Black Oak Arkansas - When Electricity Came to Arkansas
(I suppose it's questionable whether an instrumental song counts as "mentioning" a state, but I can watch old BOA all the live-long day)
New York is too easy, although come to think I'm not sure if I know a song that's unambiguously talking about the state as a whole rather than the city.
Similarly, Texas and California have about a bazillion songs each.
3: My first thought was Jay-Z's "Empire State of Mind", but looking at the lyrics, it's pretty much about NYC.
"New York State Of Mind" the same -- it's really about the city.
Ohio is a great state name to sing.
"4 dead in Ohio"
"Ay! Oh! Where did you go, Ohio?"
Songs that make Buckeyes swell with pride.
"Alabama Rain" (Jim Croce); "Sweet Home Alabama"
"Moonlight in Vermont"; "Long Vermont Roads" (Magnetic Fields)
Too many to count for Georgia and California.
"Virginia Plain" by Roxy Music: not directly named for the state of Virginia.
Sufjan Stevens has Illinois and Michigan covered....
"Love on a Greyhound Bus" by the Dinning Sisters went through a bunch of states. My grandma had the 78 disc.
Ryan Adams - Oh My Sweet Carolina
James Taylor - Carolina in My Mind
Shelby Lynne - Alabama Frame of Mind
Willard Grant Conspiracy - Massachusetts.
"Moonlight on Vermont" as well as "Moonlight in Vermont".
Lots for Tennessee: Tennessee Stud, East Tennessee Blues, My Little Girl in Tennesee, etc. (Not that those are about the state.)
The Mountain Goats have "Going to …" songs for Maryland, Alaska, Georgia, Kansas, and Tennessee.
There's a Richard Pinhas tune called "Duncan Idaho" but it's probably not related to the state.
Then there are songs that are basically just lists of place names. "Wanted Man" isn't quite like that, but it packs a lot in.
"Michigan seems like a dream to me now"
Lyric that is oddly resonant for me (probably also for other Michigan alums)
For the double state bonus, quite possibly my favorite Ohio Players song ever is "Far East Mississippi".
"Alabama, Arkansas, I do love my ma and pa..."
So, what if a prince were gay, would there be two duke of waleses?
for this questions, palace brothers - ohio river boat song
'we built this city' counts too, i guess.
Lyle Lovett's "North Dakota" is pretty great.
Some obscure band that probably no one here's ever heard of called Captain Automatic has a song named after New Hampshire (can't listen to it for another ten minutes though, I'm almost through The Sinking of the Titanic) and Matt Pond PA has a tune just called "New Hampshire".
20 gets it exactly right. And "(That's Right) You're Not From Texas" mentions a lot of other states too ("they're OK in Oklahoma / Up in Arkansas they're fair / But those old folks in Missouri / They don't even know you're there").
The Bee Gees did "Massachusetts" and "South Dakota Morning".
Alabama, you got
The weight on your shoulders
That's breaking your back.
Your Cadillac
Has got a wheel in the ditch
And a wheel on the track
also damien juradao and some neil young guy.
are you people just naming any old state
srsly not going to help foreigners out here
John Denver's "Song of Wyoming" and (Colorado) "Rocky Mountain High".
Hey, that same Willard Grant Conspiracy album has a song called "Christmas in Nevada".
The Softies, "Holiday in Rhode Island"
25:"kozelizkeqhie" -- yoyo is an excellent surrealist speller!
Also continuing the rock tradition of affirming Ohio -- "Blood Buzz Ohio" by the National, with the lyrics I suspect they wrote for me, "I still owe money to the money to the money I owe."
How it took this long for Archers of Loaf's "South Carolina" to occur to me is a mystery.
The band (Bub) has a song called "Bordeaux Texas", which amuses me.
"Blood Buzz Ohio" by the National
That song was a reluctant last-minute cut from the last mix I posted here.
