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| Hackensack |
I had a couple of cities beginning with H lined and and then had to rely on pals to provide the others or to provide inspiration.
The first one I had in mind was Harrisburg which is the name of a song on Golden Age of Radio the debut album by Josh Ritter. Harrisburg is the capital city of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and with a population of 50K is the 9th largest city in the state.It has also been rated as the second best place in the US to raise a family.
Where possible I have been resisting the big guns - Dallas, Boston, etc but for the trickier letters I will fall back on them. Thus Houston the biggest city in Texas and the fourth biggest in the US with a population of 2.3 million is included .Ernie suggested Houston Chicks by Doug Sahm and I also have Home to Houston by Steve Earle but I have gone for the more simple Houston by R.E.M. from their Accelerator album.
C kindly pointed me in the direction of Fountains of Wayne and their song Hackensack. A city on Cass County, Minnesota it is easily this week's smallest stopping of point with a population of only 313. Nevertheless it is a city so it's in.
Alyson made reference in last week's comments to Hawaii and it's capital Honolulu (population 351K) and Ernie suggested Honolulu Rock a Roll a by Eartha Kitt which I may well come back to.In the end I went for Honolulu Lulu by Jan and Dean. And here was me thinking that she came from Dennistoun.
I is tricky. I have one and maybe some more if I am allowed a little bit of artistic licence.
I'd love to nominate one of the hick towns we visited on our California road trip last year. Hollister hasn't got a lot going for it (not even, seemingly, the Hollister clothing brand) but it was the birthplace of songwriter William D Carey who wrote The Sun Forgot to Shine This Morning by Ella Fitzgerald.
ReplyDeleteFor 'I' I'll put forward 'From Auschwitz to Ipswich' by Jarvis Cocker. There is an Ipswich is in Massachusetts.
ReplyDeleteGood call.I'll store that one away
DeleteMy initial thought was "Got to be Indiana wants me!"... until I realised Indiana was a state not a city. However, I do have an Indianapolis song by The Bottle Rockets. (Oh wait, there is an Indiana city in Pennsylvania!)
ReplyDeleteKelly Clarkson did a song called Irvine. I have no idea why that's in my computer.
There is, however, a city called Indepedence, and I'm more than 90% sure that's where Bruce wrote Independence Day. (Well, if you're going to allow Ernie's Ipswich...)
kd lang - Inglewood?
I'm done.
Sorry, that was John, not Ernie.
DeleteThe Bottlerockets one is the one I was thinking of.Not sure if I'm prepared to go down the Kelly Clarkson road!
ReplyDeleteNot to be pedantic, but the Fountains of Wayne song is definitely about Hackensack, New Jersey (population 46,030); a suburb of New York City. The FoW discography is absolutely full of references to places in and around New York -- starting with the business in Wayne, New Jersey that gave the band its name.
ReplyDeleteMarc
Not as easy to come with songs about cities starting with an I and having done some research I can only find the ones mentioned above by kd lang and the Bottle Rockets.
ReplyDeleteLots of songs about Independence but not the city!
H provided some fine songs but some letters will be harder than others. Looking forward to Q, X and Z.
Yes, the FoW song is about Hackensack, New Jersey. According to songfacts "Part of Schlesinger's childhood was spent in Montclair, New Jersey, and he couldn't resist the lure of rhyming 'go back' with 'Hackensack' in this song. The band is named after Wayne, New Jersey, where there were prominent fountains at a garden center along the main drag.'
ReplyDeleteThanks Marc/Norman
ReplyDeleteI'm using artistic licence to sneak it in!