Songs Describing Places in Absurdly Idealized Terms

[Amor de Cosmos]

I think I'd be standing an awful long time in Winslow Arizona before any young lady came down to look at me.

[sw2borshch]

The rest of the country episodically tries to disown New Jersey.

That line is very specific to the time and place in that the infrastructure was such that were one in New York City and "looking for America" outside of New England, by far the most efficient starting point was the New Jersey Turnpike. This hasn't been the case for decades.

Can't believe you would be involved in any New Jersey dissing, ursus.

Anyway, according to the song, Florida is horrider than Whitley Bay. I would imagine that this is very much a matter of taste and how keen one is on a Spanish City.

I can remember being very disappointed to discover that Spanish City wasn't actually made of liquorice.

[Hot Pepsi]

As I mentioned before, the major features of West Virginia that John Denver mentions are actually in Virginia. Neither is really “almost heaven.” There are some nice mountains, but they’re being torn down to get the last of the coal.

[Satchmo Distel]

I was disappointed with Galveston when I visited a few years ago.

[Walt Flanagans Dog]

I was disappointed with Galveston when I visited a few years ago.

Galveston was also mentioned in Girl VII by Saint Etienne, which us provincial indie kids assumed was some sort of gazetteer of cool places in London and further afield:
Primrose Hill, Staten Island, Chalk Farm, Massif Central
Gospel Oak, S?o Paolo, Boston Manor, Costa Rica
Arnos Grove, San Clemente, Tufnell Park, Gracetown
York Way, Videoton, Clerkenwell, Portobello, Maida Vale
Old Ford, Valencia, Kennington, Galveston, Holland Park
Studamer, Dollis Hill, Fougeres, London Fields
Bratislava, Haggerston, Lav?nia, Canonbury, Alice Springs
Tooting Graveney, Baffin Island, Pollard's Hill, Winnepeg
Plumstead Common, Hyderabad, Silvertown, Buffalo

....but which the band later revealed to be less selective:

"It was because of Vogue by Madonna. I think Sarah had been to San Clemente but the places in it, at the time, most of us had never been to. There's a Hungarian football team in there from a Panini sticker book - see if you can spot it!" (Bob Stanley, 2009).

[San Bernardhinault]

My one visit to Galveston was in early January and it had that deserted seaside town feel that I mentioned liking on the seaside town thread. It also had a proper crazy golf mini-golf with moving windmills and an ostrich or emu pecking the ground so you had to time your putt.

[San Bernardhinault]

Carrying on HP’s West Virginia kick, the idyllic sun dappled, lemonade sipping Morgantown that Joni Mitchell sings about appears to bear very little connection to the Morgantown I visited.

[Amor de Cosmos]

Galveston's one of my very favourite US cities. Admittedly that's mainly for photographic reasons as the visual contrasts are so stark.

[Nocturnal Submission]

Galveston was also mentioned in Girl VII by Saint Etienne, which us provincial indie kids assumed was some sort of gazetteer of cool places in London and further afield:
Primrose Hill, Staten Island, Chalk Farm, Massif Central
Gospel Oak, S?o Paolo, Boston Manor, Costa Rica
Arnos Grove, San Clemente, Tufnell Park, Gracetown
York Way, Videoton, Clerkenwell, Portobello, Maida Vale
Old Ford, Valencia, Kennington, Galveston, Holland Park
Studamer, Dollis Hill, Fougeres, London Fields
Bratislava, Haggerston, Lav?nia, Canonbury, Alice Springs
Tooting Graveney, Baffin Island, Pollard's Hill, Winnepeg
Plumstead Common, Hyderabad, Silvertown, Buffalo

....but which the band later revealed to be less selective:

"It was because of Vogue by Madonna. I think Sarah had been to San Clemente but the places in it, at the time, most of us had never been to. There's a Hungarian football team in there from a Panini sticker book - see if you can spot it!" (Bob Stanley, 2009).

