Bye Bye Love

"Bye Bye Love," written by Ric Ocasek, is the seventh track from the group's debut album, The Cars. Benjamin Orr does the lead vocals here - he and Ocasek shared lead vocal duties in the group.

This is is not at all to be confused with the song of the same title by The Everly Brothers (and covered by Ray Charles, Simon & Garfunkel, and others). The Everly Brothers song implies a comma: "Bye Bye, Love" where The Cars is: "Bye, Bye Love." The Everly's hit is very straightforward: the guy has lost his girl and he's heartbroken. Ric Ocasek didn't write like that: his songs were full of contradictions and ambiguity. This one is more chaotic than most, as we hear the singer losing his mind and blaming it on the girl: Substitution mass confusion Clouds inside your head Well, foggin' all my energies

This song has been used in the HBO TV series Big Love in the 2010 episode "The Sins of the Father," where it was chosen for having an '80s sound. Since the song was written and released in 1978, that tells you how far The Cars were looking ahead. The song also appears in the movies Super 8 (2011) and 7 Chinese Brothers (2015).