Obsessed with True Crime discussion
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Songs based on True Crime
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K.A.
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Dec 14, 2016 05:36PM
This thread is about songs based on true crime.
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Copied from Chit Chat #2 thread:K.A. said:
Do we have a section for songs based on true crimes? I was thinking about that today while listening to the song The Way, by Fastball. It's not really about a crime, as it turned out to be an accident (?), but it brought the topic to mind. Here's a link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b0wfu... It's based on the disappearance of 80-year-old couple the Howards in Texas (found dead in Arkansas).
Of course, there's I Don't Like Mondays by the Boomtown Rats, based on Brenda Ann Spencer's shooting spree.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8yteM...
I don't think Pumped-Up Kicks by Foster the People counts, because it's about a made-up school shooting rather than a real one.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SDTZ7...
I'm sure there are others...
Shelley replied (several separate posts):Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid by Bob Dylan is based on a true crime story.
This page lists 15 of them including another one by Bob Dylan.
https://www.pastemagazine.com/article...
Here's another site with tons!
http://www.songfacts.com/category-son...
K.A. replied:Wow, cool! Thanks...do we need a separate thread for this info?
I didn't realize that Deep Red Bells was a true-crime song - I have that one and always liked it.
The second list seems to include songs about fictional crime-committers as well as real ones.
Fishface replied (two posts):This is probably worth a thread on its own...it inspired me to finally look up that Richard Marx song, "Hazard," aka "Who Killed Mary?" and see if it was based on a true crime. Turns out it wasn't.
"Lullaby For Wayne" by Weezer is about WAYNE Lo's massacre at Simon's Rock College.
Who knew? I've never thought about music in relation to true crime. Interesting links!
Bob Dylan's "Hurricane" is about the wrongful imprisonment of boxer Rubin “Hurricane” Carter in the 1960s.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1FOlV...
Video of the song with lyrics.
Bruce Springsteen: “Nebraska" about Charles Starkweather and Caril Fugate. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I2Vz_...
Video of the song with lyrics.
The Killers: "Jenny Was a Friend of Mine" was inspired by killer Robert Chambers' defense of the Jennifer Levin murder charges, in which Chambers claimed he had no motive for the murder, and that he and the victim were "friends".https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=om_18...
Video of the song with lyrics.
It's no surprise that heavy metal bands have songs about killers like Gein, Dahmer and Bundy. There are many.
"Cassie" by FlyLeaf is about one of the victims killed in the Columbine massacre.
"Play It safe" by Iggy Pop and David Bowie ends with the lines "I wanna be a criminal/Play it safe" but then there are these exclamations that didn't get into the lyrics, like "Movin' and groovin' with the Son of Sam/Splish splash I was Jim Jones" -- he mentions Al Capone and a few others IIRC.
"Desolation Row" by Bob Dylan is about a real lynching.Did I remember to mention "Gary Gilmore's Eyes" by the Adverts?
Not one, but two album covers by black-metal bands refer to true crimes: DAWN OF THE BLACK HEARTS by Mayhem has as its cover photo the death scene of the band's previous leadsinger, Per Ohlin, on the cover -- the snapping of which photo quickly led to acts that got the surviving band members arrested. See The Encyclopedia of Dead Rock Stars: Heroin, Handguns, and Ham Sandwiches under the entry for "Dead" (Ohlin's stage name).
In Ketten released an album called THURINGIAN PAGAN MADNESS with Sandro Beyer's headstone pictured on the front. In Ketten was the new name of a band previously called Absurd who were incarcerated after killing Beyers. "In Ketten" means "in chains."
Says here in Of Long Memory: Mississippi And The Murder Of Medgar Evers that Bob Dylan's song "Only A Pawn In Their Game" is about the abovementioned Evers murder. Dylan mistakenly identifies the killer as a po' white boy manipulated by the white power elite into killing Evers. In fact, the killer was a member of that white elite.
Son of Sam by the Dead BoysDeath Valley 69 by Sonic Youth is about the Manson family
By the way Fishface kudos for mentioning Gary Gilmores Eyes,that was a favourite of mine back in my youth!
"Bring On The Night" by the Police is about Gary Gilmore, too."Hate So Real" by J Church is about the Starkweather/Fugate killing spree.
"Keep Searchin'" by Del Shannon was also based on those crimes.
At this link you can see the Not Ready For Prime Time Players performing "Let's Kill Gary Gilmore For Christmas:"
http://www.houstonpress.com/music/gar...
