Ric Ocasek Didn’t Care if People Thought This Classic Cars Track Was “Perverse”

New wave band The Cars made their debut in 1978 with the hit single “Just What I Needed,” launching a career which would continue throughout the ’80s with six albums and one hit after another.

As the band was on the rise, frontman Ric Ocasek sat down for an interview with New Musical Express, in which he discussed the band’s lyrics, which include lines like “when you bite your lip/it’s some reaction to love” in “My Best Friend’s Girl,” one of the first songs Ocasek wrote for the band, and “I guess you’re just what I needed/I needed someone to bleed” in “Just What I Needed.”

“I don’t care if people think I’m perverse,” he said of reaction to the lyrics. He also discussed his use of imagery.

“They forget about the verses when they hear the chorus,” Ocasek said. “See, I like to do as much as I can with the words as far as imagery goes, so that it’s really left open for a lot of things, even though I remember a specific impression of something I had at the time. Once they’re done, they’re out there, in public domain.”

Ocasek also had a great sense of humor and liked to play with listeners’ expectations—”My Best Friend’s Girl” in particular features a bit of a twist in the chorus.

“Up until that point, you think the singer stole his best friend’s girl based on how good he feels about her,” Ocasek said. “With the last line of the chorus – ‘But she used to be mine’ – you realize the guy didn’t steal his best friend’s girl – his friend stole her away from him.”

The song’s success came as a bit of a surprise to Ocasek, who explained who viewed songs as individual pieces of an album and not necessarily as singles.

“I don’t think I could ever craft a song into being a single,” he said of his writing process. “I guess you can tell which ones are a little more catchy. In The Cars, I could bounce off the guys, and they would say, ‘That’s a single.’ But when I’m writing songs, I don’t think that way. I just think that they’re all chapters in the book for that one record.”

“Just What I Needed” and “My Best Friend’s Girl” are remembered now as some of The Cars’ biggest songs. Although the band broke up in 1988, Ocasek continued working as a producer until his death, including for bands like Weezer, No Doubt, Bad Religion, and more.