A comprehensive list of songs written about and inspired by Morningside Heights, complete with never-before-seen discoveries!

Recently, I was scrolling around Wikipedia, procrastinating on God-knows-what, when I stumbled across the Wikipedia page for Suzanne Vega’s 1982 song “Tom’s Diner,” the classic that spawned a million samples, covers, and interpolations. Now, perhaps I’ve been living under a rock and had completely missed the memo on this one prior to this day, but it was through this Wikipedia article that I first learned that “Tom’s Diner” is about Morningside Heights’ very own Tom’s Restaurant, where Vega frequented while studying at Barnard. I was already well aware of Tom’s Restaurant’s Seinfeldian fame, of course, but I hadn’t even considered the possibility of any sort of connection between Vega’s classic song and Morningside Heights.

My discovery got me thinking: what other classic songs are inspired by (or linked to) the wonderful, gentrified neighborhood we know and love, or even Columbia campus itself? I have conducted extensive research to determine the most influential songs written about the Morningside Heights area, and I even stumbled across historical documents and archives containing information never before seen, until now. Without further ado, here is the definitive soundtrack to Morningside Heights!

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“Copacabana,” Barry Manilow

Manilow’s 1978 hit famously relates the bloody, lovelorn story of a cast of characters— Lola the showgirl, Tony the bartender, Rico the gangster— that takes place at New York’s Copacabana nightclub. However, long-lost interviews have revealed that Manilow actually originally wrote the song about a squabble between a few of the workers at the Joe Coffee on the bottom floor of Noco. Rather than the dramatic gunfight and struggles with alcoholism depicted in the “Copacabana” we now know, the actual event involved one of the workers getting angry at another, splashing them in the face with a cup of lukewarm coffee, and then symbolically taking off their apron and walking out. After toying around with different drafts commemorating this saga, Manilow decided to spice things up a little more, and he moved the setting downtown to provide a more exotic, high-stakes feel.

“Back to December,” Taylor Swift

The listening public knows Speak Now standout “Back to December” as a poignant lament and apology towards ex-boyfriend Taylor Lautner, an early and definitive moment in Taylor’s lyrical and emotional maturity. However, a little-known fact about “Back to December” is that Taylor actually wrote the original draft about the Columbia tree lighting ceremony on College Walk. Written in the buffer period between the tree lights being turned off in late winter and Daylight Savings plunging the world back into light in early spring, “Back to December” originally was intended to harken back to a time when, no matter what else was going in your life, you always had the lights of the College Walk trees as something to keep you going, something to look at and remind you that there is beauty left in the world.

“Centuries,” Fall Out Boy

Here’s what we knew before: in 2015, Fall Out Boy wrote a song that interpolated Vega’s hook from “Tom’s Diner.” Now, recently unearthed artifacts and documents suggest that in order to remain faithful to the spirit of Vega’s original song, the band traveled to Morningside Heights prior to writing “Centuries” in order to get a feel for the setting of “Tom’s Diner.” I’m told that after a mediocre dinner at Tom’s Restaurant, Pete Wentz, Patrick Stump and co. spent several weeks exploring Morningside Heights, and ultimately wrote “Centuries” to commemorate the legend of  Koronet Pizza, very presciently anticipating the immortality and inevitability of this timeless establishment beloved by humans and rodents alike!

“Hotel California,” the Eagles

The finalized lyrics of this 1976 banger frame an anonymous hotel in the Golden State as its setting, but historical analysis and recently restored footage has revealed that the Eagles originally wrote this song about none other than our very own Schermerhorn Hall. Eagles songwriters Don Henley and Glenn Frey initially wrote the chorus as “Welcome to the Schermerhorn Extension,” but focus group testing in the early stages of recording found that this lyrical reference was not relatable to most audiences, especially given that many of the people who have tangoed with the captivating mysticism of the Schermerhorn Extension are still trapped there, wandering the eternal labyrinth, to this day. The final song fell victim to West Coast bias, but it can be our little secret that we came so close to having had “Hotel California”’s all-time guitar solo as a serenade to natural sciences at Columbia!

“Take Me Home, Country Roads,” John Denver

Are you going to really let yourself be fooled by something as silly as geographical references in the lyrics of West Virginia’s state song? Make no mistake, John Denver initially wrote this song about nothing less than the comforts of the 1 train line, a New York City institution that Barnumbia students are well acquainted with. Who among us hasn’t been compelled to pen a moving, thoughtful ode to the scarlet-themed transportation conduit that’s carried us all home on many a late night? What’s more, while conducting research for this article, I discovered a hidden library— underground, in fact; I tore through scroll after scroll, and one of them contained, to my astonishment, John Denver’s first draft of lyrics for “Take Me Home, Country Roads,” which validates the interpretation that he’d originally written the song with the 1 train in mind. The lyrics were in their original Latin, but I have painstakingly translated them, and here follows a transcription of Denver’s initial draft:

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Almost heaven, number 1 line

Van Cortlandt Park, way down to South Ferry

Always ride the MTA’s finest

Cathedral Parkway, up to 116th

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Take me home, 1 line train

To the place I belong

Columbus Circle, Lincoln Center

Take me home, 1 line train

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New York City, on the subway

No Metrocard, if you’ve got Apple Pay

But there’s one train that stands out most

Keep your N, Q, R, W, your 7 and your F

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Take me home, 1 line train

To the place I belong

Columbus Circle, Lincoln Center

Take me home, 1 line train

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Thank you for your words, Mr. Denver.

“Harmony Hall”, Vampire Weekend

This is the most obvious one on this list, so I almost considered not including it, but no list of Morningside Heights-related music is complete without Vampire Weekend. As we all know, in the opening lines of “Harmony Hall,” “we took a vow in summertime” is a reference to first-year NSOP, while “now we find ourselves in late December” refers to the unfortunate position of taking final exams on December 23rd. The titular “Harmony Hall” itself refers, of course, to Morton Williams, a dignified and stony-walled place if ever I saw one.

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I hope the discoveries I’ve made can help you listen to all of these classic songs in a totally new light! And thank you to all of these wonderful musical artists and creative geniuses for celebrating the campus and the neighborhood so dear to all of our hearts!

Tom’s! via bwarchives