Sugar, We're Goin Down
Encyclopedia
"Sugar, We're Goin Down" is a song by American rock
band Fall Out Boy
, and the lead single from their third album, From Under the Cork Tree
(2005). With the music composed by lead vocalist and guitarist Patrick Stump
and all lyrics penned by bassist Pete Wentz, the single reached No. 8 on the US Billboard Hot 100
, becoming Fall Out Boy's first top 10 hit and exploding the band into the mainstream, exposing them to a new mainstream audience. It spent five weeks in the top 10 and 20 weeks in the top 20, out of its 42 chart weeks before it was retired. Patrick Stump
told Rolling Stone
that he deliberately slurred the lyrics in the song's chorus to make it sound better, saying that he "was trying to do a straight punk song for fun" and adding, "I saw those lyrics and just kind of barked them out. But there was something about the rhythm of it, where I was like, 'Hmm, that actually might be too good for just a shitty punk song.'" During the writing of the song it went through thirty changes and then went back to the way it first started.
Two different CD singles were released with different B-side
s, Part I with a green cover and Part II with a red cover. Blender
ranked "Sugar, We're Goin Down" number four their "The 100 Greatest Songs of 2005" list and About.com
placed the song at number three on their "Top 100 Pop Songs of 2005" list.
The song has so far sold more than two-million digital downloads in the United States (as of week ending July 5, 2009), becoming the band's first two-million seller and is certified double platinum
by the Recording Industry Association of America
(RIAA), denoting the shipment of two-million units.
The song appears on the karaoke games Lips
(as downloadable content) and in Karaoke Revolution Presents: American Idol
, and is also a playable song on Band Hero
. It is in the soundtrack of the 2005 film The Fog
. American country pop artist Taylor Swift
covered "Sugar, We're Goin Down" at a concert on her 2011 Speak Now Tour in Chicago.
), all music composed by lead vocalist and guitarist Patrick Stump
(of Fall Out Boy
), excluding remixes.
CD single:
CD 1:
CD 2:
7" vinyl:
on July 2, 2005, at No. 93 and rose each week. Eleven weeks later, on September 17, 2005, the song entered the top 10 at its peak of No. 8, becoming Fall Out Boy's first top 10 single. At this point, the song did not have much airplay but had relied on the strength of digital downloads alone, and it experienced a sales surge following the band's performance at the 2005 MTV Video Music Awards
.
Following this download surge, however, downloads fell, and the song dropped to No. 15 the following week. During this time, though, mainstream radio support came in, and while downloads were falling, airplay was able to help stabilize the song. As a result, "Sugar" rose in the following weeks to be at either position No. 10 or 11. It spent five weeks in the top 10 and 20 weeks in the top 20, and in total stayed on the charts for 42 weeks before it was retired, making it the band's most successful single charting. The track peaked at No. 2 on the Hot Digital Songs
chart and reached the top position on Hot Digital Tracks
. Its airplay peak was No. 19 on the Hot 100 Airplay
.
On the Pop 100
chart, "Sugar, We're Goin Down" displayed a slightly better performance. With the same digital download stats, but with an airplay panel to its advantage, the song reached a peak position of No. 6 on the Pop 100 with its component airplay, Pop 100 Airplay
, being No. 6. In terms of total spins versus total impressions, the single also peaked at No. 6 on the Top 40 Mainstream chart. It reached No. 3 on the Hot Modern Rock Tracks chart and became a rock-radio staple.
In the UK
, the song first charted on January 15, 2006 at No. 54, hitting outside of
the top 20 at No. 24 on February 5. However, it continued rising in the charts in February, and entered the chart in the top 10, at its peak position of No. 8. It remained in the top 75 of the UK Singles Chart
for 21 weeks.
follows the persecution and subsequent redemption of a boy with antler
s. The video establishes the life of a socially outcast boy with antlers (played by Donald Cumming of The Virgins
), and his feelings for a neighborhood girl. It is made clear that the girl's father (played by Gerald McRaney
) disapproves. Distraught, the boy tries to cut his antlers off, but is stopped by the girl. Later on, the father attempts to shoot the boy with an arrow, but is hit by a car. When he rushes to the man's aid, the boy finds that the father has hooves. They connect, and the father accepts him, allowing him to date his daughter. Shots of the band performing in a VFW hall (actually a NY soundstage) are featured.
The video was shot in the town of Margaretville, New York
found in the Catskill Mountains.
The antlers in the video can be seen in Fall Out Boy's music video for their 2008 single "What a Catch, Donnie
."
Another version of the video exists, and has been played on some UK and Australian music channels. The video simply features the footage of the band playing from the main video, added to footage of the band's live performances and tour movies. This version won the "MTV2 Award" at the 2005 MTV Video Music Awards
.
