Sad meaning behind Outkast's 'Hey Ya!'

If your were around or even in utero in 2003, then you'll remember that Outkast’s pop hit ‘Hey Ya!’ slaps - and still does, of course.

But if you've ever sat down and done a deep dive listening to the lyrics you'll realise that it isn't as upbeat as the bop itself.

Turns out the toe-tapper has some pretty tear-jerking depth and a darker meaning to it than you might realise.

See the video below that sees one TikTok user break this thing down for you (for nothing) and proper to be bummed out as you shake your head like a polaroid picture:

While the seemingly upbeat song seems like it would be pretty surface - right down to the enthusiastic exclamation mark in the title - it turns out there's a level of sarcasm to it.

The classic 2003 anthem, that will transport many of us back to those heady days of the early noughties, was the first single from Andre 3000's side of the Outkast album: Speakerboxxx/The Love Below

On December 13, 2003, it hit the #1 spot on the US Billboard 100, and remained there until February 7, 2004 but only got to number three in the UK charts.

It peaked at 20^th in the chart of the decade.

But you can't be blamed for not really taking the song and it's love-themed video too seriously - until you hear this mind blowing breakdown.

In the TikTok video, user @elizabethdevasto shared the song as part of a series she’s catchily titled ‘Songs that hit different when you know what they’re written about’.

YouTube/Outkast

In her video, she said: “André 3000 actually wrote this about modern-day relationships and how messed up they are.

“In the beginning of the song, he even references his own relationship; how his baby doesn’t wanna leave him, how he doesn’t really know what the reason is behind it.”

The band themselves have addressed this too.

Back in 2021, the official Outkast Twitter account shared a post that read: “Alright alright alright alright alright we made one.”

The picture underneath showed a shot of Andre 3000 in the song’s video with his head divided up into two parts.

The smallest part was labelled ‘a bop’ and the largest part was labelled ‘the saddest song ever written’.

Have a look at some of the lyrics:

At one point, Andre sings: “You think you’ve got it / Oh, you think you’ve got it / But got it just don’t get it when there’s nothin’ at all.

“We get together / Oh, we get together / But separate’s always better when there’s feelings involved

“Know what they say - its / Nothing lasts forever!”

Hmm, those do seem quite sad really, actually.

When you really go through the lyrics, they all seem quite sad and despondent, don’t they?

Twitter/Outkast

Making reference to another part, the TikTok video continues: “What he’s talking about is in modern-day relationships, people stay in them because they just don’t want to be alone, not because of their love for the other person.

“If you just read the lyrics it actually sounds like a really sad song.

“Even at the breakdown at the end, he makes a reference to how people are just gonna see it as a happy song and not even think about the deeper meaning behind it, nor do they even wanna hear about it.”

That lyric reads: “Y’all don’t want to hear me, you just want to dance.”

There you have it – will you ever listen to that song in the same way again?