Sing All About It: Songs About Newspapers: The New Yorker Two of America's most venerable newspapers, the Boston Globe and the Washington Post, have been sold in the past week: the Globe to John Henry, the owner of the Boston Red Sox, for seventy million dollars; and the Post to Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon.com, for two hundred and fifty million dollars. Read David Remnick on the sale of the Post. Daily newspapers have been part of the American landscape since the Pennsylvania Packet; for much of the nation's history, they were the sole source of news. But they've been fairly minor figures in the history of rock and roll. For starters, rock and roll has depended upon (and concerned itself with) expansion in media and technology: the increased popularity of portable AM radios in the nineteen-sixties, the birth of MTV in the eighties, and so on. And rock's preoccupation with style has meant that when bands do write about print journalism, they lean more toward magazines than newspapers. Still, there are dozens of songs about newspapers. Here are ten. John Fogerty, "Headlines" (1986) A ferocious world-gone-wrong jeremiad from Fogerty's follow-up to "Centerfield," the unjustly maligned "Eye of the Zombie." The song opens with a savage parody of international conflict: "I read it in the paper today / Two cars howling "til the break of day." The Rolling Stones, "Yesterday's Papers" (1967) Are the Stones misogynistic? Are their songs? This one, from "Between the Buttons," offers some evidence in support of that theory - it equates "yesterday's girl" with old newspapers that should be discarded as soon as possible. Smog, "The Morning Paper" (1997) The leadoff track on "Red Apple Falls" opens with muted horns and a dim, weary view of the news. "Morning paper is on its way," Bill Callahan sings, "it's all bad news on every page." His solution is to go back to sleep. Joe Jackson, "Sunday Papers" (1979) If you ask people of a certain age to name one pop song about newspapers, this is the one they'll name. It's a portrait of an elderly mother who is confined to her home, and about the way that the newspaper keeps her connected to the world - or, more specifically, to the worthless gossip in the world. The lyric you will find yourself repeating in your own head: "Well, I got nothing against the press / They wouldn't print it if it wasn't true." Honey Cone, "Want Ads" (1970) If you ask people of another age to name one pop song about newspapers, this is the one they'll name. It's about a part of the newspaper that writers usually don't think about, but that has been central to the survival of many papers. It's also the only song here that topped the charts: "Wanted, young man, single and free." Public Enemy, "A Letter To The New York Post" (1991) Public Enemy took exception to the Post's coverage of the African-American community (specifically, a domestic-violence story about Flavor Flav), and so they decided simply to suffer in silence with their discontent. No, no: they wrote a sharp, funny, angry song about it. There are a few cringeworthy moments, including some offhanded homophobia and perhaps too much self-justification from Flavor Flav (most famously, "Put my address in the paper cause I smacked that girl / She's the mother of my kids I took around the world"). On the other hand, there's also Chuck D's timeless description of the Post as "America's oldest continuously published daily piece of bullshit." The Kinks, "Did You See His Name?" Sort of a cross between "A Day In the Life" and "Crime and Punishment," this song was written by Ray Davies for the television show "At The Eleventh Hour" before it was recorded by the Kinks - it tells the story of a man who stole "a tin of beans" from a discount grocery and was driven to suicide by the resulting publicity. The Jam, "News of the World" (1978) The Jam's assessment of newspaper reporters is rather dim: "Little men tapping things out, points of view / Remember their views are not the gospel truth." But the song starts with a call to arms ("Power pop!") and moves along briskly. And the performance video is excellent. Loudon Wainwright III, "Sunday Times" (1998) Unreleased until the "BBC Sessions" album, this is a tour through America's most famous paper. Favorite couplet: "You need a job? That's Section 9. You're not jobless? Hey, that's fine / Section 10 is Real Estate. You're not homeless? Hey, that's great. There's no video available of "Sunday Times," so here's a worthy replacement: "T.S.M.N.W.A.," (also known as "They Spelled My Name Wrong Again"), which appears to be more about newspaper ads than journalism proper, but still exhibits an interest in accuracy. Flatt and Scruggs, "Jimmie Brown the Newsboy" (1951) It's not exactly rock and roll, but it's one of the most canonical American newspaper songs, and this version of the Carter Family classic is among the best. Also worth searching out on YouTube: a performance of the song by Mac Wiseman and George Hamilton IV.