#85, “Whopper Whopper,” Burger King (2023)

150 Favorite Songs: #85, “Whopper Whopper,” Burger King (2023)

Sometimes, someone releases a song that’s so perfect, so essential, so just plain good, you know you will be thinking about it over and over again for the rest of your life. For my parents’ generation, that song might have been “Blowin’ in the Wind” or “Let It Be” or “Both Sides Now.” If you’re a kid just discovering music today, it might be “All Too Well” or “Blinding Lights” or “As It Was.” This whole project is about exploring those songs for me. But for all of us—old, young, whatever you are when you’re my age—there’s occasionally a song that reaches all of us.

“Whopper Whopper,” the Burger King song, is such a song. It’s deceptively simple, built on a vocal melody that literally anyone can sing and the same two-syllable word repeated over and over—”Whopper whopper whopper whopper”—to establish itself. It’s a perfect earworm, burrowing itself immediately into the listener’s brain. It mostly just rhymes the word “whopper” with “whopper,” a clever way to ensure that you hear the word “whopper” a lot of times when you listen to it, which is important since it was written to sell Whoppers. (At one point, they pivot to “topper,” an obvious—but still satisfying!—rhyme.)

The backstory on “Whopper Whopper” is good: It was created by an ad agency that, while trying to land the Burger King account, came up with the melody. In the pitch meeting, the agency’s leads came in and just started singing it. Burger King’s marketing team, recognizing when greatness has been thrust upon them, hired the agency, and the rest is history. The song has been stuck in my head for the past two years. Now it’s probably in yours, too.

Okay, this isn’t really entry #85, and I know April Fool’s pranks are annoying! Sorry!! I just thought this was funny. I’ll be back tomorrow with the actual #85.