As far as hits, we've got "Little Green Apples" and "Me And You and A Dog Named Boo", both of which are sort of damning with faint praise. And there's Prince's "Uptown", and a bunch of other songs by local bands.
Given that we produced The Andrews Sisters, Judy Garland, Bob Dylan, Prince, Soul Asylum AND The Trashmen, you'd think there'd be more good, Minnesota-specific songs.
John Denver's "Song of Wyoming" and (Colorado) "Rocky Mountain High"
I must be badly short of coffee to have remembered "Song of Wyoming" but not "Country Roads", which is about West Virginia (mountain mama).
So The National is like if Stuart Staples had less interesting arrangements?
For RI I like "Rhode Island Is Famous for You," even if I dispute that "New Jersey gives us glue."
43 - I think the Mountain Goats have a song called "Minnesota", and the Dandy Warhols have "Minnesoter".
I think the Mountain Goats have a song called "Minnesota"
On Full Force Galesburg.
If we're doing John Denver, "Matthew" covers Kansas.
How comprehensive can it be if it doesn't even have Richard Youngs' "Wynding Hills of Maine"?
Full Force Galesburg
Lots of place songs on that one, as it turns out
he lost track of his paramour a week ago? That's a long time. Have you filed a missing person's report? That might be more helpful than your current plan
People try and do this all the time but "ran off" isn't the same as missing. See also "stopped returning my calls", "isn't answering my facebook messages", etc.
The real insanity though is Su/zan/ne's Law which mandates we start investigating reports of 18-21 year olds immediately. SWPL, reporting your adult "child" as missing at the drop of a hat.
"Someday Soon," which I know in its Judy Collins version, mentions Colorado.
51: In percentage terms the maximum is ((n-1)/n)*100.
For just namechecking in the lyrics, my NJ fave (excluding all Springsteen) is either:
I am dreaming of a life
and it's not the life that's mine
in a stolen car I rocket west out past that Jersey line
and the robots in their riot gear glimmer in my rearview mirror
love came like an axe and had her way with this coarse earth
and a small deserving book she was recovered and understood
and I awoke
or
Walcott, all the way to New Jersey
All the way to the Garden State, out of Cape Cod tonight
(Respectively, "Morning New Disease" by Jets to Brazil and "Walcott" by Vampire Weekend.)
53: What does it mean to say that an adult is missing, then? I'm trying to come up with a clear set of criteria where it'd make sense to call the cops.
Billy Joel's "Home" gets the Pennsylvania Turnpike and Indiana's early morning dew, IIRC. Also Colorado, but we had that one already.
I had forgotten that "By the Time I Get to Phoenix" refers not solely to cities, but also to Oklahoma.
57: I'm curious also. If you call the po-po and say that your non-cohabiting romantic partner is not responding to calls and the door bell for 24 hours, will they grill you to see if you didn't just get dumped?
Josh Ritter, "Idaho"
Jim White, "Alabama Chrome"
James Talley, "Richland, Washington" (from a WFMU weird stuff collection, but a real good song)
R. Dean Taylor, "Indiana Wants Me"
Alison Krause's "Oh, Atlanta" mentions a place called "Geor-ga-gia" quite a few times.
John Linnell...quite a few.
For the double state bonus, quite possibly my favorite Ohio Players song ever is "Far East Mississippi".
Is this related to Bo Diddley's "Hong Kong, Mississippi"?
My favorite Oregon song:
Don't Take Me Alive
Agents of the law
Luckless pedestrians
I know you're out there
With rage in your eyes and your megaphones
Saying "All is forgiven"...
"Mad Dog, surrender"
How can I answer
A man of my mind can do anything
Refrain:
I'm a bookkeeper's son
I don't want to shoot no one
Well I crossed my old man back in Oregon
Don't take me alive
- Steely Dan
The National aren't really to my liking but I've heard that song enough (on a mix CD in the car) to quite like it now, and the idea of being carried to Ohio in a swarm of bees always amuses me. I think that same CD starts off with Newport State of Mind which is much more fun to sing along to than Jay-Z's version.