Rock music
Rock music is a genre of popular music that developed during and after the 1960s, particularly in the United Kingdom and the United States. It has its roots in 1940s and 1950s rock and roll, itself heavily influenced by rhythm and blues and country music...
band Fall Out Boy
Fall Out Boy
Fall Out Boy is an American rock band from Wilmette, Illinois, formed in 2001. The band consists of vocalist, guitarist and composer Patrick Stump, bassist and lyricist Pete Wentz, guitarist Joe Trohman, and drummer Andy Hurley. The band released five studio albums from 2003–2008...
, and the lead single from their third album, From Under the Cork Tree
From Under the Cork Tree
From Under the Cork Tree is the third studio album by American rock band Fall Out Boy. It was released on May 3, 2005, through Island Records as the band's major label debut...
(2005). With the music composed by lead vocalist and guitarist Patrick Stump
Patrick Stump
Patrick Vaughn Stump is an American singer-songwriter, composer, record producer, and music critic. He is the composer, lead singer, and multi-instrumentalist of Fall Out Boy, an American rock band from Wilmette, Illinois, and is also a solo artist...
and all lyrics penned by bassist Pete Wentz, the single reached No. 8 on the US Billboard Hot 100
Billboard Hot 100
The Billboard Hot 100 is the United States music industry standard singles popularity chart issued weekly by Billboard magazine. Chart rankings are based on radio play and sales; the tracking-week for sales begins on Monday and ends on Sunday, while the radio play tracking-week runs from Wednesday...
, becoming Fall Out Boy's first top 10 hit and exploding the band into the mainstream, exposing them to a new mainstream audience. It spent five weeks in the top 10 and 20 weeks in the top 20, out of its 42 chart weeks before it was retired. Patrick Stump
Patrick Stump
Patrick Vaughn Stump is an American singer-songwriter, composer, record producer, and music critic. He is the composer, lead singer, and multi-instrumentalist of Fall Out Boy, an American rock band from Wilmette, Illinois, and is also a solo artist...
told Rolling Stone
Rolling Stone
Rolling Stone is a US-based magazine devoted to music, liberal politics, and popular culture that is published every two weeks. Rolling Stone was founded in San Francisco in 1967 by Jann Wenner and music critic Ralph J...
that he deliberately slurred the lyrics in the song's chorus to make it sound better, saying that he "was trying to do a straight punk song for fun" and adding, "I saw those lyrics and just kind of barked them out. But there was something about the rhythm of it, where I was like, 'Hmm, that actually might be too good for just a shitty punk song.'" During the writing of the song it went through thirty changes and then went back to the way it first started.
Two different CD singles were released with different B-side
A-side and B-side
A-side and B-side originally referred to the two sides of gramophone records on which singles were released beginning in the 1950s. The terms have come to refer to the types of song conventionally placed on each side of the record, with the A-side being the featured song , while the B-side, or...
s, Part I with a green cover and Part II with a red cover. Blender
Blender (magazine)
Blender was an American music magazine that billed itself as "the ultimate guide to music and more". It was also known for sometimes steamy pictorials of celebrities....
ranked "Sugar, We're Goin Down" number four their "The 100 Greatest Songs of 2005" list and About.com
About.com
About.com is an online source for original information and advice. It is written in English, and is aimed primarily at North Americans. It is owned by The New York Times Company....
placed the song at number three on their "Top 100 Pop Songs of 2005" list.
The song has so far sold more than two-million digital downloads in the United States (as of week ending July 5, 2009), becoming the band's first two-million seller and is certified double platinum
RIAA certification
In the United States, the Recording Industry Association of America awards certification based on the number of albums and singles sold through retail and other ancillary markets. Other countries have similar awards...
by the Recording Industry Association of America
Recording Industry Association of America
The Recording Industry Association of America is a trade organization that represents the recording industry distributors in the United States...
(RIAA), denoting the shipment of two-million units.
The song appears on the karaoke games Lips
Lips (video game)
Lips is a video game for the Xbox 360. Lips was developed by iNiS and published by Microsoft Game Studios. The game features the use of motion sensitive wireless microphones and supports the use of songs already owned through a Zune or iPod. The game was released on November 18, 2008 in North...
(as downloadable content) and in Karaoke Revolution Presents: American Idol
Karaoke Revolution
Karaoke Revolution and its many sequels are video games for the PlayStation 2, PlayStation 3, Nintendo GameCube, Wii, Xbox, and Xbox 360, developed by Harmonix Music Systems and Blitz Games and published by Konami in its Bemani line of music games. The Original Concept for Karaoke Revolution was...
