Pittsburgh

From This Might Be A Wiki

Screenshot from the studio version's video

song name	Pittsburgh
artist	They Might Be Giants
album	Venue Songs (Album), Venue Songs (DVD/CD)
year	2004
first played	July 25, 2004 (18 known performances)
run time	1:20
sung by	John Linnell

The venue song for Mr. Small's Theatre, it was originally known as "Mr. Small's Theatre" in the concert setlist.
This song recalls a tough show at the late bar, the Electric Banana: "It's a gig we played -- probably '86, after the release of our first album," Linnell says. "It (the venue) stood on sort of stilts on an edge of a hill, which we became aware of after we played the set, it was hanging maybe 40 feet over the edge of a precipice. It added to the sense of exciting danger."
The Electric Banana is a reference to a now-defunct Pittsburgh club where they played in 1987. Jamie Lincoln Kitman recalled that the club was nearly empty and that he was ready to throw up his hands. The Johns shook hands with everyone there and played "the best concert he had heard," Kitman told the New Yorker in 2001. An executive from a local Pittsburgh station was in the crowd, and the following day, "Don't Let's Start" was first broadcast on commercial radio.
The reference to the owner of The Electric Banana (in the live/DVD intro to the song), Johnny Banana, is not a joke. That is the name of the man who owned the club.

Current Rating

Pittsburgh is currently ranked #182 out of 797. (70 wikians have given it an average rating of 8.77)