You have probably heard Twisted Sister‘s “We’re Not Gonna Take It” has been used in a variety of contexts over the years. It has been used in movies and commercials, at sports games, by politicians from all sides and virtually anyone else who wanted to make a point, which the former frontman Dee Snider says, was a conscious decision when writing the melody.
In a recent radio interview transcribed by Ultimate Guitar, Snider broke it down:
“I very deliberately wrote an anthem. I wanted something that people would use as a rallying cry. And I was deliberately very vague about what you wouldn’t accept. In fact, I think the review of Twisted Sister’s ‘We’re Not Gonna Take It’ in the ‘Village Voice’ was three words – ‘what by who’ – and then a big blank space before the next review. That was it. And I scream, ‘That’s the point!’ The point was, ‘This is not ‘Smoke on the Water,’ man. I’m not telling you about ‘Funky Claude’ – who I met, by the way. ‘He’s a guy?’ ‘Dee, that’s Funky Claude.’ I said, ‘Who was running in and out? Dragging kids on the floor?’ ‘Yeah, that was him.'”
Snider said he had a few people in mind when writing it, but he avoided getting too personal about them. However, he never imagined the song would become so popular.
“But I said, ‘I want to be general,’ so people can relate to their situation,” he said. “Well, mind you, I was thinking about my dad, my bosses, my teachers, ex-girlfriends – things like that. And because it’s so general, it’s become a rallying cry for every cause and every side. So everyone on the far left sings it and everyone on the far right sings it. And now it’s almost a folk song – it’s just transcended the genre, the band. And that’s incredible. I never expected that.”
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