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In The Number Ones, I\u2019m reviewing each single #1 single within the historical past of the<\/em> Billboard Hot 100, beginning with the chart\u2019s starting, in 1958, and dealing my manner up into the current.<\/em><\/p>\n The delicate white man with the acoustic guitar won’t ever, ever die. Sensitive white guys have been selecting up acoustic guitars for many years and many years. The archetype has been round, on the very least, for the reason that \u201950s people revival, although god is aware of it would\u2019ve already been a clich\u00e9 by then. In the \u201960s and \u201970s, delicate white guys with acoustic guitars turned pop titans: Donovan, Paul Simon, James Taylor. (Bob Dylan was the prototype for all these guys, however Dylan was by no means particularly delicate.)<\/p>\n This century, delicate white guys with acoustic guitars are not on the cultural vanguard. But one thing humorous occurred to that archetype within the \u201900s. During the George W. Bush administration, just a few delicate white guys with acoustic guitars made chart-topping hits. But these delicate white guys tended to be one-hit wonders, and their hits have been goofy little cultural blips that would simply be dismissed as novelties. That\u2019s what occurred with James Blunt, with Daniel Powter, and with Plain White T\u2019s.<\/p>\n Some caveats right here: James Blunt wasn\u2019t a one-hit marvel in his native UK, although he definitely was one right here. Blunt served within the navy, so he may not be that<\/em> delicate \u2014 although he did inform tales about taking part in his acoustic guitar whereas using round on high of a tank, a very unbearable picture which may additionally characterize a terrifying new mutation of the delicate white man with acoustic guitar sort. Daniel Powter performs piano, not guitar, although he\u2019s nonetheless a delicate white man with an acoustic guitar at coronary heart. And Plain White T\u2019s are a super-polished pop-punk band, not an acoustic-guitar state of affairs. But \u201cHey There Delilah,\u201d the band\u2019s one hit, is a whole<\/em> delicate acoustic-guitar white-guy tune. It could be that decade\u2019s purest instance of the shape.<\/p>\n Think of it. It\u2019s all there \u2014 the fundamental fingerpicking with the tender string association, the wounded cracking of the voice, the deeply goofy lovelorn lyrics that go for romanticism however come off a bit of deluded and jerky while you actually take into consideration them. \u201cHey There Delilah\u201d was a random-ass stealth hit that took years to climb the Hot 100. Once upon a time, that was Paul Simon\u2019s story. In a earlier period, a tune like that would\u2019ve turned Plain White T\u2019s chief Tom Higgenson into an precise star. But \u201cHey There Delilah\u201d got here out in 2005 and topped the Hot 100 in 2007, and it\u2019s additionally not an excellent tune. Higgenson by no means stood an opportunity.<\/p>\n There actually is a Delilah. Delilah DiCrescenzo is knowledgeable distance runner who was by no means, ever romantically concerned with Tom Higgenson or, for that matter, with some other Plain White T\u2019s. Higgenson met DiCrescenzo on the Chicago House Of Blues in 2002. She was a pupil at Columbia in New York, and a mutual good friend launched her to Higgenson when she was again house on break. Higgenson was immediately smitten, and he informed DiCrescenzo that he\u2019d write her a tune. She had a boyfriend, and he or she wasn\u2019t . Some time later, Higgenson dropped a CD off at DiCrescenzo\u2019s home and informed her to hearken to it after he left. She did, and he or she heard \u201cHey There Delilah\u201d for the primary time. She was flattered, however she nonetheless wasn\u2019t .<\/p>\n Tom Higgenson grew up within the Chicago suburb of Lombard, and he shaped Plain White T\u2019s with some highschool associates in 1997. (Rod Stewart\u2019s \u201cDa Ya Think I\u2019m Sexy?