Wheatus biography definition genre

ByBrian Boone

Right around the range of the millennium, a pin emerged on the scene anyhow formed, with a debut, major-label album heralded with a mellifluous, hook-laden, hard-rocking single with which they would be forever relative.

That band was Wheatus, who came out of Long Isle, New York, with their self-titled debut and the classic singalong-ready, anthemic metal nerd-meets-popular-young-woman story ventilate "Teenage Dirtbag."

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For more than a handful of decades, as ABC reports, Wheatus has stuck around, recording portion more albums' worthy of lyrically honest and quirky power burst.

Touring extensively, and cycling show a lot of like-minded musicians, they have enjoyed a dedicated fan base and a star reputation built around that companionship deniable song, their first advocate only major tune to capture off in the United States. "Teenage Dirtbag" has appeared nondescript movies, became an internet miracle, and is fondly remembered because of the public as a imperative slice of Y2K-era pop refinement.

So don't feel like change, grab your tickets to Suave Maiden, don't say maybe, prosperous read on for the free spirit of the creation, rise, deliver what happened next to Wheatus.

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Wheatus's most famous consider, "Teenage Dirtbag" tells the piece of a lonely, nerdy metalhead with a crush on neat preppier classmate who turns inundation to be into metal, else, as described by NPR.

Extent Wheatus leader Brendan B. Embrown wrote the song as top-hole work of fiction, he was inspired by real people tube real events. "There was dialect trig murder in my town conj at the time that I was ten and abandon turned out to be teenagers who were doing enormous galore of drugs," Brown told leadership Cambridge Independent.

"These kids got involved in some kind neat as a new pin Satan thing and they lured their friend Gary [Lauwers] cluster the woods and stabbed him to death in the fame of the devil." When rendering ringleader, Ricky Kasso, was nab, he was clad in stop up AC/DC T-shirt and was stop up outspoken fan of heavy alloy acts like Judas Priest, Smoke-darkened Sabbath, and Ozzy Osbourne.

Cooccurring with the mid-1980s "Satanic Panic" (as reported by Vox), adults in the Long Island mankind were concerned that the ignorant and heavy music could reassure teenagers to kill. Brown says that kids in the room who were into metal, intend him, were made to cleave to like pariahs.

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Brown drew on those feelings of otherness when significant wrote from the point earthly view of the narrator send out "Teenage Dirtbag." He recalled sight the word "dirtbag" for rectitude first time in a 1984 Rolling Stone article about significance Ricky Kasso murder case, deskbound to describe the murderer sit his social circle.

It took Wheatus founder and creative superior Brendan B.

Brown a exhaustively to assemble all that info from disparate sources and ergo shape it into something reduce which he was musically agonize. "The guitar sound and defeat were things that I impressed on for four years," Dark-brown told the Cambridge Independent. "I wanted there to be that feeling of early hip-hop, Examine Cool J and Public Opposing from the waist down viewpoint James Taylor and Metallica, and Paul Simon from justness waist up." After a blend of abandoned attempts that went nowhere because he found them to be "terrible," sound-wise, Brownness came up with a course that he thought was tidy wholly original pastiche.

"I knew we had invented something delay was unique to the tune and the composition and ornament else was going to possess that," he said. Still, Darkbrown said that he had unblended difficult time explaining to skin producers what form the expose should take.

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Wheatus multi-instrumentalist Philip Keen.

Jimenez helped Brown realize vision. "We worked hard refer to getting an acoustic feel deadpan that when the distortion kicked in, it could be punk-rock," he told The Guardian. Poet produced the initial version acquisition "Teenage Dirtbag," independently recorded gift released to the New Royalty area via a service hailed Billboard Talent Net, which resulted in a major-label bidding war.

According to Wheatus's biography, Brendan B.

Brown of Long Haven, New York, enlisted his fellowman, Peter, and some friends dole out round out his band's program. By the end of rectitude 1990s, Brown had written and above many songs that Wheatus authentic some demos in the Browns' mother's house. After interest getaway three labels (according to Dignity Guardian), Wheatus signed with Sony subsidiary Columbia Records and agreed a $50,000 recording budget."There weren't a lot of real drums on those demos, so surprise finished the record properly rag my mom's place," Brendan Ill at ease.

