Some girls love bad boys. For every man who commits a massacre, there’s a whole crowd of women who go wild for him. More often than not, when serial killers and mass murderers make their way into prison, there’s a truckload of love letters waiting for them.

We spend a lot of time trying to figure out what’s wrong with the men who kill—but the women who love them may be every bit as disturbed as the killers themselves. Here is a small collection of examples.

10 The Woman Who Creeped Out Ted Bundy

Ted Bundy, the serial killer and rapist who ended at least 30 lives, got hundreds of letters from female fans while he was in prison. One woman named Janet, though, was so enthusiastic that she even managed to creep Ted Bundy out.

He only responded to her once, and Janet reacted like it was the most profound moment of her existence. “I got the letter you sent me and read it again,” she wrote him. “I kissed it all over and held it to me. I don’t mind telling you I am crying. I just don’t see how I can stand it anymore. I love you so very much, Ted.”^[1]

When she started showing up at his trials, even Bundy got nervous. He wrote a letter to his wife, Carole, telling her to stop letting Janet sit near her so that he wouldn’t have to look at her. “There she sits contemplating me with her mad eyes like a deranged seagull studying a clam,” Bundy wrote. “I can feel her spreading hot sauce on me already.”

9 Dylann Roof’s ‘Roofies’

After white supremacist and mass murderer Dylann Roof opened fire on a church in Charleston in 2016, he got such a massive following of female fans online that they even came up with a name for themselves: “roofies.”

For some reason, a group of women felt strangely aroused by the news of the murder. One was frankly honest about her confusing feelings, writing, “I feel so bad that I find Dylann handsome, but wtf can I do about it.”^[2]

Others, though, embrace it. One woman got his name tattooed beneath her breasts and kept a whole blog where she bragged about the love letters she’d sent him and shared lists of what she called “lesser known facts about Dylann.”

In the Internet age, enough of these people can come together that they actually have subcultures within their fan club. Dedicated “roofies” scorn the new fans, who they call “newfies,” feeling an elite superiority for having admired the mass murderer from the second he massacred a church full of innocent people.

“The OG’s are more mature & I would say know the most about Dylann, his life & the case,” one self-proclaimed roofie explained. “The newfies don’t really know a lot about him, they like to start drama.”

8 James Holmes’s Fangirls

“I hope you’re okay James,” begins one woman’s letter to James Holmes.^[3] “You’re all I think about. You’re all I think about. I actually had a dream about you, haha. I gave you a hand massage!”

It was one of literally thousands of cards that James Holmes received after opening fire on a crowded theater in Colorado and murdering 12 people in 2012. She’d enclosed a picture of herself—but that was hardly abnormal. Holmes has received so many pictures from admiring girls that he has a wall full of them.

It’s hard to imagine, but for some women, the sight of a wide-eyed, mentally unstable mass murderer drove them wild. The letter raves about his appearance. “I can’t believe your curls are gone. I like them,” she wrote. “I like a lot about your appearance. You’re handsome. You have strong hands and facial hair. You have really nice eyes.”

It’s all creepy, but there’s a disturbing suggestion in almost every one of these letters. A lot of them end with a line like, “If there’s anything I can do for you let me know.” If Holmes asked, these women would do whatever he bid.

7 Richard Ramirez’s Secret Admirer In The Jury

Richard Ramirez got so many letters from fans that he had his own stationary made with “NightStalker” emblazoned across the top of the page.

He got all kinds of letters. He got letters from teenage girls and adult women alike and even ended up marrying one of his admirers while he was in prison. But the most disturbing story has to be the one about Cindy Haden, the Night Stalker admirer who was on his jury.

After weeks of batting eyes at the serial killer with a pentagram on his hand, Haden brought Ramirez a plate full of cupcakes with the message “I love you” written on top.^[4]

Haden’s love for Ramirez wasn’t enough to get him off, though, and after a few arguments in the jury booth, even she put through a guilty verdict. She was still convinced, though, that she’d met her one true love. She visited Ramirez in jail, told him that she loved him, and even brought her parents along to meet the man she was convinced was her soul mate.

