The 10 greatest in-song characters ever created - Far Out Magazine

A strong concept is essential for great songwriting. While, more often than not, in the songs of The Beatles, David Bowie or Pink Floyd, those concepts are born out of personal experiences and merely flecked with the notions of another creative world, sometimes artists go one step further and create fictional characters to enact their expressions better. Here, we're picking out ten of our favourite in-song characters, including entries from those mentioned above, as well as The Kinks and The Who.

For many, it can be easy to find a universal truth in the personal moments in our lives. It's the kind of songwriting Bob Dylan has been delivering for over six decades; it is the kind of song that floated punk across the Atlantic and the kind of visceral connection that provides ballast to our favourite songs. However, on some occasions, the need to rip away the tangible links we have to our world and imbue a created character with all the triumphs and tribulations of humanity allows the artist in question to relinquish the shackles of realism and fall headfirst into a more expressive outlet.

Pop music was still in its infancy when the first concept albums began to filter through the airwaves in the 1960s. As the group of musicians at the top of the table looked for new and enjoyable ways to sell records while still engaging their artistry, they began to break free from the confines of commercial record sales. While record executives worried that such a move would hamper the sales of albums, ti did quite the opposite and turned pop music into high-brow art.

Albums like The Beatles' Sgt. Pepper and The Who's Tommy, which both feature below, would prove that great art would always finds its intended audience. More often than not, within those concept albums would be some of the band's finest character creations. However, elsewhere, artists would use characters to embellish singular songs with a unique viewpoint unconnected to anything or anyone. Whichever way you look at it, the use of these characters has only enlightened the music world.

Below, we've picked out ten of our favourite in-song characters of all time.

The 10 greatest in-song characters ever created:

Pink – Pink Floyd – 'Another Brick in the Wall'

In truth, Pink isn't just a creation from the mind of Roger Waters and Pink Floyd, but a reflection of the man Roger Waters thought himself to be. Throughout their seminal album, The Wall, Pink acts as the protagonist, first being trampled on by the establishment and then rallying against it. Played by Bob Geldof in the motion picture, Pink is a bastion of Waters' discontent and his creative innovation.

Few artists were as capable of creating such a rock opera as Pink Floyd did, but without their hero, The Wall may have felt rather pallid. Considered one of Waters' most honest and vulnerable creations, the band uses Pink to demonstrate the variety of emotions that plague every human, even rock stars. Waters used Pink to put himself under the spotlight by exploring his relationship with his father and his frustrations with fame.

Sgt. Pepper – The Beatles – 'Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band'

Many creations from the world of The Beatles could have been featured on this list. However, many of them are contained within Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, the 1967 concept album that proved The Beatles weren't a rock band but high art. While a shout-out must be made for Eleanor Rigby, Polythene Pam, Mean Mr Mustard and a host more, we thought we'd focus on the main man, Sgt. Pepper.

The group, tired of fame, decided to pitch themselves as the Seargeant's band. By creating an alter-ego for the band, it allowed the Fab Four to write for a different persona. "I thought it would be a very interesting idea for us to assume alter egos for this album we were about to make. It was quite liberating," Paul McCartney said, according to Radio X.

McCartney also added: "We were fed up with being the Beatles. We really hated that fucking four little mop-top approach. We were not boys, we were men … and thought of ourselves as artists rather than just performers."

Born out of mishearing the band's roadie Mal Evans when he asked for salt and pepper, the band ran away with the concept. The image of Sgt. Pepper has long been traced back to James Melvin Babington. However, it is his role as the fictional band's chief organiser that we cherish most.

Major Tom – David Bowie – 'Space Oddity'

There was one character which Bowie relied on throughout his time in the limelight—Major Tom. The fictional astronaut not only became a part of Bowie's rich iconography and featured in four of his most treasured songs but also happened to bookmark his time in the spotlight and on this earth, providing us with the theory that David Bowie, more so than any other of his characters, truly was Major Tom.

Bowie's breakout hit, 'Space Oddity', centred on the fictional astronaut's first brushes with space and his seemingly difficult time in accepting the minuteness of earth. After a successful launch, Major Tom finally sees the world and its troubles for what they're worth and makes a decision to remain inactive as his spacecraft carries on into oblivion. "Here am I floating 'round my tin can, far above the moon," sings Bowie as Tom, "Planet Earth is blue, and there's nothing I can do."

Major Tom would appear again in 'Ashes to Ashes' with the line "everyone knows Major Tom's a junkie" and again in 'Hallo Spaceboy' as bowie pays tribute to the launchpad of 'Space Oddity'. Major tom's final appearance comes in the video for his final release, 'Blackstar'. Through four songs, David Bowie chronicled the life and times of Major Tom, featuring his iconic image as part of his rich iconography up until the day he died.

Tommy – The Who – 'Pinball Wizard'

So there was little doubt that The Who would feature on our list. The group are widely credited with creating the first-ever rock opera with Tommy and the interpretation of that character within the brilliant 'Pinball Wizard' is one of the most succinct depictions we can think of. While the film, released six years after the album in 195, may well have the odd nightmarish moment, the song 'Pinball Wizard' was a joyous moment of connection for the "deaf, dumb and blind" titular figure.

While Pete Townshend may no longer be a fan of the song, its place in The Who history books is assured, least of all because of Tommy. The character's upbringing is wholly traumatic until the moment he feels the vibrations of the machine, it gives him purpose and provides the opera with a moment of joy.

Mrs Robinson – Simon & Garfunkel – 'Mrs Robinson'

One of the greatest folk duos of all time didn't only spend their time writing about the degradation of the working class of America or using their gospel leanings to create magnificent swirling songs. Sometimes, they wrote pop tunes and 'Mrs. Robinson' is certainly one of them. Written for the 1968 film The Graduate the song has long been seen as an ode to Anne Bancroft, the older female protagonist who seduces Dustin Hoffman. However, that's a little off the mark.

