A History of Cleveland Sports
Fight Songs (In Stereo)
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by Andrew Clayman
In a lot of sports towns, cheesy old fight songs are sung with pride-- transcending their gimmicky, promotional origins to become enduring anthems of a team’s success. Unfortunately, the tune’s a tad different in Cleveland, where fifty years of sunken dreams have left us with a sports soundtrack rife with desperation and unintentional comedy. Sure, we can still hum along to all the classic Indians, Browns, and Cavs theme songs, and we might even secretly love a few of them. But when it comes down to it, we know that catching “Indian Fever” is actually a bad thing—akin to the plague in some respects. And while we all certainly chant “Here We Go Again” during Browns games, it is rarely uttered in the manner Michael Stanley intended.
On the bright side, Cleveland’s diverse jukebox of original sports jams does serve as a pretty good window into our shared past—both on the field and in the stands. Each song belongs to its time, written to appeal to its own simplified nugget of pop culture history. So, predictably, we got a little funkier in the ‘70s, synthier in the ‘80s, and shittier in the 2000s. But why get ahead of ourselves? Please enjoy the official Evolution of Cleveland Sports Fight Songs, featuring full audio of the legendary recordings themselves.
Written in 1946, this is the only song in our playlist actually associated with a championship team. But let’s go ahead and gloss over that sad fact for now. The amusing tidbit about the Browns’ original (and still only viable) fight song is that Paul Brown himself played a major role in its creation, recruiting his old Massillon High School crony George T. Bird to write and arrange it. For a brief time, Bird even brought in his all-girl marching band, the "Musical Majorettes," to serve as the team's halftime music / cheerleaders. Innovative as Brown and Bird might have been when it came to football and girl power, however, the tune itself fits pretty easily into the traditional Sousa-esque college fight song mold. Still, they might have been on to something, because this 65 year-old anthem probably holds up as well as any other on the list.
1. Cleveland Browns Fight Song: Hi O-Hi-O for Cleveland (1940s)
How do you cope with the trade of Rocky Colavito and a collapse into perennial irrelevance? By chilling at the Copacabana, of course! In this little samaba-esque lounge ditty, Sammy Watkins [no, not that one] and his Orchestra suggest, rather passively, than it might be kinda fun to “go, go, go to the Indians ballgame.” Then, backed by a dainty jazz flute, the lady singer says “we’ll be king and queen for a day when the Indians play.” It’s a somewhat unique approach to a fight song, in that it mainly emphasizes the spectators’ search for Sunday recreation, rather than the talents or motivations of the actual team. I suppose they do mention how lovely it would be if the Indians won “every game,” but that just speaks to a snooty sense of entitlement. Why should I care what Betty Draper thinks about my damn baseball team?
2. The Indians Baseball Song (1960s)
Now here’s a voice I can get behind! “Come On Cavs” has a soft spot in many hearts, being the sax-tastic theme to the Cavaliers’ Miracle of Richfield season in 1976. But would you believe this particular brand of afro-picking, bell-bottomed funk was penned not by Sly Stone, but this man—the extremely white and mustachey Cleveland DJ Larry Morrow? It’s true. Jim Chones broke his foot kicking a cat when he heard about it.
3. Come On Cavs, Gonna Make It Happen (1970s)
This classic 7” single from the legendary band Messenger (?) combines the basic cadence of “A Boy Named Sue” with the vocal stylings of Country Joe McDonald. It also promotes the dangerous combination of alcohol and tranquilizers, which can apparently lead to severe hallucinations including but not limited to (a) Brian Sipe throwing winged footballs, (b) Sam Rutigliano spiking his team’s sports drink with radioactive chemicals (c) God showing up dressed in a Browns uniform.
4. The Kardiac Kids Song (1980)
Here we have another example of the tightrope the Tribe marketing team must walk when crafting its theme songs. Notice the subtle avoidance of any specific predictions of greatness from the likes of Carmello Castillo or Neal Heaton. Instead, we’ve got lines like “each game is a brand new beginning” (translation: forget about yesterday’s horrendous performance); “you’re the winner at every game” (if you bet against the home team); and, of course, “be a believer” (because when God’s not in his Browns jersey, he’s decked out in Wahoo).
5. Indian Fever (1980s)
Up to this point, Cleveland sports teams had had their share of cheap, novelty theme songs. What they were lacking was a true, red-blooded, completely un-ironic ANTHEM. And heartland rocker and proud Clevelander Michael Stanley was more than happy to give it to them. Sure, it’s hard to picture the choir boy crew of Price, Daugherty, and Nance “taking no prisoners,” but you have to tip your cap to Stanley for that “hard workin’ town, hard workin’ team” zinger. Those Cavs teams really were just like us-- not particularly athletic, battling chronic back pain, and bemoaning unrealized potential.
