The Theme Music Game

Ivor Ballokov

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Right so here it is, the game all the kids are playing these days, The Theme Music Game.

The rules.

  • Each day one person posts a theme
  • The rest of us then have until midnight to post youtube videos/spotify links etc to music that is in someway related to that theme.
  • When you post a song you must explain why it relates to the theme.
  • Don't make the themes too specific like "about a moose called hank" (looking at you Dwayne) but don't make them too general either like "love"
  • Actually that is it.
Theme 1: Music inspired by the death or deaths of a real person/s.



This song by Paul Simon is actually a triple whammy as it mentions three deaths, firstly Johnny Ace a blues singer from the 50's who'd allegedly died in a game of Russian roulette, then JFK and finally the murder of his friend John Lennon.

The video is of the Simon and Garfunkel reunion in central park 1981 a year after Lennon's death, I think the first time he performed it live, it's made all the more incredible that towards the end of the song a fan actually storms the stage to get to Simon just as he's singing about Lennon. Timing.

Anyways, get posting please, I'm begging you not to let this thread be a failure, my reputation couldn't handle another flop thread.
 
The first that springs to mind



The only way i can explain how this relates to the theme is that, it is what the theme is. A song inspired by a person's death and a tribute to them (even if it's a rehash of another tribute to Monroe done years before), although i will say that Elton John has said he'd never perform this version of the song live unless asked to be Prince Charles/William or Harry.
 
Good call, probably the most famous example right there, although this one has to be up there too.



Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and the Big Bopper referenced in this one, and probably one of Janis Joplin or Billie Holiday was the "girl who sang the blues" and James Dean is in there too. Big name dropper Don McLean.
 
Here's another,



This is about the deaths of two people, the man mentioned was a friend of Neil Pearts (the band's drummer, if you've not heard of him go find the drummers thread!) that died of aids. The second half of the song is about a girl who was murdered in Peart's hometown, and it's a bloody good track as well.
 
Never really listened to Rush, although Role Models almost tempted me to give them a go, but that is quite a decent tune.


One of my favourites this one, I was only about 7 when it was released but I vividly remember loving it. For those who don't know the story behind it.

"Jeremy" is based on two different true stories. The song takes its main inspiration from a newspaper article about a 16-year-old boy named Jeremy Wade Delle, born February 10, 1975, from Richardson, Texas who shot himself in front of his English class at Richardson High School on the morning of January 8, 1991 at about 9:45 am. In a 2009 interview, Vedder said that he felt "the need to take that small article and make something of it—to give that action, to give it reaction, to give it more importance."[5]

Delle was described by schoolmates as "real quiet" and known for "acting sad."[6] After coming in to class late that morning, Delle was told to get an admittance slip from the school office. He left the classroom, and returned with a .357 Magnum revolver. Delle walked to the front of the classroom, announced "Miss, I got what I really went for", put the barrel of the firearm in his mouth, and pulled the trigger before his teacher or classmates could react.[6] A girl named Lisa Moore knew Jeremy from the in-school suspension program: "He and I would pass notes back and forth and he would talk about life and stuff," she said. "He signed all of his notes, 'Write back.' But on Monday he wrote, 'Later days.' I didn't know what to make of it. But I never thought this would happen."[6]

When asked about the song, Vedder explained:
It came from a small paragraph in a paper which means you kill yourself and you make a big old sacrifice and try to get your revenge. That all you're gonna end up with is a paragraph in a newspaper. Sixty-three degrees and cloudy in a suburban neighborhood. That's the beginning of the video and that's the same thing is that in the end, it does nothing … nothing changes. The world goes on and you're gone. The best revenge is to live on and prove yourself. Be stronger than those people. And then you can come back.[7]
​
The other story that the song is based on involved a student that Vedder knew from his junior high school in San Diego, California. He elaborated further in a 1991 interview:
I actually knew somebody in junior high school, in San Diego, California, that did the same thing, just about, didn't take his life but ended up shooting up an oceanography room. I remember being in the halls and hearing it and I had actually had altercations with this kid in the past. I was kind of a rebellious fifth-grader and I think we got in fights and stuff. So it's a bit about this kid named Jeremy and it's also a bit about a kid named Brian that I knew and I don't know...the song, I think it says a lot. I think it goes somewhere...and a lot of people interpret it different ways and it's just been recently that I've been talking about the true meaning behind it and I hope no one's offended and believe me, I think of Jeremy when I sing it.[8]
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Click to expand...
 


Written about the photographer Kevin Carter who killed himself partly because of the atrocities he'd seen taking photos in Sudan which won him a Pulitzer prize.


Another Manic's song, this time written about the death of James Dean Bradfield's mother of cancer and ocean spray cranberry juice is often given to patients.
 
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