Songfacts®:

• In a Songfacts interview with Scorpions guitarist Rudolf Schenker, he said: "I think 'Rock You Like A Hurricane' is a perfect rock anthem, which talks about attitude and sexuality. It's very important to recognize the tension between the verses and the chorus. I think Klaus (Meine) went over the lyrics around eight or nine times because the first lyrics of the song went something like 'blah blah blah blah.' And we said, 'No! The song is not feeling right.' But at the ninth or tenth time, it came.
  
  The lyric goes: 'The bitch is hungry, she needs to tell, so give her inches and feed her well.' This was the tension between the 'Rock You Like A Hurricane' chorus, and the words to the verses. This is what makes the song great. And the funny thing is, the girls, when they're talking about 'Rock You Like A Hurricane,' they say, 'Oh, I love your song 'Rock Me Like A Hurricane.''"
• The video for this song, which features a leopard, a black panther, women wearing next-to-nothing, and the band inside a makeshift cage which is being rocked back and forth by the crowd outside, was targeted by Tipper Gore in an interview about her reasons behind co-founding the PMRC (Parents Music Resource Center). Stated Gore, in an interview with Gary James, "At that time, there was Van Halen's 'Hot For Teacher,' Motley Crue's 'Looks That Kill,' The Scorpions' 'Rock You Like A Hurricane' - I mean, there were some very violent images. Through the eyes of a 6 or 8-year-old, when they see these scantily clad women kind of rounded up by the band members and put in cages, and there's whips, and there's a sort of menace and there's a sort of a sexuality, they pick up on that."
  
  The PMRC was founded in 1985 by four wives of powerful political men. They became known as the "Washington Wives." Their objective was to have record companies voluntarily place warning labels on records that contained sexually explicit or violent lyrics or images, or which were suggestive of drug use. Although many recording artists testified against the use of any labels on their material, citing their rights to freedom of speech and no censorship, the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) began placing warning labels on its merchandise, and continues to do so. The RIAA represents the US recording industry, and count among its members record labels and distributors responsible for the creation and distribution of 90% of recorded music sold there.
• The video was directed by David Mallet, who had done AC/DC's "You Shook Me All Night Long" and Billy Idol's "White Wedding." Rudolf Schenker credits him with capturing the essence of the Scorpions, saying in I Want My MTV, "He said, 'Don't be serious, let's get crazy.' That video is about attitude, craziness, and sexuality. That's how we survived into the video generation."
• This song is played at the home games of the National Hockey League's Carolina Hurricanes as they take the ice. It was #31 in the 2006 installment of VH1's "40 Greatest Metal Songs," and is considered as one of the most influential rock anthems in history.
• This song is played in Adam Sandler's film Little Nicky during the scene when Nicky (played by Sandler), upon returning to Hell, says to his mother, "I'm gonna rock that place like a hurricane!" >>>

  Suggestion credit:
  Donovan Berry - El Dorado, AR
• The Scorpions are by far the most successful German rock band in America and the UK. Says Schenker: "In the beginning of our career, we had a problem in Germany because nobody expects a German band to play rock music. With rock music, there are more bands from England or America, which are more exotic than the Scorpions, who are from Germany. But when we went to America in '79, we became the exotic ones. They said, 'Hey, what kind of crazy guys are these?' (laughs) We were already exotic, with a different view, and we also play our rock music with a little bit of an ethnic touch. You'll notice that Americans come from the blues side, whereas we come from the classical side, which is different."
• "Rock You Like A Hurricane" shows up in TV commercials from time to time, often for comedic effect. In 2008, it was used in an Allstate commercial where NASCAR driver Kasey Kahne does a dance routine to the song. In 2014, it was used in a spot for General Mills Fiber One cookies where a nerdy employee's shipment of the tasty treat is met by delighted female customers, leading him to wrongly conclude they're checking him out. "Be the man that every woman wants with new Fiber One cookies," the ad claims.
• In the TV series Scorpion, a group of geniuses works under the name "Scorpion," and uses this as their theme song. Something we learned on the show: a group of scorpions is called a cyclone.
• This introduces the character Billy Hargrove in the season 2 premiere of Stranger Things, "MADMAX." It plays as he steps out of his car in the school parking lot and the girls admire his posterior.
• Herman Rarebell, Scorpions drummer from 1977 to 1996, had a hand in writing "Rock You Like A Hurricane" alongside frontman Klaus Meine. He wanted to come up with a song that had more than a little edge. "I thought we needed a rock song with lyrics that should be forbidden," Rarebell told Classic Rock.
  
  His audacious proposal? A title that would make even the most hardened sailor blush: "F--k You Like a Hurricane." Needless to say, the label executives weren't exactly thrilled. "The record company looked at me and said: 'You're completely out of your mind!'" Rarebell laughed. "Which I was."