This song is about a man trying to get his lady friend to have sex with him. In the song, the lyrics speak of dancing as a euphemism for sex. He and the woman are at a club where “… it’s closing time,” and he says that he doesn’t want the night to stop. Also, despite saying that he and she are “… drunk to an 80s groove,” suggesting that they simply are losing themselves in the music, three lines later, he simply says that they’re both drunk and that her giving in to him is “only human.” The line about the woman’s body belying her real feelings despite saying, “No,” is particularly full of irony because Nick Jonas suffered an unwanted sexual advance during the “Happiness Begins” tour.

The Song’s Chart Performance

The song was a respectable hit but not a megahit. The highest it charted on the U.S. Billboard 100 was No. 18. It did, however, reach No. 1 in the Czech Republic on that country’s “Radio-Top 100.” Despite this showing, the song has received double-platinum status in the United States, which indicates that it has sold more than 2 million copies.

In 2019, the year that the song came out, the final four contestants on Australia’s version of “The Masked Singer” sang the song as a quartet. The winner of that season was the Vampire, played by American singer Anastacia.

A New Way to Record

The song was put together largely over FaceTime. Karl Johan Schuster, who is known more widely by his stage name, Shellback, was in Sweden at the time. Both he and famous pop-music composer Max Martin approached the Jonas Brothers with an idea for a song. But, because Shellback was at home in Sweden and couldn’t come to the U.S. for various reasons, he contacted both Martin and the Jonas brothers to talk about the song and record it for the first time using FaceTime. Nick Jonas famously quipped that it would have been a good commercial for Apple products and how they make the world smaller.

It is amusing to note that at the time they were recording and talking, it was 4 o’clock in the morning in Sweden. Shellback had to be very quiet because there were people sleeping in the rooms behind him at the time. All of the brothers expressed gratitude to both Martin and Shellback because the two took time out to do this work with them over video calls when they also had projects with many other bands and singers all over the world.

Lyrics

Yeah, ayy

I don’t want this night to end
It’s closing time, so leave with me again (yeah)
You got all my love to spend, oh
Let’s find a place where happiness begins

We gon’ dance in my living room, slave to the way you move
Hurts when I’m leaving you (ayy)
Just dance in the living room, love with an attitude
Drunk to an 80s groove (ayy)
We gon’ dance in my living room, slave to the way you move
Hurts when I’m leaving you (ayy)
Dance in the living room, love with an attitude
Drunk

It’s only human, you know that it’s real
So why would you fight or try to deny the way that you feel?
Oh, babe, you can’t fool me, your body’s got other plans
So stop pretending you’re shy, just come on and
Dance, dance, dance, dance, oh

Early morning la-la-light
Only getting up to close the blinds, oh
I’m praying you don’t change your mind
‘Cause leaving now just don’t feel right
Let’s do it one more time, oh babe

We gon’ dance in my living room, slave to the way you move
Hurts when I’m leaving you (hurts when I’m leaving you)
Just dance in the living room, love with an attitude
Drunk to an 80s groove (ayy)
We gon’ dance in my living room, slave to the way you move
Hurts when I’m leaving you (ayy)
Dance in the living room, love with an attitude
Drunk

It’s only human, you know that it’s real (know that it’s real)
So why would you fight or try to deny the way that you feel?
(The way that you feel)
Oh, babe, you can’t fool me, your body’s got other plans
So stop pretending you’re shy, just come on and
Dance, dance, dance, dance, oh

Dance, oh (woo, ayy)
Only human
It’s only (man), it’s only (man)
Only human
Oh yeah, yeah, yeah
Only human
It’s only (man), it’s only (man)
Only human

Source: LyricFind

Songwriters: Johan Karl Schuster / Joseph Jonas / Nicholas Jerry Jonas / Paul Kevin II Jonas

Only Human lyrics © Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC, Universal Music Publishing Group

Listeners of Pop music, might also appreciate the song Someone You Loved by Lewis Capaldi.

Editor’s Note: This article was first published December 20th, 2022 and last updated April 5th, 2023.