Gotta Be Wrong Sometimes

Album: King (2011)
Play Video

Songfacts®:

  • The second single from O.A.R.'s seventh album, King, is about not worrying about making mistakes in a relationship, as everyone else does at some stage. The band's vocalist Marc Roberge admitted to AOL Music: "I can't stand when people say, 'I don't have any regrets. It's just not true." He added: "For me, I just wasn't around as often as I should have been and I wasn't able to balance correctly. But the song, for me, is more lighthearted than the rest of the heavy stuff on the album, and is about two people meeting and throwing caution to the wind like you see in the movies."
  • Roberge explained the song's meaning to American Songwriter magazine: "'Gotta Be Wrong Sometimes' is about this idea that we can, in fact, live parts of this life without a care," he said. "But I think it only works in small doses, with short bursts of recklessness. Most of our time we have responsibilities and routine to center us, though we can find more power sometimes in simply being able to let go. The song is set in a moment when two people meet for the first time and decide to block the world out and simply enjoy the moment, even if for only a night."
  • The song was written during the final weeks of working on King and the band tried out several different choruses before settling on the one we hear on the album. "The team just kept digging until we found the one that opened up just perfectly. It had to deliver the theme of the song sonically as well as lyrically, said Roberge to American Songwriter. "We don't really have a set method for writing songs in this band. Some are one guy with a guitar, some are the whole band at soundcheck, and some are a group of us in the writing rooms throwing ideas at each other, swapping choruses until we all collectively smile and nod."
  • The song took less than two days to lay down, which Roberge credits in part to the band's drummer. "Unlike the rest of the album, we didn't record this track with full takes live as a band off the deck only because we had moved studios and broke down the full band set up," he told American Songwriter. "I remember listening back to our drummer Chris Culos' tracks and thinking how thankful I was he nailed the live band drum performance we needed so badly, just playing along to a demo. His high energy allowed us all to continue the team mentality we'd had throughout tracking of the entire album, and get this thing sounding more like a live track than overdub overkill."

Comments

Be the first to comment...

Editor's Picks

Early Days of MTV

Early Days of MTVFact or Fiction

If you can recall the days when MTV played videos, you know that there are lots of stories to tell. See if you can spot the real ones.

Emilio Castillo from Tower of Power

Emilio Castillo from Tower of PowerSongwriter Interviews

Emilio talks about what it's like to write and perform with the Tower of Power horns, and why every struggling band should have a friend like Huey Lewis.

American Hits With Foreign Titles

American Hits With Foreign TitlesSong Writing

What are the biggest US hits with French, Spanish (not "Rico Suave"), Italian, Scottish, Greek, and Japanese titles?

U2 Lyrics

U2 LyricsMusic Quiz

How well do you know the lyrics of U2?

Brian Kehew: The Man Behind The Remasters

Brian Kehew: The Man Behind The RemastersSong Writing

Brian has unearthed outtakes by Fleetwood Mac, Aretha Franklin, Elvis Costello and hundreds of other artists for reissues. Here's how he does it.

80s Video Director Jay Dubin

80s Video Director Jay DubinSong Writing

Billy Joel and Hall & Oates hated making videos, so they chose a director with similar contempt for the medium. That was Jay Dubin, and he has a lot to say on the subject.