We are shifting our gaze to the largest member of the animal kingdom – the Elephant – to discover what music it has inspired.
“Elephant” is a song by British singer Alexandra Burke from her second studio album Heartbreak on Hold (2012). It features Colombian-American DJ Erick Morillo, who co-wrote the song with Burke, Britt Burton, Josh Wilkinson, Harry Romero, and Jose Nuñez. The song was produced by Morillo, Romero and Nuñez under their stage name Sympho Nympho, and Mike Spencer. It was released in the United Kingdom in March 2012 as the album’s lead single. The song was released as Burke’s debut single in the United States in March 2012. “Elephant” was met with mixed reviews from critics, some of whom criticised the song’s production and the use of Auto-Tune. It debuted at number seven in Ireland and at number three in the UK, becoming Burke’s sixth top 10 hit in both countries.
“Elephant” is a song by Australian psychedelic rock band Tame Impala, released in July 2012 as the lead single from their second album Lonerism (2012). The single features artwork from Australian artist Leif Podhajsky, who also created the artwork for Innerspeaker and the follow-up Lonerism. Kevin Parker explains that: Elephant is actually one of the oldest songs that I have, it’s just been in the vaults this whole time. I’m not sure why we never recorded it before, but we were just playing it at a sound check one night and everyone in the band was like, ‘We should just put this on the album’, and so we did.
“Elephant” is a track by While She Sleeps. The expression “elephant in the room” is used to denote a significant issue that is obvious to everyone, but which they avoid discussing or even mentioning. According to The Oxford English Dictionary, the first recorded use of the phrase, as a simile, was in The New York Times in June, 1959: Financing schools has become a problem about equal to having an elephant in the living room. It’s so big you just can’t ignore it. For While She Sleeps guitarist Sean Long, the elephant in the room is mankind’s inability to get on with each other. War and destruction will carry on until we learn how to live in harmony. Long explained to Rock Sound: “Everybody is trying to achieve world peace while some people are trying to blow everything up and god knows what is happening in the middle. Has no one ever noticed that everyone has never been OK with each other? The only way world peace can happen is if people realize that not everyone will be the same. That’s the true elephant in the room.”
“Elephant Ears” is a track taken from Sara Smile the third studio album by American country music singer Jimmy Wayne. It was released in November 2009 by Valory Music Group, an imprint of Big Machine Records. The album’s title track is a cover of Hall & Oates’ 1976 single, as well as the first single from it. Dann Huff, Mark Bright and Nathan Chapman produced the album. Wayne co-wrote four of the album’s tracks: “Just Knowing You Love Me,” “Just Look at You,” “I’ll Never Leave You” and “Elephant Ears”.
“Elephant Song” is a song by The Enemy and is taken from their 2009 album ‘Music for the People’. This song is named after the symbol of Coventry, which is Enemy’s home city. Frontman Tom Clarke told The Sun in April 2009 that this song was inspired by the band’s first trip to Japan. He explained: “It’s about being on a plane for 12 hours and landing in Tokyo and it seeming like another planet. It’s an amazing place, it’s like Mars.”
“Elephants” is a song by Rachael Yamagata taken from her album ‘Teeth Sinking Into Heart’ (2008). Yamagata was working out some relationship issues when she wrote this song, which deals with our animal instincts. The first animal she sings about is the mighty elephant, which always remembers. This triggers a tough memory for Yamagata, who wants to forget her ex. Next is the tiger, which represents her ferocious side, then finally the hawk, a scavenger that will feast on the dead. Love is a dangerous game indeed. Yamagata came up with the lyric in a flash of inspiration while running down a mountain in Woodstock, New York, where she does most of her writing.
