Song Lyric Sunday – Get Over It!

Who knew that today is National Get Over It Day? Well Jim Adams knew and for this week’s Song Lyric Sunday he asked us to find a song with either the word ‘Get’ or ‘Over’ in it, or maybe both. There were plenty in this category to choose from. I foresee several Beatles songs today. For my choice I went with an obvious choice of The Rolling Stones and Get off My Cloud, and for balance, Get The Party Started, by Pink which I happen to like.

Have a great Sunday!

The Song – Get Off My Cloud

This followed “Satisfaction” as The Stones second #1 hit in the US. Keith Richards said of the song: “‘Get Off My Cloud’ was basically a response to people knocking on our door asking us for the follow up to ‘Satisfaction,’ which was such an enormous hit worldwide. This, to us, was mind-blowing. I mean not only was it a #1 record but, boom! We thought, ‘At last. We can sit back and maybe think about events.’ Suddenly there’s the knock at the door and of course what came out of that was ‘Get Off Of My Cloud.’ Because within three weeks, in those days hey, they want another single. And we weren’t quite ready for that. So it was our response to the knock at the door: Get off of my cloud. And I’m surprised that it did so well. I mean it has a certain charm but I really remember it as a knee-jerk reaction. And it came out better than I thought.”

Mick Jagger (1995): “That was Keith’s melody and my lyrics. It’s a stop-bugging-me, post-teenage-alienation song. The grown-up world was a very ordered society in the ’60s, and I was coming out of it. America was even more ordered than anywhere else. I found it was a very restrictive society in thought and behavior and dress.” >>
There was a bit of controversy over this song, as it sounded like it could be about drugs. Some radio stations shied away from the song.

Stones manager Andrew Long Oldham produced this.

Ian Stewart played piano on this track. Keith Richards explained: “That was just one of those things you could do in those days – shadow a guitar with a piano. As long as you didn’t make it obvious, it would add some different air to a track.”

The B-side of this single was “I’m Free,” which remained obscure until it was revived by The Soup Dragons in 1990.

The Song – Get the Party Started

This pure party song came from an unlikely source. It was written by Linda Perry of 4 Non Blondes, known for their introspective and very un-partylike 1992 hit “What’s Up.” After the group broke up in the early ’90s, Perry released two solo albums and started writing for other artists. She learned that hits of the ’00s were made digitally, so she bought Akai MPC and Korg Triton digital workstations and started experimenting with them. As she was learning how to use them, she came up with the track by adding layer after layer, then she quickly banged out a lyric with every party cliché she could think of, arriving at lines like:

I’m your operator, you can call anytime
I’ll be your connection to the party line

It worked: “Get The Party Started” was a huge hit for Pink and launched Perry’s songwriting career. Her next hit was “Beautiful” for Christina Aguilera.

Perry initially thought this could be a hit for Madonna until Pink happened to call her the week after she wrote the song. Pink was a huge 4 Non Blondes fan and sought out Perry, who was very surprised to get a call from a pop star. When they met, Perry gave Pink an MP3 copy of the “Get The Party Started.” Pink’s management loved the song and arranged for them to work together on her second album, Missundaztood. Perry ended up writing or co-writing (and producing) eight songs on the album, including the title track. “Get The Party Started” was issued as the first single.

Some listeners thought the song made a reference to ecstasy, the drug of choice for ravers:

I can go for miles if you know what I mean
I’m comin’ up so you better get this party started

Pink told Q Magazine in a 2017 interview that ecstasy hasn’t been her party starter of choice for a long time. She said: “I didn’t write ‘Get the Party Started,’ you’d have to ask Linda Perry if it’s about ecstasy. I don’t know what she meant with it. I still don’t know if it’s ‘I’m coming out…’ Or ‘I’m coming up…’ I don’t even know what I sang.”
Pink’s 2002 tour to support the album was called the Party Tour, and she opened her set with this song. She also played Linda Perry’s 4 Non Blondes song “What’s Up” at these shows.

“Get The Party Started” won the 2002 MTV Europe Music Award for Best Song.