6 Josef Fritzl’s Fangirls

Josef Fritzl kept his own daughter locked in a cellar for 24 years. While she was trapped in his home, he repeatedly abused her and used her as a sex slave, fathering seven children through rape before she finally managed to escape.

He was about as horrible as a human being could be. And yet, when he got caught, hundreds of women sent him love letters. They wrote that they knew he was “good at heart,” with at least one woman telling Fritzl she was sure that he’d only locked up and sexually abused his daughter to keep her from getting into trouble.

Fritzl’s cellmate recalled that he would get dozens of love letters.^[5] He said that he remembered being deeply disturbed by a picture Fritzl showed him. It was sent in by a female fan, who had posed for him next to a masked man, acting out a rape fantasy and sending it into a convicted rapist.

“The fans saw him as the chief monster,” Fritzl’s cellmate said. “They respected him.”

5 Ian Brady’s Eulogizers

Ian Brady, with the help of his girlfriend Myra Hindley, molested and murdered five children in the 1960s. But when he died of cancer in prison in 2017, a whole group of women went out onto the Internet acting like they’d lost their soul mate.

“Oh my God, I just heard about Ian. This is the worst day ever,” one wrote.^[6] “I hope he’s at peace wherever he is. I love you Ian, and I will never forget how incredibly generous it was of you to reply to me. I’ll love you forever and I’ve got your name on me for the rest of my life.”

She wasn’t lying. She showed off a picture of the tattoos that she had on her arms. The names “Ian,” “Myra,” “Jeff [Dahmer],” and “Ted [Bundy]” had been permanently inked onto her flesh.

She wasn’t even the only one. Another woman said she was “crying so much” about his death, while yet another said, “You were an interesting individual with interesting, fascinating brains and thoughts. You introduced a whole new thing to me.”

4 Anders Breivik’s Fan Club Has Tips On How To Write Him Love Letters

Anders Breivik, the white supremacist who massacred 77 people in Norway with pipe bombs and an assault rifle in 2011, receives at least 800 letters per year, most of them from female admirers.

During his trial, a 16-year-old girl begged him to marry her, while a Swedish woman named Victoria has gotten on the news for declaring herself his one true love. She’s told the world that she loves Breivik so much that, in her words: “I really wouldn’t want to live a life without him.”^[7]

There are actually fan clubs online that give instructions on the best times to write Breivik letters and a guide on how to write him. “Are you a girl or woman that is in love with Breivik?” their guide says. “You should know this is perfectly natural, I encourage you to declare your admiration and love for Breivik. Publicly if possible, especially if you’re cute.”

There’s a disturbing reason why they want more love letters going to Breivik. They want more copycats. The guide explains: “Men need to know that women admire militant nationalists.”

3 Jeffrey Dahmer’s Loving Donors

Jeffrey Dahmer isn’t just a killer. He raped, murdered, and dismembered the bodies of 17 boys, often even cannibalizing and desecrating their corpses after they were dead. And yet, for some reason, he was so popular with the ladies that in 1993 alone, his admirers sent him $12,000 to help him buy things in prison.

A large chunk of that money came from one single fan in London, who was so enchanted by the stories of him desecrating young boys’ bodies that she sent him $5,920. She wasn’t the only person who sent him things, though. Most women just sent him a few dollars to spend on cigarettes and a couple of books or magazines to help him pass the time.

“He did awful things,” one woman admitted when asked why she would send money to a serial killer, “but way deep down he isn’t a mean kid.”^[8]

2 Nikolas Cruz’s Facebook Community

There’s a Facebook community with 300 members called “Nikolas Cruz — the First Victim.”^[9] It’s a group of women who are in love with the Parkland High School shooter, where they share ideas on how they can help him and make photo collages of the mass murderer with hearts around his head.

The women there send love letters to Cruz every chance they get. “I’m 18-years-old. I’m a senior in high school,” one woman, who could’ve been one Cruz’s victims if she’d been one of his classmates, wrote in a letter decorated with hearts and happy faces. “When I saw your picture on the television, something attracted me to you.”

She’d sent him a suggestive picture showing off her body. “I’m really skinny,” she told Cruz, “and have 34C sized breasts.”

She was hardly the only one who did it. Another woman sent him a whole collection of pictures, with one showing her sucking a Popsicle in a bikini and another just showing a close-up shot of her breasts.

“In my 40 years as public defender, I’ve never seen this many letters to a defendant,” Cruz’s public defender, Howard Finklestein, has said. To Finklestein’s credit, though, he won’t let Cruz know. He has staunchly refused to reward Cruz for his crime by letting him see the letters.

1 Kenneth Bianchi’s Copycat Admirer

Veronica Compton was so inspired by the rapes and murders of Kenneth Bianchi, the Hillside Strangler, that she wrote a play about it. It was called The Mutilated Cutter, and she sent it to the serial killer in the hopes of catching his eye.

“I hope you received my letter and could spare a moment during your busy schedule to look over my play. I really think you will find the plot quite fascinating. After all, it was you who inspired it,” she wrote in a letter attached to her script. “I hope to inspire you one day.”

She was very serious about it—and she’s a perfect example of how dangerous these fangirls really can be. In 1980, after winning Bianchi over with some suggestive photographs, she decided to try to commit a copycat murder to convince the police that the killer was still at large.

Compton smuggled Bianchi’s semen out of jail in a plastic glove.^[10] She’d planned on murdering a woman and planting his semen on her body to make it look like the DNA tests had misidentified Bianchi. Compton, though, wasn’t a very effective killer. Her victim got away and called the police, and Compton ended up behind bars.

Just like Bianchi, though, Compton got love letters of her own. A man named James Wallace started writing love letters to her while she was in prison and even ended up leaving his wife of 37 years for her—all for the love of a monster.

Before motion pictures, plays were the most popular medium of long-form storytelling for live audiences. From ancient Greece to the Renaissance, plays and playwrights have captured the hearts and minds of the masses. Names like Homer and Shakespeare will ring out throughout the ages for their literary prowess.

Like any other great nation, America has produced its fair share of memorable stories through this art form. From the sixteenth century to the modern day, American playwrights have offered a rich tapestry of humor, horror, romance, and mystery on and off Broadway. With that in mind, let’s review the ten best American-written plays, a diverse collection that will pique your interest.

Related: 10 Weird Sci-Fi and Fantasy Musicals You Won’t Believe Existed

10 The Crucible–Arthur Miller

Written in 1953, The Crucible centers around the Salem Witch Trials of the 17th century and is only marginally fictional. Written during “The Red Scare,” Miller’s story is an allegory for McCarthyism. It was first performed at the Martin Beck Theatre on Broadway on January 22, 1953, starring E.G. Marshall, Beatrice Straight, and Madeleine Sherwood. The play initially received mixed reviews from both the audience and critics, yet still won the Best Play Tony that year.

By 1956, The Crucible was already considered a classic and a central work in the canon of American literature. That same year, however, Miller was questioned by the House of Representatives Committee on Un-American Activities (aka the witch hunt of the day) in 1956 and convicted of contempt of Congress for refusing to identify others present at meetings he had attended. It somehow remains relevant in every era.^[1]

9 Cat on a Hot Tin Roof–Tennesse Williams

Tennessee Williams may be the most well-known playwright in American history, and while Cat on a Hot Tin Roof may not be his most famous piece, it’s arguably the most important. Written in 1955, this three-act play examines the relationships of the Pollitt family. This play features motifs such as social mores, greed, superficiality, mendacity, decay, sexual desire, repression, and death. The dialogue throughout is often written using nonstandard spelling intended to represent accents of the Southern United States.

