SHORT TAKES : ‘Rhythm Nation: 1814’ Explained

NEW YORK — It was no mystery when “Janet Jackson’s Rhythm Nation: 1814” went platinum. But that number in the title is a mystery to many fans.

It’s true that ‘R’ is the 18th letter in the alphabet and ‘N’ is the 14th, but that’s just coincidence, Jackson said in the March 5 issue of US magazine.

“What actually happened,” Jackson said, “was that while writing ‘Rhythm Nation’ I was kidding around, saying, ‘God, you guys, I feel like this could be the national anthem for the ‘90s.’

“Just by a crazy chance we decided to look up when Francis Scott Key wrote the national anthem, and it was September 14, 1814.”

Jackson said that when she told A&M; Records executives what it meant, “They didn’t want me to say. So I didn’t. They still don’t want me to say, but everyone keeps asking me.”