In truth, when he first started writing the song, Paul Simon would use the lyrics "So here's to you, Mrs Roosevelt," and confirm the original inspiration was Eleanor Roosevelt. An activist for female rights as well as black rights, Roosevelt became an icon of the counterculture movement.

Jolene – Dolly Parton – 'Jolene'

Everybody likes to think of Dolly Parton's classic song 'Jolene' in the abstract because why would you write a song about someone in such a specific way? It's bold, to say the least, but Dolly Parton is known for being bold. Therefore, it may come as no surprise that her song, 'Jolene' was written about a real person.

Parton wrote the song about a redheaded bank teller who had a crush on her husband. She says of writing the song and the story behind it, "She got this terrible crush on my husband… And he just loved going to the bank because she paid him so much attention. It was kinda like a running joke between us – when I was saying, 'Hell, you're spending a lot of time at the bank. I don't believe we've got that kind of money.'"

The song has since become one of the greatest jilted lover songs of all time, as Parton expertly captured the uneasy feelings of abandonment we must all face in the earliest moments of our relationships. The track is now as iconic as Parton herself.

Lola – The Kinks 'Lola'

The transgender Lola has become a moment of progressive songwriting from the British invasion heroes The Kinks. In a 2016 interview, Ray Davies revealed the song's meaning: "The song came out of an experience in a club in Paris. I was dancing with this beautiful blonde, then we went out into the daylight, and I saw her stubble." He added, "So I drew on that but coloured it in, made it more interesting lyrically."

Although controversial at the time, 'Lola' proved that the band was evolving in subject matter as well as image and opened the door for artists like Lou Reed and David Bowie to explore gender fluidity in songs that appealed to rock fans of all kinds. It also included one of the most pointless aeroplane trips of all time as Ray Davies was once flown 6,000 miles so he could re-record one litigious line.

Suzanne – Leonard Cohen 'Suzanne'

Like much of Leonard cohen's catalogue, 'Suzanne' was born out of a very real experience with a very real person, Suzanne Verdal. However, that doesn't stop his idealised vision of Suzanne as one of the most romantic and somehow platonic figures of music. "He got such a kick out of seeing me emerge as a young schoolgirl, I suppose, and a young artist, into becoming Armand's lover and then-wife," recalled Verdal, in a 1998 interview. "So he was more or less chronicling the times and seemingly got a kick out of it."

"He was 'drinking me in' more than I even recognised, if you know what I mean," Verdal said when noting the song's intensity. "I took all that moment for granted. I just would speak, and I would move, and I would encourage, and he would just kind of like sit back and grin while soaking it all up, and I wouldn't always get feedback, but I felt his presence really being with me."

"The song 'Suzanne' is journalism," Cohen says in the book Leonard Cohen on Leonard Cohen: Interviews and Encounters. "It's completely accurate."

Stagger Lee – Nick Cave – 'Stagger Lee'

If there was one man to have a song written for a gun-toting gangster hell-bent on revenge, then it would be Nick Cave and his band, The Bad Seeds. While Cave has been known to use a murderous character on many occasions in his songwriting canon, few possess the same power as Stagger Lee. An adaptation of Lloyd Price's song, Cave, took the track into murky new depths.

Built on the story of "Stag" Lee Shelton gunning down his underworld rival Billy Lyons in a St Louis saloon, the song was actually more of an accident: "It was a real last-minute miracle," drummer Jim Sclavunos told NME. "I came into the studio towards the very end of the sessions, and I showed Nick a book called The Life, which was a collection of black hustler prison poetry. I pointed out an old really nasty version of 'Stagger Lee', and he got quite excited. Just a few minutes later, we piled into the live room, and recorded the song, fully realised, totally off-the-cuff, in one take."

Rhiannon – Fleetwood Mac – 'Rhiannon'

When Stevie Nicks arrived as the leading lady of Fleetwood Mac, she wasn't content with only being the singer. Nicks had long thought of herself as a songwriter and jumped right into her spot as the band's leading songsmith. One song she used to show both her intelligence as a songwriter and the ethereal quality of her personality was 'Rhiannon', a song based on the folklore of a Welsh witch — not exactly something one might expect from the sunny band.

Nicks was known to preface the song's performance at their live dates with the words: "This song's about an old Welsh witch", and she's true to her word. Nicks discovered the folkloric Rhiannon in the 1970s through a novel called Triad by Mary Bartlet Leader. The novel revolves around a woman named Branwen who is possessed by another wild woman named Rhiannon.

It's a classic piece of songwriting that would confirm Stevie Nicks as one of the best of her generation.

Ziggy Stardust – David Bowie – 'Ziggy Stardust'

If we had to open up the list to an artist to have two entries, then there was a good chance that the artist in question would be David Bowie. A serial creator and unique innovator, Bowie would often determine his eras and albums with a change of personality and focus. However, with his bold move to become Ziggy Stardust, he coupled those costume changes with songs that directly referenced him as the saviour of rock and roll.

There are countless songs on the 1972 album The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars but his anthemic 'Ziggy Stardust' is as good as it can be in terms of meeting the rock and roll alien. As the idea for the basis of a pop song, telling the tale of a well-hung, snow-white, alien rock lifeform is a little out there, but somehow Ronson and Bowie bring it all back down to earth.

In the end, the song becomes a cautionary tale as Ziggy arrives on earth in the middle of the final five years of the planet's existence. He comes with a message but is soon too wrapped up in his own ego and alienates everyone around him. Bowie's vocals are near perfection, and Mick Ronson has his hand on one of the greatest riffs in rock.

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