Rockaphilly!

The two volumes of Rockaphilly released in the UK on Rollercoaster Records in 1978 and 1980 collect recordings from 1954-1965 on Philadelphia's Arcade Records and show a pretty rich music scene in and around Philly at the time, even referring to the city as "the East Coast's own Little Nashvillle." Well... maybe, but besides the great music, there are some historically interesting artifacts including the original version of Rock Around the Clock, later covered by Bill Haley. Many of the artists revolved in the Haley orbit and various permutations of the Comets show up under different names (but no Joey Welz here). And Al Rex's topical Hydrogen Bomb: "It's a big loud noise and you're real gone.... bomb bomb, the hydrogen bomb...."

Ray Coleman & His Skyrockets - Jukebox Rock 'n' Roll

Bill Moss - You Look Like Something That The Cat Drug In

Rusty Wellington - Ducktail

The Kingsmen - It Should've Been Me

Jesse Rogers - Jump Cats Jump

Jimmy Collett - Four Alarm Boogie

Rusty Wellington - Rockin' The Blues

The Highlighters - Hot To Trot

Bill Moss - Rockabilly Hop

Rusty Wellington - Rock 'n' Roll Ruby

Curly Herdman - Buck Fever Boogie

Sonny Dae & His Knights - Rock Around The Clock

Ray Coleman & His Skyrockets - Everybody's Rockin' Tonight

Jimmy Collett - Beetle Bug Boogie

Al Rex - Hydrogen Bomb

Chuck Hess - Chuck's Boogie

The liner notes are worth a read in the images below and reveal some backstory:

All the tracks featured on Rockaphilly are taken from the archives of Arcade Records, a small Philadelphia label launched in the early 50s by the late Jack Howard to cater for a local demand for hillbilly, novelty, and later rock 'n' roll material.

Howard was an ardent country music fan who ran a printing shop in Philadelphia during the late 1940s. A well-intentioned but slightly deluded man, Howard sought a business involvement with the artists whose music he loved and in 1948, in partnership with a more opportunistic businessman named James Myers, he launched Cowboy Records, for which Bill Haley made his first solo recordings. The venture proved unsuccessful however and after a two year lapse during which Howard acted as a part-time manager to the nascent Haley, Howard launched a new label, Arcade, named after the Arcade Music Center, a record shop which Howard ran in Philly's Kensington area.

Taking his artists from local hoedowns, hillbilly radio stations and nightclubs, local sales while modest in scale, were sufficient to encourage a series of intermittent releases which stretched well into the sixties. ...

Jack fancied himself as a star-maker but in truth, apart from Bill Haley, most of the artists he launched--all solid, dependable stalwarts, did not provide Jack with the reflected glory he so earnestly craved. However we must be grateful that he did make the effort to record the wealth of local talent which existed in Pennsylvania during the late 40s and early 50s.

Rusty Wellington - Sixteen Cats 

Ray Coleman & His Skyrockets - Rock With Me Baby 

Michael Raye & Judy Shaye - Rockin' Jamboree

Keefer Sisters - Wee Willy Waterdilly 

Jesse Rogers - Jukebox Cannonball 

Rex Zario - Go Man Go Get Gone 

Sally Starr - Rockin' In The Nursery 

Rusty Wellington - Jump Jump Honey 

Al Rex - I Gotta Go 

Jackie Lee - Jumpin' Jackie 

Ray Coleman & His Skyrockets - Rock Chicken Rock

Satellites - Buzz Buzz Buzz

Joey Michaels - Sixteen Cats 

Sally Star - ABC Rock 

Rusty Wellington - I Ain't A-Movin' On No More 

Ray Coleman & His Skyrockets - I’m Rockin' 

Ray Coleman & His Skyrockets - Toodle-Oo-Bamboo 

Ray Hatcher - Philadelphia Baby 

Tanner Brothers - Bitter Tears 

Nick Nastos - Bulldoggin' The Steel

 

.....The Rebel Star is Shining............ James "Rebel" O'Leary Videos & Interview ............(York, PA)

Bask in the glory of the late James "Rebel" O'Leary & his Texas Rebelettes.

Rebel Star

Highway 81

All The Way From Texas

...and an interview with the Rebel and Jammie Ann at the 1987 Fan Fair in Nashville.

A thousand thanks to Rustle Noonetwisting for rescuing the definitive Rebel video collection and to the O'Leary family for creating the music and footage!

If you're hankerin' for more of the Reb, head on over to these earlier Tapewrecks salvage sites:

• James "Rebel" O'Leary.... ......The Man... The Legend (c1930-1994) 
• Leave My Grandpa Alone!... .....James "Rebel" O'Leary & Family... York, PA's Finest Country Band and my Vinyl Salvage Operation......

James "Rebel" O'Leary............... ......The Man... The Legend (c1930-1994)

 We wish to take this time to welcome you to our world, 

OUR BRAND of COUNTRY.... 

Come travel with us, share our thoughts, 

memories, our past, our future, our DREAMS, 

until we meet again....

I met the Rebel at his annual 39th birthday celebration in 1986. He had stopped at aged "39" some years back; no one really knows how many. This was an event not to be missed, not just for the Reb... and his family backing band... and his 30 pounds of jewelry... and his wig, but also to see their regular opening act, the Yahoos, play Sister Ray and destroy their instruments on stage to the uneasy amusement of the Rebel, family, and friends. It was such an odd match-up, but one that everyone seemed to enjoy. Then again, The Rebel was just a little out of place just about anywhere he went.

Gus Aguirre: They would walk around the York Mall Friday night... .. a lot of kids would make fun of them.. but looking back.. this guy had a great attitude and always had a smile... he did what he wanted to do...and didn't give a hoot about what anyone thought!! Pretty punk rock if you ask me!! Rock on Rebel!!!  

The only studio recording that I know of was the Southbound 81 single sold at the annual Fan Fair in Nashville, right down that lonesome highway, along with this VHS tape of a special aired on Cable TV of York:

The Man - The Legend (1986)

Darling I No Longer Love You / Interview Part 1

Walkin the Floor Over You

Cable TV of York

Interview Part 2

Cable TV of York

Southbound 81 / Interview Part 3

Rebel Star

Cable TV of York

Interview Part 4

The following interviews feature the Rebel excerpted from the 1986 video interspersed with 2014 recollections from Bob Campbell of the Rebel's opening band, the Yahoos.

Rebel: Well I originally got in music when I was about approximately between 5 or 6 years old. My brother and I, we was on a ranch; I was born in El Paso, Texas, and there we have two things: They give ya a guitar and they give ya a gun; learn ya how to shoot it....

Bob Campbell: I had been following Rebel and the family band for quite a while before they started having the regular birthday parties.  I was always into different music from my friends and could appreciate the Rebel as sort of a local version of the Shaggs. See, while others talk about how bad they were, I didn't really see it that way. One thing I got to understand about them is that they were very consistent in their quirkiness. One listen to a song like 'Ring of Fire' and you think about how they got it wrong with misplaced riffs and odd fills, but after I saw them several different times I realized that this was their "style." They played those same riffs and fills each and every time. Rosettia's steel guitar riffs were consistent in their wide, sweeping spaceship like tones for example. 

Rebel: I'm called a rebel because I broke from a part there of music. These days when I go back, and I'm speaking twenty years back, I ___ different upbeat country. Them days it was more or less a personality in music more-in-less the music itself. Now you call it "easy listening" and so forth. Them days it was "upbeat" country, which they almost considered you "rock." It isn't rock, but they considered you on a ___. And I enjoyed myself very much in my new style, and I was called "Rebel" because I broke from part of standard positions in music.

