This movie features over 85 hit songs from the 1940s to 2016.
When Ash's guitar is unplugged, she starts stomping the beat on the stage; porcupines actually do stomp their feet as a warning when they are scared.
Writer and director Garth Jennings is an admirer of jazz vocalist Shooby Taylor and chose to have his song "Stout-Hearted Men" included in the film. The song was sung by a hippo during the audition scene. Taylor suffered a stroke in 1994 and died in 2003. Jennings revealed that Taylor's son was in his 70s and "just above the poverty line" and hoped the check for rights to the song from Universal Pictures would be beneficial to him.
What Buster Moon said in Japanese to the five Japanese red pandas roughly translated to "Your routine is horrible, your footwork stinks like feet."
The masks that Big Daddy (Peter Serafinowicz) and his gang use to hide their identity are of Snowball from Pets - Vita da animali (2016).
Seth MacFarlane: [Sinatra] Mike the mouse is largely based on Frank Sinatra, whom Seth MacFarlane often imitates. Sinatra was known for his short temper, style of dress, and apparent ties to organized crime, which are incorporated into Mike's character. He sings Sinatra's signature song "My Way" on the movie's soundtrack. Frank Sinatra Jr. often guest starred in MacFarlane's series I Griffin (1999).