Am now wondering if there are any songs about British counties.
I've Been Everywhere has all your songs beat for geographical breadth.
Well I crossed my old man back in Oregon
Whoa. My entire life, I have heard that line as Aragon.
And there are a near-infinite number of stupid Texas songs . Although I love Western swing so I am grateful to the state.
14 has 65 beat for "I've Been Everywhere".
re: 64
I can't think of any pop songs off the top of my head -- there's bound to be folk songs -- but on a similar vague theme Black Box Recorder did do: "The English Motorway System"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qC_6ia1NJkg
PGD hasn't been around for a while, has he?
re: 64
Have you been enjoying the Ruritanian festivities>
Although I love Western swing so I am grateful to the state.
Once you're down in Texas, Bob Wills is still the king.
66 gets it right. What?!? "Oregon"? That's boring.
Am now wondering if there are any songs about British counties.
Blur, "Essex Dogs"
The Fall, "Lucifer Over Lancashire"
Kilmahog appears to be attractively situated!
There's "Boys from the County Hell" but whether Hell is a British county is hotly disputed.
75: Quick, write a song about it!
There's "Boys from the County Hell" but whether Hell is a British county is hotly disputed.
According to John Collier you can get there (to Hell, that is) from Sydney.
"Moonlight in Vermont"; "Long Vermont Roads" (Magnetic Fields)
Huh, I didn't know about that Magnetic Fields. Thanks, because I've gotten a little sick of the other one. I watched this and it made me all nostalgic.
"Wish To The Lord I'd Never Been Born" has the line, "I'm agonna drive in Delaware"
PGD hasn't been around for a while, has he?
No, I don't think so. But it remains unclear at what point it would have been sensible to report him missing.
Having said that: PGD!
What does it mean to say that an adult is missing, then? I'm trying to come up with a clear set of criteria where it'd make sense to call the cops.
As a sane person you'll know. Gross deviation from normal schedule like unexpectedly not coming home from work or missing work, other friends relatives also haven't heard from the person, personal items left behind, etc.
will they grill you to see if you didn't just get dumped?
A bit, because sometimes you get "her friends won't tell me where she is and she has been hanging out with this other guy but he's no good for her and I think he's probably very controlling and won't let her talk to me..."
PGD!!!!!
72 - well, we've been enjoying the day off, so much that most of us slept through the actual moment of marriage. Watched it for a while out of curiosity and gave C a mini-lecture about carriage suspension. Be more interested if they weren't all such prats. And was also kind of interested in their political guests - some Tory ex-PMs but didn't see (or weren't shown?) any Labour ones.
How about, "Cognac, Armagnac, Burgundy and Beaune"?
82: As a sane person you'll know.
Okay, if that's the standard, I feel better. I was just trying to think of how you could rule out "Maybe they just spontaneously left town for an indefinite period without telling you, packing anything, or making contact with anyone else about it," even for close family.
||
This photo from the wedding this morning cracked me up.
|>
I was just trying to think of how you could rule out "Maybe they just spontaneously left town for an indefinite period without telling you, packing anything, or making contact with anyone else about it," even for close family.
Short of an obvious Fargo style crime scene you can't really rule it out but it's still normal to make a report.
A neighboring agency had one recently of a husband calling in because his wife didn't come home from work. Fortunately she was found a couple days later safe and sound in a San Diego hotel with a male co-worker.
re: 75
I've been there. I grew up about 15 miles south, but we used to go camping and/or drinking in that area all the time as teenagers.
re: 83
There was a bit of a minor stramash earlier in the week, as Brown and Blair weren't invited. Which is a bit odd [Knights of the Garter, or no].
15 also gives you "counting the cars on the New Jersey turnpike."
46 con't: And since we're counting lyrics, "Rhode Island Is Famous for You" mentions every state, I think. (Possibly excluding Alaska and Hawaii. WHERE IS THE BIRTH CERTIFICATE?)