Bob: Because the Rebel and the Rebelettes were consistent, us regulars could really get into it. For example, during the chorus of "Your Cheating Heart" the great Hank Williams song, the band would launch into almost a march feel. Our group of fans would pound the table, buddababumb, buddababump', building up with volume and intensity until the climax where the last line of the chorus was sang and they went back into a more traditional country feel.   

Rebel: I do like original country music, and I write quite a bit myself, but I think everything should be alive and have feeling in it.... I have to get in the mood, in other words, it's like you do anything else. I gotta feel the music in my body and soul. When the[re are] musicians around me, you can feel em. It's like walkin in church; you know it's there or it isn't. So that's the way I feel about a musician; either he has it or he doesn't have it. It takes a special kind of breed of people to be a musician.

Bob:  I got invited to the birthday parties and eventually asked to put something together and play a set. So, in 1984 the Yahoos made their first appearance. We were a loose collection of musicians who patched together songs like White Light/White Heat, Folsom Prison Blues and the Mr. Ed theme song. We all dressed up a little weird (or a lot weird for some of us) but played a fairly normal set of tunes. And our instruments were pretty standard except for the electric banjo made out of a piece of plywood and played through an envelope filter. So, the Rebel crew invited us back.

Rebel: It gives you a great feelin inside, and it still does when I go out into the full house.... If you can give yourself to people; if they can enjoy you; you got it made. ...I sing from within. I don't sing for money. You have to have money. It's a real rugged life; it ain't easy.

Bob: The following year, 1985, the birthday show moved to the local firehall, possibly in part because our tuxedo wearing guitarist accidentally smashed a light at the last place. Fueled on by our success the year before, several of us formed the Lost Yahoos and dressed a little crazier, played a little more weird stuff and used a drum machine. During this show, the three core members proceeded to destroy our instruments by hatchet and drill during Folsom Prison Blues.  First we donned masks of some sort, launched into the intro riff and immediately began the mutilation process. I had a power drill behind my amp for this part. Part way into this I had arranged for 2 friends who had played with us in the Yahoos, come up on stage and tie me up. This was our big finale.

Rebel: There used to be in the older days where I can remember when I first started you'd grab a guitar and strapped it on your back, and a few guys'd jump in the car and you went to the Wheeling Jamboree, even Nashville. You also went into a club or something, and you had a few drinks now and then... maybe it got a little rough in the olden days, little more than it is now. ...You was wilder maybe.

I've been in a few fights in my life, sometimes in self-defense. Never went out of my way to pick one. I guess I've had to 'fend myself in my life; even playin musicians sometimes your own musicians 'll get a little 'tight or somethin, or a little jealous....  

Bob: We played two more years for the Rebel and then the shows stopped. You could always count on a big set from the Rebel featuring the other band members singing a few tunes. Certain songs I always looked forward to especially the Rebel Boogie, which had every Rebelism in it, the chromatic downward riff, the Keith Moon like drum fills, the higher warbly riffs and of course the sweeping pedal steel guitar, drenched in reverb and sounding like a rocket taking off! Hamilton had that driving beat and odd sense of fills that made the song so much more exciting.

Well whenever I come in town

All them girls stop and look around

Some'll shiver, some they'll shake

Say "Good Lord! The Rebel ___

Hubba hubba hubba

Rebel: I think if I had to say anything [that] caused most of my scenes -- I'm not an addict, or I'm not a man to go out an, what you say, get drunk or something like this. I take a drink; there's nothing wrong with that, and I don't buy anything else -- I guess my weakness would be women I imagine. But I also have an answer to this: I say, if God made anything better'n ladies he kept it to his self. So that's the way I part on this question.

Bob: The Rebel was always showing pictures of him with famous celebrities.  Anywhere from genuine, to cardboard cutouts (Dolly Parton, Elvis) and a couple where he saddled up to a performer and got a shot of him with them as they were rushing out the back door photo bomb style. Ray Eicher, the teacher here [at Campbell's Music] who worked with the Rebelettes (guitar lessons), asked for a picture of Rebel with Isaac Hayes. Now Ray did this tongue in cheek and never expected Rebel to be able to pull it off, but damned if he didn't. It was genuine too. Rebel must have caught up with him in a back lot and got the picture!!

Rebel: ...They say, "Hey Reb, Do me another number, will ya?"  That's what you live for.

Oh tonight the Rebel Star is shinin. 

Oh the snow and rain is coming down.

I can smell those hamburgers fryin

And them dishes rattlin all around

They call me country

But Rebel is my name!

I jumped out of teen years a couple years ago. When I say you come nineteen,  then you become twenty-teen ____ they all say. But after that you become umpteen. See I'm getting around that line where you're umpteen like Jack Benny see. I'm gonna drop at thirty-nine and I'm gonna stay there, see! If anything I'm going backwards; I ain't going forwards, ya know. But I consider myself a teenager, like umpteen.... If you feel old, you can be nineteen year old and be old. Me I'm alive; I only live once. And I am gonna try and enjoy it. And I think I'm going to make my mark. People know I was here anyway.

The Rebel passed away in 1994 (at aged 39 of course).

Thanks to the Yahoos' Bob Campbell who also recorded under the names Ben Wah, Donovan's Brain, and Scattered Limbs for Bona Fide Records. He is currently the second generation owner of Campbell's Music Service in York, PA and their online store CMusicShop.com.

Thanks also to Tory O'Leary for inspiring my earlier post on the Rebel: "Leave My Grandpa Alone!"

Thanks to Yahoos sit-in drummer Rustle Noonetwisting for providing the Rebel video and postcards, and for inviting me to the Rebel's birthday party.

Stay tuned for more of the Rebel. I'm hoping to hear more from the O'Leary family!

Aug 2016: Hear more now here! The Rebel Star is Shining....... James "Rebel" O'Leary Videos & Interview

Radioactive Releases... ........... ......The Music of Three Mile Island

Root Boy Slim, doing the Meltdown....

Pennsylvania Governor Dick Thornburgh recommended that pregnant women and young children evacuate the area near Three Mile Island in March 1979. Maybe he should have included musicians too....

(Potter County Was Made By the Hand of God, But the Devil Made) Three Mile Island - Al Shade & Jean Romaine (Potter County PA 1979)

by Tom Quinn (Lancaster-24 miles away) & Sean Kilcoyne (Hummelstown-8 miles away)

TQ: I was 10 years old on that day when we got news that something was happening at some place called Three Mile Island. I never heard of it at the time, but it was only about 24 miles northwest of our suburban Lancaster home. We were supposed to stay indoors with the windows closed. My parents remained calm, but I could tell my mom was really worried and there was a lot of talk about which way the wind would blow. When she dropped us off at my friend Corey's house, we ran from the car to the front door.

SK: Three Mile Island had been spitting radioactive filth around central Pennsylvania for more than 48 hours when the governor issued his recommendation that pregnant women and preschool-age children evacuate. It was a Friday afternoon and I was in the first grade. My elementary school was slightly outside the five-mile evacuation radius, a measurement which provided little comfort when emergency sirens began screaming out in the late March air. My six-year-old ears heard one teacher tell another that we would all probably die. 

