Historical Events  Music
Red Hot Chilli Peppers

Alternate:
City of Angels

Current:
City of Angel

Red Hot Chilli Peppers: Under the Bridge - "the city I live in, the ..."

Under the Bridge is a classic rock track from the Red Hot Chilli Peppers, released in 1992, and it was largely responsible for their breakthrough into the mainstream after its extensive wide playing on MTV.

The song focuses on depression, isolation and drug use. You'd have thought the line in question was "Angels" because it's clearly a reference to Los Angeles, and the plural makes sense there, whereas the singular doesn't.

This is a good one to catch out even hardcore RHCP fans, who aren't aware of this Mandela Effect to start with. Just ask them to complete the line and they instantly respond with what they are sure is right - until you get them to hear it again, that is.

Most lyrics sites are wrong too

Here's the correct version as sung, but don't go checking any lyrics sites as they have it as "Angels" too:

Sometimes I feel like I don't have a partner
Sometimes I feel like my only friend
Its the city I live in, the city of angel
Lonely as I am, together we cry

Widely regarded as a classic, the track became a key part of the alternative rock movement for the first half of the 1990's.

There's a clue the line is deliberate, but of course the band are from Los Angeles:

The loneliness that I was feeling triggered memories of my time with Ione and how I'd had this beautiful angel of a girl who was willing to give me all of her love, and instead of embracing that, I was downtown with f***ing gangsters shooting speedballs under a bridge.

-- Anthony Kiedis

Some people even get the title wrong, claiming the whole song is called "City of Angels".