# Come On Eileen, literally **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [September 23, 2013, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/come-on-eileen-literally/669525 "2013-09-23T17:09:18Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![The\_Controvert](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/dec6dc/32.png) [@The\_Controvert](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Controvert)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2013, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/come-on-eileen-literally/669525/1 "2013-09-23T17:09:18Z")
Okay, we all know Dexy’s double entendre by now. Supposing we take the sly interpretation quite literally. The phrase is repeated over a dozen times during the song. If each utterance of the title resulted in a literal ejaculation, we’d have quite the bukkake at the end. But what if we took that further? It’s sold at least a million copies – presumably each copy has been played at least once, so the phrase has been heard at least a million times. If we took things literally, we’d have at least a million-fold bukkake. But let’s take it even further. Number of plays on the radio? Total international sales? Total number of times heard by any person? Pick any metric you like. What I’m interested in is the total volume of semen this poor girl is covered, nay \*immersed \*in. How could we visualize it? Is it swimming pools full of ejaculate we’re talking about here? ---
**Author:** ![Chefguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chefguy/32/138_2.png) [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2013, 5:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/come-on-eileen-literally/669525/2 "2013-09-23T17:21:44Z")
Honestly, that interpretation has never occurred to me. ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2013, 5:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/come-on-eileen-literally/669525/3 "2013-09-23T17:22:46Z")
Send it to what-if at xkcd, I’m sure he wants to be more edgy! ---
**Author:** ![The\_Controvert](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/dec6dc/32.png) [@The\_Controvert](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Controvert)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2013, 5:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/come-on-eileen-literally/669525/4 "2013-09-23T17:47:12Z")
> [@Chefguy](#): > > Honestly, that interpretation has never occurred to me. Next, you’ll be telling us you think “Summer of 69” is about the year 1969. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![CarnalK](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnalk/32/486_2.png) [@CarnalK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CarnalK)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2013, 5:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/come-on-eileen-literally/669525/5 "2013-09-23T17:47:47Z")
Since the song is basically “Come on and give it up”, it’s pretty hard to call it a double entendre. I never really thought of it that way, personally. ---
**Author:** ![CLee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f19dbf/32.png) [@CLee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CLee)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2013, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/come-on-eileen-literally/669525/6 "2013-09-23T18:05:40Z")
Isn’t he simply asking the nice, appealing Catholic girl for sex? Whence the money shot? ---
**Author:** ![Justin\_Bailey](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/justin_bailey/32/8792_2.png) [@Justin\_Bailey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Justin_Bailey)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2013, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/come-on-eileen-literally/669525/7 "2013-09-23T18:07:44Z")
> [@The\_Controvert](#): > > Next, you’ll be telling us you think “Summer of 69” is about the year 1969. > > 😉 It is, actually. Bryan Adams was nine years old during the “Summer of 69” and originally wrote the song as “Summer of 79” when his music career was actually starting. The song’s co-writer, Jim Vallance, suggested changing it to “69” to tie into the Woodstock/hippie days of his teenage years. ---
**Author:** ![MrSquishy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b9e5f3/32.png) [@MrSquishy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrSquishy)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2013, 6:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/come-on-eileen-literally/669525/8 "2013-09-23T18:08:40Z")
> [@The\_Controvert](#): > > Next, you’ll be telling us you think “Summer of 69” is about the year 1969. > > 😉 I’m not sure whether you’re joking or not, but my understanding is that there are actually people out there who believe the song “Summer of '69” is not about the summer of 1969. Based on the lyrics here [http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/bryanadams/summerof69.html](http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/bryanadams/summerof69.html), can anybody explain to me why? Is it the part in the outro where he says “me and my baby in '69”? That’s the only thing in there I can see that might be misconstrued, but I’d say it’s a real stretch if you consider the entire rest of the song. I think the “Come On Eileen” thing is pretty silly too. ---
**Author:** ![keving](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/a587f6/32.png) [@keving](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/keving)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2013, 6:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/come-on-eileen-literally/669525/9 "2013-09-23T18:11:23Z")
Worst Microsoft interview question ever. I imagine radio plays will be the biggest component. And this song is mostly played in western countries. Let’s say countries in which this song is well known have a total population of 2 billion. Suppose that there’s one radio station per 100,000 people, that’s 20,000 stations. Let’s say that on average the stations have an audience of 1,000. That’s 20,000,000 listeners at any one time. And we’ll say that they play “Come On Eileen” once a week. That’s about 500 times a year, so 10,000,000,000 listens per year. And the song has existed for about 30 years, so there have been about 300,000,000,000 listens. Now, apparently the human male produces about 3ml of semen per ejaculation. That gives 1,000,000,000 litres of semen, which is about 1,000,000 m[sup]3[/sup]. Or roughly five times the volume of the _Hindenburg_. ---
