Songs that quote other songs

[killer b]

I've been a bit obsessed recently with Enrico Caruso's 1907 recording of Vesti la giubba from Leoncavallo's Pagliacci - the whole recording is gold, but I've set it to start at the money:



Famously Queen quote it at the start of It's A Hard Life



But! it turns out it's cropped up in other places too.

Here he is in Engelbert Humperdinck's When There Is No You



and again in The Ink Spots' Tell Me You Love Me



Both pretty cool tunes IMO.

Please post your other tips below

 

[Pickman's model]

God Save the queen, sex pistols

 

[zahir]

Robbie Fulks, The Buck Starts Here




quoting Crying Time by Buck Owens

 

[Elpenor]

A name check of Lee Marvin’s Wondering Star

 

[Puddy_Tat]

is a name-check a quote, though?

we've done that before

Songs which mention other songs

The Pogues - Pair of Brown Eyes (An old man in the corner sang Where the Water Lillies Grow) and obviously, The Band Played Waltzing Matilda

www.urban75.net

 

[killer b]

is a name-check a quote, though

No I'm interested in melodic quotes really

 

[Steel Icarus]

Do you mean deliberate quotes rather than stuff deliberately or accidentally very similar to others?

 

[killer b]

whichever you like really.

 

[killer b]

Michel Legrand's Windmills of your Mind:



definitely quotes this Mozart:

 

[Sweet FA]

One D; Best Song Ever & The Who; Baba O Riley.

 

[killer b]

Barry Manilow's Could It Be Magic is based on a Chopin tune:

 

[Steel Icarus]

Middle eight/sixteen from Radiohead's Creep - verse melody from The air that I breathe by The Hollies
Guitar break from the Bunnymen's Seven seas - guitar break from Morrissey's Suedehead
Love is a bourgeois construct by Pet Shop Boys - Michael Nyman Chasing sheep is best left to shepherds
The end of Love will tear us apart - And then he kissed me - The Crystals

 

[Sweet FA]

Smoke on the Water riff is nicked too. Jon Lord was a jazzer in his youth I think.

 

[Steel Icarus]

Wild world by Cat Stevens - It's a sin by Pet Shop Boys

 

[killer b]

Love is a bourgeois construct by Pet Shop Boys - Michael Nyman Chasing sheep is best left to shepherds

I remember an interview with Neil Tennant where he claimed the verse of a then-recent single had been inspired by Stretch & Vern's I'm Alive - they spread their net wide those lads

 

[Steel Icarus]

I remember an interview with Neil Tennant where he claimed the verse of a then-recent single had been inspired by Stretch & Vern's I'm Alive - they spread their net wide those lads

Yeah, and I was just coming here to post another of theirs I've remembered - Integral from their Fundamental album is a direct lift off Diva's My body, your body, everybody move your body

 

[hitmouse]

Third Reich and Roll has to be up there for the most quotes?

And I'm assuming we're excluding samples here.
Does the drum beat from Be My Baby count? I think that might have turned up in one or two other places over the years.

 

[Bus Honeygun]

The Beatles 'Taxman' and 'Start' by The Jam seem a bit too unsubtle to include.

You could probably say the same about these too, but I reckon there's a bit more to the latter than a straight lift.

 

[andysays]

The melody on this one


is based on the bass line from this one

 

[killer b]

The Beatles 'Taxman' and 'Start' by The Jam seem a bit too unsubtle to include.

You could probably say the same about these too, but I reckon there's a bit more to the latter than a straight lift.

That Neu motorik throb crops up loads of times in Stereolab's work - I'd say this is a bit closer

 

[Bus Honeygun]

That Neu motorik throb crops up loads of times in Stereolab's work - I'd say this is a bit closer

Yeah, it is a bit take your pick, but you're right, that's closest. See also:

 

[ouirdeaux]

The list of songs based on Pachelbel's Canon is staggering.

 

[hitmouse]

Suppose there's that Wire/Elastica one?

 

[Steel Icarus]

Crash by The Primitives was stolen for the Same Smile tv programme on CBeebies

 

[ebay sex moomin]

The verse to Elvis Costello's anti-Thatcher polemic Tramp the Dirt Down musically quotes Stevie Wonder's Isn't She Lovely?, which is a nice touch. Musical sarcasm.

 

[stavros]

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