Survivor ‘Eye of The Tiger’ The Rocky Call
The two most amazing things you should know about the story behind Survivor ‘Eye of The Tiger’ – 1) Sylvester Stallone personally called and asked the band to write the song. 2) The movie producers originally wanted to use “Another One Bites The Dust” from Queen. Read on to find out the story behind both.
Survivor ‘Eye of The Tiger’ was the theme song of the biggest movie of 1982, Rocky III.
Rocky Leaves A Message
Sylvester Stallone called Jim Peterik and Frankie Sullivan of Survivor and left messages on their answering machines. Chances are you don’t have a landline or answering machine anymore, but in 1982, we did. Jim Peterik spoke with Songfacts.com about Sylvester’s phone message: “Answering machines were still something of a novelty back then and to see that blinking light was a thrill. When I pressed the playback button I heard, ‘Hey, yo, Jim, that’s a nice message you got there. This is Sylvester Stallone.'”

“Another One Bites The Dust” Was Originally Used In Rocky III
The fight scene was set to “Another One Bites The Dust,” by Queen. Jim and Frankie asked Sly why not use the Queen song since it worked well in the scene. They were told that the publishing rights were not attainable and they wanted Survivor to do an original song. Peterik said he spoke with the band and said, “Man, this is going to be tough to beat.’ We had the spirit of, ‘We’ve got to try to top this.’ I started doing that now-famous dead string guitar riff and started slashing those chords to the punches we saw on the screen, and the whole song took shape in the next three days.”
Survivor ‘Eye of The Tiger’
Jim Peterik was a primary songwriter for Survivor, but he also wrote several hits for .38 Special. It’s a fascinating story. Read on to check it out.