88.last: That's more her fault than his, unless she called him or something.
That's more her fault than his
I should have clarified that. Totally not an example of a bad call, just one I found amusing.
"Mr. X, I have some good news and some bad news. The good news is that she's fine. The bad news is that if you have any red bumps or rashes, your're going to want to get them looked at soonish."
King Kong, "Uh-oh": "What a day to be driving [walking/crawling] in Nevada".
77: 75: Quick, write a song about it!
In common metre, way easier than sonnets:
On Ben Ledi, as we look down,
We spy through Scottish fog,
A bit west of Callander town,
A hamlet, Kilmahog.
Ere Romans built their grey ramparts,
And railways cut the sward,
And crofters drove their oxen carts,
The land's own spirit soared.
Where giants roamed this ancient land,
And played their eldritch games,
Frosts of endless winters stand,
Belying human claims.
Now tourists come to gape in awe,
And bike the well-worn path,
But mountains, they know not our law,
Immune from strife and wrath.
Deep in the chilly depths of lochs,
In the mosses of the bog,
A name is writ in timeless rocks:
Eternal Kilmahog
Am now wondering if there are any songs about British counties.
Plenty of Wurzels songs about Somerset and Devon, I should think. "The Lincolnshire Poacher".
I have a vague memory of a song called "I Want To Be Buried In Rutland If There's Room" but google is unhelpful.
Also, of course, "Surrey With A Fringe On Top".
86: This will be a fun meme to watch unfold.
On Ben Ledi, as we look down,
We spy through Scottish fog,
A bit west of Callander town,
A hamlet, Kilmahog
That's genius, Natilo (minor quibble though: Ledi is pronounced to rhyme with ready, and Callander is pronounced exactly the same way as calendar). I know Kilmahog well and will save that one for further use.
"Lancashire Lass"
(Do traditionals count?)
PGD hasn't been around for a while, has he?
thanks for the exclamation points!
I had a dramatic and distracting life event, and also switched jobs, which left me with less time for extended internet back-and-forth. But I still haunt the realm in lurker form, and reappear whenever there is need of country music knowledge.
100: Well, getting those iambs right has never been my strong suit.
Also, in case it was not obvious, 100% of my research for that lyric consisted of reading the Wikipedia entry.
104: it still captures the general spirit of the place very well, I thought.
Have I really failed to note Frank Zappa's "Montana"? Criminy.
There's also a Merle Haggard song about being turned loose and set free, somewhere in the middle of Montana.
I though "Kil Ma Hog" was a Hasil Adkins song.
Further to 95, Gastr del Sol's "A Watery Kentucky" and Squirrel Bait's cover of "A Tape From California".
Of course, while we're on Haggerd, I'm glad that others are proud to be a Okies from Muskogee.
I was trying to think of the toughest state for this game. Gots to be Utah. The only song I can think of is the Beach Boys "Salt Lake City."
112 - Camper van Beethoven. Also, I thought there was a Dambuilders song as part of their "50 States" project, but I seem to have been mistaken.
I haven't looked, but Connecticut can't be easy, can it?
Am now wondering if there are any songs about British counties.
"But there's panic on the streets of Carlisle, Dublin, Dundee, Humberside."
I suppose the London mention in the song technically counts too.
Oooh, yes, that's hard. "Blood on the streets of the town of New Haven" is all I can come up with, and that's a stretch.
I'm coming up with literally nothing on a New York State song, though. Lots of Buffalo songs and NYC songs, of course, but that's not really fair.
This is the official NY state song apparently. It seems to have some of the worst lyrics imaginable:
I LOVE NEW YORK
(repeat 3 times)
There isn't another like it.
No matter where you go.
And nobody can compare it.
It's win and place and show.
New York is special.
New York is diff'rent' cause there's no place else
on earth quite like New York and that's why
Those are awfully awful lyrics.
Build me a cabin in Utah
Marry me a wife, catch rainbow trout
Have a bunch of kids who call me "Pa"
That must be what it's all about
That must be what it's all about
Beautiful Nebraska, as you look around,
You will find a rainbow reaching to the ground;
All these wonders by the Master's hand;
Beautiful Nebraska land.
We are so proud of this state where we live,
There is no place that has so much to give.
Wait, now that I've clicked the link it doesn't appear to be a parody.
Tennessee has not one or two or three or four or five but six official state songs? Are you shitting me? Talk about overcompensating.
Maybe, but that really does seem to be the state song.
This government page gives all the emblems with a statutory reference, but those statutes include the slogan but no song. Maybe its status was repealed.
I was looking in Google Books for any narrative on the subject and found the following from the composer's memoirs:
In 1977, "I Love New York" became the very first tourism campaign sponsored by a state government. In 1980, it was proclaimed as the official state song of New York State. My music was now enshrined with some pretty exclusive company... I had come a long way from the porno movie scores.
124: Who knew Nebraska had a song?
This thread has got my high school Alma Mater stuck in my head.
Dear Eastside High, we love you.
We'll always proclaim.
And cherish thy precept
And honor thy name.
There's a old-timey song that goes "Say, you New York gals/ Can't you dance the polka?" and doesn't specify city or state.
folk songs "Buffalo Gals"
"The Erie Canal"
Also of course, the Utica Club National Carbonation Band theme song.
This implies that the designation was done by the governor rather than the legislature, making it, I'd guess, an unofficial state song by normal standards.
130: The lyrics are all the city -- the song's about a sailor getting rolled by a girl who lives on Bleeker Street.
That link in 127 is amazing. Apparently the guy who wrote the official NY state song also wrote:
"Ford, That's Incredible"
"Trust the Midas Touch"
"Exxon-Energy for a Strong America"
"America Believes in Liberty Mutual Insurance"
"Don't Say Drug Store, Say Drug Fair"
"Aren't You Glad You Use Dial?"
"Wrigley Spearmint Gum, Gum Gum . . . ."
I haven't looked, but Connecticut can't be easy, can it?
There's exactly one song in the mudcat database, and it's a stretch.
"Some people may claim that the name of the game is Scarsdale,
Or Beverly Hills, or even Shaker Heights,
But commuters from Manhattan call it Westport.
And it's the game that some of our local leading lights
Play
To while away those cold Connecticut nights."
134: I bet he also wrote "Brown Chicken Brown Cow".
Your hard-earned cash will disappearDamn, my children's treasury of folk songs did not have these verses.Your breeks and boots as well
For Yankee girls are tougher
Than the other side of hell.
Huh, this diversion has also taught me that "California Here I Come" is not, in fact, the official state song of California, despite it being played when the Governor shows up at official events.
Big Black has the completely dire "Jordan, Minnesota."
140: It's the official song of the San Fernando Valley.
I see now that Vermont has a new state song, which appears to surpass the old one only in its brevity. The old one is also an example, like the song linked in 135, that the names of geographical features such as rills and vales appear to persist only to fulfill the rhyme schemes of vacuous musical pledges of allegiance.
139: I do love that song. Although I'm not quite sure what the polka's doing in it.
143: That old song doesn't even have a "vales."
144: That reminds me. Just today my work lead was telling a story about his youth in the early 70s when he and his then-girlfriend-now-wife saved up for three years and then went to England, bought motorbikes, and travelled all over Europe. At some point they went their separate ways and he ended up in Israel where he ran out of money. He worked on some Kibbutzes but then started playing polka on a polka circuit and was able to make enough money to afford a plane ticket home.
So there I was picturing him playing an accordian to appreciative elderly Ashkenazi audiences, but it turns out he was saying "poker" and his New York roots were showing. I'm not sure why I found this so disappointing, but I did.
