![the fourth of july. pete droge the fourth of july. pete droge](https://lastfm.freetls.fastly.net/i/u/174s/66817a3fa9d1422bc2d6b05cd5113b3f.png)
![the fourth of july. pete droge the fourth of july. pete droge](https://i1.wp.com/music-defined.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/img_5795.jpg)
Now that's a July 4 spectacle to remember. Take "Walkin' the Dog" by '60s soul singer Rufus Thomas: "I ask my mother for 15 cents to see an elephant jump the fence. Some songs use the holiday as a convenient rhyme. He dug for him a shallow grave and laid his body down." Sun so hot, clouds so low, the eagles fill the sky." Before the holiday was up, he had caught trains in Santa Fe and Cheyenne, and ultimately "Jack Straw from Wichita cut his buddy down. The Grateful Dead's "Jack Straw" left Texas "fourth day of July. Driving into Darlington County looking for some work on the county line." They never find it, but they meet some girls and Wayne gets arrested and handcuffed to the bumper of a state trooper's Ford.Ĭlearly, characters in songs have done things on July 4 other than barbecue and watch fireworks. The only Springsteen lyric that mentions July 4 explicitly is in called "Darlington County." It starts off: "Driving into Darlington County, me and Wayne on the Fourth of July. By then even "the waitress I was seeing has lost her desire for me." In the other, the hero gets his shirt caught in the tilt-a-whirl and can't get off, which prevents him from pursuing all the New York virgins on the New Jersey boardwalk. One is about a guy leaving home, presumably ruining the family cookout. Preferably one or the other, not both, to maintain surprise and mystery.īruce Springsteen's "Independence Day" and his wordy "4th of July, Asbury Park (Sandy)" don't refer to the holiday beyond the title. To qualify, a song has to include the words "Fourth of July" or "Independence Day" in its title or lyrics. Blues" are not true Independence Day songs. Strictly speaking, the obvious standards like Hendrix's "Star- Spangled Banner" and the Grateful Dead's "U.S.