Songfacts®:

• The song is powerful; it's about a father who buys his son a gun without thinking about the horrible consequences of his actions. When the child gets picked on he goes to a dark place and uses the gun on his tormentors.
• This was featured in the motion picture End of Days, where Arnold Schwarzenegger is a man losing his grip on life who must protect a girl and kill the Devil. >>

  Suggestion credit:
  Yos - Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, for above 2
• The lyrics, "So with tears in his eye, He gonna catch 'em in the rye" (or "Readin' Catcher In The Rye," depending on the source), refer to J.D. Salinger's classic novel of teenage rebellion, The Catcher In The Rye. The 1951 novel's misanthropic protaganist, Holden Caulfield, is a heroic figure to outcasts who refuse to follow social norms. Some of Holden's admirers have even resorted to violence, such as the fictional boy from Everlast's song, and the real-life killer of John Lennon, Mark David Chapman. The book has inspired several other tunes, including Green Day's "Who Wrote Holden Caulfield?" and Guns N' Roses' "Catcher In The Rye."