On his last game he was apparently on a major winning streak and was about to leave with all the loot but his opponents all placed uzis on the table and invited him to stay longer. So he set aside just enough for a ticket home and hospitably lost all the rest back to his hosts. This was years before that Kenny Rogers song came out but he managed to figure out what to do anyhow.
Ohio is a great state name to sing.
Comden and Green being either clever or daft:
"Why, oh why, oh why-oh? Why did I ever leave Ohio?"
In the musical 1776, the Delegate from Connecticut (Sherman?) has a solo where he rhymes connecticut with etiquette and predicate. The same musical also has a few Virginia and Massachusetts songs.
Rockin' Chair by The Band mentions "Old Virginny." Night They Drove Old Dixie Down is yet another Tennessee song. Pennsylvania 6-5000 isn't really about PA.
God Dambuilders Bless America -- most of these seem like easy states to get except Delaware.
My iTunes shuffle just turned up Elton John's "The Ballad of Danny Bailey" -- a song I wasn't really aware I had -- which contains the line "So mark his grave well, 'cause Kentucky loved him."
146 - great story, and I love the idea of there being a polka circuit.
Something about being buried in Rutland sounds like it should be a Half Man Half Biscuit song, but it's not.
Not quite counties, but Rich Hall/Otis Lee Crenshaw does a son about infidelity punning on loads of Scottish towns.
151: "Delaware", from the album Delaware!
"Massachusetts", from the album Massachusetts!
Moreover, the band that did "Delaware" from Delaware is from Massachusetts!
Nobody I meet is from California, but a lot of cars around here have New Jersey plates.
I've never met anyone from California.
86 - This photo was much funnier - http://twitpic.com/4r3mes
154: UK songwriting seem to obsess more about cities than counties: case in point.
This theme was at least a sub-thread, but can't find it (or more honestly, haven't really tried). I'm sure I linked this "Delaware" (and a dozen or so other states)--presumably mentioned above, but I only scanned. And either I or someone else linked this map at the Strange Maps blog (now semi-ruined by being part of Big Think) showing states proportionally-sized to their mention in Country & Western songs (as of 1977).
re: 163
I imagine that partly comes from living in a very old country. Loyalties [and accents] are often very local. Plus counties and other non-city/town sized units in the UK have been repeatedly buggered about with so they don't have as much historical baggage as they once did.
Speaking of geography and songs, this "Rock'n'Roll map of Manhattan" is pretty good, but rather sparsely populated.
166: if they include Suzanne Vega and Leonard Cohen as Rock and Roll they might as well include Sourfunkle and Gimon and fill in some more.
Thanks for the shout-out in 21, neb. (Captain Automatic is my band. Download at the pseud link.)
Carly Simon's "The Wives Are In Connecticut" is pretty good on the role of Connecticut. "Trying to forget it that they really do regret it that they moved up to Connecticut."
Washington, D.C. deserves a pity mention. After all, there are all the people doing something real. (Magnetic Fields)
Anyone remember "These Are All The Shapes Nevada Could Have Been" by Mary's Danish?
Other personal faves:
Liz Phair, South Dakota
Damien Jurado, Arkansas
Gillian Welch, Look At Miss Ohio
and Jonathan Richman's Road Runner has to have the best-ever singing of the word "Massachusetts".
Lambchop recorded an album for Ohio: OH (Ohio). And then there's Modest Mouse's "Ohio", Joe Henry's "Ohio Air Show Plane Crash", Alec K. Redfearn & the Eyesores' "Ohio", Gillian Welch's "Look at Miss Ohio", and of course "The Banks of the Ohio", which isn't about the state.
I think you're forgetting "Look At Miss Ohio" by Gillian Welch.
But what I was going to say is that I really like the lines in Josh Ritter's "Hotel Song", "I have been to Cleveland and you have been to jail / You seemed to be recovering but I felt a little pale".
A song which also mentions Delaware!
But actually the song with the line about Cleveland is "Leaves and Kings". OH WELL.
