Songoftheday 5/16/22 -I close my eyes when I get too sad, I think thoughts that I know are bad...

 

 

"Wonderful" - Everclear

from the album Songs From An American Movie Vol. One: Learning How To Smile (2000)

Billboard Hot 100 peak: #11 (two weeks)

Weeks in the Top-40: 17

 

Today's song comes from the alternative rock band Everclear, whose second album on Capitol Records and third overall, So Much For The Afterglow, had a top-40 pop radio hit with "I Will Buy You A New Life" in the summer of 1998 (until the end of the year, album cuts that weren't released as commercial singles weren't able to place on the official Hot 100 pop chart in Billboard magazine). Another track from the album, "Father Of Mine", almost made the airplay top-40 later that year, and when Billboard changed their rules, the song had just enough airplay at the time to make it on the Hot 100 at #70. The following year, their cover of the Thin Lizzy rock classic "The Boys Are Back In Town" for the movie Detroit Rock City popped on to the Mainstream Rock radio chart for a couple weeks at #40.

 

In 2000, after an unsuccessful attempt by leader Art Alexakis to make a solo album, he reunited with Craig Montoya, and Greg Eklund for the next Everclear album Songs From An American Movie, which ended up being a two album opus released at different times of the year. The first volume, Learning How To Smile, came out in the summer of that year, with the lead single "Wonderful" preceding it. Written by the band and produced by Art with Lars Fox and Neal Avron, the song is about divorce and its impact of children. Art himself a son of divorced parents, as well as having a daughter going through the same thing, allowed different perspective on the subject, and that helps the song's narrative quite well.The music video does a good job in presenting the internal mental conflict that often arises in children in this situation, and the splitting of personal stories and feelings that occurs when they attempt to compartmentalize their lives...

"Wonderful" became Everclear's first (and only) "official" top-40 hit on Billboard's Hot 100 chart, missing the top ten by a notch in September of 2000. The song spent two weeks at #3 on Billboard's Alternative Rock radio chart, and got to #28 on their Mainstream Rock counterpart, while taking three weeks at #3 on the older-skewing Adult Top-40 format airplay list and getting to #2 on the Adult Album Alternative (or "Triple-A") rock chart. Internationally, the single reached the top-40 in Iceland (#12), Canada (#13), New Zealand (#21), the UK (#36), and Australia (#38). The Learning How To Smile volume, released in July of that year, became the band's first and only top ten success on the Billboard 200 sales tally at #9, going on to sell over a million copies. 

A second song from the album promoted to radio, "AM Radio", heavily sampled Jean Knight's 70's soul-pop nugget "Mr. Big Stuff", with a nostalgic look back at the format of their youth. The song did the best on the Alternative Rock format, peaking at #15, as well as at Adult Top-40 at #17, but it ended up only "bubbling under" the pop Hot 100 at #101. 

Volume Two of the Songs From An American Movie work, Good Time For A Bad Attitude, arrived in November of 2000. A harder-edged album than its predecessor, its lead single, "When It All Goes Wrong Again", returned the trio to the top ten on Billboard's Mainstream Rock radio chart for the first time since their breakthrough hit "Santa Monica" at #10, and got to #12 on the Alternative Rock list, but again only "bubbled under" the Hot 100 at #121. The album sold considerably less, stalling out at #66 on the Billboard 200. They even went back to the first volume to send the band's cover of Van Morrison's "Brown Eyed Girl" to Adult Top-40 radio, where it climbed to #26 in 2001. 

When Everclear returned with their next album Slow Motion Daydream in 2003, a dispute over what would be the first single ended up with the label not promoting the end choice, "Volvo Driving Soccer Mom", enough, where it stalled at #30 on the Alternative Rock radio chart. After this, not only did Everclear leave Capitol Records, but Montoya and Eklund left the group as well, leaving Alexakis alone as a "solo" act.

Continuing on with the Everclear name and recruiting Sam Hudson, Brett Snyder, and Josh Crawley into the band, they moved indie on the Eleven Seven label for their next release Welcome To The Drama Club in 2006. The album only spent a week at #169 on the Billboard 200, and again Hudson and Snyder left to be replaced by Freddy Herrera and Sean Winchester. Since then, Everclear has released four more studio album, with 2012's Invisible Stars getting them on the Billboard 200 at #119 for a week. Their most recent, Black Is The New Black, came out in 2015. In 2019, Alexakis released his first solo album Sun Songs, while Montoya and Eklund have been in a few different bands since.

(8/10)

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Here's the band performing "Wonderful" live on a TV appearance promoting the album...

Next up, in concert in California in 2000...

In 2018, Alexakis with his second reinvention of Everclear remade "Wonderful" for the album In A Different Light with an acoustic touch...

and lastly, Alexakis talking about and playing "Wonderful" for an online video for the Guitar Center...

Up tomorrow: Country crossover band asks for an update.