Rivercity

Album: Madness (2017)
Play Video

Songfacts®:

  • While Phil Labonte was working on this song at home, his marine then-wife was risking her life on the Middle East front lines. This song was inspired by the singer's feelings of helplessness as he waited for news of his spouse.

    "Rivercity stands for 'reduced communications,'" he explained. "Me and my ex would be on the phone and she'd be like, 'Yo, the base is getting mortared. I gotta go.' If someone dies, they shut off communications until they can notify the families of the people that die. So we'd be talking and she would say, 'Hey, we're going to rivercity' and hang up, and I wouldn't talk to her for three or four days and I wouldn't know what happened. The base is getting mortared. She might have taken a round or died. Being on the other end of that is agonizing."

Comments

Be the first to comment...

Editor's Picks

Modern A Cappella with Peder Karlsson of The Real Group

Modern A Cappella with Peder Karlsson of The Real GroupSong Writing

The leader of the Modern A Cappella movement talks about the genre.

Loudon Wainwright III

Loudon Wainwright IIISongwriter Interviews

"Dead Skunk" became a stinker for Loudon when he felt pressure to make another hit - his latest songs deal with mortality, his son Rufus, and picking up poop.

Kiss

KissFact or Fiction

Kiss is the subject of many outlandish rumors - some of which happen to be true. See if you can spot the fakes.

The Police

The PoliceFact or Fiction

Do their first three albums have French titles? Is "De Do Do Do, De Da Da Da" really meaningless? See if you can tell in this Fact or Fiction.

Don Dokken

Don DokkenSongwriter Interviews

Dokken frontman Don Dokken explains what broke up the band at the height of their success in the late '80s, and talks about the botched surgery that paralyzed his right arm.

"Stairway To Heaven" Lawsuit: A Timeline

"Stairway To Heaven" Lawsuit: A TimelineSong Writing

Untangling the events that led to the "Stairway To Heaven" lawsuit.