OK Go
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| OK Go | ||
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 OK Go publicity photograph
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| Background information | ||
| Origin | Chicago, Illinois, USA Washington DC, USA |
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| Genre(s) | Power pop Alternative rock |
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| Years active | 1998 – present | |
| Label(s) | Capitol | |
| Website | Official site | |
| Members | ||
| Damian Kulash Tim Nordwind Dan Konopka Andy Ross |
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| Former members | ||
| Andy Duncan | ||
OK Go is an American rock band from Chicago and Washington DC, best known for their singles "Get Over It," "A Million Ways," and "Here It Goes Again." Influenced by artists like Cheap Trick, Q and Not U, Raspberries, Fugazi, T. Rex and Queen, OK Go shares management with They Might Be Giants, another band with whom they toured before signing to Capitol Records. The band also served as the house band for public radio program This American Life on the show's fifth anniversary tour. Ira Glass, the show's host, wrote their first official bio, calling them "living catnip" and describing their songs as "part indie rock, part stadium rock, part straight up pop with the occasional whiff of Weezer or The Cars or Elliott Smith."
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[edit] Beginning success
After OK Go's exposure on This American Life and their relationship with They Might Be Giants, the band released its self-titled debut album in 2002. In the United Kingdom, "Get Over It" debuted at No. 24 in the singles chart on March 16, 2003, and the band performed it on that week's edition of Top of the Pops. Also that week, the single's video was named video of the week by Q magazine. The single was also featured in the EA Sports video games Triple Play Baseball 2002 and Madden NFL 2003.
The band contributed a cover of "This Will Be Our Year," the Zombies classic, as the lead track of Future Soundtrack for America, a political benefit album put out by Barsuk Records in the fall of 2004. Lead singer Damian Kulash also became somewhat politically active during that election cycle, writing a heavily downloaded how-to-guide entitled "How Your Band Can Fire Bush" for bands hoping to help unseat President George W. Bush.
[edit] Music video fame
The band's second album, Oh No, was recorded in Malmö, Sweden and produced by Tore Johansson (The Cardigans, Franz Ferdinand) in the fall of 2004. Released in August 2005, it gained popularity for its first single, "A Million Ways," thanks in large part to its video, which proved to be a viral Internet phenomenon in the fall of 2005. The ultra-low budget, one-take video featured the band in their back yard performing a dance choreographed by lead singer Kulash's sister, Trish Sie. Using a camera borrowed from a friend, the video was produced for under ten dollars, and was apparently released without the knowledge or consent of their label, Capitol Records (a low budget video would however leave more money to be spent on publicity). This low cost video follows similar fashion as in Fatboy Slim's Praise You video, directed by Spike Jonze. By August 2006, the video had become the most downloaded music video ever with over 9 million downloads.[1] The band performed the dance live on British TV show Soccer AM.
The nontraditional video for "A Million Ways" is not without precedent for the band. Previous oddball video efforts featuring OK Go include their Ping Pong Instructional Video and the Federal Truth In Music Project. On July 31, 2006 the band released a video in a similar vein for "Here It Goes Again" featuring an elaborately choreographed dance on treadmills, also directed and choreographed by Trish Sie. This video was viewed by over 1 million people on the media site YouTube in the first 6 days. As of October 15, 2006, the video for "Here It Goes Again" has been viewed over 7.4 million times, putting it in 9th place for the most views of any video on YouTube. The band has worked with both world-renowned and fairly unknown directors including Francis Lawrence, Olivier Gondry (brother of Michel Gondry), Brian L. Perkins, Scott Keiner, and Todd Sullivan. On August 23, 2006, Damian Kulash appeared on The Colbert Report to talk about the unconventional popularity achieved with "A Million Ways" and "Here It Goes Again".
Oddly enough, in OK Go's choreographed videos, the actual lead singer, Damian Kulash, is not the one lip-synching the words to the song, but their bassist, Tim Nordwind. On August 31, OK Go appeared live at the 2006 MTV Video Music Awards performing, complete with treadmills, "Here It Goes Again". Since the VMA performance, sales of the album & single have increased, especially on the iTunes Music Store where, as of September 5, 2006, the single has reached #11 and the album #2. Because of their success and popularity, on November 7th,2006, OK GO released a deluxe limited edition cd/dvd of their album, OH NO. The dvd contains their videos(dancing and playing instruments), a video from 180 fans doing the " A Million Ways" dance for a YouTube contest, tour and never-released footage, and a behind-the-scenes look of their treadmill rehearsals for the video and for the VMA's.
In May 2006, they've toured with Panic! At the disco, in September they've been in the U.K. supporting Motion City Soundtrack, and will continue their U.S.tour supporting Snow Patrol well into Spring 2007.
[edit] Members
[edit] Current
- Damian Kulash – lead vocals and guitar
- Tim Nordwind – bass and vocals
- Dan Konopka – drums
- Andy Ross – keyboards and guitar (2005-Present)
[edit] Former
- Andrew Duncan – guitar, piano, keyboards, vibraphone, vocals (1998-2005)
- Burleigh D. – keyboard, percussion (2002)
[edit] Discography
[edit] Albums / EPs
| Year | Album/EP | Title | US Chart # | US Heatseekers Chart # |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2000 | EP | Pink EP | ||
| EP | Brown EP | |||
| 2002 | Album | OK Go | #107 | #1 |
| 2005 | EP | Do What You Want EP | ||
| Album | Oh No | #69 | #1 |
[edit] Singles
| Year | Song | US Hot 100 | U.S. Modern Rock | U.S. Mainstream Rock | U.S. Pop 100 | UK Singles Chart | Hot Digital Songs | Album |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2002 | "Get Over It" | - | 20 | - | - | 21 | - | OK Go |
| 2003 | "Don't Ask Me" | - | - | - | - | - | - | OK Go |
| 2003 | "You're So Damn Hot" | - | - | - | - | - | - | OK Go |
| 2005 | "A Million Ways" | - | - | - | - | 43 | - | Oh No |
| 2005 | "Do What You Want" | - | - | - | - | - | - | Oh No |
| 2006 | "Oh Lately It's So Quiet" | - | - | - | - | - | - | Oh No |
| 2006 | "Invincible" | - | - | - | - | - | - | Oh No |
| 2006 | "Here It Goes Again" | 38 | 17 | - | 34 | 36 | 18 | Oh No |
[edit] Compilations
- 2004 "This Will Be Our Year" off the Future Soundtrack for America compilation.
- 2006 "Letterbox" off the Hello Radio: A Tribute to They Might Be Giants compilation.
- 2006 "This Will Be Our Year" off the John Tucker Must Die movie soundtrack.
- 2006 "Here It Goes Again" off the Now That's What I Call Music! 23 compilation.
- 2006 "Father Christmas" off the Unaccompanied Minors'' movie soundtrack.
