For some reason, I listened to Glenn Beck on the way in to work today. He was talking about the need to start reading the bible, buying ammo, and stocking up on canned food because “water will wet, fire will burn”. The root cause for the likely apocalypse was, believe it or not, quantitative easing.
It got me thinking….what are the best songs about the apocalypse, or to broaden it a bit, the best apocalyptic songs? I’ll go with “Five Years”, “Mercy Mercy Me”, “Waiting For The End Of the World”, “When Black Friday Comes”, “Living For The City”, and this, my favorite because it’s so upbeat and it’s about a HIPPIE apocalypse. What are your favorites?
Paul in KY
Life During Wartime
Cervantes
Don’t you understand what I’m tryin’ to say
Can’t you feel the fears I’m feelin’ today?
If the button is pushed, there’s no runnin’ away
There’ll be no one to save, with the world in a grave
[Take a look around ya boy, it’s bound to scare ya boy]
And you tell me
Over and over and over again, my friend
Ah, you don’t believe
We’re on the eve
of destruction.
Blue Galangal
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f2xvU9hrb0g
Pete
The Earth Died Screaming – Tom Waits
Omnes Omnibus
“Eve of Destruction” comes to mind.
Blue Galangal
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f2xvU9hrb0g – Bell X1, The End Is Nigh
Cervantes
And of course, All Along the Watchtower is by far the best.
Patricia Kayden
It’s the End of the World as We Know It — REM
Bad Moon on the Rise — CCR
Hunter Gathers
I’ve always been partial to Soundgarden’s ‘Black Hole Sun’.
Am I alone in thinking that the Obamaclypse is taking it’s sweet ass time in Ending The World? We were supposed to be a dystopia like, four years ago. And people are still running around buying Big Gulps and iPhones. What the fuck, man?
Dolly Llama
“Is Chicago, Is Not Chicago” by Soul Coughing predicted 9/11 in 1996. Just called the building wrong. Just saying.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ihZlQOaR8b8
Cervantes
@Omnes Omnibus: That’s probably because you just read some of the lyrics at #2.
JPL
Good timing on the the thread since the one downstairs is not that entertaining.
Pete
LONDON CALLING
Dolly Llama
“King of the World” by Steely Dan is pretty well textbook.
kathmandu
Blue Oyster Cult “don’t fear the reaper”
Omnes Omnibus
@Cervantes: That’s one possibility.
Villago Delenda Est
@Paul in KY: “This Ain’t no party! This ain’t no disco!”
The End – The Doors.
Lawyers, Guns and Money – Warren Zevon, the late and certainly great.
ranchandsyrup
“Ænema” by Tool.
Learn to swim.
Mike J
First We Take Manhattan
When The World Is Running Down, You Make The Best Of What’s Still Around
Villago Delenda Est
@Hunter Gathers: We’re in a dystopia right now. A blah man is in the Oval Office. It’s the End Times.
FridayNext
There Won’t Be No Country Music, There Won’t Be No Rock and Roll by CW McCall for shear 70’s Disco Country and Western Environmentalism fusion wonderfulness
Party at Ground Zero is a lot of fun
Here Comes the Flood is also good for different reasons.
And the entire 666 Album by Aphrodite’s Child.
YellowDog
Zager and Evans, “In the Year 2525”
Jacel
“Rainy Day In June” by The Kinks.
Mike J
There’s no flights home today
And no services out on the motorway
And I, I can’t leave the ground
And I can’t find a place now to put her down
Dead set on destruction
Or maybe Bullets In My Hairdo by the Finn Brothers
Hunter Gathers
@Villago Delenda Est: I refuse to believe that. They’re building a Taco Bell in my little shitburgh of a town. No dystopian future flick has a Taco Bell in it, unless you count ‘Demolition Man’.
FridayNext
oh, and 99 Luftballoons, of course. How could I forget that one!
Paul in KY
@Pete: Also, London’s Burning!
Paul in KY
@Villago Delenda Est: Good choices, VDE!
uila
Morning Dew
’77 Barton Hall
Omnes Omnibus
@YellowDog: I hate that song with the fire of a thousand suns.
Villago Delenda Est
@Paul in KY: My musical muse thanks you.
The great part of “Life During Wartime” is the last half, where Byrne gets so paranoid it makes your skin crawl. Not as catchy as “This ain’t no party!” but geeze, it’s oppressive.
Geoduck
The Dawn of the Dead remake from a few years back made good use of Johnny Cash’s “When The Man Comes Around.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=875R8kHxzrA
Villago Delenda Est
@FridayNext: “Everyone’s a superhero, everyone’s a Captain Kirk”
That came out near the height of the mass across Europe demonstrations against MRBMs, the Pershing II in particular. And of course Ronnie Ray-Gun was Preznit at the time.
