Happy 20th Birthday to Mr. Brightside
September 29th, 2023 at 1:14 PM ^
Probably the second biggest rock song of the 21st Century after Seven Nation Army.
Great song. Great album. Great band.
September 29th, 2023 at 1:24 PM ^
Maybe the 2nd biggest rock song in the football world. Not overall, that's a bit ridiculous
September 29th, 2023 at 1:56 PM ^
I'm just talking the 21st Century. There haven't been too many classics released in the past 23 years.
September 29th, 2023 at 2:24 PM ^
Yes but that's still a crazy claim. Also, I feel like you have a pretty narrow view of modern rock music.
There are probably like 6 Linkin Park songs alone that would be considered bigger songs than Mr. Brightside. Regardless of what you think of Linkin Park, the sales/plays alone blow Mr Brightside out of the water.
Alanis Morissette, The Strokes, Nickelback (seriously), KoRn, System of a Down, Matchbox 20, Green Day, Foo Fighters, Radiohead, Evanescence, idk the list goes on in terms of songs/albums that would probably be higher up on the list.
September 29th, 2023 at 3:20 PM ^
I believe you're greatly underselling the importance of initial-run chart numbers and greatly underselling the importance that staying power has on a song's greater importance. "Mr. Brightside" was released in 2005, and yet it was just outside the top-ten of most streamed rock songs LAST YEAR (linky). If you look through the years, you'll regularly find it on that chart.
And in earnest, a number of the artists you mentioned peaked commercially in the 90s. I LOVE Radiohead, but they don't have a 21st Century song that carries the rock banner like "Mr. Brightside" has.
September 29th, 2023 at 3:55 PM ^
Fair enough. Streaming has definitely changed consumption of music and I'm not really factoring that in enough.
As an aside, I think Mr. Brightside is the worst song by a pretty wide margin out of the first 5 songs on Hot Fuss. Not to say it's bad, it's just not as good as the others. Jenny was a Friend of Mine, Smile Like you Mean It, Somebody Told Me, All These Things that I've Done, and Mr Brightside? That's one hell of an opening to an album.
September 29th, 2023 at 4:09 PM ^
Maybe it's a generational thing but I simply don't get the love for Mr. Brightside. Seems so mournful but then again I'd always take some AC/DC or Led Zeppelin or lots of other groups over Neil Diamond so maybe it's just me.
If it keeps the student section happy, so be it.
September 30th, 2023 at 12:18 PM ^
I’m with you, bluebyyou. I don’t have a clue why this song is supposed to be a UM thing. But, millennials seem to really like it, so whatever. They can play it for a while, but I don’t consider it any kind of “real tradition” or anything. Yet I do see 7 Nation Army as an actual organic tradition, so maybe I’m not terribly consistent in these matters.
September 29th, 2023 at 5:08 PM ^
unWavering, not sure I'd agree that it's the worst song by a wide margin.
But, it is a fucking great album. First time I heard it, I was hooked.
September 29th, 2023 at 4:41 PM ^
Niche songs - like this one - get played by people over and over. The same people. So I’m not sure sreaming is necessarily the best indicator of popularity. A better metric would be if it were shown by streams and unique streamers. Just my opinion, of course. But I’m pretty decent with music and I’ll he completely honest that I had never heard this song before it popped up in the Michigan context. And now I’ve definitely streamed it a lot.
September 29th, 2023 at 11:26 PM ^
Most of those streams are just the rest of us trying to look at the lyrics. Trying to be relevant.
September 29th, 2023 at 6:09 PM ^
Alanis Morissette, The Strokes, Nickelback (seriously), KoRn, System of a Down, Matchbox 20, Green Day, Foo Fighters, Radiohead, Evanescence - isn't most of this 90's stuff?
September 29th, 2023 at 6:27 PM ^
Believe it or not, artists that started in the 90s also released music in the 2000s. Idk I guess they wanted to continue to make money or share their art or something.
I take some issue with someone saying there hasn't been much good rock music released in the 21st century, it's objectively not true (and I'm not even talking about the artists I listed, those just were ones with a ton of sales).
September 29th, 2023 at 6:44 PM ^
was fist-pumpin with you
…until Linkin Park
September 29th, 2023 at 7:02 PM ^
Lmao I'm not a Linkin Park stan by any means but their impact on 21st century rock is unquestionably much greater than the Killers. I'm not talking about artists I personally like, I'm talking about those that had more cultural impact (read: sales, presence in the public consciousness, etc) than the Killers.