TQ: Until that day, I had never heard of radiation. I don't think I knew what nuclear power was. I just knew about the Bomb. We spent the day playing in the basement while my parents were at work, entertaining ourselves for a little while by running up to the little window by the ceiling and screaming RADIATION! I'm Meeeeltinnnng!

photo by Lose Kibler

SK: Within the space of an hour or two, most parents had collected their offspring, leaving the school eerily depopulated. My own family was missing in action and naturally I began to panic. Fortunately, a non-catastrophic explanation prevailed: we owned a single car and my father had been detained at work. Sometime later – the wait seemed interminable but was probably an hour or so – our red VW Beetle was wobbling through the Allegheny Mountains toward Altoona.  

TQ: The next day, we headed for the hills with my cousins and spent the weekend at their grandfather's trailer in the Poconos. I was worried about my dad, who stayed behind, but we picked blueberries, ran around the woods, and had a great time. If only all disasters could be this much fun.

SK: I distinctly remember the tension of the ensuing days, my group of adults nervously monitoring media transmissions for evidence of the situation back home. It was unthinkable that something called a hydrogen bubble could cause an explosion large enough to destroy our home and kill everybody that stayed behind....

*Denotes songs we haven't found yet--please help us out!

1979: Immediate Aftermath

Radiation Funk / Meltdown - Maxwell (Columbia PA)
Radiation Sickness - Cinecyde (Detroit)
Three Mile Island - The Tyme-Aires (Etters PA)
It's a Meltdown - The Citizen Kafka Singers (NYC)
27.3 - Ice 9 (Portland OR)

Three Mile Smile - Aerosmith (Boston)
Three Mile Island - Jorge Santana
Three Mile Island Interlude - J.P. and the Reactors (Harrisburg)
Plutonium is Forever/Power - John Hall (NY)

No More Nukes - Joy Ryder & Avis Davis (NYC)
Shut 'Em Down / We Almost Lost Detroit at the No Nukes Concert - Gil Scott Heron (NYC)
Melt Down Boogie - Buzzards (Chicago)
No More Nukes / Bleecker Street Visions - Roger Matura & the Niss Puk Band (Germany)

Three Mile Island - Joseph Aronesty aka Aaron Este (NJ)
Roulette (demo) - Bruce Springsteen (NJ)
Face the Fire - Dan Fogelberg (Nashville)
Radiation - Richie Gerber (ME)
The Beatles at Three Mile Island - Russell Hoffman (on Dr. Demento)
London Calling / Clampdown - The Clash (UK) video
Three Mile Island - Jethro Jive & the Genetic Rejection
Microwave Radiation - Xterminators (San Diego)
Volcano - Jimmy Buffet
Radiation Nation on a Three Mile Isle - Mark Levy aka LEV (CA)
Overexposed - Rick Kirby and the Vigilantes (CA)
Is Your Radio Active? - Times 5 (San Francisco)
Atomic - Blondie (NYC) video
On the Beach - The Rattlers (w/Joey Ramone)
Take the Children and Run - Don Lange
Radiation Level - Sun (Dayton OH)
Nuclear Madness - Joseph Lee Hooker (DC or NJ?)
Nuclear Power - Angletrax (UK)
The Meltdown - Root Boy Slim & the Sex Change Band (DC)

Reactor No. 2 - Nash the Slash (Toronto)
Radiation - Digital Dance (Belgium)
Nuclear Night - Crystal Disco Band
Atoms on the Loose Pt. 1 and Pt. 2 - Seals and Clubs (LA)
Goodbye T.M.I. - Gary & the Outriders (Hershey/Middletown PA)
Radiation / Jimmy Carter - Styphnoids (Portland OR)
My Radiation / King of the Hill / We Are the Nukes - The Nukes (Bloomington IN)
Nukes Make Me Puke - Oz (Wilmington DE)
Living In the Cancer Zone - Lisa & the Escorts (Wilmington DE)
Three Mile Island - Andrew R. McGhie (Wilmington DE)
Nuclear Boy - Killing Joke (UK)
Three Mile Island - Frank Canna (NJ)
Nuke Update - Fluke and O'Neal
Three Mile Island - Jim Bob Graves (VA)
Black Gold - Sam Church, Jr.
General Boy Visits Apocalypse Now - Devo
The Middletown Meltdown - Larry McCollough (PA)
Nuclear Blues - Kevin Minchin (Australia)
*TMI (after Sex Pistols EMI) - The Pleasure Dotz (York PA)
Three Mile Island Blues - Alan Fox (see 1981 recording)
*Radiationmasturbation - The Fall of Christianity (CA)
Harrisburg Radiation Blues - Ernie Hawkins (Pittsburgh)
*No Nuke Blues - Vic Sadot & the Crazy Planet Band (Newark DE)
*Three Mile Island - Thomas Keegan (MI)
Three Mile Island Blues - Barry Hyman
*Three Mile Island - Robert Schlipf
*Three Mile Island Shakedown - John Fonville (San Diego?)
*TMI - Julia Goldensohn (Philadelphia)
*Three Mile Island - Jeff Kalmar
*Now We All Live in Pennsylvania - Jesse P. Slocum (Bloomington IN)
*The Phantom Atom - Thomas J. Mantle & Julia F. Kooken (CA)
*TMI Blues - Debra M. Goodson
*Three Mile Island - Joe Wagner
*3 M.I. (it's what you need) - John Alan Connerly
*Radiation for Free - Rockylox (New Zealand)
3 Mile Island - The Howard County Dump (MD, see Les Alstat 2011)
Three Mile Island - Bill Romansky (Philadelphia)
Ballade á Chooz - GAM Groupe d'Action Musicale (Belgium)
*The Ballad of Three Mile Island - Red River Dave McEnery (TX)
*Don't Melt Down on My Baby / Nuclear Waste / Plutonium - Tru Fax & the Insaniacs (DC - see 2014)

40th anniversary reissue by Sean KilKoyne's
 Metallic Rainforest Records on Bandcamp!

Meltdown - El Pifco (Australia)
Nuclear Man - The Doodads (CO)

Radiation Nuclear Machine - Don and Handbone (San Francisco 1979, recorded 1987)

Chain Reaction  - Jesse Colin Young (NYC)

Headin' for Armageddon - Willis Meyers (Souderton PA)
Headin’ for Armageddon - The Gospel Blenders (Philadelphia)
Niagra Baby - Rejex (Australia)

Three Mile Island - April 3, 1979 - "B.O.M.B" (Baltimore Oblivion Marching Band) film
(My Home Town Is A) Nuclear Meltdown - Extroverts (Canada)
Contaminational Power - Crass (UK)
Dixy Lee Raydiation - Geff Ratcheson (WA)
No Nukes (is Good Nukes) - Wet Paint (Canada)
Ain't Nowhere You Can Run - Holly Near (CA)
Next Ice Age - Eric & the Erotics (NYC)
Radiation - T.C. Radation (sic) (Italy)
Meltdown - Derek Austin (UK)
Disco Meltdown - L.R. Murphy (NYC)
Meltdown - Chalawa (Canada)
In Harrisburg - Kabarett Dusche (Germany)
*Teenage Radiation - Tokyo Rose (Detroit)
Holiday Meltdown - Tod Dockstader
Countdown for Meltdown b/w After the Meltdown (blank b-side) - The Isotopes (FL)
Critical Mass - Chrome (San Francisco)
*Critical Mass - Pera & the Dogs (Spain)
*Critical Mass - Little Kenny & His Band of Renown (DC)
Atom-Alarm - d’Gift-Lobby (Switzerland)
The Dictators - Machiavel (Belgium)
Melt Down - Hans Edler (Sweden)
Susquehanna - Lynn Grasberg (CA)
Don't Trust the Nukes - Gargerelli (NJ)
Harrisburg - Mark Jones (VA)
Rondeau Atomique - Tòcabiòl (France)
Fiesta Atomika - Alain Markusfeld (France)

