Songs About History

 

For this week's article, I was going to write about Billy Joel’s 1989 hit “We Didn't Start the Fire”. More specifically, I was going to list all 119 references and explain each one. After all, if one likes to talk about music and history, it does not get any better than this (plus a shout out to Fall Out Boys 2023 updated cover). However, after looking at this, I felt that making another list and explaining it did not seem to add to the discussion. There was nothing new. What I needed was something similar. So after some thought, I wondered how many other songs out there wrote about history. I knew of a few, but it turns out there were a lot more. So this is what this week's entry is: Songs about history.

Although there are a large number of songs about history, for the sake of brevity, I will keep this list at 10 and in no particular order.

So let us begin the list of songs with Joel's song, “We Didn't Start the Fire”. As mentioned before, there are 119 historical and cultural references beginning in 1949 (the year Billy Joel was born) until 1989 (when Joel turned 40). There has been some argument that the song is not about history because it only lists the events and people. Aside from the fact that it would be a ridiculously long song if it devoted even one line to each subject, the purpose of the song is to draw attention to the fact that a lot happened in that 40 year period and some of it was not good. Fall Out Boy continued the theme with an updated version in 2023. The song picked up where Joel left off and listed 81 events up to 2023. This version has drawn some criticism from the list as it was not chronological to omitting COVID 19, a world changing event. Looking at this song (whichever version you prefer) as a list that draws attention to a wider scope of history, there are a number of songs that focus on a particular person, event or time period in history. This is where I will begin my list. 

 “Strange Fruit” recorded by Billie Holiday. Written in 1939 and based on a poem  composed by Abel Meeopol, it can be arguably viewed as one of the earliest protest songs. The songs talks about the lynching of Black Americans with the lyrics comparing the victims to fruit on a tree. It was an extremely powerful song that Holiday made her own with her haunting delivery. She had said that she was in fear of retaliation but sang it because the imagery reminded her of her father. 

“Ohio” by Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young is seen as a protest song but it does refer to a very tumultuous period in U.S. history. The song was written by Neil Young. The story goes that he heard about the Kent State Massacre where four students were killed on May 4th 1970 during a protest of the Vietnam War and walked into a wooded area and wrote the song. At a time were the public saw the protesters as part of the problem, the shootings began a shift in the public eye of the Nixon administration and its practices.

“Sympathy for the Devil” is a song written by Mick Jagger for the Rolling Stones 1968 album Beggars Banquet. The song focuses on human events from the devils point of view. Events that are depicted in the song include the trial and death of Jesus Christ, the Hundred Years War, the Russian Revolution of 1917 and the subsequent execution of the Romanov family in 1918. The assinations of John F. Kennedy and Robert Kennedy (referred in the song as the Kennedys) are also referenced. 

“Sunday Bloody Sunday” is a song by U2 from their 1983 album War. It is overtly political song about the Troubles in Northern Ireland, a etho-nationalist conflict involving republic and loyalist paramilitary groups, British forces and civilians. It lasted from the mid 1960s to 1998. Although the song appears to take sides, Larry Mullen Jr. the bands drummer has publicly stated the song is about war itself, about not taking sides, and sitting down and talking.

“Veracruz” by Warren Zevon, a song off his third album, Excitable Boy, recounts the 1914 American occupation of Mexico and the battle for the state of Veracruz. The song is sung from the point of view of a Vercruz citizen witnessing the occupation and conflict between U.S. military and the forces of Mexican president Victoriano Huerta and the anguish of fleeing his beloved home.

“P.L.U.C.K.” by System of a Down is a particularly personal one for the group, as every member is of Armenian descent. The song, taken from their debut album in 1998, refers to the Armenian Genocide of 1915 and the physical destruction of the Armenian Christian people in the Ottoman Empire. It has been referred to as the first genocide of the 20th century. P.L.U.C.K. is an acronym for Politically Lying Unholy Cowardly Killers.

“Enola Gay”an anti-war song by Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark (OMD) was released as a single from their Organization album in 1980. The title refers to the name of the plane which dropped the first atomic bomb, nicknamed Little Boy, on the Japanese city of Hiroshima on August 6th 1945, killing more than 100,000 of its citizens.  The song is not without its controversy. Its lyrics ask the listener if the act was even necessary and its allusion to the name of the plane in which pilot Paul Tibbets named after his mother. "Is mother proud of Little Boy today?" Heady stuff. Oddly enough the song, because of its title, the song has often been mistakenly used as a gay anthem.

“Bridge of Spies” by the English pop band T Pau tells the story of the Glienicke Bridge in Germany. The bridge connects Potsdam with Berlin.During the Cold War, Potsdam was under control of communist East Germany and Berlin was part of West Germany, the bridge was often used for the exchange of spies and prisoners. The song was inspired by the final exchange of Anatoly Sharansky, a Russian accused of spying for the U.S. and sung from his point of view. 

“Blue Sky Mine” By Midnight Oil, released in February 1990 from their seventh album Blue Sky Mining. Midnight Oil were never a band to shy away from controversial subjects and this one is no different. The song refers to the experiences of workers of the Wittenoom Asbestos mines who contracted various asbestos related diseases. The blue in the song title refers to blue asbestos. The song explores themes of corruption, greed and neglect as workers suffered at the hands of corporate uncaring undermining industrialization at the cost of human lives, a theme all too familiar in history.

So there you have it, ten songs that talk about history. There are some familiar songs, some not so known and some songs you may have forgotten. Some people believe history can be boring. I say history is only boring if it is taught that way. You may not want to crack open a history book, but the next time you listen to a song you may be surprised that not all songs are about sex, drugs, and rock and roll. 

Sources for this article: 

Full disclosure: I used Wikipedia for a lot of this. As a student of history, I am not a fan of using Wikipedia as a source. However, when it comes to music, people who cite and correct Wikipedia are notoriously known for the accuracy of the articles. So I feel relatively safe when looking at these sources.