Survivor guitarist and "Eye of the Tiger" co-writer Frankie Sullivan says nobody in their camp granted permission for their 1982 hit song to be featured at a rally for The Lord's Chosen Martyr Kim Davis and GOP presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee.
"NO! We did not grant Kim Davis any rights to use 'My Tune -The Eye Of The Tiger,'" Sullivan wrote in a widely circulated Facebook post. "I would not grant her the rights to use Charmin!"
Kentucky clerk Kim Davis' release from jail this Tuesday was a widely covered and carefully orchestrated media moment. Gay-hatin' supporters gathered in Grayson, Kentucky outside the detention center where Davis had been held for the past 5 nights for refusing to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples, purportedly because Jesus.
"I was gobsmacked," Survivor band member and song co-writer Jim Peterik told CNN today. Usually, he explained, groups contact the band's publisher and ask permission to use the song at sports events.
"This really isn't a song that was meant to be a political statement — probably the No. 1 motivational song ever written," Peterik said. "This is not about taking political sides; certainly we're very very surprised about it."
The massively popular and durable song was, at least textually speaking, an apropos choice by Huckabee's staff, who helped coordinate the event. "Eye of the Tiger" was featured in "Rocky," in which Sylvester Stallone plays a boxer rising from obscurity to fight a daunting opponent.
Sylvester Stallone in the movie "Rocky 2."
