20 Years Later, The Meaning Behind OutKast’s “Hey Ya!”

On August 25, perhaps the most successful song of OutKast’s entire career will turn 20 years old. But before “Hey Ya!” was released as one of the two promotional singles for their fifth album Speakerboxxx/The Love Below (2003), OutKast’s prior LPs still demonstrated why they were held as one of the best duos in hip-hop history.

With stellar offerings like ATLiens in 1996 and their classic Stankonia in 2000, OutKast’s one-of-a-kind combination of songwriting, chemistry, and versatility shined through. In an interview we conducted with one-half of the group Big Boi, he explained that he and other-half André 3000 clicked from the very start, and have been close friends since their teenage years.

“There was a lot of kids from different schools transferred to this one school so nobody really knew each other,” he explained. “It was like a group of guys, it was like maybe five or six of us. And we started hanging out. Then me and [Andre 3000], just stuck to each other and were like, brothers. We were just in and out of school just kind of coolin’. He’s one of my best friends.”

With this strong bond and years of working together, Speakerboxxx/The Love Below was set to eclipse any record they’d set for themselves beforehand. Eventually spending seven weeks atop the Billboard 200, their first and only album to reach No. 1 on the chart, the two lead singles had a lot to do with the LP’s success. Released simultaneously in August 2003, “The Way You Move” saw Big Boi handle much of the vocals while “Hey Ya!” was completely dominated by André 3000. Both had their individual peaks at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100, but “Hey Ya!” was able to maintain its position on top for nine straight weeks.

Making “Hey Ya!”

Twenty years later, the song can be heard nightly at clubs around the world. Its fascinating paradox of upbeat instrumentation and singing combined with melancholic lyrics about heartbreak has captured listeners’ attention in a unique way. In multiple different interviews, André 3000 and his engineer spoke on how they crafted “Hey Ya!” so meticulously.

While speaking with MTV in early 2004 on the set of the song’s music video, André 3000 gave background on the song’s inspiration. “‘Hey Ya!’ is pretty much about the state of relationships in the 2000s,” he said. “It’s about some people who stay together in relationships because of tradition, because somebody told them, ‘You guys are supposed to stay together.’ But you pretty much end up being unhappy for the rest of your life.”

Although it’s incredibly detailed and story-based, André insisted during a later interview with Huffington Post that “Hey Ya!” wasn’t about him. “The song isn’t autobiographical, it’s more like fantasies or tangents based on real life,” he said. “Moments from my life spark a thought when I’m writing. The story was set in the ’50’s, so the song was me trying [to] do a Woody Allen kinda thing, a humorous kind of honesty.”

When recording the track, which practically feels like a four-minute-long movie, André’s engineer Pete Novak told MTV that they went through many trials and errors to end up with their final result. “He would do 30 or 40 takes of each line… We [recorded] a lot of vocals and lived with them and trashed them,” he said. “There were so many different versions of that song. If I had the files, I could let you hear 20 different versions of that song. There were lots of ideas that were interesting, but I’m happy with the way it turned out. We had one of the verses with him singing through a vocoder. It was cool at the time, but it didn’t really work.”

Three years after the song’s release, it would be officially certified platinum by RIAA. Made about “the state of relationships today,” which André noted in a conversation with VH1 three months after the song came out, “Hey Ya!” still resonates with fans after two decades.

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