This week, the Orpheus Review staff got together and collected some of our favorite songs about cities. Some are about our hometowns, others about places we have never been before. Maybe it’s time for an Orpheus field trip…
Neria
“Glasgow” by Jockstrap
This is a huge song for me…a great song about getting over a crush, and also about Glasgow, which is famously a city.
“Athens, France” by Black Country, New Road
Wow, I’m going hard with these Windmill selections. While this song is not about a real city, per se, the song does mention Paris in its first minute. There is also a shoutout to a “rural American town,” so that’s two potential cities mentioned.
“Zürich Is Stained” by Pavement
Another great song about breaking up and falling out of love. Zürich, which is now stained according to Stephen Malkmus, is a city in Switzerland.
Avery
“I Left My Heart In San Francisco” by Lisa Ono
I like Tony Bennet’s original ballad-adjacent serenade to the city. Lisa Ono’s Brazilian roots give the song a new life and a fun bossa-nova flair that places the listener into San Francisco on a sunny day, absent of gloom.
“Seattle Afternoon” by Reilly & Maloney
I first saw Reilly and Maloney with my Great Grandma and family at the Marina close to my house in Northwest Washington. We sat on the deck of the port’s Italian restaurant and watched the endearing duo sing a variety of happy folk songs. Suffice to say, it was a very, albeit sunny, Seattle Afternoon, beautifully painted by Ginny Reilly’s soaring Soprano voice. When I listen to this song it is a capsule of that moment–for me the song is imbued with a warmth that is home.
Melissa
“Santa Fe” by Beirut
Why have just the song title be a city when the band name can be as well? Not only is this song incredibly on theme, but it is also incredibly catchy. The way it builds layer after layer only to strip them all back down to just the drums at the very end… “sign me up, Santa Fe” is right!
“Wichita Lineman” by Glen Campbell
If we were doing a “most romantic songs of all time” playlist, this one would be top of that list too. Though I have never worked on telephone poles in the great plains, I can only imagine that the way the violins soar and whine throughout this song is how it feels to be up there all by yourself, missing your lady.
“The District Sleeps Alone Tonight” by The Postal Service
Nothing makes me more homesick than this song. “DC sleeps alone tonight… because Melissa is at Swarthmore” was actually the rest of the lyric but they cut it because Ben Gibbard couldn’t get through it without crying.
Zephyr
Brooklyn Hip-Hop
Fun fact: though Brooklyn is just a lowly borough nowadays, it was a city of its very own until the consolidation of Greater New York in 1898. Another fun fact: entire staff playlists could be made up exclusively of hip-hop songs that reference locations in Brooklyn, or even of hip-hop songs that are entirely devoted to the discussion of Brooklyn, or even of hip-hop songs that are named after Brooklyn. With that in mind, here are some of the Brooklynest Brooklyn hip-hop songs of the past five decades: No Sleep Till Brooklyn (1980s), Brooklyn Zoo (1990s), Brooklyn (2000s), Brooklyn’s Own (2010s), Brooklyn Chop House (2020s).
“Englishman in New York” by Sting
“Englishman in New York” is Sting doing what Sting does best: barking out melancholy lyrics over a bassline so effortless and buoyant that you don’t realize how bummed out he is even when you (inevitably) start singing along. Also, if you haven’t heard Shinehead’s reggae adaptation of the song, “Jamaican in New York,” do yourself a favor and give it a listen. Not to be out-cooled, Sting later teamed up with Jamaican national hero Shaggy to perform his own reggae-fied version of the piece for an NPR Tiny Desk concert. Seriously. Check it out.
“All the Critics Love U In New York” by Prince
I may be a humble collegiate music magazine contributor, but I mean it with all my heart when I say that this amateur critic loves u, Prince. The song is a satirical takedown of the New York arts scene of the early 1980s, which Prince accused of being subject to the whims of capricious, superficial posers. Prince fails to make the ‘Scene’ sound unappealing though, for the simple reason that the minute Prince sings about anything, it becomes impossibly, unattainably dope.
