“You Wanted More” by Tonic, Sunday, May 22, 2022
In 1996 Tonic scored a number 11 hit with their song “If You Could Only See” from their debut record Lemon Parade. Three years later, the band releases the first single from their follow up record Sugar. “You Wanted More” first appeared on the soundtrack to the 1999 teen sex comedy American Pie. Unlike “If You Could Only See,” “ You Wanted More” failed to crack the Hot 100 but peaked at number 3 on the Modern Rock chart. The band’s sophomore record had several underperforming singles. After their third record, 2002's Head on Straight, the band went on a lengthy hiatus.
I DON’T KNOW HOW I GOT BITTER. While many people have probably forgotten about Tonic’s debut single and their less successful follow ups, 1996 is an interesting time for music. Music YouTuber Rick Beato claims that Rock music died in 1996 mainly because Rock started divorcing itself from the blues. He also claims that the rock music of the late ‘90s and early ‘00s popularized "nameless" bands, meaning that nobody actually knows who is in the band, as opposed to the classic rock and grunge-era bands. I find this definition interesting. Rock between 1996-2006 was certainly more about the singer than the guitarist. Many casual music fans can name lead singers like Scott Stapp, Chris Martin, Ryan Tedder, but we can’t name the other band members. Then there’s bands like Fuel, The Fray, and Tonic which we can’t name a single member.I think this is interesting, but it being the music of my childhood to young adulthood, I can’t say that I enjoy late ‘90s/ ‘00s rock less.
YOU WILL NEVER SAY THAT YOU WERE WRONG. But what I find even more interesting was not particularly sexy rock music used in late ‘90s horny teenage comedies. I was twelve when the first American Pie was released in theaters. Having a strict no PG-13 movies in the house until I was at least 15, it wasn’t until much later that I saw American Pie, but being a teenager in the early ‘00s, the best lines and perverted scenes had already been spoiled. In fact, all of the jokes seemed tame to the stuff my friends talked about at school out of the watchful ears of the Christian school teachers. I was maybe first exposed to “You Wanted More” from another young adult sex comedy, MTV’s Undressed. The trashy dorm-room drama aired late at light on Saturday night syndication a few times that I was lucky enough to catch in my early teens. Like many MTV shows, it features blaring, thematically unconnected songs that as horny college students try to hook up. It’s probably tame stuff looking back on it, and the stories always ended before anything could get graphic in the bedroom—it wasn’t HBO. But the layers of risk—watching MTV, staying up too late, and a show about sex—made my otherwise tame adolescence a little more adventurous. What more could you want than that?
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