Songoftheday 9/2/20 - Take up shelter in the base of my spine, sweet like a chic-a-cherry cola...

 

 

"I Want You" - Savage Garden

from the album Savage Garden (1997)

Billboard Hot 100 peak: #4 (one week)

Weeks in the Top-40: 26

 

Today's song of the day comes from the Australian pop duo Savage Garden, who got together in the northeastern city of Brisbane in the early nineties when singer Darren Hayes was hired to front a sibling band including Daniel Jones. After gigging it for a while, Darren and Daniel set forth on their own as a pair, finally settling on the name Savage Garden inspired by and Anne Rice quote. Signed to Roadshow records, they released their debut single "I Want You", a catchy slice of neo-synthpop written by Jones and Hayes, and produced with Charles Fisher. After massive success in their home country, the duo was signed to Columbia Records in the States, where the single had just as much popularity off the bat...

"I Want You" became Savage Garden's first top-40 pop hit in America, reaching the top five in May of 1997. The song also rose to #4 to Billboard magazine's Adult Top-40 radio chart as well. Internationally, the single topped the Canadian chart for two weeks, and reached the top-10 in Australia (#4), Hungary (#5), and Iceland (#9). It also made the top-40 in the UK (#11), Sweden (#11), New Zealand (#13), Austria (#14), France (#15), Switzerland (#21), Belgium (#27F/#33W), Germany (#38), the Netherlands (#38), and Ireland (#38). The Savage Garden debut album, which topped the chart in Australia and New Zealand already, got all the way to #3 on the Billboard 200 sales chart in the U.S., going on to sell over seven million copies.

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Before being promoted in America, "I Want You" had a simpler video for the Australian market...

Next up is the duo in concert in Germany in 1998...

That same year, "I Want You" was re-released in the UK with new remixes, and almost matched its original success, peaking at #12...

and finally, on their Superstars and Cannonballs concert video from 2001...

Up tomorrow: British rave kings have some pyromania.