Melt Down - Hans Elder
Three Mile Island Blues - Fritz Hassel (Jackson Center PA)
Give It Back (demo) - Death (Detroit)
Harrisburg, Oh Harrisburg - Ruvensky, Burt and Jeff Pekarek (San Diego)
Future Fear - Bahama Mama (Rochester)
Harrisburg Girls - Lucky Del Ray & the Raydells (NJ)
Pennsylvania - At Random (MI)

Harrisburg - Teach-In (Netherlands)
Atomic Lover - Borderline (CA)
Ydinvoimaa (Nuclear Energy) - Sensuuri (Finland)

Tighten Up - Kenny Miles
Leakin’ Like a Sieve - Lev (aka Mark Levy) (CA)
Shut Down - The Tennessee Farm Band (NRC) (TN)
Meltdown - Robert Hoke (AZ)
Let’s Glow - Craig Bevan and the Tourists (Wilkes Barre PA)
Murder in the Gas Line - Randy Pump & the Gasolettes (US)
Im Laufe Der Woche - Cochise (Germany)
Heart Core Meltdown - Dean Rainey (TX/NM)
It Takes a Worried Man - DEVO (OH) video
Acres of Clams - Andrea Knopf (Harrisburg)
Traumurlaub in Zwentendorf - Akkord Arbeiter (Austria)
Na Harrisburg - Alkmaars Straat Orkest, George Janzsen (Netherlands)
Harrisburgballade - Wektuig (Netherlands)
Kernengergie - Jules de Corte (Netherlands)
Radio-Active - The Cheetahs (Edinburgh)
Nuclear Babies - The Mystic Knights of the Oingo Boingo (Los Angeles)
TMI and the Nuclear Lie - Donald Kovacs and Ralph Stoner (Mechanicsburg)

SK: When Harrisburg wasn’t blown off the map we came down from the mountains of western Pennsylvania. My family adhered to a powdered milk regimen despite assurances that radiation exposures were within “acceptable limits...."


1980

Who Will Close Pandora's Box - Fred & the Jupiter Gypsies (Harrisburg)
Radioactive Nights - Syn (Philadelphia)
Nuclear Infected - Alice Cooper (Detroit)

photo by Donna Jean

Atomic Love - The Late Teens (Harrisburg)
Critical Mass / System Failure / We are the NRC - The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (TN)
Radioactive - Scott Wilk & the Walls (Chicago)
Radiation - Suicide (NYC)

Radioactivity - The Zips (Glasgow)
Meltdown (at Madame Toussaud's) - Steve Taylor (Denver)
I'm a Reactor - The Reactors (CT & NYC)
Radioactive Love - Wreck'n Crew (NY)
TMI - Reesa & the Rooters (Philadelphia) video
Nuclear Toy - Hawkwind (UK)
All Clear in Harrisburg - Tom Paxton (NYC)

Radiation Squirm - The Judy’s (TX)
Three Mile Island - Larry Coryell (NYC)
Radioactive - Terminal Mind - (Texas)
Rotten to the Core - Missing Persons (UK)
Nuclear Twist - The Hipsters (State College PA)
Anti-Nuclear Blues - Louisiana Red 

Harrisburg / Your Money and Your Life / Tell ‘Em No - The Fourth Wall (NYC from We Are the Guinea Pigs documentary)
Janitor - Suburban Lawns (LA)
TMI - Locksmith (Pasadena)
Give Me Nuclear Power - Mykel Board’s Art (NYC)
The Whole World Causes Cancer - The Ralphs (TX)
Nuclear Blues - Blood, Sweat and Tears (CA)
Reactor - Painterband (Chicago)
Strontium 90 - Six Minute War (UK)
Low Level Radiation - The Cardboards (Pittsburgh)
Radioactivity - The Aircuts (Vancouver)
Harrisburg Half Life - Ray Anderson (US)
Harrisburg - Søren Sidevinds Spillemænd (Denmark)
R-Love (is Approaching Critical Mass) - Transistors (CO)
Atomreggae Harrisburg - KSMB (Sweden)
Harrisburg / Metallo Electtico - Kaos Rock (Italy)
Tmi - Elliott Sharp (NYC)
Radiation Man - Fault 151 (UK)
I Wanna Have a Nuclear Reaction - R-F (Atlanta)
Half Life - Humans from Earth (NJ)
City of Fear - Rondos (Netherlands)
Mutant - K.T.H. Kill The Hostages (FL)
Radioactive Feelings - Outrageous (France)
Nuclear Love - Exits (LA)
Radiation Polka - Chicago City Limits (NYC)
Reactor #2 - D.C. LaRue
Meltdown / To the Core - The Reactors (San Bernadino)
She Glows In the Dark - The Bagazoid Brothers (Cincinnati)

Atom-Most-Fear - Eric Burdon (UK)

Radio-Active - Russell Morris & The Rubes (Australia) 

Radiation Dance - Tirez Tirez (UK) 

Nuclear Cop - Redgum (Australia) 

Reactor / Atomic Waste  - Walt Rockman (West Germany)
Three Mile Island - Images
The Plutonium Factor - Ewan MacColl & Peggy Seeger (Scotland & US)
Hard Luck Story - Johnny Van Zant
The Flames - Contaminated (Vancouver)
Radiation - The Visitor (Netherlands)
Three Mile Island Pt. 1 / Three Mile Island Pt. 2  - Arcade (York PA)
*Need You - Presence (central PA)
*Three Mile Island Blues - Larry Downey and Teddy Felix
*The Harrisburg Syndrome - Michael P. Wright (OK)
Harrisburg Syndrom Oder Störfall In Stade - Gerd Schinkel (Switzerland)
Atomic Waste - Peter Alsop
Radiation - Tony Gradadi (Louisiana)
Harrisburg Rag - The Racquette River Rounders (NY)
Radiation - The Radiators (Australia)
Radiation Baby - Executive Slacks (Philadelphia)
Radiation - Fingerprintz (UK)
3 Miles High - Scott Hot Band (Allentown)
*Meltdown - Sleazy Pieces (OR)
Gone Fission - Pickers (WV)
Nuclear Waste - Inner City Unit (UK)
Atom Most Fear - Eric Burdon (UK)
No Harmful Effects/Mentality Meltdown - The Parasites of the Western World (OR)
Meltdown - Steve McDonald (New Zealand)
Prompt Critical - Insinuations (VA)
Call Home - The Scientific Americans (MA)
Radioactive Blues - Knut Kiesewetter (Germany)
Down Town Reactor - Jezz Woodroffe (UK)
My Girl’s Radioactive - Pink Steel (Canada)
Atomic Harvest - Main Street (Switzerland)
Gamma Rock - Rolls Rock (CA)
Nuclear Holiday - Credo (Bethlehem PA)
The Neutron Bomb Song - Watz Bros. (IL)

Nuclear Power - ‘Āina (HI)

Nuclear: Such a Waist (sic) - Warpigs (Sweden)
The New Talking Atom Blues - Stringband (Canada)