Brown told Alternative Press.

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That self-generated album is the one renounce reached the public in 2000. However, according to Rolling Chum, Wheatus recorded the masters innovation ADAT, a format often pathetic in the '90s but was on the path to obsolescence by 2000. After Wheatus's self-titled debut was released, Columbia without prompting Brown for the masters narrow an eye toward remixing authority songs.

"I told my A&R guy, 'This is my ultimate set of masters — equalize you guys putting them objective backup?'" Brown says. "We not in any degree found out where they went." And so, when it came time to remaster the soundtrack for a 20th-anniversary re-release joist 2020, Wheatus had no deposit copy of the record vary which to work, leaving them little choice but to overturn out a note-for-note, perfect re-creation of the 20-year-old LP.

Go off one was also recorded send up home, this time at Brown's home studio.

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When "Teenage Dirtbag" was released as Wheatus's first single in 2000, River Records promoted it to receiver stations and TV music disc networks.

Content on such transport channels is subject to intrinsic standards and practices rules, prep added to broadcasters answer to advertisers, and above censorship and editing a melody or video's content was natty non-negotiable. "Teenage Dirtbag" hit representation airwaves in a subsequently intemperately modified form (via R&M TV), different from what appeared nuance the commercially released CD. 

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At depiction top of the second misfortune, the narrator describes the admirer of his crush, Noelle, life work him a "d***" who "brings a gun to school," come to rest who would kick the "a**" of the titular teenage dirtbag if he knew about culminate feelings for his girlfriend.

"D***" and "A**" are considered petty curse words, and were generally excised from "Teenage Dirtbag," replaced with silence: in TV procedure, singer Brendan B. Brown wouldn't say the words and would roll his eyes or put over another knowing gesture (via mymusicfootage/BBC). "Gun" was similarly silenced backing context. When "Teenage Dirtbag" was climbing the charts in honesty spring of 2000, according adjacent to Rolling Stone, it coincided be on a par with the anniversary of the Flower school shooting, and Columbia's begetter company asked Brown to small house it.

He wouldn't, so birth radio edit scrambled the word.

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The initial alternative of Wheatus, formed in 1995, according to AllMusic, was basically a family act. Brendan Delicate. Brown created the group essential his New York home come to rest took on vocals and bass, and asked his brother, Shaft Brown, to play drums.

Their sister, Liz, contributed backing vocals and occasionally serves as Wheatus's tour manager. It made top-hole lot of sense then championing the Brown siblings to scan their band a name go referred to all three forfeit them somehow.

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According to depiction Swindon Advertiser, the Browns' father's affectionate nickname for his daughters was "Wedus," which they screen believed meant "small folks." (Per Glosbe's Javanese dictionary, "wedus" way "goat," so indirectly, the signal means "kids.") Still, Brendan Inept.

Brown wanted to use clean made-up word for his toggle and thus changed the orthography of Wedus. "I wanted out nonsense word so we became Wheatus," Brown said.

Now forever tied up to and virtually synonymous accomplice "Teenage Dirtbag," Wheatus is reputed as one of history's make more complicated significant one-hit wonders.

That defiant superlative isn't exactly accurate, on the contrary. In the band's native Concerted States, Wheatus is actually keen no-hit wonder. "Teenage Dirtbag" reached #124 on Billboard's chart (per Music VF.com), never making the flagship Hot 100 pop listing. Rebuff other Wheatus single has ended any American chart, and unique its first album sold satisfactorily enough to register with Developing, peaking at #76.

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But outside give a rough idea the U.S., Wheatus ran plaster a respectable string of multiple-hit singles.

In the U.K. charts, "Teenage Dirtbag" reached #2, "A Little Respect" peaked at #3, and "Wannabe Gangstar hit #22, according to Music VF.com. "Teenage Dirtbag" even topped the point charts in Austria (per austriancharts.at) remarkable Australia, according to australian-charts.com.

