There’s an online show called Soccer Morning, which you can find via You Tube, or via Stitcher Radio or Tunein. (Search for NASN Radio. It airs from 10am Eastern (USA) time, which is 3pm in the UK. It is American centric, obviously. But they also give a mention to European and World Cup football.

The presenter of the show: Jason Davis (@davisjsn) asked a question the other day – Where is the World Cup song for the USMNT (U.S. men’s national soccer team) ?

Which is a good question. Every time England qualify for something, the fans immediately take to You Tube to upload their song for England. We have the history of bursting into song for our team/country, but our American cousins still haven’t jumped on this particular bandwagon.

It might be because it’s not something USAians do, or because they expect somebody else to do it.

And that somebody else is usually somebody in the entertainment industry.

I've mentioned some of these before, but I like scratching at old wounds.

Before I pose the question again, let’s take a look at some of the music associated with the USA in the past…

⇒ We begin with a dark episode, one that many are still trying to forget…
(This was, by the way, brought up by Maxi Rodriguez @FutbolIntellect so blame him.)
It was 1990 and the first time the USA had made the finals since 1950. Sadly for them the USA’s performance in the tournament wasn’t the best… but that’s not the dark episode I am talking about. That came with the release of the offfical song for the USA 1990 World Cup team…

The perpertrators of this were Def Jef & DJ Eric Vaughn with the 1990 USA World Cup squad. I’ve looked all over for a copy of the single on vinyl or CD but no joy. If anyone does stumble across it let me know.

Oh and yes, you did see OJ Simpson there.

⇒ Next we go to 1994 and the USA were the host country. But sadly no-one bothered to do a song for the U.S team…

“But wait…” says Steve Welsh of @miniboro_dotcom, “What about the World Cup anthem from 1994 ? When the WC was in the USA ? Can’t go wrong with a bit of Daryl Hall…”

And who could forget the opening ceremony, combined with the worst miss in football ever.

But wait there’s more…

There was another American musical act who also got involved with the 1994 World Cup – and there’s a USMNT connection too:

Yes that is California Klinsmann, getting himself Americanized 20 years before he took up his USMNT role.

⇒ Fast forward to 2000’s now and to an artist who doesn’t just sing about soccer, he plays it too.

Rivers Cuomo

Rivers Cuomo is the lead singer of Weezer and a huge soccer fan. In 2002 he planned the band’s “World Cup tour” around the World Cup and then around 2006 he wrote a song about the U.S team which was eventually released on an album called “Alone: The Home Recordings Of Rivers Cuomo”. More background and the full story HERE.

The song for the USMNT was called: My Day Is Coming:

» Rivers Cuomo – My Day Is Coming

But he didn’t stop there. For the 2010 World Cup, he and his band Weezer were involved with this unoffical song:

There was another song… It was posted on this bloke’s YouTube channel, but sadly it has disappeared.
Luckily though I have the audio. The name of the artist comes from his YT channel and the title from the lyrics.

USMNT fans
» Loumae Earl – Blah Blah Blah Football

I love this one. Very tongue in cheek. Very American.

So again then, the question asked at the beginning of this post – Where is the 2014 World Cup song for the USA ?

If you have a suggestion of a song that could be used for the USMNT leave a comment below.

My thoughts are that an old song could be re-used, such as the Loumae Earl track above. Or there was a band called Air Miami who released a song (and remixes) called World Cup Fever.

Or we could go down the singing footballer route. There’s Deuce (of course) – or how about a retired player such as Jay DeMerit, or failing that – the Ginger Powerhouse of Alexi Lalas…

OK now I’ve gone too far.

1st June Update – There’s a song !

Kwami Darko, who hails from Washington DC but now lives in New York City has created an unofficial USMNT World Cup song – Bet They See Me Now:

You can Download it for free.

3 Replies to “2014 World Cup Songs – USA”

  1. Is it too late to nationalize Jedward ala David Regis? Surely some young American women can tie the knot for the good of US soccer fans with musical interests.

  2. Born to Run- The boss. As American as it gets. Or courtesy of the red white and blue by Toby Keith. That ones almost too american to be used

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