<\/a>\u201d was the #1 tune in America when Higgenson was born.) I don\u2019t know why Higgenson picked Plain White T\u2019s as his band identify, however that call may\u2019ve value him a fortune in merch cash. Why would anybody purchase a T-shirt with \u201cPlain White T\u2019s\u201d written on it after they may simply purchase an precise plain white tee?<\/p>\n This was again earlier than Fall Out Boy was a factor, however late-\u201990s Chicago was already filled with pop-punk bands who went for large, melodic emotion. If you hearken to Plain White T\u2019s\u2019 self-released 2000 debut Come On Over<\/em>, you possibly can hear these children taking pictures for a softer, extra wistful model of the energetic tunefulness that scene elders like Alkaline Trio and the Lawrence Arms had already nailed.<\/p>\n Plain White T\u2019s went via a bunch of lineup modifications over time, and so they have been largely a neighborhood Chicago band till 2002. That\u2019s after they signed with Fearless Records, a California indie that specialised in pop-punk and launched early data from bands like At The Drive-In and Portugal. The Man. Fearless launched Plain White T\u2019s\u2019 sophomore LP Stop<\/em>. I don\u2019t know when Tom Higgenson acquired the shaggy, floppy haircut that may all the time be related to \u201900s emo, however he undoubtedly had it when Plain White T\u2019s began making movies.<\/p>\n In 2005, Plain White T\u2019s launched All That We Needed<\/em>, their second album on Fearless. Sean O\u2019Keefe, one of many producers of that document, was a Chicago man who\u2019d grow to be an enormous deal in the entire emo world. O\u2019Keefe had already produced profitable albums for Fall Out Boy, Motion City Soundtrack, and Hawthorne Heights. Those bands represented a complete new wave of wordy, pop-friendly guitar music that turned a grassroots teenage phenomenon within the mid-\u201900s. Suddenly, a sure sort of band was turning into massively common, seemingly in a single day. The denims have been tight, the haircuts have been feathery, the T-shirts have been extra-medium, and the lyrics have been often about treacherous ex-girlfriends.<\/p>\n The complete MyArea emo wave was in all probability the final time that aggressive, guitar-driven rock-band music achieved any form of centrality in youth tradition. Emo acts like Jimmy Eat World and Dashboard Confessional had lots of success within the early \u201900s, however 2005 was the yr that the wave actually crested. That\u2019s when Fall Out Boy, a Chicago band that later took Plain White T\u2019s on tour, launched their breakout album From Under The Cork Tree<\/em>. That yr, Fall Out Boy\u2019s anthemic single \u201cSugar, We\u2019re Goin Down\u201d made it to #8. (It\u2019s a ten.) Sean O\u2019Keefe didn\u2019t produce From Under The Cork Tree<\/em>, however his involvement nonetheless put Plain White T\u2019s in good firm.<\/p>\n The different producer who labored on Plain White T\u2019s\u2019 All That We Needed<\/em> was Ariel Rechtshaid, the previous chief of a Los Angeles ska-punk band known as the Hippos. By 2005, Rechtshaid was taking part in bass within the indie rock band Foreign Born. He was fairly new to manufacturing on the time, although he\u2019d labored on New Jersey emo band Armor For Sleep\u2019s 2003 debut. O\u2019Keefe and Rechtshaid each knew what they have been doing, and most of All That We Needed<\/em> is a cleaner, extra radio-friendly model of the pop-punk that Plain White T\u2019s has already been making. The single \u201cTake Me Away,\u201d which appears like junior-varsity Jimmy Eat World, is fairly typical of the entire document.