If I Were a Fish and You Caught Me

Submission 2,189

Part of a series on TikTok. [View Related Entries]

About

If I Were a Fish and You Caught Me refers to a TikTok song created by TikToker corook (@hicorook) and TikToker Olivia Barton (@oliviabartonhaha) called, corook's "if i were a fish." When Barton uploaded the video of her and her girlfriend singing the song in April 2023, it led to various duets as TikTokers added their voices or other instruments to the song. The virality led to remixes and viral videos, circling back to the song's wholesome and childish nature which centered thematically on maintaining self-esteem when receiving hate online.

Origin

On April 11th, 2023, TikToker^[1] @hicorook uploaded a video in which her and her girlfriend Olivia Barton were singing an original song called "if i were a fish." Over the course of 10 days, the video gained roughly 11.4 million plays and 2.1 million likes (shown below). On April 12th, 2023, Olivia Barton posted the video to her own TikTok^[2] page (@oliviabartonhaha) as well, earning roughly 500,200 plays and 54,000 likes in nine days.

@hicorook

I was having a very emotional day, feeling insecure and out of place. So I cried to Olivia and after feeling through it, we wrote this song in 10 minutes to remember the joy in being different 🐸 happy Tuesday

♬ original sound – corook

"If I Were a Fish" Lyrics

If I were a fish and you caught me,
You'd say look at that fish,
Shimmerin' in the sun,
Such a rare one,
Can't believe that you caught one.

If I were a fish and you caught me,
You'd say look at that fish,
Heaviest in the sea,
You'd win first prize if you caught me.

Why is everybody on the internet so mean?
Why is everybody so afraid of what they've never seen?
If I was scrolling through and I saw me,
Flopping around and singing my song,
I'd say, "Damn they're cute," and sing along.

Spread

Soon after @hicorook's upload, multiple TikTokers started uploading duets with the video, adding their own voices to the song or playing instruments. For instance, on April 12th, 2023, TikToker^[3] @thebretcrowshow posted a duet in which he added a bass line, gaining roughly 1.5 million plays and 232,900 likes in nine days (shown below, left). The massive influx of duets led to a compilation video uploaded by TikToker^[4] @jasminejamiee on April 15th, 2023, gaining roughly 1.5 million plays and 328,400 likes in six days (shown below, right).

@thebretcrowshow #duet with @hicorook i wonder where that fish did go? A fishy fish, a fishy oooohh #tiktokbassist #thebretcrowshow #bassistsoftiktok #bassplayers #jammingwithfriends #primustiktok #addingbasstoduets #bassplayersoftiktok #fishsongs #positivity #happysongs ♬ original sound – corook

@jasminejamiee We need this song recorded!! Thank you @corook & @Olivia Barton for this bop!! 🥹🫶🏼🐸 #ifiwereafish ♬ original sound – corook

The virality led corook and Olivia Barton to upload the song's music video to YouTube^[5] on April 21st, 2023, gaining over 7,300 views in less than a day (shown below).

Over the course of 10 days, the original TikTok^[6] sound of corook's video amassed over 13,700 videos using it.