“Like many of Williams’s works, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof concerns itself with the elaboration of a certain fantasy of broken manliness, in this case, a manliness left stifled by the homosexual desire it must keep in abeyance.” Williams draws from his own experiences with homosexuality and alcoholism, making this play ahead of its time and still wholly valid today.^[2]

8 Wicked–Winnie Holzman

Wicked is a musical with music and lyrics by Stephen Schwartz and a book by Winnie Holzman. It is a loose adaptation of the 1995 Gregory Maguire novel Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West, which is in turn based on L. Frank Baum’s 1900 novel The Wonderful Wizard of Oz and its 1939 film adaptation.

The original Broadway production won three Tony Awards and seven Drama Desk Awards, while its original cast album received a Grammy Award. “After two decades as one of the most beloved and enduring musicals on the stage, Wicked makes its long-awaited journey to the big screen as a spectacular, generation-defining cinematic event this holiday season.”

In a classic literary trope, this story takes an empathetic look at a well-known villain, painting her as a victim and then a hero. Wicked’s success has continued to grow, with potential sequels in the works; it continues to draw large crowds nationwide, thanks to its universal themes that appeal to a broad audience.^[3]

7 Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?–Edward Albee

First staged in October 1962, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? won the 1963 Tony Award for Best Play and the 1962–1963 New York Drama Critics’ Circle Award for Best Play. It is frequently revived on the modern stage. The film adaptation was released in 1966, written by Ernest Lehman, directed by Mike Nichols, and starring Richard Burton, Elizabeth Taylor, George Segal, and Sandy Dennis.

The plot is that of a bitter, aging couple who, with the help of alcohol, “use their young houseguests to fuel anguish and emotional pain toward each other throughout a distressing night.” This play is still a standard in English and Literature classes in high schools and colleges nationwide. The themes involved seemed to resonate with Americans of all ages.^[4]

6 A Raisin in the Sun–Lorraine Hansberry

A Raisin in the Sun is a play by Lorraine Hansberry that debuted on Broadway in 1959. The title comes from Langston Hughes’s poem “Harlem” (also known as “A Dream Deferred”). The story is about a Black family’s experiences in south Chicago as they attempt to improve their financial circumstances with an insurance payout following the death of their father.

It deals with matters of housing discrimination, racism, and assimilation. The play’s central theme is the question, “What happens to a dream deferred? Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun?” The New York Drama Critics’ Circle named it the best play of 1959. In recent years, publications such as The Independent and Time Out have listed it among the best plays ever written.^[5]

5 Rent–Jonathan Larson

Rent is a rock musical with music, lyrics, and a book by Jonathan Larson. Loosely based on the 1896 opera La Bohème by Giacomo Puccini, Luigi Illica, and Giuseppe Giacosa, it tells the story of a group of impoverished young artists struggling to survive and create a life in Lower Manhattan’s East Village in the thriving days of the Bohemian culture of Alphabet City, under the shadow of HIV/AIDS.

Winner of the Tony Award for Best Musical and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama, Rent has become a pop cultural phenomenon, with songs that rock and a story that resonates with audiences of all ages. Rent represents the best of theater, brimming with passion, sorrow, and joy while tackling important issues. It has remained one of the most popular performance pieces nationwide for decades and has spawned film and TV adaptations that are as cherished as the original cast presentation.^[6]

4 Long Day’s Journey into Night–Eugene O’Neill

Long Day’s Journey into Night is a play in four acts written by American playwright Eugene O’Neill in 1939–1941 and first published posthumously in 1956. It is widely regarded as his magnum opus and one of the great American plays of the 20th century. It opened on Broadway in November 1956, winning the Tony Award for Best Play. O’Neill received the 1957 Pulitzer Prize for Drama posthumously for the play. The work is openly autobiographical.