6. Cavs Basketball: Tonight's the Night (1980s)
Um, wow. If memory serves, this Casio-inflected atrocity actually replaced “Tonight’s the Night” as the Cavalier fight song in the early ‘90s. A bit of a downgrade, I’d say, considering “Go Cavs Go” currently stands as the 17th worst song in recorded history, sandwiched snuggly between Train's "Drops of Jupiter" and the Barbasol shaving cream jingle. No one liked “Go Cavs Go” when it was actually in use, and its proven immune even to the sort of irrational nostalgia that’s made “Indians Fever” retroactively amusing.
7. Go Cavs Go (1990s)
As the Cavs took a step back, the Indians rebounded with an all-time classic. Initially written as another “have faith even though we suck” song in the early ‘90s, the lyrics were tweaked when the team moved to Jacobs Field and started looking like a legitimate contender (although the singer still cautiously says that “we’ve got a future” rather than “we’re f%&%in’ awesome” or something). This fight song is still used on radio broadcasts sometimes, mainly because it does the two things a great fight song is supposed to do—it pumps you up, and it doesn’t inspire suicidal thoughts after repeated listens.
8. Talkin' Tribe (1990s)
The Browns were feeling a bit left behind on the fight song front in the ‘80s and ‘90s, despite a series of popular but awful fan anthems like “Bernie Bernie.” To bring the franchise back into musical relevance, they called upon the tried and true guitar of—who else? Michael Stanley! Only this time, Michael wasn’t content to just tap into Cleveland’s blue collar soft spot. Instead, he called big name rock n’ roll friends Joe Walsh, Clarence Clemons, and Gerald Levert to pump some “We Are the World” energy into the new Browns anthem. Eventually, “Here We Go Again” would function as the expansion Browns’ comeback song, but I’m pretty sure it was originally written for one of the Bellichick teams in the mid ‘90s, with the endlessly repetitive chorus referring more to the start of a new season, rather than an entirely new era of unprecedented embarrassment and misery.
9. Cleveland Browns: Here We Go Again (1990s)
Improved lyrics:
This is awful. This is stupid. This is tuneless. We’ve got Darius Miiiiiiles. Hey!
...It should be noted that the Cavs of the first LeBron era had some theme songs, too, but I honestly can't remember a single one of them. Hmm.
10. This Is Cleveland (2000s)
It’s the 21st century now, which means that even the elderly prefer rock n’ roll to polka. Hence, fight songs must be “edgier.” This one was well crafted in at least one respect—the opening warpath rhythm and anonymous chanting chorus succeed at grabbing fans’ attention away from their smart phones for a second or two. Stylistically, though, it’s really not all that different from the way “Indians Fever” starts; just a little more grungy and less cheesy. Well, less cheesy until the generic, Sam’s Club-brand Bon Jovi starts singing the first verse, anyway. Ugh. Can I get a fight song vocal with some actual fire behind it?
11. It's Tribe Time Now! (2010s)
12. Brown and Orange (2010s)
Okay, on second thought, maybe fire is overrated. This isn’t a team-sanctioned Browns fight song, by the way. It’s more like the modern equivalent of what Messenger was doing in 1980—independently releasing a basement tape as an ode to a football team. In this case, though, the band Dirt has the internet to shuttle its rock-rap Browns jam across the globe, meaning that a kid in Peru might come across “Brown and Orange” and learn that the Cleveland Browns truly are the “baddest team in the league,” just as their record often suggests.
I suppose I should note that there are a couple other “Brown and Orange” songs out there right now that simply lift the backing track from Wiz Khalifa’s “Black and Yellow” song and make it about Cleveland instead of Pittsburgh. That is some sad, unimaginative, second fiddle shit that defeats its own purpose. Maybe we really ought to just stick with “Hi O-Hi-O for Cleveland” and let the needle fall off the record this time.
On a related note, did you know there are apparently lyrics to that mightiest of Browns anthems? Sing along, won't you?
Hi-O-Hi-O for Cleveland,
For the greatest team in the land
We raise our voices, in one great chorus,
Just to make them understand
We're proud they come from Cleveland,
Where we play the best football
Hi-O-Hi-O for Cleveland
To the greatest pro team of all !
We're All-American people
From an All-American town
We cheer the Indians,
we cheer the Barons
And we cheer the Cleveland Browns.
We're all for one with Cleveland
We sing to her renown.
For we're All-American people
From an All-American town!
