El Paso, Texas

Everything El Paso is known for

206 songs mention this city 88 artists from here

El Paso, Texas, a city known for its vibrant border culture and location at the foot of the Franklin Mountains, boasts a diverse musical identity. With 87 artists calling it home, the city has produced talents across various genres. For instance, Khalid, an R&B artist, hails from El Paso, as do the indie bands Cigarettes After Sex and The Mars Volta. The city is also mentioned in 140 songs, including the classic "Feleena (From El Paso)" by Marty Robbins and "El Paso City" also by Marty Robbins.

Music in El Paso

Songs About El Paso

Feleena (From El Paso)
Marty Robbins
95%
Down By The River
Ray Wylie Hubbard
93%
"Gonna cross the Santa Fe Bridge"
el paso
bryce canyon wrangler
90%
El Paso
Madisons
90%
The Legend of Chavo Guerrero
Mountain Goats
84%
"Born down in El Paso where the tumbleweeds blow"
El Paso Train
Jeremy Castle
83%
El Paso
R.W. Hampton
83%
El Paso
Kyle Park
83%
El Paso (King of the Hill O.S.T.)
Old 97's
83%
El Paso City
Marty Robbins
83%
"The west Texas city of El Paso"
El Paso
Tom Russell
83%
"Out in the West Texas town of El Paso"
El Paso Song
St. Cinder
83%
"I lost my mind in El Paso"
El Paso
Jenna Paulette
81%
"Pulling me back to El Paso"
El Paso
The Madisons
81%
"El Paso died along with her bless their soul"
Lassoed In El Paso
Cowboys & Indians
81%
That Ole el Paso Story Again
Billy Walker
81%
"That Ole el Paso Story Again"
El Paso
Charlie Marie
80%
"El Paso was where we met"
El Paso
Grateful Dead
80%
"Out in the West Texas town of El Paso"
Arsehole from El Paso (Live)
Kinky Friedman
80%
El Paso (feat. Ben Truman)
Bryce Canyon Wranglers
80%

Showing top 20 of 206 songs

Artists From El Paso

C
Cigarettes After Sex
indie Pop: 83
K
Khalid
r-n-b Pop: 82
A
At the Drive‐In
electronic Pop: 62
.
...this Life
metal Pop: 57
S
Solido
latin Pop: 51
M
Mars Volta
rock Pop: 50
T
The Mars Volta
indie Pop: 50
V
Vikki Carr
pop Pop: 50
G
Gunplay
hip-hop Pop: 47
A
At the Drive-In
indie Pop: 46
L
Little King
rock Pop: 45
l
late night drive home
rock Pop: 45
T
The Bobby Fuller Four
rock Pop: 42
R
Riot Ten
electronic Pop: 42
D
De Facto
indie Pop: 40
H
Hoodboi
electronic Pop: 40
R
Randy Van Horne
other Pop: 40
P
Phil Ochs
folk Pop: 39
D
Debbie Reynolds
pop Pop: 38
S
Sparta
indie Pop: 36

Showing top 20 of 88 artists

Rivers & Roads in Song near El Paso

Songs written about the waterways and highways that run near El Paso.

Interstate 10 32 songs Rio Grande / Río Bravo 157 songs Rio Grande / Río Bravo 242 songs

Musical Heritage

El Paso Chicano punk scene RoadyGoat

Before the world knew The Mars Volta, before At the Drive-In blew up, there was a punk scene in El Paso — mostly Chicano kids, running from the late seventies clean into the two-thousands. By the nineties they had welded heavy metal, hardcore, and emo into something all their own. Out of that came At the Drive-In, The Mars Volta, and Sparta. And these were bands that used the noise to say something — At the Drive-In's 2000 track "Invalid Litter Dept." is about the women being murdered across the river in Juarez. A writer named Tara Lopez finally put it all down in a book, "Chuco Punk," out on the University of Texas Press. El Paso was making that racket for a quarter century. Now it has got the history book to prove it.

