I am an unabashed supporter of the Dallas Cowboys.
I’m a Cowboys fan for many of the same reasons I’m a Catholic. Despite my better judgment, it’s hard to shake off youthful indoctrination — Sunday morning catechism at church followed by Sunday afternoon football on television. And the power of certain mystical rituals, whether it’s the consecration of the Eucharist or the invocation of every higher power in the universe during a fourth quarter touchdown drive, remains indelible.
My anxieties about NFL player safety, television advertising, and gross displays of American nationalism explode in an irrational haze of blue, white, and silver every Sunday, some Mondays, and one Thursday a year. On these days, I am filled with the kind of boundless misplaced energy and parochial bloodlust that leads to deadly battles and really outlandish tailgates.
On these days, I would like to get fired up to a song that rewards my loyalty to a $4 billion sports franchise by citing some of the mythologized attributes of the team I’ve chosen to support.
Most NFL teams, including the Cowboys, do have some version of a fight song — the tradition isn’t quite as rich as the songs for English soccer clubs — but I have something more modern in mind.
For recent examples of the football anthem, we could look to Wiz Khalifa’s “We Dem Boyz,” which was adopted by Cowboys fans during the 2014 season and shortly thereafter became ubiquitous. It’s a nice slogan to co-opt, but the song has two drawbacks as a Cowboys anthem: Wiz Khalifa is a Steelers fan, and the lyrics to “We Dem Boyz” have nothing to do with the Cowboys football team being better than all other football teams.
The Dallas rapper Dorrough Music, who just signed a merchandise deal with the team, was on the mark with “It’s Our Time” in 2013, but the song is badly dated — DeMarco Murray and DeMarcus Ware, both name-checked here, now play for other teams.
And this is Dallas, where “shiny and new” is a mission statement and the obliteration of the past is the cost of doing business. We need an anthem that pays tribute to the 2016-2017 Dallas Cowboys, an anthem for the rookie quarterback-running back tandem leading America’s Team to the top of the NFC.
We need it before the playoffs begin in January.
