHINE - Electrastar, about the death of band member (and brother of the singer Nicola Sirkis) Stephane Sirkis

THE CURE - Pictures Of You, about Robert Smith regretting that he once threw away all his childhood pictures when being ashamed of his past, later to regret that he also threw away his only memories

HEATHER NOVA - Drink It In, about her brother Mishka's struggle to beat cancer (of which he luckily cured completely !)

NINE INCH NAILS - the whole album "The Downward Spiral" is based on the life and work of cult leader/serial killer Charles Manson. The album was recorded in the house where the Manson Family murdered 8 months pregnant Sharon Tate and 5 other people. Trent Reznor of NIN was the last one to live in the house before it was sloped.

U2 - Sometimes You Can't Make It..., Bono wrote this for his late dad and sung it for the first time on his dad's funeral.

PLACEBO - Black-Eyed. A multi-themed song featuring the troubled childhood of Brian Molko (who was depressive for a few years), the divorce of his parents, and his bisexuality.

BLACK SABBATH - Sweet Leaf, the first song that directly described and promoted cannabis use.

Also, "Isobel" by Dido is based upon a true story but she never told the details of it. Seems to be about a girl that either took her own life or disappeared ("I thought it was strange when you missed the train. I thought it was strange when your car was found by that tree in Ennis where we used to hang around... Dear Isobel I wish you well, and what you've done is right, oh it's been such hell, I wish you well and hope you're safe tonight")

Tori Amos was raped during childhood and I know she wrote a song on it, but i'm not sure of the title.

christ I dunno where to start. i 'd say i'll be back a few times.
Great thread by the way Gerrit (did you get out the South Park Movie yet? :D )

Apparently both "A Pair of Brown Eyes" by the Pogues and "53rd and 3rd" by The Ramones are about their respective writers working as male prostitutes.

Most of the stories are fictional but Nick Caves Murder Ballads LP is an awsome listen for those seeking story based songs.

Opening track 'Song of Joy' is about a guy who knocks on a door late one evening and starts explaining to the man of the house that he's a vagrant who left his home years ago after his manic depressive wife and family were murdered by a lunatic while he was visiting a patient

I was visiting a sick friend/I was a doctor then/ Joy and the girls were on their own

He goes on to explain that the man who did it quotes John Milton on the walls in the victims blood /the police are investigating at tremendous cost/ in my house he wrote HIS RED RIGHT HAND/ that they tell me -is from Paradise Lost

So basically he's begging for a bed for the night -BUT everything he says is littered with references to John Milton.

Fairwell happy fields whereJoy forever dwells/ Hail Horrors hail

"The sun to me is dark and silent as the moon"/ do you good sir have a room?/ are you beckoning me in?

Don McLean - American Pie

McLean eventually acknowledged that his song was a tribute to the late Buddy Holly and the metamorphosis of music after his death. This in-depth FAQ explains -- "American Pie" refers to rock 'n' roll music, which fell apart on February 2, 1959, ("the day the music died") with the plane crash that killed Holly, the Big Bopper, and Ritchie Valens ("the three men I admire most"). The allusions don't stop there. Bob Dylan is supposedly the jester "who sang for the King and Queen," and "the girl who sang the blues" could be no other than soulful Janis Joplin.

And my favourite.....

Walk on by U2

All about Aung Sung Suu Ski's struggle.
Those scum in the regime banned it but it's goinf to be balring out when Burma is free!

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by liam88

And my favourite.....

Walk on by U2

All about Aung Sung Suu Ski's struggle.
Those scum in the regime banned it but it's goinf to be balring out when Burma is free!

---

Have you heard Damien Rices new song for the "free Aung Sung Suu Ski foundation"(i think thats what its called).The song is called "Unplayed Piano" and it's brilliant

no-one has yet mentioned "Joxer Goes to Stuttgart"

:eek:

Everything from the Harry Chapin songbook basically but two outstanding ones

W.O.L.D. Song about a perpetual adolescent who gets jobs in radio as a DJ in the USA but can never stay around long enough in one place to satisfy his wife and kids so she shows him the door. He ends up back in the place she is living and tries to win her back.. she rebuffs him politely.
" Feeling over 45 going on 15" as he says himself


CATS IN THE CRADLE... Song about a workaholic father too busy to play with his son... Son grows up to be too busy to spend time with his Dad when the old guy retires .
" when are you coming home Dad I don't know when/ But we'll get together then Dad you know we'll have a good time then"


Sir hamish

Paddy McAloon's song is a gentle dig at The Boss and his themes for most of his songs.. Cars and Girls... of course Bruce's songs are a lot deeper than that most of the time. But it's a good one nevertheless.
There are references to Bruce in the opening lines of that song.