So he set aside just enough for a ticket home and hospitably lost all the rest back to his hosts. This was years before that Kenny Rogers song came out but he managed to figure out what to do anyhow.
He arguably violated the "never count your money..." principle by setting aside the fare, I suppose it doesn't matter if he played to lose thereafter.
Also, it is cool that "Uzi" is an Israeli Christian first name.
I think you're forgetting "Look At Miss Ohio" by Gillian Welch.
buh
that Kenny Rogers song came out
But "eight miles out of Memphis" could be any one of three states.
"Leaves and Kings"
About an itinerant checkers player.
173 brings to mind the lines from Anne Summers's "Uh-huh, Oh No". "From drinking just a couple cocktails / to coming to your senses in jail / From spending a September in Vail / to being beaten senseless by some hick named Dale"
180: And actually "Pancho and Lefty" with, "The desert's quiet, Cleveland's cold."
There's also The Ice of Boston which touches on D.C., too. A little.
But "eight miles out of Memphis" could be any one of three states.
Or, indeed, Egypt.
are you people just naming any old state
The next list will go by NANP area codes (ludacris+nate d excepted).
E., reporting live from PEnnsylvania 6-5000.
I imagine that partly comes from living in a very old country. Loyalties [and accents] are often very local. Plus counties and other non-city/town sized units in the UK have been repeatedly buggered about with so they don't have as much historical baggage as they once did.
Yeah, but I'm still a bit surprised I can't think of more songs about, say, Yorkshire, which still has a strong cultural identity. To be fair, if we counted London boroughs as counties, we could probably come up with loads of songs.
To be fair, if we counted London boroughs as counties, we could probably come up with loads of songs.
Could we? Carry Me Back to Barking and Dagenham. The Green Leaves of Waltham Forest. Camden on My Mind. London Boroughs were invented in 1963 (which was a little late for me). Locations in and around London, sure.
There are likewise plenty of songs about places in Yorkshire, but not the county (unless you count the Dalesman's Litany).
London boroughs are too big to have songs written about them really but there are a few. "Doing the (London Borough of) Lambeth Walk", "(Royal Brough of Kensington and) Chelsea Sunday" being the pukka ones.
You could probably also stretch to "Kingston Town", since the capital of Jamaica is named after RB Kingston-upon-Thames, but I think people would say you were pushing it if you included "Sexual Ealing". And I'm guessing that Lionel Ritchie's "Harrow (Is It Me You're Looking For?)" would be right out.
I did once consider writing a British version of "Wanted Man" ("Wanted man in Billericay/Wanted man in Potter's Bar/Wanted man in Hemel Hempstead/Wanted man in Royal Leamington Spa").
I had reached "Went to sleep last night in Berwick/Woke up in Gretna Green/Wondering how the hell I'm wanted/In fucking Aberdeen" before deciding it was too much trouble and giving up.
It's all coming back now ... "Wanted man in Merthyr Tydfil/Wanted man in Abersoch/Wanted man in Llanfairpwllgwyngychgogerychwyrndrobwllantysliogogogoch"
"Sutton Death" by Megadeth.
"Merton on the Dance Floor" by Sophie Ellis-Bextor.
I was just thinking of "River Deep, Merton High".
There is a town near Falkirk called California, about which a lot of Americans seem to have mysteriously written songs ...
193. Yeah, that sort of thing happens a lot. Last time I passed through San Francisco, I was on a train from Malaga to Granada.
"Hounslow" by Elvis Presley.
"If I Had A Hammersmith (and Fulham)" by Pete Seeger
"Poplar" by the Veronicas.
Also, various people have apparently recorded a song called "Newham Oon", but I have no idea what an oon is.
There's also that Echo and the Bunnymen tribute to Killin, "Killin Oon".
An "O'on" is a Scots word for an oven, and was historically used for this:
http://www.falkirklocalhistorysociety.co.uk/home/index.php?id=102
[Which was, iirc, in the marshes behind my high school]
