Why So Many Pop Song Lyrics Make So Little Sense (HINT: There’s a Language Barrier)

The grammatical bar for pop lyrics is plenty low, but some effort, at least, is required to clear it. And while we are fairly forgiving when it comes to the grammar of pop songs, we expect them at least to be fairly idiomatic most of the time. The lines above don’t sound like someone who’s careless about grammar. They sound like someone who is not a native English speaker and is also careless about grammar.

As it happens, the man behind many of the mega-hits of the last two decades, and also this song, is writer-producer Max Martin, who is from Sweden. Martin co-wrote and produced dozens of hit singles for Britney Spears, ‘N Sync, the Backstreet Boys, Pink, and Katy Perry, among other Billboard chart-toppers. And a number of his co-writers—Andreas Carlsson, Jorgen Elofsson, Per Magnusson, David Kreuger, Denniz Pop—also hail from the land of ABBA and lingonberries.