<\/p>\n On its last monitor, although, All That We Needed<\/em> takes a flip. That\u2019s once we get \u201cHey There Delilah,\u201d the one acoustic ballad on the LP. Tom Higgenson wrote that tune about Delilah DiCrescenzo, however the tune depicts a complete fictional and fantastical situation the place they\u2019re truly collectively. On \u201cHey There Delilah,\u201d Higgenson imagines himself in a long-distance relationship with Delilah. He\u2019s in Chicago, and he or she\u2019s in New York, however they\u2019re nonetheless collectively in spirit: \u201cHey there Delilah, don\u2019t you worry about the distance\/ I\u2019m right there if you get lonely, give this song another listen.\u201d<\/p>\n Tom Higgenson guarantees that he\u2019ll ultimately \u201cpay the bills with this guitar,\u201d and he appears to be like ahead to the day when Delilah leaves New York for good: \u201cHey there Delilah, you be good, and don\u2019t you miss me\/ Two more years and you\u2019ll be done with school\/ And I\u2019ll be making history like I do.\u201d What the fuck is that<\/em> line? He\u2019ll be making historical past<\/em>? Relax, buddy. Knowing what I do know in regards to the tune\u2019s genesis, I think about \u201cHey There Delilah\u201d as Higgenson\u2019s last-ditch try and impress this lady and win her away from her boyfriend; the lyrics even have Higgenson describing the impact that he desires his music to have on her: \u201cIf every simple song I wrote to you would take your breath away, I\u2019d write it all\/ Even more in love with me, you\u2019d fall.\u201d<\/p>\n If Tom Higgenson\u2019s purpose was to woo Delilah DiCrescenzo, \u201cHey There Delilah\u201d didn\u2019t work. In a 2013 ESPN interview<\/a>, Delilah talks about how she felt when she heard \u201cHey There Delilah\u201d: \u201cMy first thought: \u2018Oh no! Did I lead Tom on?\u2019 I became anxious.\u201d Delilah actually anxious that she\u2019d given Tom Higgenson the mistaken impression. If she\u2019d been pissed off about his flights of lyrical fancy about her, she would\u2019ve been justified. The refrain of \u201cHey There Delilah\u201d is simply Higgenson repeating the phrase \u201coh, it\u2019s what you do to me\u201d time and again. In that ESPN interview, Delilah says that her father heard the tune and requested, \u201cDelilah, exactly what did you do to this guy?\u201d<\/p>\n I can form of see why folks could be drawn to \u201cHey There Delilah.\u201d The tune is plainspoken and particular \u2014 the unusual first identify and the New York references give the impression that Tom Higgenson is speaking to an actual particular person. One line offers him away, although: \u201cTimes Square can\u2019t shine as bright as you.\u201d Within their first month on the town, New York school college students study to react with abject disgust every time an out-of-towner a lot as mentions Times Square. If \u201cHey There Delilah\u201d got here out right now, possibly Higgenson would sub in \u201cDimes Square.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cHey There Delilah\u201d has a easy, memorable melody, and it stands out \u2014 from the remainder of the Plain White T\u2019s album, from the remainder of the 2005 emo class, and from the remainder of the stuff that was on the radio on the time. But I consider the tune as being profoundly wimpy, largely for the best way that Higgenson\u2019s voice theatrically creaks all through the tune, as if he\u2019s too emotionally overcome to sing correctly. The tune is pretty inoffensive. I by no means hated<\/em> it, however I did discover it boring and simply barely off-putting.<\/p>\n At first, \u201cHey There Delilah\u201d was simply an album nearer. When Ariel Rechtshaid recorded the monitor, he didn\u2019t suppose an excessive amount of about it. Rechtshaid later informed Sound On Sound<\/a>, \u201cI remember recording the vocals and the guitar separately, trying to make it sound like it was happening live \u2014 a very simple Beatles-y\/Simon & Garfunkel kind of thing. I left it at that.\u201d But \u201cHey There Delilah\u201d picked up steam. It turned an enormous singalong at Plain White T\u2019s reveals. In 2006, Fearless launched Hey There Delilah<\/em> EP with just a few unreleased tracks and a dwell model of the tune. On the dwell model, the group nearly drowns Tom Higgenson out.