Pick a Day

Music History Events: Song Inspirations

August 22, 1997 Twelve-year-old Georgia Lee Moses is found dead in South Petaluma, California. Tom Waits hears her story and is inspired to write "Georgia Lee," the thirteenth track on Mule Variations.

June 28, 1997 Lela Howard (83) and her husband Raymond (88) drive to a festival 10 miles away in Temple, Texas, but don't return. Fastball frontman Tony Scalzo writes the song "The Way" after reading about it. Days after completing the song, the couple is found dead about 200 miles from the festival.

September 28, 1994 Uwe Vandrei, an obsessed fan of Sarah McLachlan who inspired her song "Possession," commits suicide in Ottawa. Vandrei had sued McLachlan for songwriting credit on the track, but the case had yet to reach trial.

September 17, 1994 Scott Weiland of Stone Temple Pilots marries his first wife, Janina Castaneda. The STP song "Sour Girl" is about her.

May 10, 1994 Serial killer John Gacy, the subject of songs by Sufjan Stevens and Jane's Addiction, is executed for the murders of 33 young men and boys.

February 1, 1994 Tori Amos releases her second album, Under The Pink, featuring the hit single "Cornflake Girl."More

March 20, 1993 Two children are killed in an Irish Republican Army bombing in Warrington, England, inspiring the Cranberries song "Zombie."

April 16, 1992 David Milgaard is released from jail in Canada after serving 23 years for a crime he didn't commit. The Tragically Hip, who have helped in his fight for justice, write the song "Wheat Kings" about the ordeal.

January 8, 1991 Jeremy Delle, a 15-year-old student at Richardson High School in Texas, shoots himself in his English class. When Eddie Vedder reads about it, he writes the song "Jeremy" about Delle and other young people who have committed suicide in schools.

February 9, 1990 Midnight Oil release the album Blue Sky Mining. The lead single, "Blue Sky Mine," is inspired by the Wittenoom industrial disaster in the band's native Australia. The song is a Top 10 hit on the ARIA singles chart and tops the rock charts in the US.More

October 16, 1989 Kate Bush releases her sixth studio album, The Sensual World. The title track, inspired by James Joyce's novel Ulysses, earns her a Grammy nomination for Best Alternative Music Performance.

January 22, 1987 Pennsylvania State Treasurer R. Budd Dwyer, who had been found guilty of accepting bribes, pulls out a gun and kills himself at a press conference, inspiring the Filter song "Hey Man Nice Shot."

July 3, 1986 Bono's 26-year-old personal assistant Greg Carroll is killed in a motorcycle act while running an errand in Dublin. U2's next album, The Joshua Tree, is dedicated to Carroll, who inspired the song "One Tree Hill."

September 7, 1985 "St. Elmo's Fire (Man In Motion)" hits #1 in the US. David Foster and John Parr wrote the song for the film St. Elmo's Fire, but they wrote it about Rick Hansen, who went around the world in his wheelchair raising money for spinal cord research on his "Man In Motion" tour.

October 23, 1984 The BBC runs a news report showing shocking and disturbing footage of famine in Ethiopia. Bob Geldof springs into action, setting up the Band-Aid relief effort, which releases the charity single "Do They Know It's Christmas?" a little over a month later. Geldof later organizes Live Aid to assist in relief efforts.

August 9, 1983 22-year-old Thomas Reilly is shot and killed by a British soldier in Belfast. He was a friend of the band Spandau Ballet, and sold merch on their True tour. His death would inspire the band's song "Through The Barricades" and the Bananarama song "King Of The Jungle."

April 12, 1981 Rush are guests at Kennedy Space Center to witness the first space shuttle launch, which inspires their song "Countdown."

May 6, 1978 The model Cheryl Tiegs appears on the cover of Time magazine, inspiring Bob Seger's song "Hollywood Nights."More

March 5, 1977 18-year-old Kate Bush writes "Wuthering Heights" after catching the end of a BBC adaptation of Emily Bronte's novel of the same name. The ethereal tune becomes her debut single the following year and hits #1 in the UK.

February 18, 1977 Fela Kuti's residence is sacked by nearly a thousand soldiers, inspiring his song "Zombie."

May 31, 1976 Tom Waits begins a two-week stint performing at Ronnie Scott's Club in Soho, London, England. The club is run by Pete King, and the experience inspires Waits to write "The Piano Has Been Drinking (Not Me) (An Evening with Pete King)."

May 24, 1975 On his 34th birthday, Bob Dylan attends the annual Romani celebration of their patron saint Sarah the Black in Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer, France. The experience inspires the song "One More Cup of Coffee (Valley Below)."

April 30, 1975 The Vietnam War ends with the fall of Saigon. Many returning veterans suffer ill effects, which is the subject of the song "Still in Saigon" by The Charlie Daniels Band.

March 24, 1975 Paul McCartney throws a party on the Queen Mary to celebrate the release of the Wings album Venus And Mars. Bob Dylan and Joni Mitchell are among the guests; their conversation about painting leads to Dylan's song "One More Cup of Coffee (Valley Below)" and Mitchell's "Paprika Plains."

September 15, 1973 The protest singer Victor Jara is brutally murdered in Chile under orders by the country's new dictator, Augusto Pinochet. The incident inspires Calexico's 2008 track "Victor Jara's Hands."

December 22, 1972 Mott the Hoople's Ian Hunter writes "All The Way From Memphis" and dedicates it to two of their crew, Leee Childers and Tony Zanetta. And Memphis, Tennessee.

September 5, 1971 While Wishbone Ash are on stage at an outdoor concert in Austin, Texas, hot dog vender Francisco Carrasco is shot dead. The tragedy inspires the song "Rock 'N' Roll Widow."

September 4, 1971 At a Bruce Springsteen show at the Student Prince in Asbury Park, New Jersey, the E Street Band comes together when sax player Clarence Clemons joins the band on stage for the first time, a story recounted in the song "Tenth Avenue Freeze-out."

August 21, 1971 Inmate George Jackson is shot dead in a bizarre escape attempt at San Quentin prison, prompting the Bob Dylan song "George Jackson."

December 18, 1970 Segregationist Georgia governor Lester Maddox walks off The Dick Cavett Show when the host implies his supporters are bigots. Randy Newman writes a song about it, "Rednecks," which begins: Last night I saw Lester Maddox on a TV show