From The Beatles to Led Led Zeppelin: 15 creepy songs with lyrics that have aged terribly
The defence of “it was of its time” is a common refrain, whether referring to the language spoken by Santino Corleone in The Godfather or certain works by Agatha Christie. However, just as some dialogue in The Godfather or murder mystery novels may feel dated, there are also pop songs that haven’t aged as gracefully as their creators intended them to be, despite aiming for timelessness.
Looking back at history with a contemporary lens is never easy; we’ve narrowed down the focus to just 15 songs, but there could easily be more contenders for the list. ‘Fairy Tale of New York’ could also be argued for inclusion, but its setting in the 1950s justifies the characters’ actions. As an Irishman, I’m also inclined to give Elvis Costello credit for ‘Oliver’s Army’, given that the lyrics mirror the words Cromwell used to describe the Irish population.
But it’s much harder to defend the following 15 songs, each of them grubby in their own way, and all of them complicated to make a case for. They range from a rollicking Led Zeppelin rocker to a more sedate Guns N’ Roses tune that uses a number of slurs that are unacceptable in Britain and Ireland.
The 15 tunes chosen have merit – the Megadeth song is brilliantly presented and produced – but there’s no saving the sentiment or the fact that none of them would make it onto the airwaves today. And if you do feel sick by the end, blame the songwriters, not Far Out.
15 songs that have aged terribly:
15. ‘Run for Your Life’ – The Beatles
Inspired by the Elvis Presley song ‘Baby, Let’s Play House’ in which the hip-swinging singer calls out, “I’d rather see you dead little girl than to be with another man,” John Lennon decided he would tell his own tale of dark domestic violence. Obviously, the dark side of life has its place in music, provided you illuminate it with a sense of morality pervading over the prose in some way. Sadly, that was lost somewhere along the line with this track, and it just sounds like a callous tale told by a man who had, indeed, his own brushes with abusive relationships to begin with.
Lennon eventually ended up hating the song when the irony seemed lost, as the hidden message was somewhat subverted, and the track was hoisted by its own poppy petard. This miscue has led to it being banned by radio stations for espousing a dangerous message of violence against women. In short, it’s perhaps The Beatles’ most regrettable song.
And with lyrics like, “Let this be a sermon / I mean everything I’ve said / Baby, I’m determined / And I’d rather see you dead,” it is easy to see why.
14. ‘Do What U Want’ – Lady Gaga
The title alone is troubling enough with this track. And then, even before we get to the lyrics, you’ve got the sickening music video, too. Both R. Kelly and director Terry Richardson have been investigated for extensive and troubling sexual misconduct charges, with Kelly convicted on a 30-year sentence, and the clip stars both of them. Weirdly, it is actually worse than the criminal billing behind it suggests. The video and song are essentially an advocacy of rape. It features various suggestions of supporting sexual misconduct, including Kelly in the role of a doctor examining Gaga, who is wearing nothing but a surgical sheet with the words ‘Do What U Want’ ringing in the background.
Gaga has since called the song and video “absolutely horrifying and indefensible”. She continued: “My intention was to create something extremely defiant and provocative because I was angry and still hadn’t processed the trauma that had occurred in my own life… I think it’s clear how explicitly twisted my thinking was at the time.”
With lines like, “You can’t have my heart, and you won’t use my mind / But do what you want with my body,” it’s easy to see why she has tried to wash her hands of this nonconsensual horror-show.
13. ‘Island Girl’ – Elton John
Perhaps the most troubling thing about Elton John’s reggae track is that it hit number one without people batting much of an eye at the evidently problematic lyrics at the time. Middle-class lyricist Bernie Taupin used Caribbean musicology to weave what he perceived to be a fitting tale of a young girl who moves to New York City and instantly begins “turning tricks for the dudes in the big city”.
While that might be a derogatory stereo-typing of Caribbean women, he then proceeds to pen a line with potent anti-immigration undertones, asking, “What you wanting with the white man’s world?” as though this “black as coal” “Jamaican honey” has nothing to offer or gain in the big city barring practices the track pertains to be immoral.
This reduction of women of colour to objects with failing autonomy is exacerbated further with lines like “Black boy want you in his island world”. And beyond that, the general undertone of racist language is profound. The song even begins with the troubling line, “I see your teeth flash.” This track reached number one, and that fact alone is a prime example of why ‘wokeness’ should be reclassified as simple, equitable responsibility.
12. ‘Baby It’s Cold Outside’ – Dean Martin
This seasonal classic is quite possibly the most openly problematic mega-hit of all time. No extrapolation is needed for the revelation to come across that this is a tale of sexual assault and, depending on what you read into the alarmed delivery of the line “Say, what’s in the drink?” potential date rape. Without any hint of subversion, the track just straight-up says, “Ugh, you’re very pushy, you know?” to which the counterpart responds, “I’d like to think of it as opportunistic.”