**Author:** ![thinksnow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thinksnow/32/2849_2.png) [@thinksnow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thinksnow)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2013, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/come-on-eileen-literally/669525/10 "2013-09-23T18:21:28Z")
We’re going to need a bigger boat. We can name it, “Little man.” ---
**Author:** ![The\_Controvert](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/dec6dc/32.png) [@The\_Controvert](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Controvert)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2013, 6:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/come-on-eileen-literally/669525/11 "2013-09-23T18:22:19Z")
Nice calculation. I’m not sure all the radio stations play this song on average once a week for 30 straight years is right, but I suppose it’ll do as a rough estimate. I think you might have left off the number of utterances per song play. So multiply it by 15 and now we’re up to 75 Hindenbergs. ---
**Author:** ![Yodalicious](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yodalicious/32/8195_2.png) [@Yodalicious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yodalicious)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2013, 6:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/come-on-eileen-literally/669525/12 "2013-09-23T18:28:06Z")
> [@The\_Controvert](#): > > Next, you’ll be telling us you think “Summer of 69” is about the year 1969. > > 😉 Or that “Brown Eyed Girl” isn’t about anal sex. ---
**Author:** ![keving](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/a587f6/32.png) [@keving](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/keving)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2013, 6:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/come-on-eileen-literally/669525/13 "2013-09-23T18:31:40Z")
> [@The\_Controvert](#): > > Nice calculation. I’m not sure all the radio stations play this song on average once a week for 30 straight years is right, but I suppose it’ll do as a rough estimate. I think you might have left off the number of utterances per song play. So multiply it by 15 and now we’re up to 75 Hindenbergs. Yes, maybe I listen to too many “80s gold” stations. And also I somehow estimated 500 weeks in a year. Let’s say the average radio station actually plays the song about ten times a year, so we divide by fifty, and then incorporate your correction re 15 repeated utterances of the phrase, so overall we divide by about three. So it’s more like two Hindenburgs. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Controvert](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/dec6dc/32.png) [@The\_Controvert](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Controvert)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2013, 6:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/come-on-eileen-literally/669525/14 "2013-09-23T18:32:44Z")
> [@MrSquishy](#): > > I’m not sure whether you’re joking or not, but my understanding is that there are actually people out there who believe the song “Summer of '69” is not about the summer of 1969. > > Is it the part in the outro where he says “me and my baby in '69”? That’s the only thing in there I can see that might be misconstrued, but I’d say it’s a real stretch if you consider the entire rest of the song. I do think there is a double entendre, although I don’t know if it’s intentional. Just replace all instances of '69 with “oral sex”. It works everywhere. “Summer of oral sex”… see? ---
**Author:** ![Chefguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chefguy/32/138_2.png) [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2013, 6:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/come-on-eileen-literally/669525/15 "2013-09-23T18:37:19Z")
> [@The\_Controvert](#): > > I do think there is a double entendre, although I don’t know if it’s intentional. Just replace all instances of '69 with “oral sex”. It works everywhere. “Summer of oral sex”… see? I think you can find a double meaning in pretty much anything you want to, especially if you think like a 15-year old. I also think that most of it is just bullshit. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2013, 6:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/come-on-eileen-literally/669525/16 "2013-09-23T18:53:56Z")
There’s no chance at all that “Summer of 69” refers to the year, given the age of the singer. ---
**Author:** ![bup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/6bbea6/32.png) [@bup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bup)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2013, 6:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/come-on-eileen-literally/669525/17 "2013-09-23T18:58:25Z")
But it scans better than “the summer of '79.” ---
**Author:** ![Jophiel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jophiel/32/66_2.png) [@Jophiel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jophiel)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2013, 6:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/come-on-eileen-literally/669525/18 "2013-09-23T18:58:51Z")
> [@The\_Controvert](#): > > Just replace all instances of '69 with “oral sex”. It works everywhere. “Summer of oral sex”… see? Played until my fingers bled, it was the summer of oral sex? _Bleacch_ > [@Chronos](#): > > There’s no chance at all that “Summer of 69” refers to the year, given the age of the singer. It refers to the age of the narrating character, which is different than the age of the physical singer. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2013, 7:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/come-on-eileen-literally/669525/19 "2013-09-23T19:19:07Z")
That doesn’t really make a lot of sense. The overt meaning of the song is “Eileen, let me have sex with you.” And you’re saying the real hidden meaning on the song is “I want to masturbate on Eileen”? That makes the overt meaning more explicit than the supposed double entendre. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2013, 7:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/come-on-eileen-literally/669525/20 "2013-09-23T19:28:48Z")
Now “Hella Good” by No Doubt - that’s a double entendre. She’s singing about “dancing” but the song is really about sex. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/come-on-eileen-literally/669525.md?page=2)