Don McLean Reveals the Meaning of the Song Himself
It wasn’t until 2015 that Don McLean decided to lift the veil on the meaning of the song. His decision was taken at the time the original manuscript of the song was sold at auction in New York. The manuscript that was put up for sale was accompanied by a note in which McLean mentions that “American Pie” is “a morality song” that showcases the decline of the USA together with its loss of innocence.
In an interview that was published in the auction catalog, McLean revealed that “Basically in American Pie, things are heading in the wrong direction (…) It is becoming less idyllic. I don’t know whether you consider that wrong or right, but it is a morality song in a sense.” Before the auction, whenever he was asked what the song meant, McLean would joke “It means I don’t ever have to work again if I don’t want to.”
Source: nypost.com
He also mentioned that “American Pie “is as relevant as ever, because the world went downhill since he wrote the song.”I was around in 1970, and now I am around in 2015… there is no poetry and very little romance in anything anymore, so it is really like the last phase of American Pie.”
Besides the short explanation above, McLean refused to offer further revelations about who’s who in the song, stating that “Over the years I’ve dealt with all these stupid questions of ‘Who’s that?’ and ‘Who’s that?’ These are things I never had in my head for a second when I wrote the song. I was trying to capture something very ephemeral, and I did, but it took a long time.”