One of the reason “Old Europe” is so hated is that they despised Saint Ronnie and they love the near sheriff. Drives the wingslime nuts.
roxy
@YellowDog:
You beat me to it Yellow Dog. I still have the 45 of the In the Year 2525 by Zagar and Evans.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=izQB2-Kmiic
Here’s the lyrics:
In the year 2525, if man is still alive
If woman can survive, they may find
In the year 3535
Ain’t gonna need to tell the truth, tell no lie
Everything you think, do and say
Is in the pill you took today
In the year 4545
You ain’t gonna need your teeth, won’t need your eyes
You won’t find a thing to chew
Nobody’s gonna look at you
In the year 5555
Your arms hangin’ limp at your sides
Your legs got nothin’ to do
Some machine’s doin’ that for you
In the year 6565
Ain’t gonna need no husband, won’t need no wife
You’ll pick your son, pick your daughter too
From the bottom of a long glass tube
In the year 7510
If God’s a-coming, He oughta make it by then
Maybe He’ll look around Himself and say
“Guess it’s time for the Judgement Day”
In the year 8510
God is gonna shake His mighty head
He’ll either say, “I’m pleased where man has been”
Or tear it down, and start again
In the year 9595
I’m kinda wonderin’ if man is gonna be alive
He’s taken everything this old earth can give
And he ain’t put back nothing
Now it’s been ten thousand years, man has cried a billion tears
For what, he never knew, now man’s reign is through
But through eternal night, the twinkling of starlight
So very far away, maybe it’s only yesterday
Pete
@Paul in KY: Basically, don’t move to London
Jewish Steel
http://youtu.be/4MXe09DSCWc
Run To The Hills by Iron Maiden.
chopper
Calamity Song by the Decembrists.
James Barnett
When I’m feeling mellow, it’s “Wooden Ships on the Water”, Crosby, Stills, and Nash.
When I’m not, it’s “Anarchy in the UK”, The Sex Pistols.
Groucho48
Hard Rains A-gonna Fall
Gimme Shelter
Der Ring des Nibelungen
Bob
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=neGdoqsuiN8
Guy
Leonard Cohen “The Future”.
You don’t know me from the wind
You never will, you never did
I’m the little jew
Who wrote the bible
I’ve seen the nations rise and fall
I’ve heard their stories, heard them all
But love’s the only engine of survival
Your servant here, he has been told
To say it clear, to say it cold:
It’s over, it ain’t going
Any further
And now the wheels of heaven stop
You feel the devil’s riding crop
Get ready for the future:
It is murder.
dedc79
Temptation of Adam – Josh ritter
Ella in New Mexico
Seriously, that’s pretty much what Mormons do just because. So why is now any different, Glenn?
Tod Kelly
I think you’ve already got the best one with the Nothing But Flowers, but I feel like It’s the End of the Word as We Know It deserves some love.
catclub
I don’t know any recent songs.
I’ll Fly Away
dedc79
Party at Ground Zero – Fishbone
Porco Rosso
Cities in dust? Souxie and the Banshees or Junkie XL,
Hallowed Ground by the Vionent Femmes,
American Pageant by Jon Langford and the Sadies
dark sun, sally timms
gogol's wife
@Omnes Omnibus:
Me too, but my husband does a really hilarious job of singing it.
I usually like to throw in a song from the 1930s, but I can’t think of any apocalyptic 1930s songs. They were dealing with real problems so didn’t like to fantasize about apocalypse, I guess.
Porco Rosso
m.youtube.com/watch?v=eaMBagakSdM
Mike G
I’m surprised Beck’s followers can afford canned food and ammo. If they followed his hysterical warnings to buy gold three years ago, they’ve lost about a third of their money.
Eljai
Prince – 1999. Hey, remember when Y2K was going to freak out all of the computers?
RobertGomez
Young Marble Giants – Final Day
Chicagopat
“Increased chances” by Chitlins, Whiskey and Skirt
The population is greatly decreased,
And now the odds are grealy increased,
That I may someday get a chance to kiss your lips.
I thank the Lord each day for the apocalypse.
Folks are mostly disfigured or dead,
But sugar, I won’t let it go to my head.
My Mamma’s face has dripped down into the dirt,
But I’m still chasing Chitlins, Whiskey and Skirt
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jN_SxiP6RZ0
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
The fuck’s the matter with you? Should we stage an intervention?
gian
Two suns in the sunset.
Xenos
Prayer in C — an EU pop hit on the subject this summer, an older tune from a French band singing in English, remixed by a German DJ. Basically, pissed off at God, swearing to never forgive him.
J.W. Hamner
I want to say The Julie Ruin – “Ha Ha Ha” because it’s awesome and all should love Kathleen Hanna and despair… but despite the use of words like Armageddon, James Jones, and neutron bomb it’s about a metaphorical end of the world, not an actual one.
Golgaronok
GY!BE — The Dead Flag Blues.
Mike J
@Eljai: I remember tens of thousands of people working very hard for a long time to make sure it didn’t happen.
catclub
@Mike G:
They already lost it when they bought the gold. Now they have lost the value in the gold, too.
/finance pedant
catclub
@gogol’s wife: anything relevant from Caberet?