The “long day” in the title refers to the play’s setting, which takes place during one day. “O’Neill recounts a fateful summer evening at the Tyrone family’s seaside home, where members of the clan battle their addictions (to alcohol and morphine) as well as one another.” O’Neill is widely considered one of the greatest American poets, but his plays are often overlooked. This piece is his farewell to the public with whom he had a love/hate relationship throughout his life and career.^[7]

3 Fences–August Wilson

Fences is a 1985 play by the American playwright August Wilson. Set in the 1950s, it is the sixth in Wilson’s ten-part “Pittsburgh Cycle.” Like all the “Pittsburgh” plays, Fences explores the evolving African-American experience and examines race relations, among other themes. The play won the 1987 Pulitzer Prize for Drama and the 1987 Tony Award for Best Play.

The play was first developed at the Eugene O’Neill Theater Center’s 1983 National Playwrights Conference and premiered at the Yale Repertory Theatre in 1985. James Earl Jones played the main character, Troy, on stage, and in the motion picture adaptation, the character was played by Denzel Washington, opposite Viola Davis as Rose. Wilson became a nationally recognized playwright in 1987 when his play Fences won four Tony Awards and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama.^[8]

2 Glengarry Glen Ross–David Mamet

Glengarry Glen Ross is a play by David Mamet that won the Pulitzer Prize in 1984. The play shows parts of two days in the lives of four desperate Chicago real estate agents who are prepared to engage in any number of unethical, illegal acts—from lies and flattery to bribery, threats, intimidation, and burglary—to sell real estate to unwitting prospective buyers.

It is based on Mamet’s experience, having previously worked in a similar office. The world premiere was at the National Theatre in London on September 21, 1983. The play opened on Broadway on March 25, 1984, at the John Golden Theatre and closed on February 17, 1985, after 378 performances. It was nominated for four Tony awards, including Best Play, Best Director, and two Best Featured Actor nominations for Robert Prosky and Joe Mantegna, who won the production’s one Tony.

“This scalding comedy is about small-time, cutthroat real estate salesmen trying to grind out a living by pushing plots of land on reluctant buyers in a never-ending scramble for their share of the American dream.”^[9]

1 Angels in America: A Gay Fantasia on National Themes–Tony Kushner

Angels in America is a 1991 American two-part play by Tony Kushner. The play’s two parts, Millennium Approaches and Perestroika, may be presented separately or together as a seven-hour epic. The work won numerous awards, including the Pulitzer Prize for Drama, the Tony Award for Best Play, and the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Play.

Part one of the play premiered in 1991, followed by part two in 1992, with its Broadway opening in 1993. It is a complex, often metaphorical, and at times symbolic examination of AIDS and homosexuality in the United States in the 1980s. Angels in America includes explicit sexual situations, nudity, and adult language and tackles adult themes.

“The play weaves together politics, religion, and human connection themes. It follows characters grappling with illness, identity, and societal change, all while being influenced by their encounters with celestial beings.” It is not nearly as well-known as the other entries on this list. However, it is arguably the best and most influential American written play ever.^[10]

Answer songs, which are written as a response to other songs, have been around for a long time. For instance, in 1923 the song “Yes! We Have No Bananas!” made waves on the music scene. Later that same year an answer song called “I’ve Got The Yes! We Have No Banana Blues” was released.

As the years went by, more and more answer songs saw the light with some of the most well-known ones including “California Gurls” by Katy Perry, “Love Will Tear Us Apart” by Joy Division and according to some, “The Rain Song” by Led Zeppelin.

On this list are just some of the many, many answer songs that have been written in response to the famous ones that came before them.

10 “It Wasn’t God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels” – Kitty Wells

Country music singer, Hank Thompson, released one of the most popular songs in country music history in 1952, namely, “The Wild Side of Life.” The song and especially the following lyric “I didn’t know God made honky tonk angels” inspired the Kitty Wells answer song “It Wasn’t God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels.”

Wells’ lyrics directly address what Thompson sings about, namely: “I didn’t know that God made honky tonk angels.” She sings in reply: “It wasn’t God who made honky tonk angels, as you said in the words of your song. Too many times married men think they’re still single. And that’s caused many a good girl to go wrong.”

