Ready to go: Music, memory and Leicester City
As the dust settles on the point gained against Everton or two points lost debate, writes Helen Thompson, we have another long weekend of waiting to see which direction the twisty loop of the Leicester City rollercoaster will take next.
Some of you will be entirely relaxed and I envy you, some of you will go for the ostrich route and some of you will hopefully join me in trying to stay distracted.
Perhaps it's because it's the week of notable anniversaries for Leicester City that I find myself reflecting on seasons past and particularly how I remember so many games or moments because of a song or piece of music.
Identity and allegiance
I have long been fascinated by how music and memory associate themselves and how a song can instantly transport you back to a single moment, feeling or place. Music and football are intrinsically linked, music offers identity and allegiance to football, one of many factors in feeling like you belong.
For every song crafted for or about football, there are a dozen songs that are now just associated with football and that clubs and fans play because it’s special to them. Darude’s Sandstorm is a prime example you can probably always find somewhere blaring out of speakers on a Saturday.
The music a club plays around the matchday routine tells you a lot about them and their town or city’s identity. Typically it feels like Premier League clubs conform to chart music, generally pretty modern and often designed to get the crowd going. But years in the Championship and League One offered a little more variety.
Away days at certain clubs, often Northern, felt like taking a time machine back to the 1970s. Are they nostalgic or is it just cheaper? Manchester City used to lean heavily towards playing local bands, though their depth of choice is pretty strong.
Then there are clubs like Crystal Palace who appear to have compiled their playlist with the idea that "whatever, anything goes". Or perhaps that's just leftover irritation from not only losing late in the game last month but having to endure the PA system blasting out Vengaboys at the end.
Leicester life
Ask any Leicester City fan about their favourite game or footballing moment and they can always recite the emotion in the clearest detail even if they can't quite remember the exact date it happened or who scored the insert random number goal.
I'd be fascinated to know if music is also something that springs to mind for these memories too. Think of Leicester City and there are the obvious artists and songs; Kasabian, Jersey Budd’s now iconic version of When You're Smiling, Uptown Funk to name but a few.
At the start of my football love story with Leicester City, Filbert Street always played the same tracks just before kick-off, Let Me Entertain You by Robbie Williams and Republica’s Ready to Go. Even now, hearing Republica will make the hair stand up on the back of my neck.
In those days, music was something I ingested rather than picked myself. It’s typically as a teenager that you develop and curate your own taste in music. Oddly, I didn’t find myself having such fond feelings and going back to Bon Jovi’s Keep The Faith from those days, though its motto is making a comeback even if we haven’t resorted to blasting it back out of the PA system yet. This isn’t a hint if the Foxes staff are reading this.
There are songs that conjure up the good memories: Black and White Town by Doves will forever be linked to my memory of a long trip (from Grimsby) to The Valley to see Leicester play the underdog role and knock Charlton out of the FA Cup. If we’re all being honest, the montage videos and little documentary from the 2015/16 season have been watched a few times, so it conjures up great images to hear either Kygo's Firestone or London Thunder by Foals.
This was brought to a head by having Kasabian play the same songs we’re used to hearing at the King Power played out at Victoria Park for the trophy celebrations. I have my own personal favourite memory of the first song that came on when we left Manchester City, Robert Huth having been on a hat-trick and Riyad Mahrez stealing the show. We finally believed in the impossible dream and Wolves by Coasts offered the perfect song to match the cloud-nine feeling in the car.
Pumped up and rough trips
The association carries into most non-footballing scenarios too, most of us have been to a gig or in a public space where Freed From Desire has come on and you have various versions of the song sung back, tailored for whichever city you’re in. Cue some often vexed, non-football goers who seem less enthusiastic about it.
In these scenarios, much like when the goal music rings out, they move the collective crowd and unite fans who may not always agree otherwise. Similar to everybody coming together to belt out ‘Barnes will tear you apart again’ regardless of whether you know or like the Joy Division original. Most of the best Leicester chants have taken well-known, loved songs and turned them to honour a player.
There are the songs that keep us going on the long, long drives around the country watching the Foxes not win away. I’m of the belief that most football fans have a playlist designed to pump you up before a game, I’d also highly recommend playlists to cheer you up after a loss, or to match the ridiculous feeling of late winners and comfortable victories (sparse as they may be in 2022/23).
There were some rough trips back to back in the Championship years, not least when we won away so rarely. I’m always transported back to Crystal Palace away on the opening day of 2009/10, when we lost 3-2 under Paulo Sousa after an incredibly poor first half. The song that takes me back? Kickstarts by Example. Poignant lyrics: “Start to think it could be fizzling out, kinda shocked because I never really had any doubts, look into your eyes imagine life without you and the love kick starts again”.
Then there are the songs we wish we could forget, or at least erase the corresponding football memory. You won’t find me voluntarily switching on The Black Eyed Peas, but if I hear I Got A Feeling I am unfortunately thrust straight back to the Cardiff City away end where Martyn Waghorn"s saved penalty (after that Yann Kermorgant miss) and this song plays out to celebrate Cardiff City advancing to the play-off final.
Too late?
I don’t consider myself a particularly superstitious person. I’ve never bought into the reason that Leicester lost because lucky socks weren’t worn (maybe that's just because there's been an ongoing lack of competent defending or clean sheets). Nor do I have to enter via a certain turnstile, but one will always favour #10 in honour of Andy King.
Although it's been tempting many times to throw rationality out of the window this season because we needed something, anything, I consider myself pretty rational. Why then do I allow my music library or playlists to influence how I think a game will finish before the ball has even been kicked?
Sat in the car ready to drive to Leicester ahead of the Everton game, I loaded up music on my phone and hit shuffle. The first track it picked? Titled Too Late. Not the omen I really wanted to parallel Dean Smith’s limited number of games to turn around the Foxes fortune.
This was followed shortly after by The Pigeon Detectives’ new song, featuring the lyrics “I keep falling to pieces over you”. They’re clearly not about watching Leicester City this season, but they might as well be. Most of us will have been in some sort of love affair with this football club longer than most of our friendships or actual relationships so it’s easy to see why lyrics like this resonate.
Music won’t change our fortunes and a simple change of music before or after the game won’t save us, but it can be a factor in getting the crowd going. How rocking was it when they played Freed From Desire after Wolves? While there isn’t currently a song that encapsulates the season, after all it isn’t done yet, here’s hoping it can be one accompanying a positive memory.
And if the club does want to shake up the pre-match music, I’m all for bringing back Republica.
