November 26th, 2007
1. Robbie Fulks, "Fuck This Town"
Country smart-aleck Robbie Fulks moved to Nashville during the post-Garth Brooks gold rush of the early '90s, where he worked for a publishing company that shopped songs to country artists. The experience was understandably soul-crushing, so Fulks penned this bile-filled "fuck you" to Music Row—peddlers of "soft-rock feminist crap" to a "moron market"—on his 1997 debut, South Mouth. He's since grown more forgiving of Nashville, but "Fuck This Town" is another example of a great musical tradition: Writing off entire cities in song.
Key line: "So, fuck this town, fuck this town / fuck it end-to-end, fuck it up and down / can't get noticed—can't get found—can't get a cut / so fuck this town."
"Fuck This Town" by Robbie Fulks
2. Ike & Tina Turner, "Nutbush City Limits"
Any berg that birthed and raised Tina Turner should supposedly be a pretty amazing place. But The Queen Of Rock 'N' Roll was more than happy to escape her hometown of Nutbush, Tennessee, as evidenced by this 1973 hit, Ike & Tina's last as a duo. Over heavy wah-guitar action and unsettling synthesizer, Tina belts out a list of Nutbush's main attractions—"A church house, gin house, schoolhouse, outhouse"—before railing against the constricting effect the village had on a wild soul like herself: "25 was the speed limit / motorcycle not allowed in it," then later, "no whiskey for sale / you can't cop no bail / salt pork and molasses is all you get in jail."
Key line: "A one-horse town / you have to watch what you're puttin' down / in old Nutbush."
3. Dixie Chicks, "Lubbock Or Leave It"
Shaking off the dust of a one-horse town isn't an uncommon theme in modern country music, though that sentiment is rarely laced with as much vitriol as Dixie Chicks' Natalie Maines spits in this kiss-off to her hometown. Obviously still smarting from the thrashing she received from conservative America following her anti-Bush statements in 2003, Maines scorns the religious pretense and general hypocrisy of the small Texas city, pointing to the painting of fellow Lubbockite Buddy Holly outside the city's airport and wondering if "Maybe when I'm dead and gone I'm gonna get a statue too."
Key line: "Throw stones from the top of your rock thinking no one can see / the secrets you hide behind your Southern hospitality."
4. The Bottle Rockets, "Indianapolis"
A million songs have bemoaned the hard-knock life of a small-time touring musician, but The Bottle Rockets capture it on the most tedious level here: a van breakdown that strands them in Indianapolis. Ten days into a tour, the novelty has worn off, and frontman Brian Henneman openly fantasizes about ditching his bandmates for a ride home. The waiting, and Indiana's favorite son, may drive him over the edge: "Who knows what this repair will cost, scared to spend a dime / I'll puke if that jukebox plays John Cougar one more time."
Key line: "Is this hell or Indianapolis?"
5. John Denver, "Toledo"
Whatever little notoriety Randy Sparks' satirical song "Toledo" ever managed can largely be attributed to John Denver, who sang it in concert with a big, corny smile, the tee-hee-I'm-being-naughty expression of the teacher's pet reading somebody else's mildly dirty words off the bathroom wall. As fuck-this-town sentiments go, "Toledo" is relatively mild, but its barbed mockery was a notable departure from Denver's normal squeaky-clean, country-loving persona, especially in the way it rips on a Midwestern town for being so numbingly boring that it's "like being nowhere at all." "They roll back the sidewalks precisely at 10 / and people who live there are not seen again," Denver cheerfully sings. Funny, he always seemed like the kind of guy who'd be in bed at 9:30 sharp himself. Key line: "You ask how I know of Toledo, Ohio? Well, I spent a week there one day / they've got entertainment to dazzle your eyes: Go visit the bakery and watch the buns rise."
Watch a live performance here.
6. The Pretenders, "My City Was Gone"
It's one thing to feel alienated in a strange town you've never visited before; it's another to come home and find everything you once knew and loved has disappeared. In "My City Was Gone," head Pretender Chrissie Hynde visits her hometown of Akron, Ohio, and finds that the countryside has been "paved down the middle by a government that had no pride," with shopping malls and parking lots standing in its place. The most poignant moment comes when Hynde visits the house where she grew up: "I stood on the back porch, there was nobody home." Turns out Thomas Wolfe was right all along.
Key line: "The farms of Ohio had been replaced by shopping malls / and Muzak filled the air from Seneca to Cuyahoga Falls."
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