Obviously at Leeds United we were very lucky to have our very own crooner, super-fan celebrity in the form of Ronnie Hilton who lent his vocal chords to "Marching on together" and "Leeds United Calypso" original, timeless, unique classics, but where does the rest of our popular tunes come from?
Let's start with "We Are Leeds!", about a year ago there was understandably a big hoo-ha when some American baseball outfit called The Minosota Twins nicked our very own "Marching On Together" but the yanks could argue we pinched "We Are Leeds" from them as the origins of the tune date way, way back to 1897 when John Philip Sousa penned a patriotic American marching anthem entitled "The Stars and Stripes forever" obvious other clubs have plagiarised it and it was popular during the 1984/85 Miners Strike.
"Glory, Glory Leeds United" as covered by Hilton also has its roots steeped in American patriotism, the tune of course deriving from the American civil war entitled "John Browns body" or even "John Brown's song" which is believed to date way back to 1856 written by William Stieffe. However the music is arguably better known as "The Battle Hymn of the Republic", in 1861 Julia Ward Howard changed the lyrics so sampling was rife even in those days!
It's hard to picture Luke Varney in an operatic sense, but "Who needs Van Persie when we've got Luke Varney" hails from Verdi's Rigoletto which approximately dates way back to 1851.
At times we conveniently forget Uncle Ken's disgraceful away ticketing prices and direct "Is that all you bring away?" at the West Stand, this song is only just older than Bates as it is believed to come from CYM Rhondda written around 1905 by John Hughes. You may also know it as "Bread of Heaven" or dear Ken would probably appreciate its English title "Guide me oh thou great redeemer".
A barb often directed at dear Ken was "Wash your mouth out son..." Our best known anti Chelsea anthem and you probably already know it comes from the 1956 Doris Day song "Que Sera Sera" which appeared in Hitchcock's "The man who knew too much", that's Alfred not Kevin Hitchcock by the way.
Finally to bring us up to date, where does "Brian Brian McDermott" come from? The answer is of course from the White Stripes 2003 hit "Seven Nation Army". It was something of a slow burner on the terraces with Club Brugge fans laying claim to starting it off shortly after it was released. Italy adopted it for their 2006 World Cup campaign and it was aired in Euro 2008. It seemed to have caught on for Euro 2012 before Leeds fans hailed our follically challenged genius with it at the end of last season.