Today, we look at five songs that have twist endings.
In Drawing Crazy Patterns, I spotlight at least five things from pop culture that fit under a specific theme (basically, stuff that happens frequently enough to be worth pointing it out). Note that these lists are inherently not exhaustive. They are a list of five examples (occasionally I’ll be nice and toss in a sixth). So no instance is “missing” if it is not listed. It’s just not one of the five examples that I chose. You can always feel free to suggest ANOTHER example that fits the theme, if you’d like, but nothing is “missing” from this list.
September is a month of Drawing Crazy Patterns!
Generally speaking, story songs tend to be autobiographical, and they tend to be pretty linear. So there usually isn’t enough plot in most songs for them to pull off twist endings or anything like that, but a number of songs over the years HAVE been able to pull that off. Here are five of them.
“ONE TIN SOLDIER”
This is a funny one, because it’s really more of a morality play than anything else, but, I mean, I guess those have twist endings, right?
In “One Tin Soldier,” there is a mountain kingdom that apparently had this great treasure. The people in the valley become jealous, and sent a message to the mountain people, that they must give them the treasure or else the valley people would attack them, kill them and take the treasure. The mountain people said they can’t give it to them, but they can share it with them.
The valley people attack, killing all of the mountain people. They then found the treasure, and it was a stone saying “Peace on Earth.”
I imagine the valley people all said, “D’oh!” at that point.
“FOOL IN THE RAIN”
“Fool in the Rain” debuted on the eight and final Led Zeppelin album, In Through the Out Door, and it was clearly a case of Zeppelin trying to mix up their writing style to try to remain current with the times. It is a much poppier tune than most Zeppelin songs. In it, a man is standing in the rain, stood up by his girlfriend, a “fool in the rain,” and he goes through the ups and downs of their relationship, while wallowing over the fact that she stood him up.
It ends, though, by revealing he is a “fool in the rain” for a whole OTHER reason…he was waiting on the wrong block!
“Ooh now my body is starting to quiver
And the palms of my hands getting wet, oh
I got no reason to doubt you baby
It’s all a terrible mess
And I’ll run in the rain till I’m breathless
When I’m breathless I’ll run ’til I drop, hey!
And the thoughts of a fool’s kind of careless
I’m just a fool waiting on the wrong block, oh yeah”
“ESCAPE (THE PINA COLADA SONG)”
Amusingly, both this and “Fool in the Rain” were released in the same year, 1979. In this Rupert Holmes tune (by far the biggest hit of his career, and the dude has won a Tony Award for Best Musical, so that’s saying a lot), “Escape (The Pina Colada Song),” a man is bored in his relationship, and sees a personal ad that attracts his attention (it catchily opens with “If you like Pina Coladas, and getting caught in the rain…”). He responds to the ad with his own, similar ad, and he sets to meet this mystery person who has the same views of him about champagne, health food and times of day for making love (midnight is their shared preference) and, well, guess who it is?
So I waited with high hopes
And she walked in the place
I knew her smile in an instant
I knew the curve of her face
It was my own lovely lady
And she said, “Oh, it’s you”
Then we laughed for a moment
And I said, “I never knew”
“That you like piña coladas…
I suspect that that relationship is likely not in great shape, but hey, maybe this works for them.
“HUMAN”
This is a fun one, as throughout the song, “Human,” by Human League, the male singer is apologizing to his love for cheating on her while they were separated from each other. He insists that:
I’m only human
Of flesh and blood I’m made
Human
Born to make mistakes
So in the end, she forgives him, but not before the twist, while they were separated, SHE cheated on HIM, too!
The tears I cry aren’t tears of pain
They’re all to hide my guilt and shame
I forgive you, now I ask the same of you
While we were apart, I was human too
They should double date with the couple from “Escape (The Pina Colada Song).”
“CEILINGS”
Lizzie McAlpine is one of the hot new singer/songwriters making waves in that Olivia Rodrigo-type approach (all, of course, inspired by Taylor Swift), and her first big hit, “Ceilings,” is seemingly about a number of vignettes in a romantic relationship she is having, like the opening verse:
Ceilings, plaster
Can’t you just make it move faster?
Lovely to be sitting here with you
You’re kinda cute but it’s raining harder
My shoes are now full of water
Lovely to be rained on with you
It’s kinda cute but it’s so short
However, after a whole song’s worth of discussing the romance, she shocks us in the last verse by revealing that this has all just been in her imagination!
But it’s not real
And you don’t exist
And I can’t recall the last time I was kissed
It hits me in the car
And it feels like the end of a movie I’ve seen before
Before
Okay, folks, if you have suggestions for a future Drawing Crazy Patterns, drop me a line at brian@poprefs.com! I don’t have 30 topics just yet, so I could use the suggestions!
Fool in the Rain is the same story and same twist ending as the 50s hit Silhouettes by the Ray’s.
Lost control and rang your bell, I was sore
Let me in or else I’ll beat down your door
When two strangers who had been two Silhouettes on the shade
Said to my shock
You’re on the wrong block.
When I saw the title of this column, my first thought was of “My Girl Bill” by Jim Stafford.
Rupert Holmes has said he shouldn’t have done that song first person because it’s not autobiographical and too many people assume it is.
I suspect the Valley People probably cussed out the mountain people for tricking them. That seems about their speed.
Another twist ending is one of my favorite’s. Dido’s Christmas Day, on one of those Can’t Believe It’s Christmas compilation CD’s. It’s a sweet song, until the end………
Great list! I’d add “come sail away” by Styx. “I thought that they were angels and much to my surprise they climbed aboard their starship and headed for the skies!”
How about “A Boy Named Sue”?
“If I ever have a son… I’m naming him Bill … or Jimmy … anything but Sue!”
One of favorite twist endings is Bruce Springsteen’s “Brilliant Disguise”. Through most of the song he sings about how he doesn’t really trust the woman he loves – he’s afraid she’s wearing a brilliant disguise. But when he ends the song he warns his love “So when you look at me you better look hard and look twice – is that me baby or just a brilliant disguise?”
The Night Chicago Died
For me, the best song with a twist ending is “Richard Cory” written by Paul Simon based on an earlier poem with the same ending.
The lyrics from a factory worker’s point of view show his perception of Richard Cory – “He had everything a man could want” “he surely must be happy with everything he’s got” “I wish that I could be Richard Cory” but the song takes an abrupt change of tone showing that Richard Cory’s private life is not as happy as it seemed.
That’s a really good example, John. When I was a teacher, I would use that poem and song as an example of how poetry and music are intertwined with poems becoming songs. Because students who “didn’t like poetry” still liked music.
The other example I would use is “The Unicorn Song.”
What is the twist in The Night Chicago Died?
My favorite examples are two songs by Jim Croce, “Leroy Brown” and “You Don’t Mess around with Jim.” They both have essentially the same “plot”: the title character is touted as a big, dangerous guy that no one should ever mess with. But at the end of the song the tough guy runs into someone worse and gets his ass kicked. “Leroy Brown” is probably the better known song, but the other is more fun. The last line of the chorus is “and you don’t mess around with Jim,” but the final line of the song changes it to “you don’t mess around with Slim.”