Everything about American Woman Song totally explained
"
American Woman" is the title track of
Canadian band
The Guess Who's
1970 album,
American Woman.
Song information
The
song's origins took the form of a live
jam in
Kitchener, Ontario. The group was rushing into the second set and began improvising a rhythm to liven up the crowd.
Burton Cummings, the lead singer, began improvising lyrics to fit the music.
The song's lyrics have been the matter of some debate, often interpreted as an attack on U.S. politics (especially the
draft).
Jim Kale, the group's
bassist and the song's co-author, explained his take on the lyrics:
Randy Bachman has
claimed that the American woman referred to in the song is in fact the
Statue of Liberty, furthering the anti-war theme.
As a single, the track spent three weeks at the top of the
Billboard Hot 100 (where it was credited as a
double sided hit, along with "
No Sugar Tonight"), an unprecedented success for a Canadian band; at the time, it competed with singles such as
The Jackson 5's "
ABC" and
the Beatles's "
Let it Be".
"American Woman" was voted Best Canadian Single of All Time by
Chart Magazine in both the 2000 and 2005 polls of readers, music industry professionals, and musicians throughout Canada.
The song has been covered by many, including
Lenny Kravitz,
Krokus, and the
The Butthole Surfers. It was also featured in
Sam Mendes's movie
American Beauty. It has most recently been covered by former Guess Who members Cummings and Bachman in a
blues rock style.
Trivia
Shortly after its release The Guess Who were invited to play at the White House. Because of its supposed anti-American lyrics, Pat Nixon asked that they not play "American Woman."
The song starts with a 1:15 intro, in which Randy Bachman plays a blues shuffle and turnaround repetitively on an acoustic guitar. While Bachman plays guitar, Cummings sings in a spoken word style. Though this intro is contained on all releases of the song, it's rarely played on the radio.
The song is widely regarded as a rock classic. M.C. Strong calls it "a juddering behemoth of a record fuelled by guitar distortion and a testosterone saturated verve" and describes Cummings as sounding "like Jim Morrison after a particularly heavy night on the whisky and cigs".
This was used in commercials for Tommy Hilfiger and Castrol motor oil.
It was featured in .
Lenny Kravitz version
Kravitz covered the song for the soundtrack of . It was later included in the 1999 re-issue of his 5 album. Lenny said that he wanted to make a funkier version of the song, but ironically it didn't feature any kind of snare drums, something common in funk songs. However, Kravitz argues that he's listened to old funk records that don't feature notable drums sounds.
Single tracklisting
"American Woman (Single Version)" – 3:50
"Straight Cold Player (Live performance)" – 3:42
"Thinking Of You (Hexum Dancehall Remix)" – 5:58
"Fields Of Joy (Live performance)" – 4:20
References
Further Information
Get more info on 'American Woman Song'.
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