About

The Lion Sleeps Tonight is a pop song made popular by doo-wop band The Tokens. The song is well known for its gentle vocal intro, and the lyrics: "A Wimoweh, A Wimoweh." In the 2010s, the song has been used in remix videos in which someone is about to get hurt.

Origin

The song was originally recorded by Solomon Linda under the title "Mbube" in 1939 (shown below, left). After being covered by several artists over the following decades, the most popular version of the song was recorded by The Tokens in 1961^[1] (shown below, right).

The song has also notably been covered by the group Tight Fit, who had a #1 hit with the song in 1982 (shown below).

Spread

The song has had a large impact on popular culture. A cover by Ladysmith Black Mambazo appeared in the 1988 film Coming to America (shown below, left). It was memorably used in a scene from Friends in which Marcel the monkey plays it on a CD player, which spawned the Marcel's Favorite Song meme (shown below, right).

The song began seeing use in remix memes in which someone gets hurt in late 2018. On November 24th, 2018, Instagram user @cold_lasagna_ uploaded a video using the song, gaining more than 800,000 views in less than two months (shown below).

In the ensuing months, many more similar remixes appeared. A compilation of such videos was posted to YouTube by TheMemeologist on January 1st, 2019, gaining over 370,000 views (shown below, left). Another posted by Yodeling Asian on December 11th, 2018 gained over 98,000 views (shown below, right).

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References