Maddy
“Pulaski at Night” by Andrew Bird
As far as cities go, Chicago is a place I have never actually visited. Yet now that I’ve heard this song, I can say that I love this city at least a little bit. Built around the sentence “I want to see Pulaski at night,” which Bird overheard a visiting student from Thailand telling their friend, the song is a tribute to the bittersweetness of the city, a not uncomplicated love story to Bird’s hometown. With the help of melodic violin and bass, the tune creates a sophisticated and dynamic accompaniment to the sparse yet powerful lyrics.
“Los Angeles” by Big Thief
A place I have visited, Los Angeles is one hour removed from being my hometown. Yet it’s not my attachment to the place that lights up the song for me. The city is the backdrop for a deep kind of friendship and love that Adrienne Lenker sings about in this song, a relationship clearly deserving of the kind of joy that the song’s opening ushers in with laughs. She might not live in LA, but she gets it.
“New York” by St. Vincent
As a city that is diametrically opposed to LA and yet only slightly less relevant, New York is proudly the object of many songs. Yet in this song, the city shares the spotlight with an anonymous and somberly missed individual, whom “New York isn’t New York without.” Still, St. Vincent would “do it all again,” just as you should listen to this song – again and again.
Dani
“Philadelphia” by Good Night & Good Morning
Wow! We kinda live there. A song that feels like catching the last SEPTA train home. It has that Philly tenderness, Brotherly Love, tenderness hidden under chipped paint. The kind you only notice when you pretend you’re in a movie staring out the window of the train, realizing you don’t feel as alone as you felt an hour ago.
“San Francisco” by I Hate Sex
San Francisco is a city. Also, the title of this song. I used to listen to this one on repeat in middle school, pretending I understood every messy emotion in it. Now, it just reminds me how dramatic I was back when I would blast it in my room and feel so angsty. It still hits, just in a funnier, more self-aware way.
“Heaven or Las Vegas” by Cocteau Twins
“Hi I’m Dani, I use she/her pronouns, and I’m from Las Vegas.” – my intro obv
I listen to this to feel like I’m home. Not the Strip version of Vegas, but the slow desert mornings and the quiet neighborhoods where the sky feels too big. This song and I are a bad combination when I’m too homesick.
Oona
“The City” by Jockstrap
Darius
“Dallas” by Silver Jews
I’ve never been to Dallas but the lyrics evoke such a sinister pynchonian suburbia that I find engrossing. My favorite lyric in the song sums it up best:
“Once you taste the geometry of a church in a cul-de-sac/you’re gonna wanna sit with the bad kids in the back”
“Portland” by The Replacements
Admittedly if I hadn’t been searching for city themed songs, this would not have been a song I would actively choose to listen to. Regardless, I’m so happy I did because now I’m obsessed!
“Night Lights” by Gerry Mulligan Sextet
“Night Lights” is an instrumental jazz song about no city in particular. Either way, it’s the song I picture myself listening to as I walk late at night down some rainy city avenue. The album cover basically.
Hope
“Losing Touch (NYC)” by thanks for coming
This instant classic is from indie rock god Rachel Brown. Although their solo career, under name thanks for coming, is sometimes upstaged by their very popular awesome duo Water From Your Eyes with Nate Amos, thanks for coming has much to offer. This song leans more traditional singer-songwriter, but it is certainly equally as head-boppable as any WFYE song.
“Dream of San Pedro” by Dos
A duet of two basses, just singing to each other. Perhaps one of the most beautiful songs ever made. The tune is made even better when you learn Dos is a project featuring Mike Watt of the Minutemen and Kira Roessler, a former Black Flag bassist. This song, on their third album justamente tres, was recorded shortly after their divorce.
“I Guess the Lord Must Be in New York City” by Harry Nilsson
I listen to this every time I go to New York; the perfect song for returning home.
Isaac
“Just Outside of Austin” by Lukas Nelson
A song that does a wonderful job capturing the essence of Austin. Written by the son of outlaw country legend WILLIE NELSON!!
“Terlingua Sky” by Gary P. Nunn
For those unfortunate enough to have never spent a night in Terlingua, eating three-bean chili beneath the West Texas stars, this song will give you a glimpse of what you’re missing.
Leave a Reply