Dating back to 1944, the call and response number was almost simultaneously appraised as a hit and picked apart. In 1949, the film Neptune’s Daughter helped to popularise it, but at the same time, illuminated how truly problematic it was. It achieved the latter in a classic act of subversion. The utter madness of the lyrics comes to the fore when the gender roles are reversed, and Betty Garrett pleads with an elderly gentleman to stay rather than brace the ravaging cold, and suddenly, any hint of romantic cajoling is lost amid the various awkward gulps induced.
Interestingly, however, the one thing that the lyrics don’t mention is Christmas.
11. ‘Christine Sixteen’ – Kiss
Kiss came to the fore by courting controversy. They rallied against conservatism with a new lewd brand of rock ‘n’ roll that pursued a sense of liberation. It’s worth noting, however, that this can be taken too far. Liberation does not mean a mutiny against morality and virtues. Sadly, that point was sorely missed with this rather disgusting piece of misguided rock ‘n’ roll.
Once more, very little analysis is needed to condemn the lyrics of this track. I present the following verse without comment: “I don’t usually say things/ Like this to girls your age/ (Christine, sixteen)/ But when I saw you coming/ Out of the school that day/ That day I knew, I knew/ I’ve got to have you, I’ve got to have you/ (Christine, sixteen).” The problem is worsened by the gyrating that goes along with it–not one hint of irony is offered in what is, essentially, an open advocation of possessively lusting after school girls.
10. ‘Sick Again’-Led Zeppelin
Led Zeppelin author Bob Spitz was hopeful that Robert Plant would speak to him for his book. It looked likely, but then the #MeToo movement started, and the band were less anxious to spill their secrets. Jimmy Page’s dalliances with younger women have been notarised, but Plant might well have some skeletons in his cupboard, too, if the lyrics are anything to go by. Take exhibit ‘Sick Again’, bolstered by the presence of a groupie who has followed the band since she was “13” and waits for the day she will turn that sacred “16”.
The number is deeply sonically sultry, but the undertone – that of a grown man waiting for the day a girl will be old enough to sleep with – is more than a little insidious to listen to. Plant closes out the tune with a series of scintillating moans, which might indicate what his intentions are.
9. ‘You’re All I Need’- Mötley Crüe
Mötley Crüe have long courted controversy, but there’s something a little too nasty about ‘You’re All I Need’, which is likely to offend listeners who are sensitive to femicide. Bassist Nikki Sixx later admitted that the song came from some genuine real-life impulses he felt, demonstrating an eagerness to communicate to his girlfriend through song. “I took the cassette over to her apartment, and I didn’t say anything. I just had a little cassette player, and I just played it for her, and she started crying, and I walked out the door,” he admitted to Rolling Stone. “I was like, ‘Well now, that’s that.'”
Disturbingly, the song details the perspective of a man who kills his girlfriend to preserve her beauty. Disguising the sentiment is Vince Neil’s lovelorn vocal, capturing a genuinely impressive performance that starts low, escalating to an out-and-out scream during the coda.
8. ‘One In A Million’- Guns N’ Roses
Like Nicky Wire, Axl Rose enjoys trolling fans, but this tune made his bandmates uncomfortable. The song contains not one but two slurs, the first geared at members of the Black community, the latter at members of the LGBTQ+ community. We will not be publishing the slurs, but you can always listen to the track to hear them if you wish.
Roses’ defence was that one of the band members – Slash – is bi-racial and would have refused to play on it if he thought it was created with genuine racist intent. However, Rose’s experience does not speak for us all.
There’s no denying that the tune uses the words for shock value, making it virtually impossible to play the song unedited on the radio. At one point, Rose asks the listeners to ignore their primal whims and excuse him because he’s a “small-town boy”. Duff McKagan later admitted he was uncomfortable with the track but hit the roof when Rose opted to sing a number penned by Charles Manson on their 1993 effort, The Spaghetti Incident?
‘One In A Million’ might well be one of the most offensive songs in contemporary history.
7. ‘Jeanny’- Falco
Austrian vocalist Falco is best known internationally for ‘Amadeus’, released on the heels of the regained interest in Mozart’s work. Still, there was a more experimental side to the singer, as can be heard in this probing tune, encapsulating the horrors of a kidnapping. It’s sung in German, but the sentiment is apparent from the off-set, not least because of the cackling vocal style. The song similarly features a news broadcast that details the kidnapping, complete with a collection of damning headlines.
The tune is rarely heard on radios these days, perhaps because of the raw content. It’s unlikely that a rock artist would release a song written in such a way today, but the song feels crisp, keeping in check the realities and perspectives of the story in question. Then again, The Killers wrote ‘Jenny Was A Friend Of Mine’, which is regularly heard in concerts, so maybe they would?
