Any Major Murder Songs Vol. 3
It’s Halloween this week, and to scare the children, here’s the third mix of Murder Songs. I didn’t post one last year, when the pandemic was claiming so many lives. But this year, death by Covid is mostly a matter of choice, at least in countries where vaccinations are freely available. So here we go.
These compilations of murder songs are a bit like a TV crime shows such as Law & Order. At least in some of the cases featured in the songs, the killers have been brought to justice. In some songs, that justice is distributed through the death penalty, which in itself could be defined as a form of murder (in that a person who is defenceless and doesn’t pose an immediate threat is being put to death by people who have the tools to perform that function, usually to extract a firm of retribution).
A couple of songs tell stories that describe acts which amount to vigilante justice. One can’t really justify that sort of thing, of course, but it is quite satisfying when Stagger Lee gets shot in the balls or the killer of Nell in the Cisco Houston song gets his comeuppance. I fear that there’s a bit of Charles Bronson in even the most liberal among us.
Some of our killers here are filled with remorse, and some with none at all. There seems to be a thread of mental illness issues in most of these cases — or all, if psychopathy is a mental illness.
In almost all of these songs, presented from various perspectives, there is a story being told that teaches us something about the human condition. Even the nasty Guns n’ Roses song is a reflection of an uncomfortable reality.
Happy listening!
As always, the mix is timed to fit on a standard CD-R, includes home-law-and-ordered covers, and the text above and tracklisting below in an illustrated PDF. PW in comments.
- Blondie – Youth Nabbed As Sniper (1978)
The Vic: Random people, by a sniper - The Boomtown Rats – I Don’t Like Mondays (1979)
The Vic: Two adults at Cleveland Elementary School in San Diego - Bruce Springsteen – Johnny 99 (1986)
The Vic: A night clerk, while Johnny was drunk and sad. - Richard & Linda Thompson – Did She Jump Or Was She Pushed? (1982)
The Vic: She. Could’ve been suicide, but they found some fingerprints right around her throat… - Johnny Cash – Delia’s Gone (1994)
The Vic: Delia. In real life: 15-year-old Delia Green, shot by Mose Houston, also 15, on Christmas Eve 1900. - Grateful Dead – Stagger Lee (1978)
The Vic: Billy DeLions, thrower of a lucky dice. Here a Delia gets justice. - Robert Cray – Smoking Gun (1986)
The Vic: An unnamed woman, shot by a paranoid jealous partner. - Barry Manilow – Copacabana (At The Copa) (1978)
The Vic: Why, Tony, of course. - Eminem feat. Dido – Stan (2000)
The Vic: Stan’s pregnant girlfriend, tied up in the trunk… - Alice Cooper – Killer (1971)
The Vic: Do we know? Here the (unrepentant) killer goes off to be executed. - Guns n’ Roses – Used To Love Her (1988)
The Vic: A complaining girlfriend. The national anthem of Misogynia. - Elvis Costello & The Imposters – The Name Of This Thing Is Not Love (2004)
The Vic: A fling, according to the self-justifying murderer. - Gillian Welch & David Rawlings – Poor Ellen Smith (2020)
The Vic: Poor Ellen Smith, shot through the heart. 20 years on, the killer gets out of jail. - Cisco Houston – The Killer (rel. 1968)
The Vic: Blake, the murderer of Nell. - Kingston Trio – Tom Dooley (1958)
The Vic: Unnamed victim, stabbed by Tom Dooley. - Charley Pride – The Banks Of The Ohio (1968)
The Vic: The only woman he loved, killed by the singer himself. - Big Tom and The Mainliners – Life To Go (1973)
The Vic: The singer’s honky-tonk friend, 18 years ago. - Doc & Merle Watson – The Lawson Family Murder (1971)
The Vic: Charlie Lawson’s family. On Christmas Eve. Why? Nobody knows. - Momus – Murderers, The Hope Of Women (1988)
The Vic: Sweet Fanny Adams, his wife. - Rosie Thomas – Charlotte (2002)
The Vic: Charlotte, a victim of domestic abuse.
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