Nuclear Energy - Athletico Spizz (UK)
Pennsylvania Rain - Frigos (Italy)
Song from Harrisburg - Nightwatch (NYC)
No Nukes For Me - Judy Gorman-Jacobs (NYC)

Vi Älskar Dej, Amerika! - Björn Afzelius (Sweden)
Suomi-ilmiö - Eppu Normaali (Finland)
Meltdown (David Besse) - Pat Dailey (OH)
Acid Reign - Truth & Rights (Jamaica)
Downwind - Mark Vavra (IL)
*Nukes Till We Puke - The Fleshapoids (ME)
Kosher Delight (Napper’s Delight) - The Yiddish People aka Gefilte Joe & the Fish (Los Angeles)

*Atomic Energy Overdose - Chamois (Austin) Possibly same as Waylyn James 2017

Contamination Zone - The Limps (UK)
Nukes Till We Puke - The Fleshapoids (ME) On our seeking list
Nuclear sí - Aviador Dro (Spain) video
Atomic Crusader - DuChamp (Kansas City)
Gamma Ray Blues - John Gill (Coatesville PA)

No Nukes - George Robson (AZ)

SK: Growing up, TMI was an inescapable feature of my domain, a 400-foot concrete colossus lurking at the periphery of my daily movements and vision. My imagination absorbed the forbidden interiors, the  massive control panels, the slope of the cooling towers, the vapor pillows spilling over their tops, merging with the atmosphere....

1981

Nuclear Power - Fallout (UK)
Three Mile Island - Fred Small (MA)
Stop the Nukes - Joey Skidmore & the Cellmates (MO)
Nuclear Meltdown - ? 
Three Isle My Land / Meltdown Requiem - Heads in the Sky (Canada)
Radiation Baby - The Form (Boston)
Radioactive Love - Nathan-Coates (Chicago)
Harrisburg - De Fabriek (Netherlands)
Radio Active (Fun, Fun, Fun) - Deborah Galli 
Harrisburg Today - Tim Craven (PA)
Strontium 90 - Kreegah! (Norway)
Radiation - The Mistakes (UK)
Nuclear Song - Craig Carothers (Portland OR)
Radioactive Love / Radiation - Gotham City (Australia)
Three Mile Island - Steve Allen
Meltdown Situation - The 012 (UK)
Shades - Poly Styrene (UK)
Radiation - Bell & James (Philadelphia)
Radiation - The Tom and Marty Band (VA)
*Susquehanna Meltdown - Fly By Night (central PA)
Meltdown - The Chameleons (Portland OR)
Radiation - Passport (West Germany)
No More - Charlie Murphy (Seattle)
Plutonium - Al Millan and the Robots (San Luis Obispo)
The Man With X-Ray Eyes - Bauhaus
Another Harrisburg - Nomadic Dissident
Ground Zero / No Need To Worry - L.E. McCullough (Pittsburgh)
Radioactive Kid - The Meteors (UK)
Leland Scott - Why Don’t You Trust Us? (VA)
Free Three Mile Island - Obrador (WA)
Meltdown - Day 5 (UK, see elMasher’s 2010 version)
Radioactive Baby Food - Random Speed (NY)
Radiation Song - Dogman and the Shepherds (TX)
Meltdown - David Hines (Los Angeles)
Radioactive - Rocking Horse (Minneapolis)
Fall Out Dust - Asha Puthli (India/NY)
Atomic Kid - Agents Provocateurs (Amherst) 
Nuclear Therapy - Laboratory Adults (NYC)
Attack of the Fifty Foot Woman - The Tubes - (Los Angeles)
Meltdown - Wood Brothers (NC)
One Little Thing the Atom Can’t Do - Bluestein Family - (CA)
Bright Morning Star (New England)
Three Mile Island Blues - Alan Fox with Steve Portman (Philadelphia 1979 song recorded in 1981 on Swarthmore College Radio)
Atomic USA - Moderns (CA)

1982

Radiationmasturbation - The Authorities (CA)

Harrisburg - Buschband (Germany)
Uh-Oh Plutonium - Anne Waldman & the Hyacinth Girls (NYC)
Radiation Nation - Subverts (Chicago)
Meltdown - Lipstick Stains (GA)
The No Nuke Song - Serious Bizness (NYC)
Atomkraft - Elektrisk Regn (Norway)
Nuclear Blues - Flashback (CA)
Ballad of Three Mile Island - Jack Alves (AZ)
Babylon - Driftwood 
Here's to the Nukes - AJO Repertory Company 
Caveat No. 23 - Rigsby and Lamb 
Radiation Blues - Hans Olson 
Nuke Blues (Melt Down Mama) - Richard Kaplan
Midlogue - Peter Cannon
Five or Ten from Now - Big Pete Pearson with the Magic Matt Blues Band
Shut Up - Sun City Girls
Girl From Three Mile Island - Timothy J. MacDonald (LA on the Dr. Demento show)
Radiation - The Outfit (Ireland) 
Nuclear Reactor - Birth Control (Germany)
*Anti-Nuclear Songbook - Shelly & the Crustaceans (Seattle)
Radio-Active - Barry Ford (UK)
Fission Blues - Andy Nookes
Nuketown - Atomic Reactors
The Battle of the Nuke War Dreams - Gary Mule Deer w/Dr Demento intro (SD)
Radioactive Mist - Iko (Montreal)
Radio Active - Vital Organs (UK)
Human Error - Mark Foggo - (Netherlands)
An Accident Waiting to Happen - Michele Mercure (Harrisburg) video
Nuclear No - Las Vulpess (Spain)
Along the Susquehanna - JE Dudgeon with Michael Bogdon and Friends (MD)
No Candu - Cobblestone (Canada)
Canvey Island - DIRT (UK)
Drowning Witch - Frank Zappa (CA)
Take the Children and Run - Peggy Seeger 

1983

Radioactive Chocolate - MDC (San Francisco)
Nuclear Power (Yes Please) - Dave Greenfield & J.J. Burnel (UK)
Radio Active Baby - The Turn-Ups (Harrisburg)

Sister Cities - The Pawns of Society (Harrisburg)
Harrisburg - La Banda Sin Futuro (Spain)
I'm in Love With My Nuclear Reactor - Kelley & the Beachcombers (LA) video
Meltdown - Loverboy
Nuclear Love / Meltdown Dub - Annie G
T.M.I. - Spanish Dogs (FL)
Happy Mutants (For Nuclear Energy) - Killing Children (IN)
Meltdown - Lives of Angels (UK)
*Meltdown - Metro Youth (UK)
Stimulation Radiation - Scott Freed ()
No Nukes - US Import
Nuclear Reactions - Long Beach Long Island (NY)
Three Miles to Oblivion - Crucifix (Berkeley)
Uranium - Autumn Poison (UK)
Nuke Blues - Page Wilson (VA)
No Nuclear Energy - The Bite (Belgium)
Nuclear Blues - Flashback (CA)
Harrisburg Blues - Terry Kegan (West Germany)
Nineteen Miles from Shoreham Town - Kirk Kelly (NY)
Melt Yourself Down - James White - (NYC)
All Clear in Harrisburg - Nan Hoffman (NY)
Don't Mess with the Messer - The Speedboys (Lancaster)
Atomic Love - Katzberg & Snyder (RI)

