Say Nice Things About Detroit

Ira Glass: I grew up in Baltimore. And I remember in the 1970s, at a very low moment, the city commissioned a slogan and a song and an ad campaign called Charm City, USA. And at the time, Baltimore was grimy and run down and still recovering from the riots and white flight of the 1960s. I have never met a single person who took this slogan seriously.

And I always thought that that's how it goes. Right? My wife has told me how pathetic Detroit's slogan, "Say Nice Things About Detroit," seemed to her even as a kid. That's where she's from. This kind of forced boosterism arrives precisely when things are at their worst in a city.

So I wondered if there are actually cities where these campaigns work. And somebody told me that Calgary, Canada, was a place like that. And we looked for a born-and-bred Calgarian to tell us whether or not it was true. And that is how we found Ken Lima-Coelho. And he said yes. He said back in the '80s, they had a feel good song. At the time, he says, they only had three TV channels, and it was on two of them.

Ken Lima-coelho: So I've probably heard it-- I'm not even exaggerating-- 1,000 times. Everybody knew it. Everybody knew it. And there was this kind of weird pride around the song. And I actually remember that. We used to sing this with our friends. And my mom used to talk about this song.

Ira Glass: Wait. You would sing this song with your friends?

Ken Lima-coelho: Oh yeah. Absolutely. And somebody would start, and we would sing it, and we'd all laugh. I loved it. I loved it then. I kind of love it now. Just when you hear that "bling," those first little strains of the mel-- I'm right back there.

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