https://www.theringer.com/music/2019/5/3/18525721/smash-mouth-all-star-20th-anniversary-memes
On May 4, 1999, a hit was born—an unkillable one. Twenty years after the song's release, the band's songwriter relives the creative process behind it and explores why the sensation has continued to permeate pop culture through memes, YouTube videos, and even an as-yet-unstaged Broadway musical.
They really didn't want to use "All Star."
It was 2001, and the creators of Shrek, an upcoming animated film about a foul-tempered ogre, had slotted it in as a placeholder track over the opening sequence. It had the feeling they wanted: fun, and edgy yet not too edgy. But the song, by the band Smash Mouth, had been all over radio and television since its release two years prior. It also had been featured in two recent movies, Mystery Men and Inspector Gadget, and licensed for Rat Race, which would be out later in the year. Surely, they should use something fresher.
So Matt Mahaffey, a young artist signed to DreamWorks' records division, was enlisted to come up with a replacement: a song that was like "All Star," but not "All Star." As Mahaffey saw it, it was his task to beat it. He was shown a rough cut of the movie, then wrote and demoed a song that day.
The Shrek team loved it. Mahaffey was flown from Los Angeles to meet the animation team in Palo Alto, and paired with "All Star" producer Eric Valentine to lay down the master. The process took weeks. The cut of the movie kept changing, and the music had to be adjusted to fit. But Mahaffey was excited: His song was shaping up to be the only original number in the movie. "We worked so hard to make it perfect," Mahaffey said recently.
call a 24-hour "All Star" hotline on 830-476-5664 (a handy number, it has been suggested, for women to give out to potential creeps).
Fun article. Can't believe the song is 20 years old.
In recent years, with its rotating personnel, Smash Mouth has been "almost like a cover band" of itself, Camp says. They continue to play his songs on the road, with Harwell openly admitting to concert audiences that, yes, he knows that most of them are there to hear three songs, but they should "try to have fun until we get there." And then, as promised, every night, the closing song sends the audience out on a terrific high:
All that glitters is gold
Only shooting stars break the mold.
That last line happens to be a mixed metaphor, but who cares.
On May 4, 1999, a hit was born—an unkillable one. Twenty years after the song's release, the band's songwriter relives the creative process behind it and explores why the sensation has continued to permeate pop culture through memes, YouTube videos, and even an as-yet-unstaged Broadway musical.
They really didn't want to use "All Star."
It was 2001, and the creators of Shrek, an upcoming animated film about a foul-tempered ogre, had slotted it in as a placeholder track over the opening sequence. It had the feeling they wanted: fun, and edgy yet not too edgy. But the song, by the band Smash Mouth, had been all over radio and television since its release two years prior. It also had been featured in two recent movies, Mystery Men and Inspector Gadget, and licensed for Rat Race, which would be out later in the year. Surely, they should use something fresher.
So Matt Mahaffey, a young artist signed to DreamWorks' records division, was enlisted to come up with a replacement: a song that was like "All Star," but not "All Star." As Mahaffey saw it, it was his task to beat it. He was shown a rough cut of the movie, then wrote and demoed a song that day.
The Shrek team loved it. Mahaffey was flown from Los Angeles to meet the animation team in Palo Alto, and paired with "All Star" producer Eric Valentine to lay down the master. The process took weeks. The cut of the movie kept changing, and the music had to be adjusted to fit. But Mahaffey was excited: His song was shaping up to be the only original number in the movie. "We worked so hard to make it perfect," Mahaffey said recently.
call a 24-hour "All Star" hotline on 830-476-5664 (a handy number, it has been suggested, for women to give out to potential creeps).
Fun article. Can't believe the song is 20 years old.
In recent years, with its rotating personnel, Smash Mouth has been "almost like a cover band" of itself, Camp says. They continue to play his songs on the road, with Harwell openly admitting to concert audiences that, yes, he knows that most of them are there to hear three songs, but they should "try to have fun until we get there." And then, as promised, every night, the closing song sends the audience out on a terrific high:
All that glitters is gold
Only shooting stars break the mold.
That last line happens to be a mixed metaphor, but who cares.
