Everyone gets songs stuck in their heads that just won’t go away. They sneak into your subconscious. They are epic earworms that you find yourself humming uncontrollably, singing in the shower, or tapping the beat to with your foot or ballpoint pen when you should be working. Sometimes they even keep you awake at night. Whether they are current hits, one-hit wonders, movie soundtrack gems, holiday favorites, or songs from your youth, their catchy vocals, riffs, hooks, and choruses seem to linger for days.
Here, those songs find a home, no matter the genre. Here, those epic earworms are revisited, explained, and celebrated. Here, you may find the song that haunts you tomorrow. Here is today’s unescapable song of the day…and the story behind it.
Today’s Epic Earworm: The Wallflowers — “One Headlight”
Music video for “One Headlight” by the Wallflowers, courtesy of Interscope Records
Jacob Dylan had a lot on his shoulders when his band, The Wallflowers, released their self-titled debut album in 1992 on Virgin Records. The son of legendary folk rocker Bob Dylan had big shoes to fill. Unfortunately for the band, neither the album nor its two singles charted. While working on their second album, Dylan sat down at his kitchen table and wrote a song about the death of ideas, the loss of innocence, and an imperfect world. While the lyrics were particularly gloomy at times, they did offer a glimmering ray of hope.
Dylan noted later that he was not so much trying to write a hit as he was trying to impress a certain producer. He was able to get his song to that producer, but the band never did hear back from him. Things would all work out in the end, though. The band eventually recorded their sophomore effort, Bringing Down the Horse, with legendary producer and musician T-Bone Burnett on Interscope Records.
The Depressing Song Impresses
The Wallflowers’ first single from Bringing Down the Horse, “6th Avenue Heartache,” was the first success for the band. It peaked in the Top Ten of three different Billboard charts. It was the album’s second single, though, that would finally push the band to the top of the charts. Dylan’s bluesy, melancholy kitchen table rocker, “One Headlight,” reached Number One on all three of Billboard’s rock airplay charts (Mainstream, Modern, and Adult Alternative). The song spent 70 weeks on the Billboard Hot 100 Airplay chart, peaking at Number Two for five of those weeks.
Largely on the strength of “One Headlight,” Bringing Down The Horse went on to be certified quadruple-platinum in the U.S. and sextuple-platinum in Canada. The epic earworm, which references Bruce Springsteen‘s “Independence Day” and “One Step Up,” showed that even when Dylan was down, he was not out. It proves that even in today’s sometimes depressing world, there is always that one glimmering headlight of hope that can make one’s dreams seem slightly more possible.
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