Outkast - Hey Ya! (Lyrics)
Artist/Group: Outkast Album: Speakerboxxx/The Love Below Released: 2003 Label: LaFace/Arista Watch the Official Video of this song www.youtube.com/watch?v=PWgvGjAhvIw -------------------------------------------------- "Hey Ya!" is a song performed by the American hip-hop group Outkast and André 3000. Along with "The Way You Move", recorded by Outkast's other member Big Boi, "Hey Ya!" was released by LaFace Records as one of the two lead singles from the duo's fifth album, Speakerboxxx/The Love Below. The track became a commercial success, reaching number one in the United States, Australia, Canada, Norway, and Sweden. André 3000 wrote "Hey Ya!" in 2000, but began work on recording it in December 2002 at Stankonia Studios in Atlanta, Georgia. He used an acoustic guitar for accompaniment, inspired by bands such as the Ramones, the Buzzcocks, the Hives, and the Smiths. Having already been handed the song by his creator, he recorded the introduction, the first verse, and the hook. André began recording the vocals during this time, doing several dozen takes. He returned to work on the song several evenings later, with session musician Kevin Kendricks performing the bassline on the synthesizer. Months later, André 3000 worked with Pete Novak at the Larrabee Sound Studios in Los Angeles. They experimented with various sound effects, including singing through a vocoder, and did 30 to 40 takes for each line. "Hey Ya!" is a song in G major. Each cadential six-measure phrase is constructed using a change of meter on the fourth measure and uses a I–IV–V–VI chord progression. G major and C major chords are played for one and two 4/4 measures, respectively. André 3000 then uses a deceptive cadence after a 2/4 measure of the dominant D major chord, leading into two 4/4 measures of an E major chord (against a G note in the melody implying E minor). The song moves at a tempo of 158 beats per minute, and André's vocal range spans more than an octave and a half, from B3 to G5. The song opens with three pick up beats as André 3000 counts "one, two, three, oh" and then leads into the first verse. The lyrics begin to describe the protagonist's concerns and doubts about a romantic relationship. He wonders if they are staying together just "for tradition", as in the lines "But does she really wanna [mess around] / But can't stand to see me / Walk out the door?" André 3000 commented, "I think it's more important to be happy than to meet up to...the world's expectations of what a relationship should be. So this is a celebration of how men and women relate to each other in the 2000s". The song then leads into the chorus, which consists of the line "Hey ya!" repeated eight times, accompanied by a synthesizer performing the bassline. During the second verse, the protagonist gets cold feet and wonders what the purpose of continuing the relationship is, pondering the question, "If they say nothing is forever...then what makes love the exception?" After repeating the chorus, the song leads into a call and response section. André 3000 jokes, "What's cooler than being cool?", and the "fellas'" response, an overdubbed version of his vocals, is "Ice cold", a reference to one of André Benjamin's stage names. He then calls to the "ladies", whose response is overdubbed from vocals by Rabeka Tuinei, who was an assistant to the audio engineer. The song's breakdown coined the phrase "shake it like a Polaroid picture", a reference to an erroneous technique used by some photographers to expedite instant film. Early versions of the film needed to be dried, and shaking the picture helped it to dry faster. The breakdown also namechecks singer Beyoncé and actress Lucy Liu. The song closes by repeating the chorus and then gradually fading out. "Hey Ya!" received universal acclaim from music critics and fans alike. PopMatters described the track as "brilliantly rousing" and "spazzy with electrifying multiplicity". Entertainment Weekly highlighted it as the catchiest song on the double album, and Stylus Magazine identified it as one of the best songs in OutKast's history. "Hey Ya!" topped the 2003 Pazz & Jop list, a survey of several hundred music critics conducted by Robert Christgau, with 322 mentions, beating runner-up Beyoncé Knowles' "Crazy in Love" by 119. It was listed at number 15 on Blender's 2005 list of "The 500 Greatest Songs Since You Were Born", and Pitchfork Media included it in its collection of The Pitchfork 500. -------------------------------------------------- Follow Outkast: www.facebook.com/outkast/ www.instagram.com/outkast/ twitter.com/outkast #outkast #raplyrics #hiphoplyrics #lyrics
