American Woman (1970) 5/2/20

The Guess Who started the 1970s by releasing one of the “Great Songs of the Decade” right off the bat in January!

Four things you should know about “American Woman:”

#1: The song was improvised! During a concert, guitarist Randy Bachman was replacing a broken string, and while tuning, started to play a riff he really liked and wanted to remember. He repeated it a few times...and then the band started jamming around it. Once they had the tune worked out, singer Burton Cummings made up the lyrics on the spot!

#2: A kid with a cassette recorder saved the day! The concert was NOT being recorded for release (or any other reason), but members of the group spotted a kid in the crowd making a bootleg copy and convinced him to hand it over so they could listen to what they had created and write down the lyrics Cummings had ad libbed.

#3: The members of the group disagree on what the song is actually about! Cummings has repeatedly said that the lyrics were about preferring Canadian groupies over American groupies because Canadian groupies were much nicer. (Yikes!) He also acknowledges how chauvinistic the song is. Bachman, however, states the song is political—a protest about America's involvement in the Vietnam War.

#4: Cummings and Bachman rarely agreed on anything. :-) But one thing EVERYONE can agree on is the song was a HUGE hit in both countries! Chartwise, it went to #1 in Canada and the US...and reached the Top 10 in 5 other countries.

In 1999, Lenny Kravitz recorded a remake, and it was a monster hit all over again!

By then, Billboard Magazine had broken up their charts to reflect sales and airplay in smaller, more specifically-targeted formats. With those parameters in place, Lenny's version hit the Top 20 on 4 different charts. It also went to #2 in Canada...and Iceland, of all places.

Whatever it's really about, “American Woman” is a “Great Song of 1970...and 1999.”

The Guess Who:

Lenny Kravitz: