Good Stuff - College Fight Songs

Jun 12, 23

College fight songs are great. I’m not even going to wax poetic about them, either, that they are Americana and apple pie and all that. I’m not going to make an argument for their greatness, either. I’m just baldly asserting it: College fight songs are great. If you disagree we can’t be friends.

Seriously though, they are great. I’ve been a sort of connoisseur of them since I was a teenager, back when I followed college football closely. I haven’t heard them all by any means, but really there’s only a handful that are truly distinctive; the lesser ones tend to all sound the same, a sort of generic fight song that we’ve all heard, probably in part based on the Notre Dame fight song which is titled “Notre Dame Victory March”:

That’s the chorus, the part most people know. That one and “The Victors”, the name of the University of Michigan fight song, tend to be put forth as the best of the best. “The Victors” is indistinguishable from a circus march, but the chorus is completely great, and I cannot deny that. It showcases two of the characteristics about fight songs that I love the most: Loud and brassy. I had a band director who called it a “wall of sound”, just a wrecking ball of brass smacking your chest. Here’s Michigan’s “The Victors” (skip to 00:50 to hear the chorus I’m talking about)

First of all, I’m going to make a bold claim here: Any list of the greatest fight songs that doesn’t have Mississippi State’s “Hail State” at least in the top ten is automatically invalidated. I’m an an Ole Miss alum, so I have negative love for archrival Mississippi State, but I love Mississippi State’s fight song. It is dead simple. Catchy. Brassy. Loud. It is like the guy who wrote it was deliberately trying to write a tune that you just can’t get out of your head, and that’s great if you’re a Mississippi State fan, but if you’re the visiting team, holy god, you’re going to absolutely hate it. At the home football game, they’re going to play it 250 times, short and long versions, so it’ll be playing on repeat in your head when you go to bed that night. For my money, “Hail State” is an absolute clinic about what a fight song ought to be. It is the essense of fight song. No frills. To the point. Unique. Here it is:

Okay, so now I’ve established a spectrum of sorts. On one hand, we have the fairly complex circus march that is Michigan’s “The Victors” and the absolute barebones essense of fight song “Hail State”. That’s good! I would argue, not strongly, but I would argue that anything much more complicated than “The Victors” is not all that useful for the purposes of a fight song, and I’m arguing that you can’t strip one down any simpler than “Hail State”. Most fall somewhere between the two.

Let’s take USC’s “Fight On”, another frequently sighted as among the best:

Another in this vein I would say is Oklahoma’s “Boomer Sooner” and Ole Miss’ “Forward Rebels”. All together, they are victory marches. Here’s “Forward Rebels” because, Go Rebels!:

Sometimes a college has a collection of other tunes that aren’t the official fight song, but which are just more beloved and better known. USC has three or four of these, but “Tribute to Troy” is especially splendid.

Florida State’s “War Chant” is also splendid, but again, it is not the official fight song, so it doesn’t count in any list of best fight songs. FSU’s official fight song, aptly titled “Fight Song”, is as unremarkable as it’s title.

In those examples, I want to point out that they are fire me up songs, as opposed to victory marches. One is for before the touchdown. One is for after. “War Chant” is meant to strike fear into the heart of the opposition. “Tribute to Troy” is meant to prepare one for battle. “Rocky Top” is often thought of as Tennessee’s fight song, but it isn’t. It falls into this category as well.

Alabama’s official fight song “Yea Alabama” to my ear is off doing it’s own thing with the fight song genre, and I think it is awesome, even though I really dislike Alabama. It has the distinction of just absolutely being one with its University, inseparable. It is a joyful, strutting musical escapade. It is very, very good:

My number one, interestingly, is Auburn’s “War Eagle”, and again, I don’t give a damn about Auburn athletics. “War Eagle” has it all. It is a victory march, but it’s fanfare gets the blood pumping so it has the fire-me-up elements, plus it has a catchy chorus that is almost in the same league as Mississippi State’s “Hail State” (but not quite). It has it all. I don’t see how it can be done any better:

Listen to it a couple of times and then tell me there’s a better fight song out there.

If I were to list them, it would look something like this:

  1. Auburn “War Eagle”
  2. Michigan “The Victors”
  3. Mississippi State “Hail State”
  4. Alabama “Yea Alabama”
  5. USC “Fight On”
  6. Ole Miss “Forward Rebels”
  7. Florida “Orange and Blue”
  8. Oklahoma “Boomer Sooner”

That’s just a rough sketch.

If you google best college fight songs, almost every list has Michigan and Notre Dame (I don’t even have Notre Dame in my top ten, I don’t think), and really I think Michigan’s is a circus march mostly, but I’m putting it my #2 because it has that wall-of-sound chorus that is really hard to beat. Interesting to me, and almost criminal I’d say, is how little respect “Hail State” gets. On some lists going to fifty, it isn’t even there at all. Ridiculous.