As part of Bluecoat’s celebration of Liverpool FC winning the 2019/20 season Premier League, their Artistic Director Bryan Biggs has compiled a music playlist on a football theme.
Drawing from his own vinyl collection and with a little help from the internet, the selection focuses on LFC and the many records released by the team, fans and others over the past five decades.
However, there are also tracks in this Top 40 about other teams, about victories and defeats, the World Cup and European Championships; records that inspired football chants and songs that feature them; anthems you love and hate; tunes to sing along with or dance to.
Together, they reflect the fascination that football has held for musicians for nearly a century and a half, starting with Football Crazy, written in the 1880s and recorded by Scottish folk duo Robin Hall and Jimmy MacGregor in 1959.
The playlist covers many musical genres including pop, comedy, prog rock, reggae, punk, indie, country, and disco, from the UK, Europe, Jamaica, Kenya and USA.
A warning though: the playlist includes some truly awful records (that can be easily skipped by moving onto the next track), and a few – the real sound of the terraces – that include some colourful language.
Football Crazy YouTube Playlist
Football Crazy Spotify Playlist
(with fewer tracks)
Bryan has also trawled their My Bluecoat archive to create a new slideshow featuring football-themed artwork over the past 40 years.