Robin Oz
Ashes and Fire by Ryan Adams
As he stared past the fire, his hunger to leave – well it gnawed his poor heart alive
Her skin smelled like black cherry blossom perfume
And the sail boats, they all sailed by
And a river she cried
And the wind was suddenly sweeter than Roosevelt pie
The windows blew out, and the cigarette smoke drifted by
The bums on the bowery were swallowed in the light
Of cars rambling by in the night
Screaming “run for your life”
With cool and silvery eyes, and a heart that was fit for design
Drown in a river of tears, oh – a river she cried
Left her with a heart – made of ashes and fire
One day there was a silence that washed through the town
There was no reason to speak, so no one made a sound
Her eyes were indigo, her cats were all calico
And the sail boats they all sailed by
And a river she cried
With cool and silvery eyes, and a heart that was fit for design
Drown in a river of tears, oh – a river she cried
Left her with a heart – made of ashes and fire
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VXXxv3vlEGc
SectionH
Weird Al Yankovic’s Christmas at Ground Zero
and for something a lot weirder than Weird Al, Tiny Tim’s The Ice Caps Are Melting.
Kathleen
@Omnes Omnibus: Ha! So do I. Eve of Destruction is really not one of my favorites, either.
Though it’s not apocalyptic per se, “Inner City Blues” by Marvin Gaye is pretty dystopian. “Makes me wanna holler and throw up both my hands.
This ain’t livin, this ain’t livin. No, no, Baby. No no no.”
althuser
Nanobots – They Might Be Giants. Even perkier than Nothing But Flowers!
Morning Dew – most famously by the Grateful Dead, but the original makes clear its about post-apocalyptic nuclear fallout
Nutella
When Saddam Hussein lobbed a few bombs in the general direction of Israel I went around with “It’s the end of the world as we know it and I feel fine” in my head for days.
JohnnyHitNRunPraline
Cortez the Killer.
Gravenstone
Just because they’re a long forgotten band;
“Armageddon” and “Static”, both by Planet P Project
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
Randy Newman Political Science
m.c. simon milligan
Electric Funeral – Black Sabbath
Mike E
Moribund The Burgermeister by Peter Gabriel.
Frankensteinbeck
@Mike G:
Much more than that. The gold companies Beck hucksters for are scammers. They vastly overprice the gold selling it to their customers by selling generic coins for collectible prices.
joel hanes
what are the best songs about the apocalypse
Tom Lehrer, “We’ll All Go Together When We Go”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TIoBrob3bjI
joel hanes
Honorable mention to “Marching, Marching to Shibboleth”
by the 40-voice St. Louis Aquarium Choir (with Organ Leroy, at his organ again)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d7vTHlEfovo
Cervantes
@Omnes Omnibus: A remote one.
Ralphie Bruber
WEEN: Transdermal Celebration!
Southern Beale
“All Along The Watchtower,” either Dylan’s or Hendrix’s, but Dylan recorded his at Nashville’s famous Studio A, recently (and I mean, like, last week) saved from the wrecking ball after a city-wide uproar. A developer wanted to put condos on the site.
LABiker
Comet by Wire.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w9jKuNepLZI
karounie
Wooden Ships by Crosby Stills Nash, etc. made famous by Jefferson Airplane
“Won’t you try some of my huckleberries?
I’ve been eating them for six or seven weeks,
haven’t got sick once.
Probably keep us both alive.”
I was a kid when someone’s older sibling played this record for us. I had just started reading YA- type science fiction and I was fascinated to find this theme in popular rock n roll. David Bowie was still a few years into my future…
bruceJ
@Villago Delenda Est:
To this day I cannot hear “This is the end” without hearing Hueys going TWOCKA THWOCKA THWOCKA in my head…my room-mate and I were ginormous film geeks when “Apocalypse Now” came out and we watched it from the fourth row center at the only 70mm theater in town
bruceJ
@Eljai: This kind of thing chaps my ass, a little.
Y2K didn’t ‘freak out all the computers’ because a shit-ton of people put in shit-tons of hours of work making damned sure it didn’t happen.
hilts
Doug,
It’s the End of the World As We Know It and I FEEL FINE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_eyFiClAzq8
Ken
@gogol’s wife: It’s not quite about the end of the world, but Cole Porter’s “Well Did You Evah” (1939) has, “Have you heard? It’s in the stars. Next July we collide with Mars.”
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
@chopper: It is indeed catchy.
Calamity Song. (3:53)
Cheers,
Scott.
Lurking Canadian
@bruceJ: Y2K was likely to cause significant chaos in financial, and other, records.
I have never seen a decent explanation for why it was going to lead to car wrecks, or crashing elevators. I’ve written a lot of code that went into a lot of vehicles. Not a single line of it ever gave a shit what year it was.
delk
Armageddon Days Are Here (again) by The The
angelfoot
Mekons “Secrets”.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XykoYf–WR0
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
@delk: The The Sweet Bird of Truth (5:23)
Cheers,
Scott.
ChristianPinko
“Waste of Tiamat” by High on Fire. Because if you’re going to sing about the end of the world, then it should sound like it.
Infamous Heel-Filcher
Way too little Iron Maiden in this thread.
I say we start with “When The Wild Wind Blows” and work backwards from there. There’s a great apocalyptic song on nearly every album.
Paul in KY
@Pete: Well, He’s down by the river…