Wheatus’ Teenage Dirtbag is based on a seriously dark true story
Wheatus’ 'Teenage Dirtbag' has a seriously creepy true story behind it, and it's left fans horrified.
Whether it was blasted at your primary school discos or a fan-favourite go-to at any dodgy karaoke night - the track has become cemented in pretty much everyone's brains if you happen to be born pre-millennium.
Now, while many of us could probably recite the catchy lyrics off by heart now, what a lot of us don't know are the eerie origins of the smash hit.
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The debut single first graced our earholes back in the year 2000 and is arguably the most well-known song by Wheatus after selling millions upon millions of copies worldwide.
It was written by guitarist and vocalist Brendan B. Brown and has become a cult classic made popular by its relatable coming-of-age lyrics about an unrequited high school romance.
In case you need your jukebox memory jogging, the song is sung from the perspective of a narrator who longs for a girl who doesn’t seem to notice him until the very end at which point she asks him to go to an Iron Maiden concert with her at the school prom.
It's all very American let's just say.
Oh yeah - the iconic music video also featured clips from the movie Loser which starred American Pie's Jason Biggs and American Beauty's Mena Suvari.
Some of the lyrics include: "Her boyfriend's a d*ck / And he brings a gun to school," as well as "I'm just a teenage dirtbag, baby / Listen to Iron Maiden, baby, with me."
The song was actually inspired by a childhood experience of Brown's as he opened up about his muse in a 2012 interview with Tone Deaf.
The star revealed: "It came from the summer of 1984 on Long Island, when I was 10 years old.
"That summer in the woods behind my house, there was a Satanic, drug-induced ritual teen homicide that went down; and the kid who did it was called Ricky Kasso, and he was arrested wearing an AC/DC T-shirt.
"That made all the papers, and the television, obviously; and here I was, 10 years old, walking around with a case full of AC/DC and Iron Maiden and Metallica – and all the parents and the teachers and the cops thought I was some kind of Satan worshipper.
"So that's the backdrop for that song," Brown concluded.
He also added in the same interview the possible reason why he thought the song was so successful, recalling his father's words: "Every teenager has to go through that 'being an outsider' thing, at least a little bit. So that story is still the same for people, even if it's thirty years after I went through it."
Guess you really do learn something new every day.
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Rhiannon Ingle