Cyprus may not feature prominently in the international pop music scene, but the island has surfaced in some unexpected corners of music history.
There is a Cat Stevens instrumental named after Cyprus, a British indie favourite called “Limassol” written by a band that had never visited the city, and even a classic Madchester anthem with a Cyprus-born songwriter behind it.
Here are four tracks with genuine Cyprus connections, plus one bonus song that is not quite what it seems.
“Kypros” – Cat Stevens
The most direct example comes from one of the biggest British singer-songwriters of the 1970s.
Cat Stevens, born Steven Demetre Georgiou to a Greek Cypriot father and Swedish mother, included an instrumental called “Kypros” on his 1977 album Izitso. Kypros is of course the Greek name for Cyprus.
The track contains no lyrics, so there are no references to beaches, villages or halloumi, but its title leaves little doubt about the island connection.
It is a small but intriguing piece of Stevens’s Cypriot heritage hidden inside an album better known for its experiments with synthesisers, drum machines and electronic sounds.
“Limassol” – Maxïmo Park
In 2005, Newcastle indie band Maxïmo Park released “Limassol” on their acclaimed debut album, A Certain Trigger.
The song repeatedly mentions the city’s name, which might suggest a Mediterranean romance or at least an eventful holiday there. But, strangely, the band had never been there.
Looking back on the album in 2025, drummer Tom English explained that bassist Archis Tiku had brought the original tune to the group. Singer Paul Smith changed most of its lyrics but retained “Limassol” as the chorus cry.
English added that none of the band had visited the city even two decades after the song came out. The source of the original title remains unexplained, making “Limassol” perhaps the best-known song about a Cyprus city that is not obviously about the city at all.
“Step On” – Happy Mondays
One of the defining songs of Manchester’s “Madchester” era also has a subtle Cyprus connection.
Happy Mondays’ 1990 hit “Step On”, famous for Shaun Ryder’s “You’re twisting my melon, man” line, was a reworking of John Kongos’s 1971 song “He’s Gonna Step On You Again”.
The original was co-written by Chris Demetriou, a musician and songwriter born in Cyprus who grew up in South Africa before moving to Britain with Kongos in 1967.
Demetriou said he began writing its lyrics as a protest against South Africa’s political conditions and the mistreatment of the country’s Black population. Nearly 20 years later, the song was transformed into a baggy Manchester dance-floor classic.
“Find Me Falling” – Harry Connick Jr.
Harry Connick Jr’s Cyprus-linked contribution was written for the screen.
The American singer and actor starred as a struggling rock musician who moves to a cliffside home in Cyprus in the 2024 Netflix romantic comedy Find Me Falling, written and directed by Cypriot filmmaker Stelana Kliris.
Connick wrote and performed two original songs for the film: “Find Me Falling” and “Girl on the Beach”. Kliris described the film itself as a “love letter to Cyprus”, with the island receiving almost as much screen time as its human stars.
The songs do not function as conventional tributes to Cyprus, but they were written specifically for a story set and filmed on the island, giving them one of the clearest modern connections on the list.
Bonus: “Cyprus Avenue” – Van Morrison
“Cyprus Avenue”, from Van Morrison’s celebrated 1968 album Astral Weeks, sounds like the most obvious Cyprus song of them all.
It is not.
Morrison was writing about Cyprus Avenue, a tree-lined residential street in his native Belfast that became associated with memories of his youth. He later returned to perform concerts on the street itself.
The name still leads back to the island, however. A Belfast street-history archive cites a 1941 account saying Cyprus Avenue, Cyprus Gardens, Cyprus Park and Cyprus Street were named following Britain’s assumption of control over Cyprus in 1878.
So Van Morrison was not singing about Cyprus, but the street was apparently named because of it.
Close enough!