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Pancho Villa's El Paso years RoadyGoat

Long before he was a revolutionary general, Pancho Villa was a broke man in El Paso surviving on less than a dime a day. Born in Durango in 1878, he first crossed into the city around 1909. A car dealer named Burkhead met him at the old county courthouse and hired him — three dollars a week to tend fighting roosters in pens down on Second Street. Within a year he was back in Chihuahua, pulled into the uprising against President Díaz, and between 1911 and 1915 he was in and out of El Paso constantly, running guns and supplies. There's no solid evidence he set foot in Texas after that. Down in Parral, nine bullets found him in his black Dodge touring car. He was forty-five. In the barrios across the river, they still sing the corridos.

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Villa and Pershing statue, Hotel Paso del Norte RoadyGoat

Downtown El Paso, in the plaza outside the Hotel Paso del Norte, there's an eight-foot statue of two enemies shaking hands: Pancho Villa and General John J. Pershing. And Villa's cast not as some sombrero-wearing bandit, but as a military leader. The history behind that handshake is anything but friendly. In 1916, Villa raided Columbus, New Mexico — eighty miles west of here — burned the town, took horses and machine guns, and killed fifteen Americans. President Wilson ordered Pershing, the commanding general over at Fort Bliss, to march into Mexico and bring Villa back. He never caught him. Years later, in 1981, a giant Villa statue rolled through El Paso on its way from Mexico City to Arizona, and hundreds of people from both sides of the river met it at the bridge with poems, gritos, and songs. Same man. Two very different welcomes.

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History of El Paso

Assassination of John Wesley Hardin — El Paso, Texas, 1895 RoadyGoat

1895

El Paso, August nineteenth, eighteen ninety-five. John Wesley Hardin was standing at the bar of the Acme Saloon on San Antonio Street, rolling dice, his back to the door. He had killed more than forty men across Texas in the eighteen seventies, served sixteen years in Huntsville Prison, studied law, passed the bar exam, and set up a practice in El Paso. None of that saved him. A constable named John Selman walked in behind him and put a bullet through the back of his head. Hardin was dead before he hit the floor. Selman was tried for murder and acquitted. He was shot and killed himself eight months later in a different El Paso alley by a different man with a different grudge. The Acme Saloon is gone. The block looks ordinary. El Paso kept moving.

El Paso, TX RoadyGoat

El Paso's story is written in the landscape itself. “The Pass,” as the name suggests, became a vital crossroads because of its geography. It's where the Rio Grande carves its way through the mountains, creating a natural corridor between Mexico and the north. People have been drawn to this passage for millennia – evidence at Hueco Tanks shows indigenous communities thrived here, finding shelter and water in the rock basins. That strategic location is why El Paso became a Spanish settlement, and later, an important trade route. Even now, you can feel that sense of connection to something bigger, something beyond just Texas. Today, visitors come for the sunshine, the hiking in the Franklin Mountains where desert bighorn sheep roam, and the unique cultural blend. But ask a local why people stay, and they'll tell you it's the warmth. It's not just the desert heat, but the welcoming spirit born from generations of different cultures mixing and merging. F. Murray Abraham, who grew up here, probably understood that spirit – a kind of open-heartedness you find in places that have always been a meeting point. El Paso isn’t just a place on a map; it’s a place in the heart, a place where the desert blooms with unexpected life.

El Paso, TX RoadyGoat

El Paso’s story is etched in the desert landscape, a place where the Rio Grande cuts its path between mountains and where cultures have mingled for centuries. While government jobs and the military play a big part in the modern economy, a strong case can be made that our most enduring industry is rooted in that convergence of cultures — the creation of unique and vibrant borderland products, particularly textiles and crafts. Think of the intricate embroidery on a traditional fiesta dress, the sturdy stitching on a pair of cowboy boots, or the colorful patterns woven into a serape. These aren't just items; they're stories told in thread and leather. This tradition grew organically from the blending of Spanish colonial craftsmanship with indigenous techniques and designs. The dry climate is perfect for preserving textiles, and the proximity to both Mexican and American markets created a unique opportunity. The skills were passed down through generations, evolving with the times but always retaining that distinctive El Paso flavor — a warmth and artistry you won’t find anywhere else.

