Someday We'll Know

"Someday We'll Know"
Single by New Radicals
from the album
Maybe You've Been Brainwashed Too
Released May 3, 1999
Format CD
Recorded 1997-98
Genre Soft Rock
Length 3:39
Label MCA
Producer(s) Gregg Alexander
New Radicals singles chronology
"You Get What You Give"
(1998)		 "Someday We'll Know"
(1999)

"Someday We'll Know" is a song by the New Radicals. It was released in May 1999 as the second single off their album Maybe You've Been Brainwashed Too and the follow-up to the smash "You Get What You Give". The single did not fare as well as the previous single, in part due to the announcement of lead member of the band Gregg Alexander stating that the New Radicals "[would] no longer be a recording, promoting, or performing entity" and that he would focus on producing and writing material for other artists. This announcement came just as the music video was being produced for the song and the statement that "the fatigue of traveling and getting three hours' sleep in a different hotel every night to do boring 'hanging and schmoozing' with radio and retail people is definitely not for me" effectively stopped all promotion of the song.[1]

Content

It is a midtempo ballad about lost love and regret, in which the singer asks a series of rhetorical questions and compares them to the end of his relationship, suggesting that issues of love and breaking up pose questions that will never be answered. For the line, "I'm speeding by the place that I met you for the 97th time tonight," which has led some to erroneously interpret the song as the account of an obsessive stalker, Alexander used the number 97 because of the year the band formed.

The B-side was "The Decency League", a cynical and bitter song about suppression and censorship of sex by Christian "decency leagues". Alexander sings, "The decency league, dedicated to stopping all sexual behaviour/I'm merely trying to deprive all those of the reasonable use of their sexual organs". The track acts as a stark contrast to the A-side.

Track listing

  1. "Someday We'll Know" (Gregg Alexander, Danielle Brisebois, Debra Holland) - 3:39
  2. "The Decency League" (Alexander) - 3:30
  3. "Technicolor Lover" (Alexander) - 3:42
  4. "Someday We'll Know (Instrumental)" (Alexander, Brisebois, Holland) - 3:39

Music video

Directed by David Barnblatt, the video features the whole band playing the song in a damp warehouse with Gregg Alexander on guitar. It features scenes of people in different places: a laundromat, a bus, a diner, and a pool. In one scene, a lonely woman sits alone stirring her coffee, and the end of the video shows an empty seat at the back of a bus.

Chart performance

Chart (1999–2000) Peak
position
Germany (Official German Charts)[2] 79
Netherlands (Single Top 100)[3] 75
New Zealand (Recorded Music NZ)[4] 45
UK Singles (The Official Charts Company)[5] 48
U.S. Billboard Adult Pop Songs[6] 28

Cover versions

The song was also covered by Mandy Moore and Jon Foreman on the A Walk to Remember soundtrack, by Hall & Oates on their 2003 album Do It for Love and live by Ronan Keating during his 2002 tour, Destination Everywhere. The Hall & Oates version included a guest appearance by Todd Rundgren on guitar and vocals.

An acoustic cover of the song was done by MYMP on their 2011 album The Unreleased Acoustic Collection

A cover of the song was also done by English-American folk rock band America on their 2011 album Back Pages.

Sitti covered the song in a bossa nova style on her 2014 album Bossa Love.

References

  1. ↑ New Radicals' Alexander Pulls The Plug. Billboard. 24 July 1999. Retrieved 11 June 2013.
  2. ↑ "Musicline.de – New Radicals Single-Chartverfolgung" (in German). Media Control Charts. PhonoNet GmbH.
  3. ↑ "Dutchcharts.nl – New Radicals – Someday We'll Know" (in Dutch). Single Top 100.
  4. ↑ "Charts.org.nz – New Radicals – Someday We'll Know". Top 40 Singles.
  5. ↑ International Chart history
  6. ↑ Billboard.com - Artist Chart History - The New Radicals

External links

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