9 Wrongly Interpreted Famous Songs

BuzzJune 29, 2017

While listening to the lyrics of a song, we all have our own interpretations, but here are the songs which were wrongly interpreted for too long. Now, the truth is revealed!

Bryan Adams – Summer of 69

In this song, Bryan Adams was only ten years old. That year he learned guitar, played in a band, and fell in love. Still, the rumors say that the song has nothing to do with the year 1969, but with a particular 69 position. Adult readers will know what this position 69 refers to. Therefore, the song is about Mr. Adams’ fondness for a certain 69 position. According to Adams, the lyrics are actually about “making love in the summertime.”

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The Police – Every Breath You Take

This is perhaps the Police’s most popular song. Every Breath You Take has been played on countless family occasions due to the widely held belief that it is about genuine love. Yes, it is about love. However, according to Sting, it is about love’s “sinister and ugly” side. Sting wrote this song while his marriage was falling apart. He was jealous and obsessed over his lost lover and felt the urge for constant surveillance and control over his wife. Scary, right?

Bob Dylan – Mr. Tambourine Man

This song was used in the movie Dangerous Minds. People considered it to be an ode to mind-altering drugs. Mr. Tambourine Man was supposedly the synonym for Dylan’s drug dealer. Dylan claims to have started using LSD after writing the song. However, there is still the idea that LSD was responsible for some of the lyrics. He insisted that the song was never about drugs. He also said that it was about the search for inspiration. According to his words, Mr. Tambourine Man was inspired by musician Bruce Langhorne. Bruce played a large Turkish tambourine during Dylan’s previous recording sessions.

Eagles – Hotel California

Hotel California’s lyrics have had numerous interpretations through the years. One point of view from the 80s was that the song referred to a hotel bought by Anton LaVey, the founder of the Church of Satan. The spooky album cover with lyric “they just can’t kill the beast” was additionally proving this belief. Don Henley and Glenn Frey officially claimed that the song was metaphorically describing excesses in America and the Los Angeles high life.

Phil Collins – In the Air Tonight

The story says that Phil Collins saw someone drowning from a distance and that the song is about that experience. Then a third person, who was close enough to help, either ignored or refused to help the drowning person. Supposedly, Collins condemned this third person through this song. Another version of the story said that Collins found this person at one of his shows and sung the song directly to them. Collins stated that this story is not true. Rather, he formed the lyrics from the bitterness and anger he felt while going through his divorce.

Queen – Bohemian Rhapsody

The AIDS epidemics of the 80s took place many years after the publishing of this song. However, it was rumored to reference Freddie Mercury’s battle with AIDS. The lyrics were believed to be about a man who killed someone and his condemnation could chronicle Mercury’s feelings about his illness and certain death. The band has been intentionally vague over the years about the actual meaning of the lyrics. Still, Mercury was quoted as saying that the words were simply “a random rhyming nonsense” that were just written to go with the music.

Tom Petty – American Girl

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The legend says that Tom Petty wrote this song about a student from the University of Florida. The student committed suicide by jumping from her dorm room balcony. This belief is based on the facts that Petty is from Gainesville where the University of Florida is located and that Highway 441 does pass by the school. Still, Petty claimed that the lyrics were inspired by the sounds of the freeway near his apartment in California.

Dave Matthews Band – Crash Into Me

Dave Matthews claimed that this was a love song written from the perspective of a peeping tom. The song itself is a celebration of women from a voyeuristic point of view. Here, the narrator is literally standing outside of a woman’s window watching her.

The Beatles – Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds

John Lennon said that this song was inspired by a drawing made by his son. He also stated he had no idea that the first letters of the words “Lucy,” “Sky,” and “Diamonds” stood for LSD. He also denied the claims that the lyrics certainly sound like some sort of drug-induced hallucination.