1984

Three Mile Island - Pinkard and Bowden (TX)
Harrisburg - Midnight Oil (Australia)
*Sister Cities - The Screaming Lincolns (Harrisburg)
Glowing In the Dark - Experimental Products (Philadelphia)
Give Us More (Nuclear Power) - Qxx (UK)
Reactor Disaster - Leukaemia (UK)

Marching Up To Seabrook - Pat Scanlon & The Black Water String Band (Boston)

Sizewell ABC - Tim Laycock (UK)

3 Mile Ain’t An Island - The Proles (Philadelphia)
Take the Children and Run - Iain MacIntosh (Sc0tland)

1985

Meltdown - Watchtower (TX)

No Filthy Nuclear Power - Oi Polloi (UK)
Only One Mile from Three Mile Island - Libby HaLevy
Harrisburg - The Beliers (Sweden)
Harrisburg - Ur (West Germany)

SK: ...the Nuclear Regulatory Commission allowed the undamaged Unit 1 reactor to go back online in 1985. This was not a welcome development for most central Pennsylvania households, but by that point in my own childhood I had spent the entire Reagan-era acutely fearful of the coming nuclear holocaust. When emergency sirens sounded in the dead of night to arouse volunteer firefighters from their slumbers, my juvenile pysche was pre-programmed for panic. After  the TMI-1 restart, the only formality was which flavor our nuclear death would assume: reactor or missile-based. 

TQ: By the time of the Chernobyl disaster I had gone from pretend meltdowns to musical meltdowns (Ha! These songs are getting to me; I succumbed to the hokey TMI metaphor! But "meltdown" came into widespread usage after 1979), playing in bands and listening to music with apocalyptic themes. I was pretty sure 1986 was the year World War III would start, based of course on all the scholarly evidence I had accumulated from pop psychics, episodes of Leonard Nimoy's In Search Of..., and the lyrics of the Minutemen and Dead Kennedys. I didn't bother to apply to colleges until the last minute, and then only one....




1986: Chernobyl

Deadly Radiation Blues - Jayne Cortez (NYC)
Party At the Nuclear Plant - The Flys (CA)
Fallout - Dead Flowers (UK)
The Susquehanna River - Mofungo (NYC)

Meltdown - Hermanos Gusanos
Tsjerno Harris- R.T.C. Rockin Teenage Combo (Netherlands)
Harrisnobyl - De Fabriek (Netherlands)
Rich Man’s War - John Trudell (Santee Sioux)

1987

Meltdown - Reactor
Tute Sekure - Persone (Sweden, in Esperanto)
Chernobyl Song - Battery Farley (Los Angeles)
3 Mile Island - Moaners (DE)

1988

 
Nuclear Wastoid - Miser (Elizabethtown PA)
Roulette - Bruce Springsteen (NJ orig 1979)
The Wheel of Light: Three Mile Island - Zone (Wales)
*Three Mile Island - Ed Johnson
*Radiation Contamination - Sneak Attack (NJ)
Keikoku Dōri, Keikaku Dōri (As Warned, As Planned) - Sano Motoharu (Japan)

Dare Ni Mo Mienai, Nioi Mo Nai (“No One Can See It, It Has No Smell”) - Rankin Taxi (Japan)

1989

 
Three Mile Island - Suzanne Pasternak (Canada)
Nuclear Power - Silence (central PA)
Future Shock - EvilDead (Los Angeles)

1990

TMI - Rick Baker (Pittsburgh)

From Three Mile Island With Love - James Pond, Underwater Agent
Last Call - T.P.Y. (Hershey PA)
Extinction - CIA

Metal Meltdown - Judas Priest (UK)
Nucalypso - Dave Guard (US)

1991

Headin' for Armageddon - Joey Welz (Lititz PA cover of Willis Meyers' 1979 single) video

Stop the Pollution - Dr. Alban (Sweden)
Constantí, Molta Merda I Poc Vi - Els Pets (Spain) 

Three Mile Island - Stony Island (Chicago)

Radioactivity - Kraftwerk (Germany)

1992

Meltdown (or Mickey Mouse at 3 Mile Island) - The Urban Squirrels (NY)
Three Mile Island - Mark Harp
Atomic Myopia - Destroy

Störfall - Toxoplasma (Germany)

1993

This Land - MDC (San Francisco)
Do the Meltdown - Brain-Wave Project (Conshohocken PA)

*Groove For Radial Nerve / 3 Mile Island - Beowulf Scantron Test (MI)

1994

Time To Fight - H-Blockx (Germany)

1995

Let's Be - TMI Generation (central PA)

Strahlentod - Prager Handgriff (Germany)

1996

We're the Kids of the Three Mile Island - The Vitamen (NYC)

1997

3 Mile Island - Juicy Fruit

Bearer of Bad News - Triple Fast Action (Chicago)

 

2000

  
TMI / TMI (Unit 3) / Nuclear Fusion - Hex / L.U. Cipha (York PA)
Three Mile Island - Imagho (France)

2001

 
Three Mile Island - Jerry Joseph & the Jackmormons (CO)
Fallout Shelter - Dennis Most & the Instigators (IN)
America - Donna the Buffalo

2003

 
Three Mile Island - Andy Middleton (Harrisburg)
Three Mile Island - Kickland, Johnson & Martin
Evil Dead - Future Shock
War All the Time - Thursday

 

2004

 
Three Mile Island - Stockholm Syndrome

 

2005

 
Three Mile Island - Nuclear Forehead (WA)
Meltdown - Atomic Mosquitos

Three Mile Island - Crossroad (Austria)

2006

 
Just a Little Meltdown - Tom Neilson
Three Mile Island - Two For One At the Eye (Moon Township PA)
*Three Mile Island - ek-sedes (LA)
*Three Mile Island - Radio Active (NJ)
*Daytrip to Three Mile Island - Valere Iubeo (UK)
Vacation Homes on Three Mile Island - Chris Hamlet (Louisiana)
3 Mile Island - Owenshire (Ontario)

2007

Three Mile Island - Oh Shit They’re Going To Kill Us (Franklin PA)
Nu-Clear - Johnny Dock (Doylestown PA)

2008

Three Mile Island - Clouds 10: Mushrooms (WI)
Three Mile Island - Darius Brubeck & Gathering Forces
Nuclear Power Song - Environment Man (CA)
True Love - Thou Shalt Not
Three Mile Island Baby - The Shame Holes (WI)
3 Mile Island/Core Breach/Half Life/Children of the Atom - Paul Blackford
The Cryin’ Land - Jefferson Pepper (York Haven PA)

2009

Three Miles Island - Nightmare (France)
Good Times on Three Mile Island - The Durden Estate (Red Lion PA)
Three Mile Monster Island - Divine Tragedy (Pittsburgh)
INES Level 5 - Middletown, Pennsylvania (TMINGS) - Lev Kowalczwk (Ireland)
Three Mile Island - Phil Nico
Radioactive Boy - Modern Action (CA)

Cocktail Time in Hell - D.O.A. (Vancouver)
Lonely Road - Genuflect (Boston) 

2010

Three Mile Island - Three Step Charlie (Las Vegas)
Harrisburg (Three Mile Island) I-XI - Gasfront (CA)

2011: Fukushima

Three Mile Island-part two - Les Alstat & the Green Farmacy Gardeners (MD orig 1979 by Howard County Dump) video

