Foods to Sing Along: Food symbolism in music
The first time I remember hearing the song “I Wish I Was a Punk Rocker”, I was distracted. I had the radio on, but my mind was focused on scribbling down who-knows-what on a small notebook. I remember humming along to the faint sound of the egg shakers until the chorus came along. That’s when I mumbled with great confidence: “I wish I was a prawn cracker”.
I laughed at myself. That sounded so silly. I was hungry, that’s what it was.
I wondered if anyone had misheard the song in the same way. It turned out they did. Many people did, in fact. Although that song itself isn’t about food, hearing it again today made me think about all the songs that actually are about food or use food to convey different feelings. And - trust me - there are very many of those.
Traditionally, folk songs around the world have been used to celebrate food in its literal sense. Songs of this kind were created to appreciate and honour rural agricultural life and the products of countryside labour. These anthems can be seen as blessings or localised celebration of the land and what it can offer. There is a lot more than that in modern days. For decades, food has been used in literature and music alike as a symbolic tool.
How is that done? What messages do these songs convey?
Jazz music is a notable first example. Back when the movement first started, jazz songs made a splash for their sexually explicit references. This tendency to create associations with sex is still present today. The range of food symbolisms is much wider though. References around food and drinks are used in popular culture to give life advice, and express love and nostalgia too. Flirtatious innuendos and pick-up lines are still frequent, but so is the choice of using a food to describe other feelings and emotions. These foods often appear in the title of the song already, putting forward their pivotal significance. The k-pop industry has been particularly prolific in producing hit songs named after foods. From Blackpink’s collaboration with Selena Gomez for Ice Cream to Le SSerafim’s Spaghetti and fictional character Pengsoo’s Kong-guksu (celebrating a Korean cold soup noodle dish), the list of songs of this kind is truly long and varied.
Some foods are definitely more common than others. For example, bakery and sweet confectionery items are consistently used in reference to love (e.g. honey, candy, sugar, ice cream), and so are sweet fruits or plants. These references are applicable across a variety of languages and cultural backgrounds. From Maroon 5’s Sugar (English) to Rosalia’s Candy (Spanish), a tendency is evident. Some songs are then more comical than others. Comedians have equally deployed food and channeled their love for food to make music. Japanese artist Daimaou Kosaka allegedly came up with the hit song PPAP (Pen-Pineapple-Apple-Pen) in his house while eating from a can of pineapple. While silly and catchy, the song is set to be a reference to his upbringing in Aomori Prefecture, Japan’s biggest apple-producing region. Similarly, Korean comedian Lee Soo-ji created Sexy Food for her rapper alter ego “Hambuggy” (which is funny in itself) to celebrate all her most beloved dishes.
More subtle representations are worth highlighting too. For example, certain foods can reference class differences or aspirations. In singing Oysters in My Pocket, Royel Otis does a little bit of that. The song can be interpreted as a call for action to not miss any opportunity. It also somewhat expresses a desire for a more lavish lifestyle in a way.Other songs can playfully stir things up altogether - not just literally. For example, Sister Deborah’s afrobeat Ghana Jollof is a lively take on jollof rice. It shines a light on the competition that Ghana and Nigeria cooks have in making the best version of the dish. While celebrating culinary heritage, the song does indirectly allude to underlying tensions around authenticity and the origin of a dish. It is also interesting to see that the framing of specific dishes or ingredients can lead to completely different interpretations or usages. Cultural nuances are particularly relevant when looking at food symbolism. Foods can carry very culturally specific connotations. Let’s look at red beans for example. In 1994, the Chinese song Hong Dou (literally red bean) by Faye Wong talked about love, longing and shared experiences. The cooking of red beans is used in the song as a metaphor to express tangled emotions of coming together with a lover. This framing aligns with an ancient Chinese legend which mentions red bean in reference to long distance lovers. In a completely different way, the Korean song Patbingsu is a celebration of the Korean shaved ice dessert with red beans - a dish with the same name as the title. It is an ode to summertime and the joy of having a fresh sweet treat. While simple and straight-forward, the song is - in its own unique way - a quintessentially Korean anthem. It celebrates a specific and culturally bounded food experience.
Whether we are hungry or not, it seems like we sing about food more often than we realise. Food can carry a multitude of meanings. And that’s one of its many charms. Prawn crackers might not be on the list of famous song titles (yet…there are some indie ones out there), but who knows what might come next.