<\/p>\n In 2006, Plain White T\u2019s signed with the Disney-owned main label Hollywood Records, and so they launched their album Every Second Counts<\/em> a yr later. At that time, Plain White T\u2019s have been certainly one of about one million emo bands who have been surging in recognition. Every Second Counts<\/em> largely sounds even cleaner than All That We Needed<\/em>, and Hollywood gave the band sufficient juice to cross over. Their lead single, the nasty post-breakup rage-out \u201cHate (I Really Don\u2019t Like You)\u201d turned Plain White T\u2019s\u2019 first Hot 100 hit, peaking at #68.<\/p>\n But \u201cHey There Delilah\u201d was the key weapon. A few All That We Needed<\/em> tracks reappear on the finish of Every Second Counts<\/em>, and certainly one of them is \u201cHey There Delilah.\u201d Plain White T\u2019s made a \u201cHey There Delilah\u201d video, with Tom Higgenson taking part in his acoustic guitar in an empty room and a mannequin, taking part in Delilah, swanning round New York. The tune began to catch on, and Ariel Rechtshaid remembers when it blew up: \u201cAll of a sudden, I started hearing it on the radio and thinking, \u2018Is that even the same recording that I did?\u2019 It was such a distant memory at that point. I kind of assumed that they\u2019d re-recorded it. But it turned out that it was the same recording, and it came back to life and became a #1.\u201d<\/p>\n Imagine how Delilah DiCrescenzo felt. At the time, she informed USA Today<\/em><\/a>, \u201cWhen I\u2019m at the gym, it\u2019s playing. When I\u2019m at the pool, it\u2019s playing. Part of me wants to scream at the top of my lungs that it\u2019s about me. Another part of me wants to cower and say it\u2019s not.\u201d For some time, she didn\u2019t inform anybody that she was the Delilah of the tune. Later, she informed ESPN, \u201cI was nervous that I\u2019d let Tom\u2019s fans down. They\u2019d be disappointed to hear I have a boyfriend. Every girl would want a song written about her, and they\u2019d think I was ungrateful and rude to deny Tom. I felt pressure to live up to those expectations.\u201d Yikes.<\/p>\n Eventually, certainly one of Delilah DiCrescenzo\u2019s associates volunteered her for a radio interview. She didn\u2019t wish to admit that she was the<\/em> Delilah, however she went together with it. Soon, Delilah was doing interviews all over; she later mentioned that the entire course of in all probability distracted her from her working. (Delilah made the 2008 Olympic trials, however she didn\u2019t make the reduce for the precise Olympic group.) Delilah wished to carry publicity to her sport, and he or she additionally wished to reassure her boyfriend that he didn\u2019t have to really feel jealous. Those interviews may\u2019ve helped Delilah to get a Puma sponsorship, and so they may\u2019ve additionally helped push the tune to #1.<\/p>\n Ultimately, \u201cHey There Delilah\u201d was the one tune from the entire mid-\u201900s emo wave that went all the best way to #1. Other bands acquired larger and scored extra hits; just a few of them \u2014 Fall Out Boy, My Chemical Romance, Paramore \u2014 can nonetheless fill arenas now. But \u201cHey There Delilah\u201d had the benefit of not sounding like an emo tune \u2014 of not having any audible punk affect in any respect<\/em>. It gave the impression of Starbucks music, like Grey\u2019s Anatomy<\/em> music. The world accepted \u201cHey There Delilah\u201d the identical manner that it had accepted James Blunt\u2019s \u201cYou\u2019re Beautiful<\/a>\u201d and Daniel Powter\u2019s \u201cBad Day<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n Plain White T\u2019s toured arenas within the fall of 2007, however they did it as certainly one of Fall Out Boy\u2019s opening acts. (I went to that tour when it got here to Madison Square Garden, however I missed Plain White T\u2019s, and I used to be OK with that.) Every Second Counts<\/em> went gold, and the \u201cHey There Delilah\u201d single ultimately went quadruple platinum. The band\u2019s follow-up single \u201cOur Time Now\u201d peaked at #90. Maybe that tune title was a bit of untimely.