Texas Western 1966 - Glory Road

1966

On March 19, 1966, Texas Western College (now UTEP) started five Black players against all-white Kentucky in the NCAA championship game, winning 72-65 and changing college sports forever.

Historical Marker →

John Wesley Hardin - El Paso

1853

John Wesley Hardin, considered the deadliest gunfighter in the Old West, was shot and killed in the Acme Saloon in El Paso on August 19, 1895.

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El Camino Real (The King's Highway)

1581

The regal highway extending between his Catholic majesty's far-flung kingdoms of New Spain, from Mexico City to the Kingdom of New Mexico, passed here. From 1581 onward it was the route followed by conqueror, padre, merchant, adventurer and settler. Along its course passed ox-cart and mule-train and the traffic of the new realm. Erected by the State of Texas 1936

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El Paso del Norte

1581

As they approached the Rio Grande from the south, Spanish explorers in the colonial period viewed two mountain ranges rising out of the desert with a deep chasm between. This site they named El Paso del Norte (the Pass of the North), and it became the location of two future border cities, Ciudad Juárez on the south or right bank of the Rio Grande and El Paso, Texas, on the opposite side of the river. The arrival of the first Spanish expedition at the Pass of the North in 1581 marked the beginning of more than 400 years of history in the El Paso area. It was followed in 1598 by the colonizing expedition under Juan de Oñate . On April 30, 1598, in a ceremony at a site near present San Elizario, Oñate took formal possession of the entire territory drained by the Rio Grande and brought Spanish civilization to the Pass of the North. In 1659 Fray García de San Francisco founded Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe Mission, which still stands in downtown Ciudad Juárez, the oldest structure in the El Paso area. The Pueblo revolt of 1680 sent Spanish colonists and Tigua Indians of New Mexico fleeing southward to take refuge at the Pass. By 1682 five settlements were founded south of the river-El Paso del Norte, San Lorenzo, Senecú, Ysleta, and Socorro, thus providing the Pass with a concentration of population from that time to the present. A presidio was built in 1684. The area became a trade center on one of the historic caminos reales , or royal highways, and agriculture flourished, particularly the vineyards, producing wine and brandy that ranked in quality with the best in the realm. When Mexico won its independence from Spain in 1821 the El Paso area and what is now the American Southwest became a part of the Mexican nation. The municipal council of El Paso del Norte granted land north of the Rio Grande to Juan María Ponce de León , and it became a thriving agricultural and ranching enterprise; his land is now the site of downtown El Paso. With the outbreak of hostilities between the United States and Mexico in May 1846, Col. Alexander Doniphan and his Missouri volunteers defeated the Mexicans at the battle of Brazito, entered El Paso del Norte, and occupied the city of Chihuahua in early 1847. The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo of February 2, 1848, fixed the boundary between the two nations at the Rio Grande, and thus El Paso del Norte, the future Ciudad Juárez, became a bordertown. By late 1849, aided by the gold rush to California, five settlements had been established by Anglo-Americans north of the river, one of them, known as Franklin, on the ranch of former proprietor, Ponce de León. In 1859, however, pioneer Anson Mills named this settlement El Paso, thus generating considerable confusion that lasted for almost thirty years. During the period of the French intervention in Mexico the republican cause under the leadership of Benito Juárez took refuge in El Paso del Norte in August 1865 and remained there for almost a year. With the aid of American arms and munitions the tide began to turn in favor of the Juárez republicans, who returned to Mexico City in triumph in 1867. On September 16, 1888, El Paso del Norte was renamed Ciudad Juárez, and thus the historic name El Paso became the sole possession of the bustling little railroad town at the western tip of Texas.

Tsha Handbook → · 6.7 mi away

Things to Do in El Paso

nature 9.2 mi away
Franklin Mountains

The Franklin Mountains rise straight out of downtown El Paso and split the city in half. The exposed rock at the core is over a billion years old -- some of…
day trip
Day Trip to El Paso 👢 (FULL EPISODE) S5 E1

Featured on The Daytripper — a full-episode local travel guide.

Everything Near El Paso

325 stories, landmarks & places within ~20 miles — the same local lore RoadyGoat plays as you drive through.

Explore El Paso on the Map
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