Three Mile Island - Arms
Three Mile Island - Minushuman (France)
Three Mile Island - Metalhead Motion Pictures (Long Island)
Something in the Air - Three Mile Island Band (Middletown PA)
A Catastrophe - Fukushima, Chernobyl, Three Mile Island - Miki Shunji and his Grand Orchestra (Japan)
Three Mile Island - Noon By Noon (UK)
Surf's Up! Three Mile Island - The Lugosis (Shippensburg PA)
Three Mile Island - A Jedi Craves Not These Things
Three Mile Island - Phil Jacobi (UK)
Nuclear Hotseat - Libby Halevy
Another Fukushima - Raging Grannies
No Nukes Swing - Laura Sue, the Silver Nightingale & Friends (FL)
Pennsylvania Wind - Brendan "Mookx " Hanley (Australia - written 1979)
TMI-2 - Dan Parr (UK)Song For Fukushima - David Bernz - (NY)
Nuclear Accident - Next Generation (Switzerland)

2012

 

TMI-2 - Three Mile Island (UK)
Three Mile Island Opera - Andrea Molino (Italy)
Three Mile Island: TMI - Suicide Squirrel (NJ)
Harrisburg - Rusk (Lithuania)
Three Mile Island - Grayscale
3 Mile Island - The James Taylor Quartet
Meltdown Stomp - The Meltdowns (Detroit)
Three Mile Islands - Noon (UK)
Three Mile Island, Chernobyl, Fukushima - Radiation Poisoning
Thee Mile Island - Jackson Lee (NYC)
Three Mile Island - Paul Gibson
3 Mile Island - Proper Concern (Canada)
Three Mile Island - Trident
Sunrise Over Three Mile Island - Twenty Necks (Australia)
Three Mile Island - Chris Campbell (Los Angeles)
Wind Whistle - Dave Elder (NY)
TMI (Three Mile Island) - Sianide 1134 (York PA)
3 Miles Island - <1979> (Germany)

Hur Tänker Du Då? - Mikael Wiehe (Sweden)

Turn Back the Nuclear Tide - Richard Hamilton (US)

2013

<1979>Three Smile Island - DJapperz (Belgium)
Three Mile Island - Black Pilots (UK)
1979 - 3 Mile Island - DrMOIIE (Germany)
Three Smile Island - Analog Distortion (AK)
The Three Mile Island Incident - Anwkozik
Three Mile Island - Allioth (Germany)
Three Mile Island - Ben Johnson
Sunrise Over Three Mile Island - Garbage Day (Australia)
Three Mile Island - Trident (Philippines)
Three Mile Island - Ben Johnston (UK)

Good Times on Three Mile Island - Sometime After Dark (New Freedom PA)

3 Mile Island - The Wonderful Sadists (Cincinnati)

2014

Three Mile Island -Dog Flambe (UK)

Three Mile Island - El Kabongg (MD)
(Three Mile) Island Vacation - Nebulous 6
Three Mile Island - Rogers Canyon (WY)
Three Mile Island - Tsar Bomba (Sweden)
Three Mile Island - Unit 2 (Middletown PA)
Three Miles Island - Genox ()
Meltdown - Tellurium Band (UK)
Bright Lights - Vid Libert (WI)
Energy - Jan Zander (Netherlands)
O'Pennsyltucky - Mischief Brew (Philadelphia) video

Don't Meltdown On My Baby / Nuclear Waste - Tru Fax & the Insaniacs (DC orig. 1979)
3 mile island - Radiation Patrol (RI)
Emergency Alert System - Three Mile Island Nuclear Accident - douro 20

Nitehawk - Airborn (Italy)

2015

IT027 / Three Mile Island - Stenny-Hagale (Germany)
TMI-2 - Three Mile Island (UK)
Gone Fission - Dallin Schmidt (Canada)
Unit 2 - Three Mile Island (Middletown PA)
Three Mile Island - Rogers Canyon (WY)
Three Mile Island - Crossroad (Austria)
(Three Mile) Island Vacation - Nebulous
Three Mile Island - Lou Karsh (Australia)

2016

 
Three Mile Island - Jackson Lee
The New Scum - Ephelant and Time
How Would I Feel - Robert S. Steinberg
Three Mile Island / 1979 - Jake Kitty (Harrisburg)
Three Mile Island - Yellow 11 (Philadelphia)
Meltdown - elMasher (UK)
Three Mile Island - Stony Island
Ballad of Three Mile Island - Quasi Pseudo & the Annonymi (WV)

Hey Captain Midnight - Adolescents (CA)

Sallys Flat - Tony Smith (Australia)

2017

Three Mile Island - Marzie Doats (UK)
A Clear View of Three Mile Island From On Top of Governor Dick Tower - Soporus (Philadelphia)
Three Miles Island - My Own Cubic Stone (France)
The Power of the Atom - Dynamic Prophet (UK)
Three Mile Island - Daniel Fagerström & Alexander Skepp (Sweden)
Three Mile Island - The Black Museum (UK)
Dust From Three Mile Island (1979) - Arcane Waves (France)
Dreams of Three Mile Island - Striations/Macronympha (CA)
Atomic Energy Overdose - Waylyn James (Austin) - Possibly the same song as Chamois 1980

2018

3 Mile Island - Klike (UK)
1979/ The Happening at Three Mile Island * Pennsylvania, U​.​S​.​A - Cloudwarmer (NYC)
Three Mile Island - Ethan Walters (Australia)
Three Mile Island - Dove Project
From Three Mile Island with Love - Ghosts and Leviathans (Dublin)
Way Down Upon the Susquehanna - Rich Stewart aka Barroom Ramber (Lancaster PA)
All U Can Hate - Three Mile Island - Scuderia (Italy)

Threads - Eureka California (GA)
Three Mile Island - Gypsy and Federico Balducci (UK)

Take the Children and Run - Mustard's Retreat (MI)

2019

Melted Roses (Three Mile Island Mix) - Manipulant (Lancaster PA)
Three Mile Island - Alien Keyes (Harrisburg)
Three Mile Island - Dumb Drugs
Three Mile Island - Alien Keyes (Harrisburg)
Turning A Potential Chernobyl Into A Mere Three Mile Island - HOORS (Ireland)

Aiko - Desolate (NY)
Risks - Moonrover (Portugal)
Chernobyl, F*ck You Shima! and Three Mile Island - Gregory Vanderlaan (CA)

2020

Three Mile Island - Code of the Jaguar (Philadelphia)

Ketchup - Girls Rituals (Toronto) video
For DOOM - Open Mike Eagle (Los Angeles)
Three Mile Island 1979 - Mope County (UK)
Three Miles Island Grind Away Out (Spain)
Three Mile Island - WILT (Italy)
03_threemileisland - digitalsakura (Germany)
Three Mile Island - Klyde Parker (Pittsburgh)
Three Mile Island - Anders Hammar (Sweden)
Three Mile Island - Nightmare, Inc (Los Angeles)
The Three Mile Island Crisis in 1979 - Chris Woodbridge
Three Mile Island (1 & 2) - DigiMax
Every Man Is a Three Mile Island - Haerdsmaelta (Sweden)
Atomb - Cytotoxin (Germany)
Three Mile Island - HEX/Hex1134 (York, PA)

Eating the Paste - Murdered By Robots (FL)

2021

Three Mile Island - Main Theme - Paul Caveworks (Greece)

Three Mile Island Radiation Moloch - Flesh Wound (Finland)
Lukämie in de Elvmarsch - Wilfred Staake (Germany)

Sonsöz - Serap Yağız, Taner Öngür (Turkey)

The Same Mistake - Salem Trials (UK)

