Lyrical Content
The song is one of Aerosmith's most successful attempts at tackling social issues. It reflects on the sorry state of the world ("There's something wrong with the world today"), religion ("We're seeing things in a different way and God knows it ain't his"), racism ("If you can judge a wise man by the color of his skin"), among other things. However, the lyrics in the song also suggest that the world is still worth living in ("We could tell 'em no, or we could let it go, but I would rather be a-hangin' on"). The lyrics also contain a reference to the Yardbirds song, "Mister You're a Better Man Than I" (Aerosmith had previously recorded a version of a song popularized by the Yardbirds, "Train Kept A-Rollin'").
According to the band's autobiography Walk This Way, the song was inspired by the Los Angeles riots of 1992. Steven Tyler also mentions in the book, that the song features the sound of a bass drum he stole from his high school; four loud beats are heard from that drum in a pause between the final verse and chorus.
Read more about this topic: Livin' On The Edge
Famous quotes containing the word content:
“The content of a thought depends on its external relations; on the way that the thought is related to the world, not on the way that it is related to other thoughts.”
—Jerry Alan Fodor (b. 1935)