Yeah, Mr Brightside has had a moment nearly 20 years after its release but I still vehemently disagree that it's anywhere close to the top of most defining/influential/relevant 21st century rock songs
September 29th, 2023 at 1:29 PM ^
The Killers at Royal Albert Hall - enjoy!
September 29th, 2023 at 1:37 PM ^
1:16:00 if you want to fast forward
September 29th, 2023 at 1:57 PM ^
Great story about the song.
September 29th, 2023 at 1:31 PM ^
I remember coming in to my job in college. We had a small boombox, and I had just lime-wired the new White Stripes album. Popped it in the CD player, Seven Nation Army intro hits, and immediately 3 people stopped and one blurts out "is Jack White playing a bass guitar?"
Must have replayed that song 20x during our shift. It was apparent upon first listen that song would be an instant classic.
September 29th, 2023 at 4:11 PM ^
First time I ever heard Seven Nation Army, I was driving . . . to a Michigan game. It was an instant classic in my mind.
September 29th, 2023 at 1:25 PM ^
September 29th, 2023 at 1:33 PM ^
I don’t get up to many games, so when I was at the 2021 OSU/Michigan game, it was my first experience with Mr Brightside.
It was a surreal moment in the snow, with the glow of victory brightening, to the sounds of Mr Brightside.
September 29th, 2023 at 1:41 PM ^
The Official Theme Song of the last two Ohio State wins.
Now make it three.
September 29th, 2023 at 2:13 PM ^
As much as I appreciate that song, 2021 the official theme song at the big house, was that “don’t you know, pump it up!
September 29th, 2023 at 2:31 PM ^
September 29th, 2023 at 4:28 PM ^
For me, the official theme song of the 2021 Game was the sound of the whining of the ohio players and 3rd-base Ryan complaining about their stuffy noses and upset tummies.
September 29th, 2023 at 8:45 PM ^
The noise was constant, and loud, and constant! It was so loud and constant that big plays didn't stand out on the TV. It was unreal. Still the most impactful, cathartic, game I've ever watched. The 2022 game was good, but it was no 2021...
September 29th, 2023 at 2:31 PM ^
It was only one half.
It was only one half!
- Mr. Toughside
September 29th, 2023 at 2:41 PM ^
I just can’t look
its killing me
September 29th, 2023 at 2:58 PM ^
They're running the ball.
September 29th, 2023 at 1:48 PM ^
I have to admit I was a bit sad that BTN basically made this a segment of the broadcast last week. "After the break, we'll be back with Mr Brightside from The Big House!" On the one hand, it's kind of a cool acknowledgement of a pretty recent and unique tradition. On the other hand, it speaks to the fact that there is LITERALLY NOTHING THAT CFB WILL NOT TRY TO MONETIZE AND MAKE A PART OF THE "PRODUCT." This, outside of the annoying personalities (Put some fucking sleeves on McAfee, we already see "fat guy who thinks he's jacked" at the gym every day), is why I turned off GameDay for good. There is NOTHING sacred to them, no inside joke, no inside tradition they won't sell to the CFB world to fill a 6 minute segment of a show that is TOO FUCKING LONG.
Get off my lawn.
September 29th, 2023 at 1:59 PM ^
I LOVE that they made it a segment of the broadcast. It was awesome:
https://twitter.com/i/status/1705650826599940350
Every network needs to do this every week.
September 29th, 2023 at 1:53 PM ^
- I really like this song. It was from my college years, so it brings back good memories of late nights in college bars.
- I think it's a really weird choice for a signature song. I always interpreted it as a dude who is talking about an ex, a girl he's with, or a girl he wants to be with -- who is either with another guy (or his insecurities make him think she's with another guy). Then he sarcastically refers to himself as Mr. Brightside. i always thought it was just an emo song with a catchy hook
- Maybe it doesn't matter, bc all that matters is that the hook is catchy and nobody cares about the words or meanings (shout-out Blues Traveler). I have no idea what Seven Nation Army is about, but it gets me pumped up at a stadium.
- In my overanalysis of this, I started making weird connections where Michigan is the emo singer, the National Championship is our "girl", the Bamas and Georgias are the other guy, and the sarcastic Brightside response is how we all cope through the endless BPONE feelings. So maybe it does make sense -- but it doesn't make me pumped up for the 4th quarter, lol. The one time it didn't feel odd to me was live in Indy as we were clinching the B1G against Iowa.
