Songoftheday 4/12/22 - If I fall along the way pick me up and dust me off, and if I get too tired to make it be my breath so I can walk...

 

 

"Bent" - Matchbox Twenty

from the album Mad Season (2000)

Billboard Hot 100 peak: #1 (one week)

Weeks in the Top-40: 37

 

Today's song comes from the rock band Matchbox Twenty, whose debut album Yourself Or Someone Like You in 1997 had sold over twelve million copies and spun off four big radio hits with "Push", "3AM', "Real World", and "Back 2 Good".  Then in 1999, lead singer Rob Thomas wrote and sang on "Smooth" from the veteran rock group Santana, which reigned on the pop chart for twelve weeks and won all the Grammy Awards. It was so ubiquitous at the time that it threatened to overshadow everything Thomas' band had done. So when it came time for the band (changing the 20 to Twenty) to release the lead single from their sophomore effort, Mad Season, the band had a music video where they comically take revenge on their lead singer. "Bent", written by Thomas and produced by Matt Serletic, the song itself casts a positive light on a relationship where Rob admits that he's flawed but reaches out for help and patience. It's a pretty real and deep emotion that's usually glossed over in mainstream rock music, but it's not mealy-mouthed in the production either, though it's definitely more geared to "pop" radio this time out...

"Bent" became Matchbox Twenty's first and only #1 pop hit on Billboard magazine's Hot 100 chart in America in July of 2000. The song made both the Alternative (#16) and Mainstream (#24) Rock radio charts, though it would be their last time on either of them. But the biggest success of "Bent" was on older-skewing format airplay charts, spending 13 weeks at #1 on the Adult Top-40 chart and 14 weeks atop the Triple A (Adult Album Alternative) Rock list. Internationally, the single topped the singles chart in Canada, and made the top-40 in Australia (#19) and New Zealand (#20). The Mad Season album, released in May of that year, spent a week at #3 on the Billboard 200 sales tally, and over a year on the chart, going on to sell over four million copies, a very respectable number, but of course a fraction of what their debut did. At the Grammy Awards in 2001, the Mad Season set was nominated for Best Rock Album, losing out to the Foo Fighters for their There Is Nothing Left To Lose release. Both the band and the album will return to the series.

(7/10)

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Here's the band performing "Bent" at the Hard Rock Cafe for an MTV broadcast...

Next up, in concert in London in 2012...

And lastly,Rob Thomas live at Red Rocks, Colorado for the Soundstage series in 2015, with just his guitar as backup...

Up tomorrow: The rapper's hitting the streets largely.