2022

Three Mile Island - Sisto Rossi (FL)
Three Mile Island - Mostly Other People Do the Killing (NYC)
Three Mile Island - Remains of Silence
Three Mile Island - Lord M&M, Ft. Gino the Dino, Dan the Menace

Three Mile Island - Equinox
Three Mile Island - Dataloop
Three Mile Island - Remains of Silence
High Roller - Rapmessiah (NYC)
Uranium Rap - TheNeXTGUI
Three Mile Island - Itrusko (Italy)
Suicide - Dogg Brothers
Fire On the River - Phil Burdett & Blip Pilot (UK)
Literal Angels - Precision Auto (Melbourne)

Atomic Mama - John Kruth (NYC)

2023

Three Mile Island (Chainsaw Mix) - Leave It To Cleaver (CA)
Three Mile Island - Justin Depoy (NM)
Disassociating on the Shores of Three Mile Island - vacavi (OK)
Three Mile Island - Shane Dawson (Australia)
Attack of the 50 Foot Woman - Far Canal (UK)

All in the Hall - Honest John Lacy (CA)
3 Mile Island - Alaska (NYC)

2024

Three Mile Island - The Lucky Bastids (Boston)

Where is America? - Rick Arnoldi (MA)

Unknown Dates:
*Christmas On Three Mile Island - Leon Redbone parody by Old Man Ribber (no known recording)
Fukushima Harrisburg Chernobyl Hiroshima - KK Slider and Co
Harrisburg Blues - Uninvited (West Germany)

3 Mile Island Blues and Other Hummable Ditties for the 80's - Charles “Rick” Kelly
*Three Mile Island - Dave & Spike (Canada)

Proto-TMI - Atomic Blast Polka by the Steelton Polka Platters (Steelton PA c1978) is up there with the China Syndrome for eerily predicting the TMI accident!

TQ: I survived Three Mile Island and the latter Cold War, went to college in Philly without much of a plan, and grew out of my sense of impending doom. But the impact of TMI was much bigger than I ever realized, certainly as little kids in our own worlds, but even as adults, for me anyway. The only lyrical references I was aware of at the time were on The Clash's London Calling. 

Once I started looking, I was surprised to find so many TMI songs. I figure any song about "radiation" in '79-81 had to be part of the reaction. The '79 tracks tend to be very literal, anti-nuke, some good black humor, and sometimes hyperbolic and some would say silly fear mongering. There are lots of people glowing in the dark, mutant fish, and nuclear explosions. The 80s tracks began to use nuclear accident lingo as metaphor in the best tradition of atomic bomb songs from the 50s and 60s with "radioactive" coming to mean "hot love" more often than not.  Reesa's You melt my heart like TMI is my favorite, and Syn's Radioactive Nights is the hands-down mathematical winner (15 distinct metaphors!). I held most of the later tracks to a higher standard. Most had to make direct reference to TMI to make the cut. There are at least 21 songs titled Three Mile Island or TMI from the 2000-2012 period, though interestingly, outside the US, "Harrisburg" seems to be the word most closely associated with the accident. Sean and I salvaged many of these tracks from the analog abyss, digitizing and archiving them for the first time, and I hope people can find an interest in their collective effect, weirdness, fear, and humor.

SK: As far as the impact goes, yeah, I would agree, it's hard to overestimate. It even informed how we discussed such events. Following from your point about the word "radiation", I bet "reactor", "control rod" and "meltdown" weren't even in some adult vocabularies before 1979. And for those that wrote all the earnest, politically engaged protest songs throughout the 70s in opposition to new nuclear plants, all of a sudden their worst fears are confirmed.

I appreciate that these songs and other assorted cultural detritus (even crassly commercial cash-in stuff) tell a story about how humans of different cultures and belief systems respond to complex, traumatic events. It really becomes a sort of unofficial "people's history." There are some scholarly articles I came across about Chernobyl describing how school kids were responding with these morbid nursery rhymes while skipping rope! Children talking matter-of-factly about leukemia or calling one another "dirty radioactive pigs" as a form of insult. It's amazing how deeply these terrors filter down to the individual level, shaping private experience. This would also indicate to me that whatever official explanation may prevail, whenever you've lived through a nuclear accident, radiation exposure is a nebulous, gnawing sort of psychic burden.


There are surely more TMI songs that haven't been salvaged yet, and if you have any ideas about how we can permanently archive this collection, let us know.

Archivist and co-author of "Radioactive Releases" Sean P Kilcoyne's 2024 article, Hell No, We Won’t Glow: Selections from the Anti-Nuclear Power Discography (Signal 09: A Journal of International Political Graphics and Culture) has a long segment of protest music about the Three Mile Island accident, in the context of the global antinuclear movement and songwriting history, before, during, and after.

 
This fascinating mini-journal sized 88-page article, full of background research on the music, musicians, movement organizers, and agitprop album art, partially concludes with an an important call to action, asking: "...how do we preserve these materials for future audiences...these legacies and find ways for them to engage with the histories, ideas, art, and music inherent to these movements?"

Thanks to:

• Sean Kilcoyne contacted me as a stranger interested in helping out with the research. I had no idea he was as obsessed as I was. He found some of the most obscure tracks from all over the world and added a really great personal connection to this piece. Check out his Metallic Rainforest YouTube channel- an excellent companion source to this project!
• Rick Noll's Bona Fide blog got me started on this project.
• Bands of Central Pennsylvania
• Hardcore For Central PA
• Thanks to everybody that helped us track down a song, and to all the musicians who shared their work. -SK & TQ

Pin sent by Jeff Coleman
from Lancaster bands the Blame
and Fender Twinns,
and Steam Powered Studio.

Links:

• Popular Reactions to the Accident at Three Mile Island
• Health Physics Historical Instrumentation Museum Collection
• Three Mile Island Alert
• Three Mile Island Emergency - Dickinson College Archives
• NUCLEAR WAR and Lancaster County.... Thirty Years After
• Nuclear Platters... The Unofficial CONELRAD Sequel
• Robert Del Tredici - The People of Three Mile Island
• Chornobyl's Folklore: Vernacular Commentary on Nuclear Disaster by Lairsa Fialkova
• The Sounds of Japan's Antinuclear Movement 

Arcade:

• Three Mile Island (Apple II computer game) - Richard Orban (1980)
• SCRAM (Atari 800 1980)
• Nuclear Power Plant (Atari 1981)
• China Syndrome (Atari 2600 video game 1982)
• Meltdown (Cosmi Atari 8-bit game 1982)
• Reactor (Gottlieb 1982)

Comic Material:

• The Pepsi Syndrome - Saturday Night Live (NYC April 7, 1979)
• Nuclear Energy - Richard & Willie (1979)
• Uranium - Fred Dagg (New Zealand 1979)
• Vocabulary Building - O’Brien, Michael and John Ellis - (US 1980)
• Mutant Blues - Chris Rush (NY 1981)

Radioactive Releases on the Radio and in the News:

• "Listen Up!" TMI Special - March 31, 2014 (archived)
• "Idle Noise" TMI Special -  April 9, 2014 
• I Remember TMI: Central PS Stories WITF PA Post, March 2019
• How Three Mile Island and the nuclear industry influenced popular culture (includes interviews with Sean and Tom) WITF PA Post, March 2019
• ‘Radiation Funk’: Song about Three Mile Island nuclear accident gave people a reason to smile PennLive March 26, 2019