# Weezer's "Buddy Holly"
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weezers-buddy-holly/547173
**Category:** Cafe Society
**Created:** [July 19, 2010, 12:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weezers-buddy-holly/547173 "2010-07-19T00:16:00Z")
**Posts on this page:** 14
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Horatio\_Hellpop](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Horatio_Hellpop)
#### Post date: [July 19, 2010, 12:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weezers-buddy-holly/547173/1 "2010-07-19T00:16:00Z")
After singing this in a karaoke room for the 20th time, it dawned on me that this peppy, upbeat song is about a wimpy guy watching his girlfriend get brutalized (Raped?) by a bunch of thugs. Am I off base here? What other interpretations of this weird song are there?
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### Author:  [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)
#### Post date: [July 19, 2010, 12:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weezers-buddy-holly/547173/2 "2010-07-19T00:19:13Z")
Where the hell did you get THAT idea?
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### Author:  [@Cat\_Fight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Fight)
#### Post date: [July 19, 2010, 12:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weezers-buddy-holly/547173/3 "2010-07-19T00:23:09Z")
I got the feeling it was about two geeky retro kids getting in a fight with some douches.
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### Author:  [@alice\_in\_wonderland](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alice_in_wonderland)
#### Post date: [July 19, 2010, 12:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weezers-buddy-holly/547173/4 "2010-07-19T00:30:44Z")
???!!!???
Jubus - that song was almost our wedding song. Uh yah, no. I don’t think your interpretation is accurate.
Well, I guess it’s accurate in your head, but that idea would never have occurred to me in 1,000 years.
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### Author:  [@Freudian\_Slit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freudian_Slit)
#### Post date: [July 19, 2010, 12:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weezers-buddy-holly/547173/5 "2010-07-19T00:32:45Z")
I don’t know if I necessarily thought that, but I definitely thought violence, and I can see where you got that from.
These parts:
> [@](#):
>
> Don’t you ever fear, I’m always near.
> I know that you need help.
> Your tongue is twisted, your eyes are slit.
> You need a guardian.
> [@](#):
>
> Bang! Bang! Knock on the door, another big bang, get down on the floor.
> Oh No! What do we do?
> Don’t look now but I lost my shoe.
> I can’t run and I can’t kick.
> What’s a matter babe, are you feelin’ sick?
> What’s a matter, what’s a matter, what’s a matter you?
> What’s a matter babe, are you feelin’ blue?
Plus the parts at the beginning where he’s talking about guys dissing his girl and asking why they’re being so violent. I mean, I don’t know if my first interpretation was necessarily guy watching his girl get raped, but my first thought was something skeevy happening. It’s not exactly a song I would think of for a wedding.
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### Author:  [@Spice\_Weasel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spice_Weasel)
#### Post date: [July 19, 2010, 12:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weezers-buddy-holly/547173/6 "2010-07-19T00:36:06Z")
It’s about a close friend Rivers had in college. They had a special relationship which was gossiped about
> [@](#):
>
> What’s with these homies dissin’ my girl?
and he wrote a song for her. A lot of the lyrics don’t make much sense because it’s filled with inside jokes.
Also features one of my favorite lines in a song
> [@](#):
>
> Your tongue is twisted, your eyes are slit
> You need a guardian
I believe that is a reference to his friend’s nationality - she was Asian, I think Japanese. I assume the ‘‘twisted tongue’’ refers to an accent.
ETA:
I don’t think the line is ‘‘I know that you need help.’’ I think it’s ‘‘I know that you’ll be there.’’
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### Author:  [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)
#### Post date: [July 19, 2010, 12:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weezers-buddy-holly/547173/7 "2010-07-19T00:47:05Z")
> [@olivesmarch4th](#):
>
> I believe that is a reference to his friend’s nationality - she was Asian, I think Japanese. I assume the ‘‘twisted tongue’’ refers to an accent.
They do it for me every time 🙂
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### Author:  [@alice\_in\_wonderland](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alice_in_wonderland)
#### Post date: [July 19, 2010, 12:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weezers-buddy-holly/547173/8 "2010-07-19T00:48:28Z")
> [@Freudian\_Slit](#):
>
> It’s not exactly a song I would think of for a wedding.
Well, I’ve always heard it as a song about a couple that’s getting dissed for being together.
No violence, rape, etc. Just typical high-school junk, ya know?
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### Author:  [@Odesio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Odesio)
#### Post date: [July 19, 2010, 12:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weezers-buddy-holly/547173/9 "2010-07-19T00:50:14Z")
Don’t feel bad. I’m pretty sure that Micky from Toni Basil’s song of the same name is gay. She even offers him anal sex but Micky just won’t go for it.
Odesio
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### Author:  [@Nzinga\_Seated](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nzinga_Seated)
#### Post date: [July 19, 2010, 12:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weezers-buddy-holly/547173/10 "2010-07-19T00:53:04Z")
I never thought about it (I love that song…that whole album, actually). But now that you mention it, I can see that interpretation.
And I never take a songwriter’s word for what a song is about.
ETA: Also, I have a bad habit of looking for darker meanings whenever I hear upbeat songs by good songwriters. I have no clue when this habit started, but I know I never used to do it. Now, I’m all the time looking for deep dark subtext under peppy beats.
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### Author:  [@Freudian\_Slit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freudian_Slit)
#### Post date: [July 19, 2010, 1:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weezers-buddy-holly/547173/11 "2010-07-19T01:02:25Z")
> [@alice\_in\_wonderland](#):
>
> Well, I’ve always heard it as a song about a couple that’s getting dissed for being together.
>
> No violence, rape, etc. Just typical high-school junk, ya know?
That does make sense, but the guy in the song does use the word “violent” himself. And the stuff about getting down on the floor, bang bang…it has a really violent feel to it. It sounds a bit more than typical high school stuff.
While we’re on the subject, was the Annie of MJ’s Smooth Criminal a rape victim or was she just assaulted (non sexually)?
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### Author:  [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)
#### Post date: [July 19, 2010, 2:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weezers-buddy-holly/547173/12 "2010-07-19T02:30:37Z")
It sounds then like they’re being interrupted during some “quality time”, by said bullies, and then he’s like, “oh shit, can’t find my clothes, what do we do – hey, you look sick?”
Or something. 😉
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### Author:  [@Hippy\_Hollow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hippy_Hollow)
#### Post date: [July 19, 2010, 3:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weezers-buddy-holly/547173/13 "2010-07-19T03:23:36Z")
Not that it means anything in relation to this thread, but I once saw Rivers Cuomo on campus, walking towards the library. I had to resist the urge to yell “Hey Weezer!”
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### Author:  [@Huerta88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Huerta88)
#### Post date: [July 20, 2010, 4:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weezers-buddy-holly/547173/14 "2010-07-20T16:22:16Z")
The liner notes from his tossed off solo album (a miscellany of half-baked demos, really) relate the story of walking across a college campus with a Korean girlfriend and having some galoots making rude comments for some reason or another, and he took it from there. From what I’ve read the guy apparently takes himself (his own life story) very seriously (he has an elaborate spreadsheet of every song he’s ever even started writing) so it seems probable that’s ripped straight from the pages of his 1989 journals or whatever.