Some of the Most Controversial Songs Performed by Texas Artists

Texas is no stranger to controversy & neither are musical artists FROM Texas. Many bands & artists have been caught up in their forms of controversy; from writing songs with extremely questionable themes or lyrics that rubbed people the wrong way. Here are some of the most controversial songs (and artists) that have been released.

ZZ Top has written some songs that are certainly questionable to some people

Now we love ZZ Top; they're hands down one of the greatest bands to come out of Texas. They've written many classics but even so, some are their songs were met with a little controversy when they came out.

Examples include "Francine", which talks about a man falling in love with his girlfriend...who was 13 years old.

"My Francine just turned thirteen
She's my angelic teenage queen"

"Mexican Blackbird" is another one; another love song, this time about a Mexican prostitute:

"She's hot as a pepper
But smooth as a Mexican brew
So head for the border
And put in an order or two
The wings of the blackbird
Will spread like an eagle for you"

And let's not forget about the song about the place with the nice girls(ah!)... La Grange; a song dedicated to The Chicken House. Hey even though the lyrics caused a stir when it first came out, we will NEVER not like that catchy riff and those shuffling drums. It's still a classic.

Queen Bee, Beyoncé, has known to ruffle a feather or two with her songs

Houston's Beyoncé is one of the biggest stars in the world but that doesn't mean that she's had run ins on some of her songs. 2 examples

People definitely had a problem with her using audio from the Challenger explosion in her song "XO", even though she used it as a tribute to the lives lost in the disaster.
Beyoncé had to change the lyrics to "Heated" after using the "spaz"; people claimed it was an slur against those with cerebral palsy.

When you're the queen, everyone wants to try to bring you down I guess...

Kacey Musgrave & Willie Nelson have each written a song about same gender love

Now it's totally fine if an artist wants to write about a love song, but when a COUNTRY artist does it, oh you know some people won't like that. Kacey Musgrave's "Follow Your Arrow" & Willie's "Cowboys Are Frequently Secretly (Fond of Each Other)" both have equal topics; in this case, loving someone who's the same gender as you. (Also Kacey's song is about recreational marijuana use, so that's another level of controversy)

I know that's a HOT topic in the world of country but at least there are artists that are trying to prove that, yes, you CAN write songs about these topics and still be hits.

The Chicks have been known to get under people's skins with their songs

Say what you want about their music, you gotta admire their stances The Chicks had on serious topics like women abuse. In the case of "Goodbye Earl", it's a song about 2 friends and their lives after high school. One gets married and stuck in an abusive relationship. SPOILERS: Earl learns REAL quick that you shouldn't hit a woman.

People didn't like the idea of spousal abuse in the song, but the band was praised for their awareness on this subject.

Drowning Pool's biggest hit was banned after 9/11

Yes the Dallas metal band that gave us "Bodies" (and is loved by wrestling fans), Drowning Pool had their biggest hit temporarily banned after the September 11 attacks, due to the questionable lyrics in the song.

Obviously the band still plays that song but they weren't happy about it when their song was banned from being played on the radio.

Machine Gun Kelly is no stranger to controversy either

Yes we've heard many stories involving the Houston rapper/rocker; the controversy really got started after he released a diss track to Eminem called "Rap Devil", a song after Eminem released "Not Alike". And there's also the Kendall Jenner incident & the blade guitar, which the internet had a feel day of letting MGK know...

Admittedly the song isn't as controversial in terms of lyrics as some of the other songs, but it was one of the reasons that started wave of hate towards MGK, according to Reddit at least.

We certainly can't forget Vanilla Ice vs Queen

Yes we couldn't talk about controversial songs from Texas artists without mention Vanilla Ice. Again, the song's lyrics are not the controversy. The controversy stemmed from what happened with the RECORDING of the 1990 song "Ice Ice Baby", and that was simply: they didn't have permission to sample "Under Pressure" for the song, so they decided to add an extra note to make it different. Queen sued and were awarded $4 million from the lawsuit.

These are just a HANDFUL of examples. But they're not the only ones to raise controversy; there are songs that have been based on real life events from Texas; Pearl Jam, At the Drive-In, Fastball have written songs all about Texas' dark history.