She’s a Psycho!

Flashback Friday

If you were a teenager in the 90s like I was, there was a very important decision you had to make. Well, if you were a girl. I don’t know that guys cared about this. You had to decide if you were team Backstreet Boys:

Or team N’Sync:

I was team Backstreet Boys. I don’t know why. For whatever reason, I just gravitated more to them than N’Sync. Honestly, they’re basically the same. Couldn’t say that back then though. There would be an intense conversation about how you’re wrong and how different they are.

But here’s the thing, despite my appreciation for the Backstreet Boys and the album pictured above, I did have issue with one particular song of theirs. I recently added more of their music to my ‘random awesomeness’ playlist and I still have the same issue with the song. Probably more so now than back then.

I’m talking about their song “As Long As You Love Me”. I remember joking about this song to my mom. My problem is with the lyrics.

“I don’t care who you are, where you’re from, what you did, as long as you love me”. See the problem? This girl could have a history of homicidal rage, but they don’t care. She could be from a long stint in prison for doing something truly heinous to her last boyfriend, but they don’t care. As long as she loves them, that’s all that matters.

“Doesn’t really matter if you’re on the run.” See! She escaped from prison and is actively being pursued by the law! “It seems like we’re meant to be”. If you say so. I wouldn’t care how much someone loves me, I don’t want someone like that.

“I’ve tried to hide it so that no one knows.” Don’t want people to know you’re in love with a psycho? I get it.

“People say I’m crazy and that I am blind.” That means people saw her on the news and know she’s someone you shouldn’t get involved with! But let’s forget all of that because as long as she loves you, all is good.

It’s not a bad song, it’s really not. It’s catchy and from what I remember, it was a big hit. But come on. They could have done a little better with those lyrics. Not saying N’Sync was any better. They did have Justin Timberlake epically screwing up “It’s Gonna Be Me” with “It’s gonna be May”. At least with that it was written as “me” and he just got carried away with the producer’s instructions for singing it.

I’m pretty sure creepy lyrics are not unique to boy bands of the 90s. As I recall, there were some questionable lyrics in songs from the 70s and 80s too.