Quote
stevie
I need to capture the culture, smells and soul of NYC as opposed to the less obscure lights and tall buildings thing.

If what the songs are out to capture the "culture, smells and soul" as the original poster requested, the list ought to be a lot more inclusive.

I don't think that kind of essence can be captured without allotting some space to, say, Hector LaVoe and Grandmaster Flash. Or their equivalents today, whom this old lady is much to out of touch to know.

The lyrics to My Way

[www.lyricsfreak.com]



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/11/2008 09:16AM by askanewyorker.

A song with a little soul - Native New Yorker by Odyssey

[www.youtube.com]


[blogs.wsj.com]



Empire State Of Mind Lyrics

[Jay-Z]
yeah
Yeah I'm out that Brooklyn.
Now I'm down in Tribeca.
Right next to DeNiro
But I'll be hood forever
I'm the new Sinatra
And since I made it here
I can make it anywhere
(Yeah they love me everywhere)
I used to cop in Harlem
All of my Dominicanos (Hey yo)
Right there off of Broadway
Brought me back to that McDonalds
Took it to my stash spot
560 State Street
Catch me in the kitchen like Simmons whipping Pastry
Cruising down 8th street
Off-white Lexus
Driving so slow
(but BK, it's from Texas!!)
Me I'm out that BedStuy
Home of that boy Biggie
now I live on Billboard
and I brought my boys with me
Say what up to Ta-ta
Still sipping Mai Tais
Sitting courtside
Knicks and Nets give me high-5
N**ga, I be Spiked out
I could trip a referee
...tell by my attitude that I'm MOST DEFINITELY FROM...

[Alicia Keys]
New York!!!!
Concrete jungle where dreams are made of,
There's nothing you can’t do,
Now you're in New York!!!
These streets will make you feel brand new,
the lights will inspire you,
Let's hear it for New York, New York, New York


[Jay-Z]
I made you hot n-gga,
Catch me at the X with OG at a Yankee game,
sh-t I made the Yankee hat more famous than a Yankee can,
you should know I bleed Blue, but I ain't a crip tho,
but I got a gang of n-ggas walking with my clique though,
welcome to the melting pot,
corners where we selling rocks,
Afrika bambaataa sh-t,
home of the hip hop,
yellow cab, gypsy cab, dollar cab, holla back,
for foreigners it ain't fitted act like they forgot how to act,
8 million stories out there and they're naked,
city it's a pity half of y’all won’t make it,
me I gotta plug a special and I got it made,
If Jeezy's payin LeBron, I’m paying Dwayne Wade,
3 dice cee-lo
3 card marley,
Labor Day parade, rest in peace Bob Marley,
Statue of Liberty, long live the World Trade,
long live the king yo,
I’m from the Empire State thats…

[Alicia Keys]
In New York!!!!
Concrete jungle where dreams are made of,
There's nothing you can’t do,
Now you're in New York!!!
These streets will make you feel brand new,
the lights will inspire you,
Let's hear it for New York, New York, New York

Welcome to the bright light..

[Jay-Z]
Lights is blinding,
girls need blinders
so they can step out of bounds quick,
the side lines is blind with casualties,
who sip the lite casually, then gradually become worse,
don’t bite the apple Eve,
caught up in the in crowd,
now you're in-style,
and in the winter gets cold en vogue with your skin out,
the city of sin is a pity on a whim.
good girls gone bad, the city's filled with them,
Mommy took a bus trip and now she got her bust out,
everybody ride her, just like a bus route,
Hail Mary to the city your a Virgin,
and Jesus can’t save you life starts when the church ends,
came here for school, graduated to the high life,
ball players, rap stars, addicted to the limelight,
MDMA got you feeling like a champion,
the city never sleeps better slip you a Ambien

[Alicia Keys]
New York!!!!
Concrete jungle where dreams are made of,
There's nothing you can’t do,
Now you're in New York!!!
These streets will make you feel brand new,
the lights will inspire you,
Let's hear it for New York, New York, New York

[Alicia Keys]
One hand in the air for the big city,
Street lights, big dreams all looking pretty,
no place in the World that can compare,
Put your lighters in the air, everybody say yeaaahh
come on, come,
yeah,

[Alicia Keys]
New York!!!!
Concrete jungle where dreams are made of,
There's nothing you can’t do,
Now you're in New York!!!
These streets will make you feel brand new,
the lights will inspire you,
Let's hear it for New York, New York, New York



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 11/02/2009 06:09AM by askanewyorker.

They keep playing that one on the radio here in the UK!!!

There's also Paloma Faith "New York" although, like Ryan Adams, it's a song about a person rather than the city itself!