Prefab Sprout have produced some of the best lyrical verses of the 1980's and early 1990's. No surprise to learn that Paddy McAloon's parents are IRISH

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by CollegeTillIDie

Everything from the Harry Chapin songbook basically but two outstanding ones

W.O.L.D. Song about a perpetual adolescent who gets jobs in radio as a DJ in the USA but can never stay around long enough in one place to satisfy his wife and kids so she shows him the door. He ends up back in the place she is living and tries to win her back.. she rebuffs him politely.
" Feeling over 45 going on 15" as he says himself


CATS IN THE CRADLE... Song about a workaholic father too busy to play with his son... Son grows up to be too busy to spend time with his Dad when the old guy retires .
" when are you coming home Dad I don't know when/ But we'll get together then Dad you know we'll have a good time then"


Sir hamish

Paddy McAloon's song is a gentle dig at The Boss and his themes for most of his songs.. Cars and Girls... of course Bruce's songs are a lot deeper than that most of the time. But it's a good one nevertheless.
There are references to Bruce in the opening lines of that song.

Prefab Sprout have produced some of the best lyrical verses of the 1980's and early 1990's. No surprise to learn that Paddy McAloon's parents are IRISH

---

Thanks for that CTID - have one Prefab Sprout album - when love lies down is on it but must have lent it to someone as I can't find in my colection.

Big Tom and the Mainliners : Four Roads To Glenamaddy.

Ode to the devotees of dancing in small ballrooms in small towns in the wesht of Ireland and the lack of facilities for our parents/grandparents and choices of entertainment in 1960s/1970s Ireland but the beginningis of relationships which gave rise to the Footie generation. :D

Sir hamish

Ah the classic song "When LOve Breaks Down"... bought the single myself.

You would be able to get the album " Steve McQueen" on CD now.
Failing that get the compilation which came out in the 1990's I think and is called " A Life Full Of Surprises" after the brand new song on it.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by CollegeTillIDie

Sir hamish

Ah the classic song "When LOve Breaks Down"... bought the single myself.

You would be able to get the album " Steve McQueen" on CD now.
Failing that get the compilation which came out in the 1990's I think and is called " A Life Full Of Surprises" after the brand new song on it.

---

Just found "Swoon" and I love the opening track "Don't sing" - I'm a sucker for harmonica/harp/mouth organ - whatever you call it - in a song.

I definitely had Steve McQueen - that had PMcA and Wendy (?) on a big motorbike on the cover, hadn't it? I'd better start checking my full collection again just to see what I have and what I've forgotton about.

Paddy McAloon appeared at the Cambridge Folk Festival a year or two ago with long hair and an enormous white beard - would have loved to been at that.

Do the initials DH mean anything to you???

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by sirhamish

Just found "Swoon" and I love the opening track "Don't sing" - I'm a sucker for harmonica/harp/mouth organ - whatever you call it - in a song.

I definitely had Steve McQueen - that had PMcA and Wendy (?) on a big motorbike on the cover, hadn't it? I'd better start checking my full collection again just to see what I have and what I've forgotton about.

Paddy McAloon appeared at the Cambridge Folk Festival a year or two ago with long hair and an enormous white beard - would have loved to been at that.

Do the initials DH mean anything to you???

---

"Oh no don't blame Mexico!" If the initials NG mean anything to you :D

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Lionel Ritchie

christ I dunno where to start. i 'd say i'll be back a few times.
Great thread by the way Gerrit (did you get out the South Park Movie yet? :D )

Apparently both "A Pair of Brown Eyes" by the Pogues and "53rd and 3rd" by The Ramones are about their respective writers working as male prostitutes.

Most of the stories are fictional but Nick Caves Murder Ballads LP is an awsome listen for those seeking story based songs.

Opening track 'Song of Joy' is about a guy who knocks on a door late one evening and starts explaining to the man of the house that he's a vagrant who left his home years ago after his manic depressive wife and family were murdered by a lunatic while he was visiting a patient

I was visiting a sick friend/I was a doctor then/ Joy and the girls were on their own

He goes on to explain that the man who did it quotes John Milton on the walls in the victims blood /the police are investigating at tremendous cost/ in my house he wrote HIS RED RIGHT HAND/ that they tell me -is from Paradise Lost

So basically he's begging for a bed for the night -BUT everything he says is littered with references to John Milton.

Fairwell happy fields whereJoy forever dwells/ Hail Horrors hail

"The sun to me is dark and silent as the moon"/ do you good sir have a room?/ are you beckoning me in?

---

Sigh... This is such a miraclously good song... One of my all-time favourite songs, maybe the most gothic song I've ever heard along with "Tales from the inverted womb" (Sopor Aeternus) and "666 Hellbound, the devil's within you" (Silke Bischoff)

I have the Murder Ballads cd in Belgium, have to ask my parents to ship it urgently as I cannot find any mp3 while waiting for a next visit :( When I first heard the song I got the shivers of excitement, and unlike with other song I still feel the thrill every time I hear it.

