She Blinded Me with Science

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"She Blinded Me with Science"

Single by Thomas Dolby
from the album The Golden Age of Wireless
Released	1983
Genre	Synth Pop
Label	Capitol Records
Writer(s)	Thomas Dolby
Producer(s)	Thomas Dolby
Chart positions
#5 (USA Hot 100)

"She Blinded Me With Science" is a New Wave song by British musician Thomas Dolby, released in 1983. It first appeared on the album The Golden Age of Wireless. It is a quirky, playful synth-pop number built around bouncy synthesizer hooks, but occasionally ventures into darker interludes meant to evoke early Hollywood mad scientist films such as Frankenstein.

1 Song structure
2 Pop culture
3 Audio sample
4 References

[edit] Song structure

The song's chorus, "She blinded me with science," plays upon the colloquial British expression "to blind [someone] with science," meaning to deliberately confuse someone by giving the impression of highly complex knowledge. In the song, however, the phrase is interpreted as a straightforward reference to the natural sciences.

The song features interjections from the British scientist and TV presenter Magnus Pyke, who repeatedly shouts "Science!" and delivers other lines in a deliberately over-the-top "mad scientist" voice, the most famous line of which was, "Good heavens, Miss Sakamoto! You're beautiful!"

[edit] Pop culture

Though it was a minor hit in the UK, it was a smash in the US, where it peaked at #5 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart. It was also a hit in dance clubs, peaking at #3 on the club play charts, and it even made the Top 50 of the R&B singles charts (then called "Black Singles"). Its appropriately quirky video was an early hit on the nascent MTV. Dolby never again recaptured the success of "She Blinded Me With Science" in the United States and is commonly considered one hit wonder in that country, though he had several other hits in the UK, where "She Blinded Me With Science" failed to reach the top 40. (It does remain, arguably, his best-remembered song in the UK, despite its relatively poor sales.)

The song is often used as a fight song at American engineering schools, and the Georgia Institute of Technology's pep band plays it to entertain the crowd at basketball games.

This song was played over the opening credits of the pilot episode for the short-lived science fiction series Misfits of Science. It is currently used in "Mythbusters" ad spots on the "Discovery Channel".

In 2004, Mobb Deep sampled the song for their hit single "Got it Twisted".

In 2002, VH1 named "She Blinded Me With Science" #20 on its list of the 100 Greatest One-hit Wonders.

VH1 named it #76 on the Greatest 80s Ever.