Songs About Natural Disasters & Accidents (Pt 2) Quiz

Answer: Tinderbox

A tinderbox is a metal box containing tinder, flint, and steel for striking a spark to create a flame, and is also the name of the Siouxsee and the Banshees album. The dance-pop-rock song describes the volcano as well as the victims, and the discovery and excavation years later of the city. The song made an appearance on the soundtrack of the movie "Grosse Pointe Blank."

"Drinkin' TNT and Smokin' Dynamite" is an album by Buddy Guy, "My Flame Burns Blue" is by Elvis Costello, and "Lighting Matches" is by Tom Brennan.

Answer: Mississippi

On April 30, 1900, Jones pulled train #1 out of the Memphis station at 12:50 am, driving his train for 155 miles, sometimes at 80mph. As his train pulled into the Durant, Mississippi depot, Jones was informed that a passenger train outside of Vaughan, Mississippi would be sitting on a siding and Jones's train would have the right of way.

Along the way, his fireman Sim Webb yelled to Jones that there was something on the tracks ahead. Jones yelled at Sim to jump, which he did. Casey Jones pulled the train's whistle to alert everyone around the stalled freight cars. He pulled back the throttle and activated the emergency brakes, slowing the train, but not enough to avoid a collision. He was found dead under the cab, the only casualty. By staying on the train and slowing it significantly, he was credited with saving the lives of the passengers and train workers.

Answer: Pete Seeger, and Falco

"The Titanic" written in 1915 by William and Versey Smith, was also known as "It Was Sad When That Great Ship Went Down" and "Titanic (Husbands and Wives)". It went:

"It was sad when that great ship went down
Husbands and wives and little children lost their lives
It was sad when that great ship went down."

Several artists recorded versions. Pete Seeger's is on his 1999 album, "Headlines and Footnotes: A Collection of Topical Songs"

Falco's "Titanic" song was in German from his 1992 album "Nachtflug" but translated it goes,
"The Titanic sinks in panic
Quite all-round But dashing
With all the millions in cash
And all the expensive laundry"

Answer: "High Water Everywhere", by Charley Patton / "Louisiana 1927", by Randy Newman

In 1929, two years after the flood, blues musician Charlie Patton wrote "High Water Everywhere" and recorded it for the Paramount Records label. It was also recorded in 2006 by Joe Bonamassa, and by Rory Block in 2005. Bob Dylan paid tribute to the song with his "High Water (For Charley Patton)" in 2001.

Mr. Patton's song:
"Man, that water was rising
At all places around
Where the fifty men and children, come to sink and drown
Now we're looking at New Orleans, where the crest stood high"

"Louisiana 1927" written and performed by Randy Newman on his album "Good Old Boys" (1974) reflects on the Great Mississippi Flood of 1927 that destroyed large areas of Mississippi, Louisiana and other southern U.S. states.

"The river rose all day
The river rose all night
Some people got lost in the flood
Some people got away alright"

Answer: 1930 R101 airship disaster

"Empire of the Clouds" is on the 2015 album "The Book of Souls" by the British heavy metal band Iron Maiden. It's an epic recording over 18 minutes long, with four movements, combining progressive rock and orchestral music. Written by frontman Bruce Dickinson, it tells the tale of the British airship R101 that crashed on a hill in Beauvais, France on October 5, 1930. The crash's impact wasn't at all violent-it was the hydrogen igniting that killed the 46 passengers and crew, and then two other crewmen who died from their injuries afterward.

"She's the biggest vessel built by man
A giant of the skies
For all you unbelievers, the Titanic fits inside"
...
""We're down lads" came the cry
Bow plunging from the sky
Three thousand horses silent as the ship began to die
The flares to guide her path, ignited at the last
The empire of the clouds
Just ashes in our past, just ashes at the last"

Answer: "The Ballad of John Axon", by Ewan MacColl

The folk song "The Ballad of John Axon" was written by Ewan MacColl in 1958, shortly after the "Derbyshire Train Crash," on February 9, 1957, in England near the village of Chapel-en-le-Frith.

Mr. MacColl based the song on the heroism of British train engineer John Axon, who perished while trying to save the lives of others in a locomotive accident on the Buxton to Manchester line, down the Woodhead Pass. At the time of the steam brake's failure, Axon had the opportunity to jump from the train while it was slow-moving, but because he knew that the train posed danger to people further down the line, he stayed at his post, doing whatever he could despite the scalding steam. John Axon died when the train collided with another train in front of it.

"By the gift of his courage
And the life that he gave
[Crash]
John Axon was a railway man to steam trains born and bred
He was an engine driver at Edgeley loco shed
He was a man of courage and served the iron way -
He gave his life upon the track one February day"

Answer: Lightnin' Hopkins

Samuel John "Lightnin" Hopkins was born March 15, 1912, and died January 30, 1982, whereas the other blues singer listed all passed on long before Hurricane Betsy attacked some Caribbean islands, south Florida, Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi, Arkansas, Tennessee and Missouri. Lightnin' Hopkins sang about the destruction it brought and the rising floodwaters:

"They say the backwater's risin'
Yes, comin' in my windows and doors"
And he sang about the loss of homes and lives:
"She had people runnin', they was tryin' to hide, but
Killed so many folks 'til the rest were left
They couldn't be satisfied"

Answer: Lake Superior

"The legend lives on from the Chippewa on down
Of the big lake they called Gitche Gumee
Superior, they said, never gives up her dead
When the gales of November come early"

The S.S. Edmund Fitzgerald sank in Lake Superior after breaking in half while carrying 26,116 tons of taconite pellets from the Burlington Northern Railroad, and sailing toward Zug Island on the Detroit River in winds 35-52 knots, and waves from 10 to 35 feet high. Twenty-nine crew members lost their lives:

"The church bell chimed 'til it rang twenty-nine times
For each man on the Edmund Fitzgerald."

Answer: Chernobyl

Saxon is a heavy metal band from England, and apparently as lead vocalist Biff Byford sings, "We were on the Russian border the day Chernobyl blew up / When the news began to break / Of a nuclear reactor melting down" thus spurring their inspiration for making this song. The Chernobyl nuclear plant in Ukraine was still part of the Soviet Union at that time in April 1986. More than 5% radioactive reactor core was released into the atmosphere:

"Sending deadly clouds of dust
Into the atmosphere
Falling down like rain upon the ground"

The long term effects of the disaster are still being studied.

Answer: Owl City

"Ladies and gentleman,
Today is a day for mourning and remembering"

begins the song by Owl City written by the electronica musician Adam Young, who says he was born on July 5th that year, and his mother would talk about being pregnant with him and watching the disaster on television and how it was a terrible blow to everyone. When Owl City went on tour sometimes, Young would play the clip of Reagan's speech to the nation about the Challenger loss: "We will never forget them, nor the last time we saw them, this morning, as they prepared for their journey and waved goodbye and "slipped the surly bonds of earth" to "touch the face of God." Adam Young used that exact quote in the last lines of lyrics to the song.