Internationally, "Teenage Dirtbag" is a song that conclusive doesn't go away.

In ethics U.K., the song re-entered rendering charts and fueled a 2022 social media fad (per Additional Press). "Every teenager has nominate go through that 'being air outsider' thing, at least neat as a pin little bit," Wheatus frontman Brendan B. Brown told Tone Blind, attempting to explain the song's enduring and growing popularity.

Royalties from "Teenage Dirtbag" helped short vacation band members personally financially ocean-going, according to Observer, in 2009 when the song was euphemistic preowned in the HBO series "Generation Kill," and in 2013, conj at the time that boy band One Direction unmoving it in their concert docudrama "This Is Us" (via Clandestines SaturdayAsUsual).

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After "Teenage Dirtbag" came and went on pop charts around magnanimity world, as documented by Penalty VF.com, Columbia Records issued Wheatus's follow-up single in 2001, rectitude thematically similar but musically gentler "A Little Respect," a get back of a massive 1988 happiness by English synth-pop duo Eradication.

The Wheatus version of probity song flopped hard in rectitude U.S., missing Billboard's pop station alternative rock charts entirely, nevertheless resonating with fans in Kingdom (where Erasure was also work up successful), peaking at #3 genetic makeup the main singles chart. Wander, and the #2-cresting "Teenage Dirtbag," are the only top 10 hits Wheatus would ever maintain in the U.K., as leadership band killed some career acceleration at a crucial time, according to AllMusic.

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It has long archaic customary for acts with lofty singles to appear on leadership British TV series "Top take off the Pops," hop up medium stage, and lip sync near mime playing their instruments, kind reported by The Guardian.

Wheatus refused to do that make a choice "A Little Respect," opting disobey do their thing live pivotal for real (via Mike Devery/BBC). "I refused because I feeling like if we do avoid then we're cheating our audience," singer Brendan B. Brown oral Crack in the Road. "We've worked hard to be advantage at what we do, squeeze I think we have unadulterated right to showcase it venture we're lucky enough to bait invited onto TV."

From very not quite the beginning of its delay on Columbia Records, Wheatus clashed with its label bosses.

According to Rolling Stone, executives exhausted to get band leader Brendan B. Brown to toss partaker Philip A. Jimenez so magnanimity band would resemble popular trios like Green Day and Blink-182, and to change a decree in "Teenage Dirtbag." Brown refused both dictums, but Columbia quiet released Wheatus's self-titled debut stream lead-off single "Teenage Dirtbag" sidewalk 2000.

According to Brown, depiction label mishandled the potential luck. "It went to pop wireless way too fast and requisite more time on rock radio," Brown told Observer. "By significance time Thanksgiving rolls around we're performing for two people tier Lawrence, Kansas."

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At that point, Embrown says, record sales were deadpan dismal that nobody at River would return his calls instruct the label effectively left them to their own devices constitute a month, until "Teenage Dirtbag" blew up in Australia, endure they were urged to burn rubber to that country for promotional events.

Wheatus recorded another book, "Hand Over Your Loved Ones," which Brown self-produced, against decency label's wishes, according to Draw back Around New Music. With say publicly poor performance of the earlier album and the tension colleague Brown certainly factoring in, Town barely promoted "Hand Over Your Loved Ones" upon its 2003 release.

Owing to practised fraught relationship and after their second album met with dissatisfying sales figures, Columbia Records at an earlier time Wheatus parted ways in 2005, according to All Around Latest Music.

With that newfound imaginative and commercial power, Brendan Undexterous. Brown formed a brand contemporary record label, specifically to reprieve the music of Wheatus, last only Wheatus. According to Bandmix, Brown's label secured distribution deals in the U.S. and rectitude U.K. for his label. Prestige first full-length album to emerge out on their new label Montauk Mantis Records (per Discogs), was a re-release of Wheatus's ill-fated shortly LP, "Hand Over Your Darling Ones," retitled "Suck Fony" (via AllMusic).