The same page mentions a song by Chain Gang called "Gary Gilmore And The Island Of Dr. Moreau."
There is already a song about the Three Guys And A Hammer killings, called "Dealers Of Fame" by a group called Oh, Sleeper!
Church of Misery wrote a song about the Matamoros ritual sacrifices called "El Padrino." They also wrote one called "Candyman" about good old Dean Corll.Macabre wrote one called "Jeffrey Dahmer and the Chocolate Factory;" another called "Laurie Dann." These guys are certainly working the theme...
Says here that "Dirty Water" is in part a salute to the Boston Strangler. That's been getting re-recorded for decades!
OMG, there's even one about the Mark Essex HoJo massacre: "Soul Discharge" by Church of Misery.
The Smiths had a song about Brady and Hindley called Suffer Little Children.Screaming Lord Sutch had a song called Jack the Ripper
Too Much Blood is a song about Issei Sagawa by the Rolling Stones.
I shudder to think how many songs there are about Saucy Jack!
The Insane Clown Posse wrote a song called "Chris Benoit."The Dead Boys wrote one called "Son of Sam."
The Hollywood Squares wrote one called "Hillside Strangler."
Rasputina has one I've never heard called "Ballad of Lizzie Borden." And please note the name of the band. :)
There's one called "Fatal Foot Fetish" about Jerry Brudos.
Eminem has one about Ted Bundy called "Stay Wide Awake." Aborted has another one about him called "Meticulous Invagination." (Rhyming that lyric must have been brutal!)The Cranberries have one about Mark David Chapman called "I Just Shot John Lennon."
Tad has one about 'Silly Eddie' Gein called "Nipple Belt."
A band I never heard of, called the Brian Jonestown Massacre, recorded "The Ballad of Jim Jones."
"Reminiscenses of a Minnesota State Training School Alumni, Class of 1905" is a song about Carl Panzram by the Flare Acoustic Arts League.
Jane's Addiction had one about Bundy. I think it was called Ted, Just Admit ItThrobbing Gristle had one called Leeds Ripper about Peter Sutcliffe
Throbbing Gristle! Teary-eyed nostalgia!
I feel like I asked this already at Shelfari but don't remember whether I got an answer. Does anyone know whether Soundgarden's song "Burden In My Hand" is based on a true crime? "Crack a smile and cut your mouth
And drown in alcohol
'Cause down below the truth is lying
Beneath the riverbed
So quench yourself and drink the water
That flows below her head
Oh no there she goes
Out in the sunshine the sun is mine
I shot my love today would you cry for me
I lost my head again would you lie for me
I left her in the sand just a burden in my hand
I lost my head again would you cry for me"
As I said on another discussion, this always makes me think of Charles Schmid leaving Gretchen Fritz -- and her sister Wendy, and Alleen Rowe -- under the Arizona sand.
Fishface wrote: "I feel like I asked this already at Shelfari but don't remember whether I got an answer. Does anyone know whether Soundgarden's song "Burden In My Hand" is based on a true crime? "Crack a smile a..."
Doesn't sound like it is. Here's what Cornell himself said about it:
"That was a song that really came from the guitar itself. It was mostly like the guitar was dictating what the lyrics should be and creating a mental image. The mental image was this sort of destitute guy. I guess he'd lost his cool if you want to put it that way. He's sort of coming to grips with what had happened and not necessarily feeling particularly emotional about it either way. He's trying to figure out how he would stand up and put one foot in front of the other—or not—and the song never really resolves any of that. It's just that moment of somebody sitting in the dirt. I had more moments like that after that song was written than I ever had before it was, so it means a lot more to me now than it did then."
Do yourselves a favor and click on this scrap of highbrow humor:http://legendsmagazine.net/63/bobbit.htm
I couldn't find a book about it, but there is a country song called "The Ballad Of Stringbean And Estelle" by Sam Bush, telling the story of the 1973 murders of the Hee Haw star and his wife. Says here Grandpa Jones found the bodies!
"Delia's gone"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SSypZ...
(From the grand, old tradition of songs about violence against women, which people love to sing and listen to--do they ignore the words? This isn't the only one based on fact.)
Then, there's the whole genre of Narcocorridos, which are based on the Mexican drug trade:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8nPfk...
Lots of corridos have traditionally taken up true crime themes
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Obsessed with True Crime
Books mentioned in this topic
Of Long Memory: Mississippi And The Murder Of Medgar Evers (other topics)The Encyclopedia of Dead Rock Stars: Heroin, Handguns, and Ham Sandwiches (other topics)
