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Subject: The Night Chicago Died - True Story?
Hey does anyone know if the song "The Night Chicago Died" is actually about some real battle of cops versus the bad guys?
Or was it just some silly tune thought up by a gangster movie fan?
By the way... there really IS an "East Side of Chicago" and it is not in Lake Michigan. Basically the entire area on the Lakeshore is the "East Side". But it seems that it would be a bad place for the cops and gangsters to have a shootout. West side or South Side (home of Bad Bad Leroy Brown) would be more likely places for a fight.
So... is the song fact or fantasy ?
Subject: Re: The Night Chicago Died - True Story?
Well, there was a man named Al Capone, who tried to make that town his own. And it was true he killed many cops. But it is a fact the Paper Lace is from the UK and not the East Side of Chicago. ;)
Subject: Re: The Night Chicago Died - True Story?
Quoting:
Hey does anyone know if the song "The Night Chicago Died" is actually about some real battle of cops versus the bad guys?
Or was it just some silly tune thought up by a gangster movie fan?
By the way... there really IS an "East Side of Chicago" and it is not in Lake Michigan. Basically the entire area on the Lakeshore is the "East Side". But it seems that it would be a bad place for the cops and gangsters to have a shootout. West side or South Side (home of Bad Bad Leroy Brown) would be more likely places for a fight.
So... is the song fact or fantasy ?
End Quote
Now you got both "the night chicago died", and "bad bad leroy brown" stuck in my head.
Its based on an actulal historic time period, but I dont know if the story is truely real...as we know there was a man named Al Capone...
I dont think Bad Bad Leroy brown was real though....he was bad, bad leroy brown, baddest man in the whole damn town
Subject: Re: The Night Chicago Died - True Story?
Well, yes it does take place during a real period, that period would be late 1920s-1930s...you can refer to my parody of it called "The saint Valentines day massacre." And one way how you know that it is fake: The "East side of Chicago" where the song is sapost to take place, would actually be located in the middle of Lake Michigan!
Subject: Re: The Night Chicago Died - True Story?
This is what the liner notes to Rhino's box set, Have a Nice Decade: The '70s Pop Culture Box, has to say about the song:
"4-10. THE NIGHT CHICAGO DIED - Paper Lace
(Peter Callander/Lionel Stitcher)
Mercury single #73492 (6/74)
(Pop #1)
In August 1974 -- four months after losing a cover battle with Bo Donaldson & The Heywoods over "Billy, Don't Be A Hero" -- Paper Lace earned a #1 hit of their own with "The Night Chicago Died." The song, about a purported police shoot-out with gangster "Scarface" Al Capone, is passable bubblegum, but bad history. Capone died in prison in 1947. Perhaps the songwriters were thinking of John Dillinger. Never mind."
Subject: Re: The Night Chicago Died - True Story?
Quoting:
I dont think Bad Bad Leroy brown was real though....he was bad, bad leroy brown, baddest man in the whole damn town
End Quote
Actually, "Bad, Bad Leroy Brown" is based on a real person--someone Jim Croce knew in the Army. Apparently, he went AWOL, then came back for his paycheck...and as the MPs led him away in handcuffs, he didn't seem so big and bad anymore!