September 29th, 2023 at 1:58 PM ^
Thank you Rob! We were writing our posts at the same time, but I could not agree more!
September 29th, 2023 at 2:40 PM ^
I always interpreted it as lamenting our decade of losses against OSU - sort of a sarcastic optimism, then took on a whole new meaning of vindication once we beat them.
September 29th, 2023 at 3:04 PM ^
You're not wrong that it's a weird choice- however, the greatest sports anthem in the world, You'll Never Walk Alone, is from a musical and is about how it's for the best the main character's dad is dead.
September 29th, 2023 at 3:30 PM ^
The song is not of my era, the meaning is probably completely wrong for a football game, and I'd never even heard the song before the Michigan Stadium connection. (Yes, I know - to paraphrase Negasonic Teenage Warhead in the first "Deadpool" move, "Fuck, Sam, you're old!")
But I absolutely love it. Tens of thousands of voices uniting in a raucous and off-key rendition gets my cholesterol-laced blood pumping every time. I even learned the words and sing them during the BTN clip, to the bemused look of the MGoGirlfriend.
I'd even like to punch Eric Roberts from the video, because A) he 's the bad guy, and B) his smug, fleshy face bears a certain resemblance to Dantonio.
September 29th, 2023 at 11:19 PM ^
It’s cool-I spent 2021 building Michigan hype videos in my mind to like 20 different Imagine Dragons songs. <a shot of OSU players getting off the team bus during “Radioactive”>
September 30th, 2023 at 10:05 AM ^
They really is no reason to look beyond your #3.
September 29th, 2023 at 1:55 PM ^
Obviously I'm in the minority here, but this one has just never done it for me as an in-stadium "hype" song. I can appreciate stadium anthems across all sports; Jump Around, Enter Sandman; 7 Nation Army, We Will Rock You, Hip Hop Hooray, etc. To me this song just does not hit that way at all. I cant be alone when I hear a more whiny tone with Mr. Brightside than a stadium rock/hype song, right? Right???
I should say, I dont mind the song, just dont get why/how it gets people amped up for some football.
September 29th, 2023 at 2:01 PM ^
Because of what it's associated with, the Michigan long depression but then, finally, the overcoming of Ohio State.
We got the girl.
September 29th, 2023 at 2:24 PM ^
But he doesn't get the girl in the song. He finds her in a bar with another guy, and she leaves with the guy in a cab.
Wiki:
Lyrically, "Mr. Brightside" depicts a true story of Flowers' jealousy and paranoia when he walked into a bar in Las Vegas and found his girlfriend cheating on him.[20] "I was asleep and I knew something was wrong," he said. "I have these instincts. I went to the Crown and Anchor, a bar in Vegas, and my girlfriend was there with another guy."[20]
September 29th, 2023 at 2:55 PM ^
Exactly. It's an emo-rock song about him NOT getting the girl and being super jealous about it. Lyrics aside, it's also just not a slammer that I'd associate with a stadium anthem. Oh well, it works for most apparently.
September 29th, 2023 at 4:16 PM ^
But WE got the girl. We took the song and finished it. We put our stamp on it and made it our own story.
September 29th, 2023 at 2:00 PM ^
I am not a big fan of the song, probably because I live out west and haven't been to a game in decades..... however......
you guys sounded amazing on TV last week...... I actually had tingles hearing 100k fans singing in unison. It sounded great and you could tell the announcers were impressed too.
September 29th, 2023 at 5:59 PM ^
It was cool that the announcers didn't "step on" the singing and actually let a play run without saying anything . We slag the broadcasts all the time for the things they get wrong, but this was one they absolutely got right.
September 29th, 2023 at 2:14 PM ^
Can one of you explain why that song is a uniquely University of Michigan song? Is it there’s some direct link with the band or the band members to Ann Arbor?
September 29th, 2023 at 2:25 PM ^
So during my investigation, I found that Boston College actually made this their song several years before us.
September 29th, 2023 at 2:41 PM ^
Meh, that's like when MSU clowns make claims on the winged helmet origin.
While it's technically true, it also isn't at all.
September 29th, 2023 at 2:37 PM ^
https://www.michigandaily.com/arts/coming-out-of-our-cage-a-look-inside-the-mr-brightside-phenomenon/