From history books to your ears! Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we’ll be counting down the greatest songs that drew inspiration from, or directly retold, important historical events.
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00:00Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we'll be counting down the greatest songs that drew
00:13inspiration from, or directly retold, important historical events.
00:2810.
00:29April 29th, 1992 – Sublime We know what you're thinking, isn't he
00:40singing April 26th, 1992 in the song?
00:44That is correct.
00:46The story goes like this.
00:48Bradley Knoll sang the wrong date while recording the song, but he and his bandmates were so
00:52happy with the take, they just decided to keep it.
01:02The song commemorates the 1992 Los Angeles riots that took place following the acquittal
01:08of the four officers involved in the assault of Rodney King.
01:11Despite getting the date wrong, this song captured the spirit of righteous indignation
01:16felt by LA residents, who came together as a destructive force, transcending race, to
01:23voice a collective anger in response to the verdict.
01:299.
01:35Hurricane – Bob Dylan
01:45The year was 1966, and Reuben Hurricane Carter's boxing career had hit a rough patch.
01:51After a series of defeats, his career was up against the ropes.
01:55The career-ending blow came outside the ring, however, when he was arrested for a triple
02:00homicide, a crime for which he was convicted on, despite little evidence.
02:13Maintaining his innocence throughout his incarceration, he remained wrongly imprisoned
02:18until 1985.
02:19Roughly halfway through his sentence, Bob Dylan wrote what would become one of his most
02:24famous songs, Hurricane, after meeting Carter and his supporters.
02:28The song showed unabashed support for the boxer, calling out the overt racial profiling
02:34behind the arrest and conviction.
02:438.
02:47Cities in Dust – Suzie and the Banshees
02:58Nowadays, when someone hears the word Pompeii, the hit song by Bastille might come to mind.
03:12But nearly two decades earlier, Suzie and the Banshees paid homage to the city of Pompeii,
03:17its destruction, rediscovery, and excavation in their song Cities in Dust, which served
03:23as the first single off their seventh studio album, Tinderbox.
03:27Who is better, or catchier, is up for debate, but there's no denying that Suzie and the
03:33Banshees paid their respects to this doomed city and its petrified citizens more directly
03:38than the contemporary indie pop rockers of Bastille.
03:49The video features lava flows and the fossilized remains of people that have made this historical
03:54site so unique and haunting.
04:027.
04:06I Don't Like Mondays – The Boomtown Rats
04:16Written by Bob Geldof, this song explores the senseless act of violence committed by
04:2116-year-old Brenda Spencer, who carried out a shooting at a San Diego elementary school
04:26in 1979.
04:34She killed the principal and the custodian, additionally wounding eight children and a
04:39police officer.
04:40When asked why she did it, she replied, I don't like Mondays.
04:44This livens up the day.
04:46Geldof and his bandmates, the Boomtown Rats, performed the new song less than a month later.
04:59It resonated so well with fans both in the UK and on their US tour that it was released
05:04as a single rather than the B-side they initially imagined.
05:146.
05:17Smoke on the Water – Deep Purple
05:29It's a true classic and contains one of the most recognizable guitar riffs ever played.
05:35In fact, we ranked it as the fifth greatest guitar riff of all time.
05:47For years, the popular song kept people asking what the song meant.
05:51However, as John Lord explains, it simply recounts their failed attempt to record at
05:56the closed Montreux Casino during its winter renovations.
06:06A flare was set off during the final live performance of the season, which resulted
06:10in the entire casino complex burning to the ground.
06:13They recorded elsewhere, but the image of the casino smoke creeping across the water
06:17of Lake Geneva was an image that stuck with bassist Roger Glover.
06:265.
06:29Zombie – The Cranberries No, it's not about a zombie apocalypse.
06:44Sadly, this song, named after a fictitious monster, documents the all-too-real horrors
06:50of the bomb attacks perpetrated by the Irish Revolutionary Army in the early 90s.
06:56Written by the Cranberries while on their 1993 tour, it specifically commemorates the
07:01death of two young boys, Jonathan Ball and Tim Berry, killed by one of two bombs set
07:07off in Warrington, England that same year.
07:18The song was uncharacteristically grim and heavy for the band, but was nonetheless released
07:24as the lead single for their second album.
07:26Its powerful lyrics and music earned the band a Best Song award at the 1995 MTV Europe Music
07:33Video Awards.
07:404.
07:44The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald – Gordon Lightfoot
07:54Gordon Lightfoot has often been called Canada's greatest songwriter.
07:59The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald is a heart-wrenching, six-and-a-half-minute ballad that tells the
08:03tragic story of a massive freighter ship that sank on Lake Superior in 1975.
08:17Traveling from the Duluth, Minnesota area to Detroit, she was caught in a heavy storm,
08:22which brought with it hurricane-level winds and waves up to 35 feet in height.
08:27The last communication from the ship came at 7.10pm on November 10th.
08:31It read, we are holding our own.
08:33Minutes later, she sank, taking all 29 men aboard with her.
08:433.
08:46Ohio – Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young The 1970s may very well have been the golden
08:59age of protest songs.
09:02On May 2nd, 1970, the Ohio Army National Guard was called to quell a student demonstration
09:07that had turned violent.
09:09On May 4th, a day that would go on to be remembered as the Kent State Massacre, things turned
09:15deadly.
09:17The guards opened fire on a group of students, killing four and wounding nine.
09:21This elicited a number of musical reactions from artists such as Steve Miller Band, The
09:26Beach Boys, and Bruce Springsteen.
09:29Despite being banned on various AM stations, Ohio became the counter-culture anthem following
09:35the event.
09:422. Sunday, Bloody Sunday – U2 Pride in the name of love might have been met
09:58with mixed critical reception at the time of its release, but over the years, it has
10:03aged relatively gracefully.
10:14The reality is, try as he might, Bono could never sing about American civil rights nearly
10:19as successfully as he did the conflict in Northern Ireland on the track Sunday, Bloody
10:24Sunday.
10:25The song refers to not only one, but two Bloody Sundays.
10:30On January 30th, 1972, British paratroopers opened fire on unarmed civil rights demonstrators,
10:37which took place in 1920 and again in 1972.
10:42In the lyrics, Bono laments the loss of life resulting from the long history of Irish-British
10:47conflict in Ireland.
10:48It's considered one of their greatest songs.
11:00Before we unveil our top pick, here are a few honorable mentions.
11:041.
11:05Run to the Hills – Iron Maiden Laments the violence of European colonization
11:10in North America 2.
11:21Joan of Arc – Leonard Cohen Tells the tragic tale of this heroic French
11:26figure's fiery end 3.
11:38Spanish Bombs – The Clash Reflects on the Spanish Civil War
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12:061.
12:08American Pie – Don McLean The artist behind the song and his refusal
12:20to discuss the lyrics and their meaning are almost as famous as the song itself.
12:25There's no denying that the day the music died is a direct reference to one of the greatest
12:31losses in musical history.
12:39McLean has gone on record admitting that the first verse of the song was an exercise in
12:43expressing his long-stewing grief over the death of Buddy Holly and that fateful plane
12:48crash that also took the lives of Ritchie Valens and J.P. Richardson Jr.
12:53But this song, in all its poetic nuance, is truly a series of snapshots.
12:58A sprawling pastiche of American popular culture and its landscape in the years following
13:04that 1959 accident.
13:14Do you agree with our list?
13:16Here are some of your favorite songs inspired by historical events.