On this day in (May 28) in 1982, Rocky III opened in theaters across the United States. The film’s opening moments introduced moviegoers to “Eye of the Tiger” by Survivor. The Chicago, Illinois-based rock band was all but unknown at the time. Then, the boxing movie made their song a massive hit, launching them to stardom. Survivor–and anyone who has worked out to the motivational jam–has Queen to thank for the song’s existence.
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Rocky III was the biggest movie of 1982, and “Eye of the Tiger” played over the opening montage of the titular character rising through the ranks and defending his title. Initially, Sylvester Stallone, who directed the movie, wanted to use Queen’s “Another One Bites the Dust” as the movie’s theme song. However, Queen refused his request to use the song. As a result, he had to find something else.
[REVIEW: Revisiting the Meaning of Survivor’s “Eye of the Tiger” 40 Years Later]
According to Songfacts, Tony Scott, the president of Survivor’s record label, showed Stallone a few tracks from the band’s sophomore album, Premonition. Stallone believed the band’s sound and writing style would be the perfect match for the opening scenes of the movie. So, he called Jim Peterik and Frankie Sullivan, Survivor’s primary songwriters, to enlist their help in creating the next Rocky theme.
Survivor’s Jim Peternik on Writing “Eye of the Tiger” for Rocky III
Jim Peternik and Frankie Sullivan wrote “Eye of the Tiger” while watching an early copy of Rocky III. They used the timing of punches in the opening montage and bits of dialogue from the movie as starting points for the song.
“When we got the initial rough cut of the movie, the scene that ‘Eye of the Tiger’ appears in was cut to ‘Another One Bites the Dust’ by Queen. Frankie and I are watching this, the punches are bring thrown, and we’re going, ‘Holy crap, this is working like a charm,’” Peternik recalled. “We called Stallone and said, ‘Why aren’t you using this?’ He goes, ‘Well, we can’t get the publishing rights to it.’ Frankie and I looked at each other and went, ‘Man, this is going to be tough to beat,’” he added.
They knew they had to do everything they could to create something that would work better than “Another One Bites the Dust.” So, they got to work. “I started doing the now-famous dead string guitar riff and started slashing those chords to the punches on the screen, and the whole song took shape in the next three days,” he recalled.
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