Tune into the king’s very surprising playlist
Songs and poems are like cousins in the creative world. Both art forms can layer their meanings in mystery, leaving the listener pondering what they've heard. Many of the songs on this list are thought-provokingly cryptic, while others were just completely random or completely wrong. It's truly amazing how many of the biggest hits came to life through misunderstandings!
Click through to discover the bizarre circumstances under which these classics were written.
The words to Britney Spears' first hit '...Baby One More Time' are so familiar now that you don't really think about them. If you pay attention, however, you'll realize they don't make sense! What is "Hit me, baby, one more time" supposed to mean?
It turns out the lyrics were written by Swedish songwriter Max Martin, who thought that "hit me" was American slang for "call me." He was incorrect, but that didn't take away from the song's success!
One of the Backstreet Boys' biggest hits is another bizarre story. The song 'I Want It That Way' features the nonsensical lyrics:
"Ain't nothin' but a heartache
Tell me why
Ain't nothin' but a mistake
Tell me why
I never want to hear you say
I want it that way"
Max Martin strikes again! The song writer just doesn't speak English that well. The line "I want it that way" is completely ambiguous and doesn't really mean anything. Coherence aside, the band decided to go with it anyway. And once again, it was a smash hit!
Joe Jonas' other band DNCE came out with the strange hit song 'Cake by the Ocean' in 2015. Once again, the bizarre lyrics came down to a mistranslation by a Swede!
Jonas shared that they were working with a Swedish producer who kept confusing the provocative name of a famous cocktail ("... on the beach") with "cake by the ocean." Eventually they just accepted it because they liked the wacky lyrics.
'Smells Like Teen Spirit' is indisputably Nirvana's biggest hit. The origin story says that a friend had written "Kurt smells like teen spirit" on the wall. Cobain thought it was some kind of anti-establishment motto and used it to write the song.
It turns out that Teen Spirit was the name of a women's deodorant worn by Cobain's girlfriend at the time, so one of their friends wrote that sentence on the wall as a joke...
Another massive hit, 'Walk This Way' came from an unusual source of inspiration. The band had gone to see the Mel Brooks' movie 'Young Frankenstein' in between recording sessions.
Steven Tyler was inspired by a line in the movie where Igor encourages Dr. Frankenstein to come with him, saying "Walk this way."
Otis Redding's best-known song '(Sittin' On) The Dock of the Bay' famously ends with a few seconds of whimsical whistling.
Redding always liked to ad-lib at the end of a song, but this time he couldn't think of anything so he just started whistling. He tragically died in a plane crash shortly after the recording. The song was released without any changes and became iconic.
Sarah McLachlan's song 'Possession' resulted in a lawsuit from an obsessed fan! The fan claimed that she had stolen the lyrics from letters he sent to her and sued her for breach of confidence and moral rights.
The Clash's song 'London Calling' seems to herald some kind of apocalypse, but apparently it was inspired by lyricist Joe Strummer's fear of drowning in the River Thames.
He'd recently read an article about the possibility of the Thames overflowing and flooding the surrounding areas. This freaked him out because he lived in a building right beside the river! They broadened the song to apply to a more general sense of impending doom.
In one of Phil Collins' famous songs he seems to be serenading a woman called 'Sussudio.' It's not just an unusual name, it's actually just a word he made up!
He was improvising lyrics one day and the word "Sussudio" came out. It was supposed to be a placeholder and he planned to go back and replace it with a real word later, but he couldn't think of anything that sounded better! So 'Sussudio' was introduced to the world.
However, one of his former girlfriends says that the song is about Marley wanting to kill the doctor who prescribed her birth control pills, because Marley thought it was sacrilegious. She quotes him as saying “the doctor who prescribed those baby-killing pills became the sheriff.”
Hanson's most famous song 'Mmmbop' was the upbeat pop anthem of the '90s. However, that was not what it was originally intended to be.
It's hard to imagine, but 'Mmmbop' started off as a ballad! The Hanson brothers wrote the song and played it at their early live shows, improvising with some 'mmmbops.' It was later reworked into the smash hit we know today.
The Rolling Stones song 'Satisfaction' came to Keith Richards in a dream. He went to sleep with his guitar and recorder beside him as usual, in case he was inspired during the night. He woke up in the morning to find the tape was full.
The Kingsmen had a huge hit with their cover of the song 'Louie Louie.' But their adaption of the song made it hard to understand what they were actually saying, and some uptight Americans alleged that the song was really about intimate relations. Gasp!
Being that it was 1963, this resulted in a two year FBI investigation. They were trying to determine if the song contained any obscenities. They finally concluded that the lyrics were suitable for all ages, but if you listen carefully, at one point in the song you can hear the drummer curse because he dropped his drumstick!
The Beatles came up with some interesting lyrics when they went through their Sgt. Pepper phase. The song 'I Am the Walrus' was perhaps the most interesting!
John Lennon learned that his old high school had started teaching classes analyzing lyrics from songs by The Beatles. He decided to write a completely nonsensical song to mess with them, and 'I Am the Walrus' was born. It's not a surprise to learn that he wrote most of it while high on LSD.
What are we singing? The true meaning behind popular lyrics
Some of the most famous lyrics of all time were mistakes!
MUSIC Songs
Songs and poems are like cousins in the creative world. Both art forms can layer their meanings in mystery, leaving the listener pondering what they've heard. Many of the songs on this list are thought-provokingly cryptic, while others were just completely random or completely wrong. It's truly amazing how many of the biggest hits came to life through misunderstandings!
Click through to discover the bizarre circumstances under which these classics were written.