"Farewell happy fields where Joy forever dwells, Hail Horrors Hail" is a thrilling quote, but what about "As if she soar into the heart of her final bloodsoaked night... Those lunatic eyes, that hungry kitchen knife... I see, Sir, that I have your attention !" and "Outside the wolves howl, the serpents hiss..." ? Nick's intonation along with the extremely threatening music is just world class. Gothic in its purest form.




also great songs on that album (every song describes a murder story) are "Henry Lee", the highly obscene "Stagger Lee" (the man makes out with a woman when her husband arrives, and the guy shoots him because he refuses to give head to him :eek: ), "The curse of Millhaven" (a 15 year old witch girl killing a whole village's residents) and of course the duet with Kylie Minogue "Where the wild roses grow".
The sentence "all beauty must die" is amazingly simple yet amazingly powerful.

I adore literature references in music by the way. Manic Street Preachers are brilliant for that, check out www.manics.nl --> behind almost every single sentence of every Manics song there's a reference :eek:

I adore the opening phrases of "A design for life": "Libraries gave us power, then work came and made us free. What price now for a shallow piece of dignity ?" (referring to the quotes "Knowledge is power" and "Arbeit macht frei")

Nicky Wire's probably the best lyricist the world has seen, and we highly miss Richey Edwards as co-lyricist :(

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Gerrit

Nicky Wire's probably the best lyricist the world has seen, and we highly miss Richey Edwards as co-lyricist :(

---

That arsehole is not even in the top 100.Even with his nowhere buddy

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by D2 Red

That arsehole is not even in the top 100.Even with his nowhere buddy

---

Wronger than Ollie Byrne in a bikini

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by CollegeTillIDie

Everything from the Harry Chapin songbook basically but two outstanding ones

---

Was going to mention him - Mr Tanner is another one which is well up there.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Gerrit

Nicky Wire's probably the best lyricist the world has seen, and we highly miss Richey Edwards as co-lyricist :(

---

theres so many great lines in the holy bible alone dunno if richey or nicky wrote them

• i know i believe in nothing but it is my nothing
• if hospitals cure then prisons must bring their pain
• such beautiful dignity in self abuse
• why do anything when you can forget everything
• self disgust is self obsession honey and i do as i please

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by gustavo

theres so many great lines in the holy bible alone dunno if richey or nicky wrote them

• i know i believe in nothing but it is my nothing
• if hospitals cure then prisons must bring their pain
• such beautiful dignity in self abuse
• why do anything when you can forget everything
• self disgust is self obsession honey and i do as i please

---

The extremely negative ones are pure Richie :p

Two Little Boys - Rolf Harris - A tale of the bond of childhood :) hehehe

Seriously though lets see,

Spanish Train - Chris De Burgh - The Devil and God playing for the soul of a doomed Train

Ordinary Man - Christy Moore - A tale of two ends of the working spectrum

And of course, the best one of all time and why we should always respect our bovine buddies,

Cows with Guns - Dr. Demento - a tale of one mighty ****ed off cow and his longing for equality and freedom......:)

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Speranza

I don't know if you are aware of this or it is what you were pointing out but "sunday, bloody Sunday" supposedly isn't about 1972 but the Bloody Sunday in Dublin during the war of independance (Croke Park killings e.t.c). Don't think Bono has ever said what its about but that is the widely held assumption.

---

There's a few stories about this, one being it's based on Edge giving out about his childhood and the fact that all his catholic mates weren't allowed out to play on a Sunday....

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by D2 Red

That arsehole is not even in the top 100.Even with his nowhere buddy

---

You have to be kidding... Nicky Wire is a lyrical genius. Lennon and McCartney didn't write as many good lyrics in their career as Nicky did on one single album - and this is sincerely said, not said with the intention of just going against the flow.

The quotes stated before here go as perfect example. If the Manics are one of rock's best bands of the last decades (and in my opinion they are) it's entirely up to the lyrics. So all credit to Richey and Nicky, their lyrics should make the Dylans and Lennons of this world simply jealous.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Gerrit

You have to be kidding... Nicky Wire is a lyrical genius. Lennon and McCartney didn't write as many good lyrics in their career as Nicky did on one single album - and this is sincerely said, not said with the intention of just going against the flow.

The quotes stated before here go as perfect example. If the Manics are one of rock's best bands of the last decades (and in my opinion they are) it's entirely up to the lyrics. So all credit to Richey and Nicky, their lyrics should make the Dylans and Lennons of this world simply jealous.

---

Get a grip and don't put that idiot and his nowhere buddy in the same sentence as Lennon and McCartney or Dylan,The music **** and the lyrics are ****.Not even worth remembering the name of the band.

Genesis - The Lamb lies down on Braodway. Song? Story? There's a whole fcuking rock opera on there!!

Brian Eno features also in the title track.

Last Peter Gabriel effort with Genesis before they became a pop band.

By the way, Gerrit, Bauhaus are often credited with starting the Goth movement as you know but Gabriel used to wear really Goth-like outfits on stage in the early seventies. In fact, some of the early albums have a kind of Goth atmosphere - eg The Fountain of Salmacis from Nursery Cryme - a reworking of the Greek hermaphrodite legend.