6. ‘Lemon Incest’- Serge and Charlotte Gainsbourg
Serge Gainsbourg was never shy about shocking people. Whether it was telling Whitney Houston that he wanted to “fuck” her live on TV or writing an organ-tinted work that presented the tune in a carnal fashion, the artist was always happy to stir up controversy. But nobody expected ‘Lemon Incest’, an angular pop tune he recorded with his 12-year-old daughter, Charlotte. Before she starred in a series of incendiary films, Charlotte recorded the tune with her father that was laced with innuendo and intrigue.
If the title wasn’t overt enough, the video also features the two singers in bed together, Serge’s naked top visible to the public. Charlotte recognised the song was tinted with outrage, but she has reclaimed the tune in recent years to say, “It’s my song too”.
5. ‘Brown Sugar’- The Rolling Stones
Now, this one’s tricky. Despite featuring a jaunty riff, and a soaring vocal line, the song itself is about a white enslaver raping an enslaved Black person. In the wake of Black Lives Matter, alongside a more general cultural awakening for much of the population, the song no longer feels appropriate and has resulted in the band removing it from their setlists.
It certainly perplexed Stones guitarist Keith Richards, who said, “I don’t know. I’m trying to figure out with the sisters quite where the beef is. Didn’t they understand this was a song about the horrors of slavery? But they’re trying to bury it.”
Vocalist Mick Jagger was more reasonable, stating that the band may perform it again in the near future. But while it lasted, the song both entertained and cautioned listeners about the dangers of slavery and how to treat everyone fairly. The song features one of Jagger’s most committed vocals, but they’re right to drop the song from their list.
4. ‘Family Tree’- Megadeth
Megadeth are known for controversy, whether it’s Dave Mustaine’s tighter vocal display or the torrent of band members who have clocked in and out of the band. But what they do boast is a desire to write and rock to their hearts’ content, which likely explains why they have dealt with such offbeat themes as rape and incest with the same dalliance as they do love and lust. In this tune, Mustaine’s character tells his victim not to feel guilty because it’s “part of the family.”
Considering Dave Ellefson‘s chequered history, the tune sounds much grimmer in 2024 than it did in 1994. Judging the tune solely as a work of art, it’s probably the most accomplished to make this list, but given the central dissertation, don’t expect Classic Rock FM to play it anytime soon. The production is wet with guitar hooks, bellowing into the work, pummelling and playing out with great effort and abandon.
3. ‘Girl, You’ll Be A Woman Soon’- Neil Diamond
This is the tune that inspired this list. Many of you will remember the track from Pulp Fiction, as Uma Thurman dances to the sounds of Neil Diamond’s sultry tune. The recording isn’t Diamond, but Urge Overkill, who throw themselves into the recording with great enthusiasm and imagination. The music fits into the danger Quentin Tarantino intends for the scene, but listening to the song on its own, it’s frightfully seedy.
Consider the lyric, “Girl, you’ll be a woman soon; Soon, you’ll need a man…” written with one element in mind. Sex washes into the song, and everywhere we turn, there’s another reference to the day the woman will be old enough to engage in sex. It’s hard to write it off as a ‘song of its time’ when it was re-recorded in the 1990s.
2. ‘Night Shift’- Siouxsie and The Banshees
We’ve had rape, incest, murder, but we’ve yet to hit necrophilia. Well, good old Siouxsie Sioux is here to add that particular outlet to this growing list of filthy endeavours. If you feel like a cold shower by the end of the list, then you won’t be alone. The song also features a number of “fuck’s”, no hollow metaphor, but the epithet rising through the singer’s garbled voice. It’s a fiery performance, put to a collection of sparkily produced guitars.
The barrelling drums enter, cascading the backdrop with a series of angular riffs and pummelling under the weighty riff; the tune breathes new life into the song, presenting a new character for the singer to inhabit. Where the song is strong is in its performance, as the band throw themselves into the tune, like a bullfighter risking everything for the ultimate thrill.
1. ‘Blurred Lines’- Robin Thicke
There could only be one winner. The most disgraceful one-hit-wonder holds a chorus that made virtually everyone feel uncomfortable when it was released in the summer of 2013. Weirdly, the song was co-written by Pharell Williams, who would go on to compose the jauntily written ‘Happy’ in 2014. But if there’s anything upbeat about this piece, then it takes a sick listener to find it.
The lyric “I know you want it” is definitely questionable, and unlike Dave Mustaine, Robin Thicke doesn’t have the good grace to admit that his intentions are far from pure. And no matter the sticky central hook, the tune is an almost direct lift from a Marvin Gaye piece. Poor show, poor show.