Rat Trap

This single by The Boomtown Rats reached #1 in the UK singles chart for two weeks in November 1978, becoming the first song by a punk or new wave act to do so. It was also the first UK chart topper for an Irish rock act.

This Springsteen homage tells the tale of a boy called Billy who feels the depressing town he lives in is a "Rat Trap." It was based on singer Bob Geldof's then job in an abattoir. He recalled to Mojo magazine February 2011: "I wrote Rat Trap in the abattoir in 1973, two years before the Rats were around. But I wasn't particular writing songs. I was just writing loads of words."

Mojo asked Geldof how much of his song writing with The Boomtown Rats was journalistic and how much what you felt, like a psychic download? He replied: "The very first interview I did with the NME, with Angie Errigo, I said I wanted to be famous, because I wanted to use fame to talk about things that bothered me. And I have. But with 'Rat Trap,' there was just as much, as you say psychic download going on. That really was me working in the abattoir."