Only 3 big sleeps to go!!!

Empire State of Mind....official video


[www.youtube.com]

how about these....
rockaway beach/ramones
the 59th St bridge song/simon and garfunkel
living for the city/stevie wonder
chelsea hotel no. 2/leonard cohen
halloween parade/lou reed
new york i love you but you're bringing me down/lcd soundsystem
daddy don't live in that new york city no more/steely dan
avenue A/the dictators
statue of liberty/xtc
union square/tom waits



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/26/2012 06:28AM by askanewyorker.

Walk On The Wild Side Lou Reed

YORKVILLE: STOOPS TO NUTS ~ Twenty-Two Stops to the City


Next Tuesday, August 14th, Garland Jeffreys—one of my songwriting heroes—will perform at City Stories: Stoops to Nuts at the Cornelia Street Cafe. It’s a family affair: Garland, Claire, and Savannah Jeffreys will take the stage along with Robert Conroy, one of my favorite artists from the Loser’s Lounge. Jeffreys is a New York City treasure. Please do yourself a favor and see the man up close next Tuesday at 6 PM.

Here is a bit I wrote about Jeffreys last year:

“Twenty-two stops to the city, twenty-two stops…” Garland Jeffreys’ voice kicks in and joins the drum’s anthem beat on “Coney Island Winter,” the terrific single from his critically acclaimed album The King of In Between, a lament and love letter to New York City. Brooklyn-born, Garland Jeffreys is a New York City storyteller who uses music to lay his story down. His introspective autobiographical songs effectively use New York as a character. Listen to “New York Skyline,” “Ghost Writer,” or “Mystery Kids.” You cannot separate him from the city, nor the city from him. Even when the city is not mentioned by name, you sense it in the words and tone of the characters, and it gives me faith in our town.

Jeffreys is a well-travelled man. He became internationally famous after his hit, “Matador” in the 1980s and still makes regular trips to Europe to perform and visit friends. He’s fluent in three languages. Yet his music reflects a yearning for New York that always brings him happily back home.

Jeffreys’ ethnic background is black, white, and Puerto Rican. He grew up (22 subway stops from the city) in Sheepshead Bay, a multi-cultural neighborhood where his was the only family of color in his local Catholic church. This racial diversity underscores and at times punctuates his music. Over coffee last year on 1st Avenue he told me that “growing up in that multi-national neighborhood in a large and loving extended family was a blessing. It readied me for the world. I’ve always mixed well with people.” I saw evidence of this when he warmly greeted the waitstaff with waves and a smile. It was easy to see why he counts Bruce Springsteen and Lou Reed as close friends. Garland is married to Claire Jeffreys, a writer and his business manager. Their talented daughter, Savannah, 15, pens her own music. Being there for his family is the central reason Garland’s been out of the musical limelight for several years. “I did not want to be on the road all the time; I wanted to watch my daughter grow up.” He also wondered whether or not he should re-engage with the business of making music. After a long period of retreat, he came to see that, in the end, performing was the most important facet of his musical identity. Little by little, performing led to a desire to get back to writing new material.

I developed arthritis in my early 20s, but still I ran to calm my nerves. Around the year 1980, my friend Jack turned me onto Jeffreys’ music, and his songs became staples on my running mix-tapes. I usually just picked music that kept my mind off the pain, but as I listened to Jeffreys’ songs over and over again, the thoughtful lyrics started getting through to me. They started making me think about things I’d been ignoring, like race. Growing up in Yorkville, I saw very few Blacks or Hispanics. At LaSalle Academy and Hunter College, I had class with Blacks and Hispanics but had little social contact. Though prejudice wasn’t flagrant in my family, the subtleties were there, mostly fed by fear of the unknown. Hearing Jefferys’ stories, seeing the city through his eyes, visualizing his “Racial Repertoire,” gave me the desire to engage in other cultures and consider the race issue from both sides. This readied me for my work in city government.

In June 1992, I drove my brother, Rory, upstate to a rehab program, and not for the first time. Rory and I tried hard to become closer as brothers, but we couldn’t make it work. I loved Rory, but I didn’t know him. I was also having my own problems and about to change jobs. I returned to New York City miserable. The next day, I read Garland Jeffreys was giving a free concert at Summerstage in Central Park. I felt low and almost didn’t go. But that morning, June 20th, was Rory’s birthday, and he and I had always shared an affection for Jeffreys’ music. Plus, I had never seen him live.

Garland played for two hours. The cops were dancing by the third song. It was a gorgeous day, and the fans made the dust whirl in the air for the whole show. I wrote my first story when I was 49, eight years ago. The seed for that story was planted in Central Park at that show.