Pop superstar and strident feminist Cyndi Lauper has revealed she changed the lyrics to her ultimate anthem, Girls Just Want To Have Fun, after being presented with a version of the track that ‘sucked’.
The 71-year-old singer, who will be playing the prestigious Pyramid Stage at Glastonbury Festival in Worthy Farm, Somerset, today, spoke about how her most iconic song came to be.
The track, which was released in 1983, was the singer’s first official release as a solo artist and reached No. 2 in the UK and US charts.
Decades after its release, the song’s lyrics have been adopted by women’s rights activists who play on the title words to decry: ‘Girls just want to have fun-damental rights’.
Now, speaking on BBC Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour, Lauper, who hails from Brooklyn, New York, has revealed her disappointment at the track, originally written by Robert Hazard as a demo in 1979, when it was first presented to her.
Cyndi Lauper has revealed she changed the lyrics to Girls Just Want To Have Fun after she originally tried to sing words written by a make songwriter but they ‘sucked’
The singer, who has long campaigned for women’s rights, told host Anita Rani: ‘I burnt my training bra at the first women’s demonstration at the Alice in Wonderland Statue.
‘I was there. And I burnt it not just for me, but for my mother, and my grandmother, right? The women whose shoulders I stand on.’
She continued to say the song, when it was originally presented to her, was ‘written by a man, for a man’.
The 71-year-old world famous singer-songwriter spoke to Woman’s Hour about how she tweaked the words to her most famous song
Lauper pointed out that the male perspective is ‘not the same point of view’ as a woman’s perspective.
She also revealed that she ‘tried to sing it like him’ but that the song ‘sucked’ and ‘didn’t sound good’ when she sang Hazard’s lyrics as a woman.
‘You might as well just listen to his version,’ she said.
Instead, in a ‘one more shot’ mentality, Lauper decided to change Hazard’s lyrics to better suit her style, and a woman’s perspective on the song.
One such lyric that was re-written was: ‘Oh Daddy, dear, we are the fortunate ones’. Instead, this became: ‘Oh mama, dear, we are not the fortunate ones’.
Lauper argued: ‘Because we’re not!’
As she re-wrote lyrics across the board, Lauper revealed the process saw her ‘take it apart and put it back together’.
Lauper is set to take to Glastonbury’s Pyramid Stage for the first time this afternoon after announcing a new major tour this week.
The American pop legend, who turned 71 on Sunday, will begin her last ever tour in October, 11 years after her She’s So Unusual: 30th Anniversary Tour
The UK and Europe farewell tour, which shares the name of her top anthem, will be her last – and is announced 11 years after her last.
The True Colours hitmaker will be accompanied on tour by a series of special guests, who will be announced closer to the time.
The news comes after Cyndi’s documentary, Let The Canary Sing, detailing her rise to fame at 30, premiered exclusively in the U.S. and Canada on June 4.
In celebration of the documentary and the tour, Cyndi left her hand and footprints at the prestigious TCL Chinese Theatre Hollywood in Los Angeles.
She was joined by her sister and Sharon Osbourne at the premiere and Cher and Bebe Rhexa at the ceremony.
During an interview with AP at the Hand And Footprint ceremony, Cyndi was asked why she decided to go on her final tour now.
She answered: ‘Because this is the strongest I am, and in five years I don’t know where I’m gonna be. I still do my yoga…and you know, I work out, I do yoga, I do [physical therapy], I do vocal exercises.
‘But, you know, I’m also working on theater stuff, like Broadway shows. And that takes a lot,’ the singer explained.
‘So, I figure I’m not gonna wait. I’m gonna do it now, because now is a good time and celebrate with everybody just one last time in an arena tour which I haven’t done on my own in…since the 80s.’
She continued: ‘My fans have been all over the world. You know, it takes a lot. But this is gonna be it. I’ll go all over, I’ll go North America, I’ll do Europe, I’ll do Asia, I’ll do Australia and then South America. So, I’m gonna try to get the hemispheres in there and say goodbye and thank you…’