top of page
Writer's pictureMaisie Loh

Musicians Inspired by Sports



We all know that love and romance inspire musicians into writing songs for their beloved or to heal a broken heart. Adele famously wrote an entire album about a breakup from her former partner. Musicians are also inspired by events in their lives that they regret - such as Joni Mitchell’s famous 1970 song “Woodstock”. The song is about how Mitchell refused to perform at the festival only to realise how important it was later on. Songs can also be inspired by others’ opinions. Kurt Cobain wrote “Smells Like Teen Spirit” after a friend commented that he smells like deodorant for women.


Musicians Who Love Sports


Music can also be inspired by other sources such as sports. Sports play a big role in the minds of Americans and Europeans, where most pop songs come from. Sports as we have seen in the news to social media can evoke a lot of passion from fans. Musicians too are often sports fans themselves. Jay-Z, who grew up in Brooklyn, loves the NBA’s New Jersey Nets so much he bought a stake in it. Tim McGraw went to Northeast Louisiana on a baseball scholarship and studied sports medicine before becoming a country music star. He was a minority owner of arena football’s Nashville Kats.


Sports have been known to inspire a whole range of emotions and we know how emotions can inspire songwriting. The ups and downs that come from major games is what inspired some of the great music about sports.


Eye of the Tiger


Eye of the Tiger is the third album by American rock band Survivor in 1982. The title track was a huge hit, reaching the number one spot in the US and UK, receiving a boost as a soundtrack in Rocky III. In fact, the band was approached by Sylvester Stallone, who wanted to collaborate with the band on the film Rocky III’s soundtrack.


Stallone insisted that the song produced “had a pulse” that would accompany the blows exchanged in the film. After watching a part of the film, Stallone sent the band a song “Ever Since The World Began”, a ballad that could not be further from the adrenaline-filled “Eye of the Tiger”. The song was released as a single three weeks after the film began screening in cinemas and took the top spot in the US singles chart and remained there for seven weeks.


Two of a Kind Working on a Full House


Garth Brooks' ingenious songwriting saw him writing “Two of a Kind Working on a Full House” based on his relationship with his partner, which he compared to the game of poker. The song is about the life he is working to build together with his partner and he used the metaphor of the poker hands “two of a kind”, sometimes called a pair or full house to describe his relationship. The metaphor works on multiple levels. Two of a kind is one of the least desirable card combinations while full house is one of the best.


Take Me Out to the Ball Game


As the song suggests, it is about going to the ball game - the ball game in question is baseball. The song was released back in 1908 and has become a classic among baseball fans in the US. The song was composed despite the singer and composer never having ever visited a baseball game before writing it.


It is so popular that it has become a tradition for stadiums to play the song during the seventh inning of a baseball game. Fans often sing along to boost the atmosphere of the game at the stadium. “Take me out to the ball game” was originally sung with only a piano. Despite its simplicity, it has spent more than 100 years as a favourite song among baseball fans.


If you are interested in song composition, check out our music programmes at Ritmo Music Studio in Singapore.


7 views0 comments

Recent Posts

See All

Comments


bottom of page