Chosen Song
Meaning/Deconstruction
The Offspring – Pretty Fly (For a White Guy)
The song ridicules a "wannabe gangsta" who is
immersed in hip-hop culture not because he truly loves or understands it, but
because it is trendy, makes him feel tough and makes it seem that he can get
all the girls ("and all the girls say I'm pretty fly - for a white
guy"). The song openly mocks the middle-class suburban youths who listen
to rap music for this reason.
The structure of the song fundamentally follows the conventions
of most other songs. It confirms to the mainstream formula of verse-chorus-second
verse-repeat chorus and so forth. The language and style of the lyrics used
work well to fit in with the irony of the music video. There is lots of
‘gangsta’ slang words used which stereotypically don’t look right coming from
the ‘white guy’ in the video. The lyrics tell the story of the day from a third
person perspective of the ‘white guy’. For example ‘So he bought Vanilla Ice’
and ‘Now he's getting a tattoo’. As a song it’s very upbeat and happy. The
catchy lyrics and guitar tunes allow the song to become recognisable from
almost any point of the song. Also the comedy and humour of the lyrics make it
a fun song to listen; it works well in several contexts and has done since its
release in 1998. The tone of the singers voice in the band is very iconic,
during this song he uses a tone that is quite aggressive but adds to the comedy
of the song. Words like ‘Hey Hey!’ and ‘Give it to me baby!’ are emphasized the
most during the song, these lyrics are sung just before the chorus starts,
making the build up for it more exciting.