Those London locations are an eclectic mix of the affluent, the trendy, the wholly unexceptional but on a Tube line and Pollards Hill.

[Hot Pepsi]

I wonder if Joni Mitchell has ever been to Morgantown.

[Satchmo Distel]

Galveston felt different to the rest of Texas and also very vulnerable and exposed to the climate. I also agree that it felt like the Blackpool of Texas (or maybe like parts of the Panhandle).

[ursus arctos]

I wonder if Joni Mitchell has ever been to Morgantown.

Given the university, it is the kind of place she would have played had she been in the area.

Galveston was one of the richest cities in the country before the 1900 Hurricane and looked like a cross between New Orleans and Cape May

[Amor de Cosmos]

It still has a few stunning examples of early American baroque architecture. As well as the detritus left by multiple hurricanes over the years. It's like a different film set every time you turn a corner. Then there's Goat Island:

[Stumpy Pepys]

Off-topic, but when I was small, I thought Basildon (based on Basildon Band notepaper) must be dead posh, like Kensington.

[Jah Womble]

I've never been to 'the isle of Greece'.

I wonder what it's like?

[Stumpy Pepys]

Wrong bridge …

[pebblethefish]

"Okay
Tokyo, South America, Australia, France, Germany, UK, Africa"

Been to some of those, and no one was dancing in the street.

[Satchmo Distel]

There's that absurd Taylor Swift song about her London beau.

[Jah Womble]

"Okay
Tokyo, South America, Australia, France, Germany, UK, Africa"

Been to some of those, and no one was dancing in the street.

The question remains - why wasn't it 'Japan, South America...etc'?

(Even then, it's still all over the shop with continents/countries.)

[Satchmo Distel]

They were going to sing it at Live Aid with Bowie in London and Jagger in Philly but the satellite time delay made this unfeasible so they showed the video instead. They both over-sing it and I find it unlistenable.

[Walt Flanagans Dog]

They were going to sing it at Live Aid with Bowie in London and Jagger in Philly but the satellite time delay made this unfeasible so they showed the video instead. They both over-sing it and I find it unlistenable.

On the Live Aid documentary* which the Beeb showed last week, Harvey Goldsmith reckoned that there was a plan to send one of them into space and he got as far as ringing NASA to find out if it was feasible**, but he was so full of bullshit throughout the whole documentary that if he'd said the sun was shining during the Wembley concert I would have checked the archive footage to be sure.

*this was the 20th anniversary documentary, shown on the 35th anniversary of Live Aid, a mind bending sentence in itself to me.
**not sure who thought this would have been money well spent in the context of what they were supposed to be doing.

[nmrfox]

I like the thought of someone thinking that Hyderabad is exotic or cool. The fact that it likes to refer to itself as Cyberabad gives some idea of what the city is like (lots of tall office buildings, very, very, dull). Buffalo is inspired, provided you like lots of oil refineries and redundant steelworks.

[3 Colours Red]

They both over-sing it and I find it unlistenable.

Probably because they only had 13 hours to record, produce and edit it AND make the video - there was simply no time for a better take.

[Jah Womble]

On the Live Aid documentary* which the Beeb showed last week, Harvey Goldsmith reckoned that there was a plan to send one of them into space and he got as far as ringing NASA to find out if it was feasible**, but he was so full of bullshit throughout the whole documentary that if he'd said the sun was shining during the Wembley concert I would have checked the archive footage to be sure.

*this was the 20th anniversary documentary, shown on the 35th anniversary of Live Aid, a mind bending sentence in itself to me.
**not sure who thought this would have been money well spent in the context of what they were supposed to be doing.

'One' of them? It could only have been Bowie, surely..?

**It really wouldn't have been.

[Satchmo Distel]

Wouldn't Bowie have been reluctant given Major Tom's experiences?

But as WFD says, the story smells of bullshit.