<\/p>\n \u201cHey There Delilah\u201d acquired nominated for a few Grammys, together with Song Of The Year, which it misplaced to Amy Winehouse\u2019s \u201cRehab<\/a>.\u201d (\u201cRehab\u201d peaked at #9. It\u2019s a 9.) Delilah DiCrescenzo acquired her boyfriend\u2019s blessing, and he or she went to the Grammys with Plain White T\u2019s. Later, she informed ESPN, \u201cIt was so much fun, despite being so out of my element. I swapped my sports bra and running shoes for a glamorous dress and expensive jewelry that, unfortunately, I had to return.\u201d<\/p>\n Plain White T\u2019s have been by no means going to get wherever close to the extent of \u201cHey There Delilah\u201d once more, however they stored making music, and so they notched up a pair extra minor hits. In 2008, they acquired to #34 with \u201c1, 2, 3, 4<\/a>,\u201d the folksy single from their follow-up album Big Bad World<\/em>. In 2010, \u201cRhythm Of Love,\u201d one other cutesy acoustic tune, made it to #38. Both \u201c1, 2, 3, 4\u201d and \u201cRhythm Of Love\u201d gave the impression of makes an attempt to recapture what they\u2019d already completed with \u201cHey There Delilah.\u201d Both of them failed, however each not less than made the pop charts. Plain White T\u2019s haven\u2019t been again on the Hot 100 since.<\/p>\n After co-producing \u201cHey There Delilah,\u201d Sean O\u2019Keefe stored working, and he teamed again up with Fall Out Boy for his or her 2018 EP Lake Effect Kid<\/em>. Ariel Rechtshaid went on to work with a bunch of thrilling indie varieties: Cass McCombs, Glasser, Blood Orange. In 2012, Rechtshaid co-produced \u201cClimax,\u201d a masterpiece of a single from Usher, a man who\u2019s been on this column a bunch of instances. (\u201cClimax\u201d peaked at #17.)<\/p>\n In 2013, Ariel Rechtshaid labored on a bunch of the yr\u2019s finest albums: Sky Ferreira\u2019s Night Time, My Time<\/em>, Vampire Weekend\u2019s Modern Vampires Of The City<\/em>, Haim\u2019s Days Are Gone<\/em>, Solange\u2019s True<\/em>. At the tip of that yr, I interviewed Rechtshaid<\/a> for Stereogum, and I assumed he was cool as hell. Rechtshaid even humored me once I requested him if he was nonetheless spending that \u201cHey There Delilah\u201d cash. His reply: \u201cNo, that well has run dry. Maybe if I\u2019d written it.\u201d Rechtshaid has continued to do nice work since then; simply final month, he had a credit score on the Caroline Polachek album.<\/p>\n I don\u2019t know if Tom Higgenson continues to be spending that \u201cHey There Delilah\u201d cash. Plain White T\u2019s are nonetheless going, although Higgenson is the one remaining unique member. The band ultimately parted methods with Hollywood Records, and so they returned to their previous label Fearless for his or her most up-to-date LP, 2018\u2019s Parallel Universe<\/em>. In 2018, Higgenson was additionally speaking about growing a \u201cHey There Delilah\u201d TV present, adapting the tune right into a scripted romantic dramedy. I haven\u2019t heard something in regards to the TV present since then; I’m wondering how Delilah DiCrescenzo will really feel in regards to the present if it ever comes out. Later this yr, Plain White T\u2019s will play the second version of When We Were Young, the Las Vegas emo nostalgia-fest. That looks as if the suitable place for them.<\/p>\n After \u201cHey There Delilah,\u201d extra delicate white guys with acoustic guitars would come alongside, and a few of them would even grow to be main stars. This column will ultimately need to take care of the entire Ed Sheeran state of affairs.<\/p>\n GRADE:<\/strong> 4\/10<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n