Billy Idol has been very clear about this not being about masturbation. Think about it, he had this rebel punk image, if he had written it about masturbation he probably would have named the song "This Song Is About Masturbation". Or "Wanking With Myself", because the term 'wanking' wasn't very well known in the US. (The lyrics to David Bowie's 'Time' included the word 'wanking', and it sailed right by US censors.)
But Idol has both spoken and written about what the lyrics really mean. In clubs in Japan he would try to mingle with girls, but they were all dancing alone - with their own reflections - right up against the mirrored walls, and didn't want to meet people or dance with them. By the time this song was re-released in the US this trend had made it to the west coast as well. (It was the damnedest thing... teen boys usually lean against the walls, and eventually the girls get tired of this and dance with each other; eventually the boys decide there is enough protective camouflage and make their way out to the floor. Suddenly this trend inverted, the dance floors were empty and the walls were lined with girls facing the mirrors.) So anybody who went to clubs on the west coast in the early 80s knew exactly what the song was about, because we'd all seen the same thing. And we literally eventually decided screw it, I'll dance by myself. Which was considered a weird thing in the clubs at the time, where people had been dancing together as couples to disco just two years before.
I find it interesting how people decide they hear a certain meaning in a song and then declare that the song IS about that thing, without taking into account their own perceptual biases. In the early 80s nobody on either coast of the US thought this song was about masturbation, but the decent God-fearing people in states like Utah and Georgia were certain that it was. Today we have bands writing about sex all the time, so people assume this was also true 35 years ago. It wasn't.
Billy Idol has been very clear about this not being about masturbation. Think about it, he had this rebel punk image, if he had written it about masturbation he probably would have named the song "This Song Is About Masturbation". Or "Wanking With Myself", because the term 'wanking' wasn't very well known in the US. (The lyrics to David Bowie's 'Time' included the word 'wanking', and it sailed right by US censors.)
But Idol has both spoken and written about what the lyrics really mean. In clubs in Japan he would try to mingle with girls, but they were all dancing alone - with their own reflections - right up against the mirrored walls, and didn't want to meet people or dance with them. By the time this song was re-released in the US this trend had made it to the west coast as well. (It was the damnedest thing... teen boys usually lean against the walls, and eventually the girls get tired of this and dance with each other; eventually the boys decide there is enough protective camouflage and make their way out to the floor. Suddenly this trend inverted, the dance floors were empty and the walls were lined with girls facing the mirrors.) So anybody who went to clubs on the west coast in the early 80s knew exactly what the song was about, because we'd all seen the same thing. And we literally eventually decided screw it, I'll dance by myself. Which was considered a weird thing in the clubs at the time, where people had been dancing together as couples to disco just two years before.
I find it interesting how people decide they hear a certain meaning in a song and then declare that the song IS about that thing, without taking into account their own perceptual biases. In the early 80s nobody on either coast of the US thought this song was about masturbation, but the decent God-fearing people in states like Utah and Georgia were certain that it was. Today we have bands writing about sex all the time, so people assume this was also true 35 years ago. It wasn't.