“The music is the poetry of life, it’s the spirit of something,” McLean said. “The day the music died” initially refers to the plane crash, McLean said, but takes on “so many things” as the song progresses through six verses. More: What you need to know about Buddy Holly and ‘the day the music died’ in Iowa But it's a dream where things morph into other things.”
He added: “(It was) this idea of being a rock 'n' roll dream, or a fantasy, of some sort. I wanted to write a song that was completely brand new in its perspective.” And not a ‘This Land Is Your Land’ or America, the Beautiful” or something like that. “Buddy Holly’s death is what I used to try to write the biggest possible song I could write about America. "The song is not about Buddy Holly," he said. The first verse appeared like a “genie out of the bottle.” He wrote the first verse in one sitting, later expanding the track into a rock 'n' roll epic capturing the loss of American innocence. Leading into the 60th anniversary of “the day the music died,” the Register spoke with McLean about Buddy Holly, the song’s legacy and if he’ll one day return to the Surf Ballroom. Read below for excerpts from the interview.īuddy Holly offers a jumping off point for the song, but “American Pie” isn’t about Holly, McLean said. More: Sorry, 'American Pie,' but the music didn't die in Clear Lake.
“Something touched me deep inside the day the music died …” It’s in the first verse that he coined the Iowa crash with a name that would stick for decades to come.
“A long, long time ago,” he described it. The song opens by transporting listeners back to McLean’s 1959, to an America before the Beatles invaded Ed Sullivan and Vietnam War protests took over city blocks.
Twelve years later, McLean took pen to paper and delivered “American Pie,” an eight-and-a-half minute acoustic epic that’d become one of the most celebrated and debated songs in popular music. The Surf Ballroom prepares for the 60th anniversary of the Winter Dance Party on Tuesday, Jan.
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