Lyrics to
Mean Business

This version of Mean Business was released by Whitesnake in 1979.

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You’re taking a walk on the wild side
If you’re gonna take a chance with me,
I’m gonna make you take a look on the inside
And you might not like what you see
So don’t you knock on my door
If you don’t want an answer
Or gimme a beat
If you don’t want a dancer

I’ve got my love gun loaded,
I’ve got you in my sight,
I never take no for an answer,
So you’d better say yes tonight
I told you the score
Right from the start,
You’ll never get to heaven
If you break my heart

So if you don’t mean business
Knock on someone else’s door,
‘Cos it’s a mean mean business
Staying alive if you fool with me

You say you want my money,
I say you’ve got no sense,
If you just want to bleed me dry
Stay on your side of the fence
No mercy you can see
‘Cos seven to eleven made a fool out of me

So if you don’t mean business
Knock on someone else’s door,
‘Cos it’s a mean mean business
Staying alive if you fool with me

You’re taking a walk on the wild side
If you’re gonna take a chance with me,
I’m gonna make you take a look on the inside
And you might not like what you see
So don’t you knock on my door
If you don’t want an answer
Or gimme a beat
If you don’t want a dancer

So if you don’t mean business
Knock on someone else’s door,
‘Cos it’s a mean mean business
Staying alive if you fool with me…

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Whitesnake has released many songs over the years besides Mean Business. Whitesnake released songs from 1978 to 1997 spanning across albums like Snakebite, Trouble, Lovehunter, Ready An' Willing, Live... In The Heart Of The City, Come An' Get It, Saints An' Sinners, Slide It In, Whitesnake, Slip Of The Tongue, and Restless Heart. Decade Lyrics has over lyrics & songs by Whitesnake.

If you're a fan of popular 1970s songs looking for more songs from 1979 or the 1970s overall, you've come to the right place!

About Lyrics and Mean Business by Whitesnake

The lyrics for Mean Business are made up of the words, verses and background chorus for the popular 1979 song by Whitesnake. Like a lot of songs, the lyrics to Mean Business have both direct meanings and metaphorical context hidden within the song's words. All of the meanings are only truly known by the creators of the lyrics for Mean Business - Whitesnake and any of the writers who worked with them on the song.

If you have an interest in the structure of words and phrases, you can dissect the lyrics to Mean Business by Whitesnake in multiple ways. The word "lyric" itself derives from the Latin word lyricus, with the actual English word lyrics applied to the definition "words set to music" listed in Stainer and Barrett's 1876 Dictionary of Musical Terms. Continuing the chain, the Latin word lyricus derives from the Greek word λυρικός or lyrikós. This somewhat means "poetry accompanied by the lyre" or "words set to music." You can easily see that by looking at the background of the word lyric, that the "lyrics to Mean Business" means the words set to the music of Mean Business, or poetry accompanied by the lyre played by Whitesnake. The singular form "lyric" is still used to mean the complete words to a song. However, the singular form lyric is also commonly used to refer to a specific line (or phrase) within a song's lyrics. Hence, by this analysis of word structure, you could say that the lyric to Mean Business and the lyrics to Mean Business are both one and the same thing. None of this talk about the word Lyrics is really relevant to fans of Whitesnake who came here looking just for the lyrics to Mean Business, but we feel it is still fun to learn what's behind commonly used words and lyrics in songs.

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