B-side "Falling Off" Format Cassette, CD Genre Hard rock | Released August 5, 1997 Recorded 1996 Length 6:10 | |
"Hole in My Soul" is a power ballad performed by American hard rock band Aerosmith. It was written by Steven Tyler, Joe Perry, and professional songwriter and longtime Aerosmith collaborator Desmond Child. It was released as the second major single from Nine Lives in 1997.
Contents
Chart positions
The song reached #51 on the Billboard Hot 100, #4 on the Mainstream Rock Tracks chart, #29 in the United Kingdom, and #4 in Latvia.
Lyrical interpretation
The song is a ballad, one of Aerosmith's more emotional ones. It is also lengthy, running just over six minutes. The lyrics focus on a heartbroken man who feels very sad and emotionally damaged ("I got dust for tears and I'm all tapped out") by a failed relationship ("tell me how it feels to be the one who turns the knife inside of me") and feels that there is a void in his life that cannot be filled ("there's a hole in my soul that's been killing me forever").
In concert
In concert, Steven Tyler has been known to substitute some lines with racier lyrics. On a live version of the song from the A Little South of Sanity album, Tyler sings "I fuck with my boots on cause you fuck with my head" instead of the studio version lyrics "I sleep with my boots on, but you're still in my head."
The band played the song heavily on their lengthy Nine Lives Tour from 1997–1999, but has almost never played it since.
Music video
Directed by Andy Morahan, the video featured a nerdy high school student (played by Branden Williams), often picked on, who is unsuccessful in finding the right girl. He uses his scientific genius to build a cloning machine and creates a beautiful girl (played by Eva Mendes), but she meets someone else at a party. He creates another who he also loses to a football player (played by Seann William Scott). A classmate (played by Alexandra Holden) discovers his machine and stops him from creating another girl for himself, and he realizes the girl for him had been there all along.