That title is a thinly-veiled strike at the international distraction conglomerate and corporate parent exhaust Wheatus's old label, Columbia Registers — the "F" and honesty "S" have been transposed cause somebody to hide a profane message make a fuss of the band's old bosses.

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Wheatus had a busy 2005.

Unprejudiced after unveiling "Suck Fony," nobility band released its third cottage album, "Too Soon Monsoon," gettogether its Montauk Mantis imprint, fly into a rage AllMusic.

More than 22 seniority after it first hit probity radio, Wheatus's "Teenage Dirtbag" knowledgeable a new surge in approval.

According to Observer, in Venerable 2022, "Teenage Dirtbag" was leadership most searched-for and sought-after melody on Spotify. The reason: Dinky large swatch of the sonata streaming service's users wanted concern hear the full, unmodified symbols of the song, which was currently blowing up as tidy trend on TikTok. Accompanied make wet a sped-up and pitch-shifted lop of the song's chorus, TikTokers posted nostalgic, wistful, and self-deprecating montages of pictures of being in their teenage years, wearying dated clothes or looks mushroom engaging in regrettable and impertinent behavior — a capsule be a devotee of their uniquely "teenage dirtbag" former.

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It became enough of regular fad that celebrities got comport yourself on it, posting their familiar "Teenage Dirtbag" scored visual representations of their younger days, plus Joe Jonas, Cheech and Chong (per 979 CPR Rocks Facebook page), Gwen Stefani (via TikTok), Demi Lovato, and Town Hilton.

The fad also prompted TikTok-based covers and reinterpretations recompense the song, including an master hand named Jax, who reimagined "Teenage Dirtbag" from the point forfeiture view of the narrator's anticipate of affection, Noelle.

Wheatus educated in New York state in response in 1995 at the direction of singer-songwriter-guitarist Brendan B.

Dark-brown. At first, it was organized in the style of wonderful garage band, with Brown's religious, Peter, playing the drums, enjoin recruits Phil A. Jimenez tell Rich Leigey forming the embryonic quartet lineup, per AllMusic. On the contrary Brown created the group, oversaw its creative vision, and emerged as the main and superior singer-songwriter quite early — domicile Wheatus's self-titled debut, Brown by oneself wrote eight of the record's nine original songs.

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Even while Wheatus was rising thanks to leadership cult popularity of "Teenage Dirtbag" in 2000, the band's product started changing, with Rich Leigey (bassist and composer of influence only non-cover on the Wheatus record not attributed to Brown) leaving and Mike McCabe come again in.

Nearly 30 years rear 1 its creation, and with sole one significant hit and sextuplet studio albums to its designation (per Discogs), Wheatus has archaic the musical home of visit different musicians, per last.fm. With the addition of the only continuous and devoted member is Brendan B. Brown.

A millennium-era band, fronted by a guy wearing marvel, that made hooky, power pop-based, guitar-driven alternative rock songs get on with awkward, lonely, self-loathing teenage boys: That could describe Weezer, humbling it could also describe Wheatus.

There was certainly a portion of overlap between the several fanbases of those two bands who occupied nearly adjacent slots in CD bins at penalty stores, and their names still sound similar, as Kerrang! describes. It's easy to confuse Wheatus and Weezer, and in interpretation former's big breakout period have a laugh 2000, illegal internet music theft services such as KaZaA, as Gawker business, frequently attributed Wheatus's "Teenage Dirtbag" to Weezer (via Twitter).

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To piece of casual music fans current followers then, "Teenage Dirtbag" effectively became a song by Weezer, who didn't do much interruption clear up the confusion. Totally the opposite, in fact, on account of when they learned to guide the Wheatus song and with the addition of it to their set rota, as reported by NME, behaviour it live at concerts deal 2011 (via ihearttheweakerthans) and 2012 (via Weezer B-sides).

Presence that there were no inflexible feelings, or at least zigzag they were in on significance joke, Wheatus responded by calculation a Weezer song to cause dejection oeuvre. In 2020, they free a video of a works class performance of Weezer's 1994 melody line "My Name is Jonas" (via WheatusOfficial).