The Wells song became the first number one hit on the Billboard chart for a solo female artist and has been credited with creating opportunities for other country stars like Patsy Cline, Dolly Parton, and Loretta Lynn. Wells’ success also brought its own set of problems, however. The song was banned from NBC radio and Wells was barred from performing it at the Grand Ole Opry.

9 “Play It All Night Long” – Warren Zevon

Some answer songs use more than one famous tune for inspiration. In the case of Lynyrd Skynyrd’s “Sweet Home Alabama”, the lyrics were written in response to two of Neil Young’s songs: “Southern Man” and “Alabama.” “Sweet Home Alabama” name-checks Young in the lyrics: “Well, I heard Mister Young sing about her. Well, I heard ol’ Neil put her down. Well, I hope Neil Young will remember. A Southern man don’t need him around anyhow.”

In 1980, singer songwriter Warren Zevon took it upon himself to write a musical response to “Sweet Home Alabama” and the result was “Play It All Night Long.” Zevon’s wit and dry sense of humor shines throughout the lyrics in which he refers to the ‘southern life’ as being bleak and poor. It is also the only song (in popular music) that refers to brucellosis.

8 “Superstar” – Lydia Murdock

Michael Jackson will forever be one of the most famous music superstars that ever lived. His songs include massive hits like “Thriller”, “Rock With You”, “I’ll Be There”, and of course “Billie Jean”. After “Billie Jean” was released in 1983, Jackson said that the lyrics were based on false claims made by groupies about his brothers while they were on tour.

Later that same year, American pop singer Lydia Murdock released a scathing answer song called “Superstar”. The lyrics include: “I’m Billie Jean and I’m mad as hell” and “You can’t love a woman and push her aside.” This song led to short-lived fame for Murdock and peaked at number 14 in UK in 1983.

7 “Live Forever” – Oasis

In 1993, Nirvana released “I Hate Myself and Want to Die” on the compilation album, The Beavis and Butt-Head Experience. The official release of the single was cancelled after Kurt Cobain’s death in 1994 and was eventually released on vinyl in 2014 after which it reached number 1 on the Billboard Hot Singles Sales chart. The song was never performed live.

Noel Gallagher, from Oasis, felt inspired to write a positive answer song the following year called “Live Forever”. He explained that he was struck by the fact that an extremely talented and popular guy like Cobain wrote lyrics about hating himself and wanting to die, while Gallagher himself wanted to ‘live forever.’ Oasis released “Live Forever” in August 1994, and it became the band’s first single to enter the top ten in the UK.

After the 2017 Manchester Arena terror attack, Liam Gallagher and Chris Martin of Coldplay performed the song at the One Love Manchester tribute show.

6 “The Wallflower” – Etta James

Hank Ballard and the Midnighters started something with “Work With Me Annie” and its sequel “Annie Had a Baby” in 1954. These two singles spawned a horde of answer songs including “Annie’s Answer” by the El-Dorados and “I’m the Father of Annie’s Baby” by Danny Taylor.

Etta James recorded her very own response to the original song in 1955 in the form of “Wallflower” which is also known as “Roll with Me, Henry.” James’ version was thought to be too risqué for radio stations with lyrics such as “Hey baby, what do I have to do to make you love me too. You’ve got to roll with me Henry, alright baby.”

Even though the lyrics clearly refer to dancing, many believed that it held a sexual connotation as well. When it was covered by Georgia Gibbs that same year, the title was changed to “Dance With Me Henry” to make it acceptable for radio airplay.

The Midnighters got the last say however when they closed out 1955 with ‘an answer to the answer’ called “Henry’s Got Flat Feet (Can’t Dance No More)”.

5 “No Pigeons” – Sporty Thievz

TLC was one of the most popular American girl groups during the nineties. Their super hits included “Creep”, “Unpretty”, “Waterfalls” and the somewhat divisive “No Scrubs”. To go with the release of “No Scrubs” in 1999, TLC shot a futuristic music video, and the rest is music history. The song became the group’s third number one single and won 2 Grammy awards following TLC’s 4-year hiatus.

