"Underground" | ||||
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Single by Ben Folds Five | ||||
from the album Ben Folds Five | ||||
Released | August 8, 1995 (album) 1996 (single) |
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Recorded | Wave Castle, Chapel Hill, North Carolina February 1995 |
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Genre | Alternative rock | |||
Length | 4:12 | |||
Label |
Passenger/Caroline Vital Distribution (single) |
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Songwriter(s) | Benjamin Scott Folds | |||
Producer(s) | Caleb Southern | |||
Ben Folds Five singles chronology | ||||
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Ben Folds Five track listing | ||||
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Naked Baby Photos track listing | ||||
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Music video | ||||
"Underground" on YouTube |
"Underground" is a song from Ben Folds Five's 1995 self-titled debut album. It was written by Ben Folds. The song is about geeks and social outcasts looking for solace in numbers in underground music and art scenes. It peaked at #37 on the UK Singles Chart. The track was #3 for the year of 1996 on Australia's Triple J Hottest 100.
Ben Folds has spoken of feeling a social outcast at times and finding it hard to make friends as a child because his family was constantly moving. As he found initial success with the band Majosha and then forming Ben Folds Five with Darren Jessee and Robert Sledge, he began to recognize members of his audiences as similar types of outcasts. He noted that these types of people, who were in search of their own identities, would often find themselves gravitating towards the underground scenes (punk, ska, hardcore, etc.) of independent music. They would latch onto the scenes with particular fervor.
"Underground" is both an ode to and castigation of these type of people, as well as the perceived notions of the underground scene looking in from the outside. As Folds says:
A catchy, raucous romp laced with falsetto, the track became the first international commercial single and first U.S. radio single from the album Ben Folds Five. It introduced the band to the world and remains the most well-known track on the album and one of the most well-known songs of the band's career, second only to "Brick".
The song was among the most popular performed at Ben Folds Five concerts. It featured a degree of audience participation, including coordinated sound effects and retorts to various lines throughout the song. Folds continues to perform the song occasionally during his solo career.
Two distinct edited versions of the song exist. A radio edit version appears with the original album cut on a 1995 promotional CD sent to radio programmers in the United States, as well as a CD sent to the United Kingdom for the same purpose. The radio edit version also appears on a second promotional CD for the United Kingdom released in 1996.