Naturally, some other artists weren’t about to take the ‘diss’ lying down. One group in particular, Sporty Thievz, released an answer song “No Pigeons” that peaked at number 12 on the US Billboard Hot 100 around the same time that “No Scrubs” was getting all the major attention.

“No Pigeons” was originally called “No Vultures” with the title changed to avoid causing extreme offense. The term ‘pigeon’ has also been used in other Sporty Thievz songs including “Cheapskate” and the remix “Even Cheaper.”

The “No Pigeons” lyrics include “… I don’t want no Pigeons, them be them girls who gets no dubs from me. Playin’ the bar dumb broke wit her best friend’s coat, tryin’ to holler at me”.

4 “The Night I Fell In Love” – Pet Shop Boys

Sometimes urban legends make their way into music as is the case with the Phil Collins song, “In The Air Tonight”. Legend has it that the opening lines describe a drowning that was in progress and someone standing close enough to the scene to help but doesn’t. Also, Collins apparently took it all in from a distance that was too far away to help. This of course isn’t true and Collins himself denied it as well, but the legend also made its way into another song; “Stan” by Ellen DegeneresEminem.

Then the Pet Shop Boys decided to name drop “Stan” in their 2002 song “The Night I Fell In Love” by singing “Then he joked “hey man, your name isn’t Stan, is it? We should be together!”” The song tells the story of a homosexual encounter between a teenaged boy and the rapper he idolizes. Because of the name “Stan”, the consensus is that the rapper referenced in the song is Eminem.

Dr Dre and Eminem responded to the track in 2003 by releasing “Can-I-Bitch” in which they run over the singing duo while rapping “Boosh! Boosh! Boosh! Boosh! What was that? Pet Shop Boys.”

3 “Diane” – Cam

“Oh, I promise I didn’t know he was your man
I would’ve noticed a gold wedding band, Diane
I’d rather you hate me than not understand,
Oh Diane”

These lyrics seem like it could belong to any country song, until you realize they were written as a reply to Dolly Parton’s infamous “Jolene.”

The song, according to country artist Cam, is “the apology so many spouses deserve, but never get.” It tells the story of Jolene coming forward to tell Diane that she never knew the man in question was married.

While the song was mainly inspired by “Jolene”, some of the inspiration also came from a friend of Cam’s real-life situation. When she was nine years old, her father came home and told her that his secretary was pregnant and that he would be leaving her mother to go and live with his mistress.

2 “Go Your Own Way” – Fleetwood Mac

Answer songs don’t always have to come from a different band or artist. The members of Fleetwood Mac took it upon themselves to answer one another in song. One of many examples of this is when Stevie Nicks wrote “Dreams” which is about the breakup between her and Lindsey Buckingham. The upbeat song is included on the band’s 1977 Rumors album.

Buckingham had a swift reply in the form of “Go Your Own Way” which can also be found on the album. Nicks later said that she ‘wanted to go over and kill him’ every time the song was played on stage.

Buckingham explained he was initially inspired by “Street Fighting Man” by the Rolling Stones but ended writing the lyrics as the beginning of a conversation with Nicks to help him move forward after their breakup.

1 “Good Idea At The Time” – OK Go

The Rolling Stones also inspired another band with their song “Sympathy for the Devil”. The song was released in 1968 with Jagger singing in the first person as the Devil and referencing tragedies and atrocities throughout history and blaming it squarely on humans:

“Stuck around St. Petersburg
When I saw it was a time for a change
Killed Tsar and his ministers
Anastasia screamed in vain”

Rock band, OK Go, wrote an answer song titled “Good Idea At The Time” which was released in 2005. Some fans of the song believe it was written as a follow up ‘tribute’ to the Stones’ original, whereas others are of the opinion that OK Go’s lyrics tries to take some blame away from humankind for all the tragedy that has befallen the world and places it back within the devil’s court:

“True about my taste; true about my wealth.
The thing about St. Petersburg:
I was never there myself, so come on.
Anastasia might have cried all night, I couldn’t say myself,
So come on, yeah, come on.”