, and is also a playable song on Band Hero
Band Hero
Band Hero is a spinoff video game as part of the Guitar Hero series of music video games, released by Activision on November 3, 2009, for the PlayStation 2, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, Wii and Nintendo DS consoles...
. It is in the soundtrack of the 2005 film The Fog
The Fog (2005 film)
The Fog is a 2005 horror film directed by Rupert Wainwright and starring Tom Welling, Selma Blair and Maggie Grace. It is a remake of John Carpenter's 1980 film of the same name, but this time made more in the vein of a "teen horror film" .Both Carpenter and Debra Hill The Fog is a 2005 horror film...
. American country pop artist Taylor Swift
Taylor Swift
Taylor Alison Swift is an American country pop singer-songwriter, musician and actress.In 2006, she released her debut single "Tim McGraw", then her self-titled debut album, which was subsequently certified multi-platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America...
covered "Sugar, We're Goin Down" at a concert on her 2011 Speak Now Tour in Chicago.
Track listing
All lyrics written by bassist Pete Wentz (of Fall Out BoyFall Out Boy
Fall Out Boy is an American rock band from Wilmette, Illinois, formed in 2001. The band consists of vocalist, guitarist and composer Patrick Stump, bassist and lyricist Pete Wentz, guitarist Joe Trohman, and drummer Andy Hurley. The band released five studio albums from 2003–2008...
), all music composed by lead vocalist and guitarist Patrick Stump
Patrick Stump
Patrick Vaughn Stump is an American singer-songwriter, composer, record producer, and music critic. He is the composer, lead singer, and multi-instrumentalist of Fall Out Boy, an American rock band from Wilmette, Illinois, and is also a solo artist...
(of Fall Out Boy
Fall Out Boy
Fall Out Boy is an American rock band from Wilmette, Illinois, formed in 2001. The band consists of vocalist, guitarist and composer Patrick Stump, bassist and lyricist Pete Wentz, guitarist Joe Trohman, and drummer Andy Hurley. The band released five studio albums from 2003–2008...
), excluding remixes.
CD single:
- "Sugar, We're Goin Down" - 3:51
- "The Music or the Misery" - 3:27
CD 1:
- "Sugar, We're Goin Down" (Guitars down version) - 3:47
- "The Music or the Misery" - 3:27
CD 2:
- "Sugar, We're Goin Down" (Album version)
- "Dance, DanceDance, Dance"Dance, Dance" is a song by American rock band Fall Out Boy and the second single from their third studio album, From Under the Cork Tree. Released in late 2005, in the United States it reached No. 9 on the Billboard Hot 100 in January 2006, becoming the band's second consecutive top 10 hit single....
" (Mark Ronson Secret Agent Remix) - "Snitches and Talkers Get Stitches and Walkers"
- "Sugar, We're Goin Down" (Video)
7" vinyl:
- "Sugar We're Goin Down"
- "Nobody Puts Baby in the Corner" (Acoustic version)
Music sample
Chart performance
"Sugar, We're Goin Down" would rise and fall in inconsistent patterns. The song debuted on the Billboard Hot 100Billboard Hot 100
The Billboard Hot 100 is the United States music industry standard singles popularity chart issued weekly by Billboard magazine. Chart rankings are based on radio play and sales; the tracking-week for sales begins on Monday and ends on Sunday, while the radio play tracking-week runs from Wednesday...
on July 2, 2005, at No. 93 and rose each week. Eleven weeks later, on September 17, 2005, the song entered the top 10 at its peak of No. 8, becoming Fall Out Boy's first top 10 single. At this point, the song did not have much airplay but had relied on the strength of digital downloads alone, and it experienced a sales surge following the band's performance at the 2005 MTV Video Music Awards
MTV Video Music Awards
An MTV Video Music Award , is an award presented by the cable channel MTV to honor the best in music videos...
.
Following this download surge, however, downloads fell, and the song dropped to No. 15 the following week. During this time, though, mainstream radio support came in, and while downloads were falling, airplay was able to help stabilize the song. As a result, "Sugar" rose in the following weeks to be at either position No. 10 or 11. It spent five weeks in the top 10 and 20 weeks in the top 20, and in total stayed on the charts for 42 weeks before it was retired, making it the band's most successful single charting. The track peaked at No. 2 on the Hot Digital Songs
Hot Digital Songs
The Hot Digital Songs chart ranks the best-selling digital singles in the United States, according to Billboard.Beginning in February 2005, digital sales have been incorporated into many of Billboards music single charts. It was decided to do so mainly because of the dramatic rise in popularity of...
chart and reached the top position on Hot Digital Tracks
Hot Digital Tracks
The Hot Digital Tracks chart is a song popularity chart that ranks the best selling digital tracks in the United States according to Billboard magazine...
. Its airplay peak was No. 19 on the Hot 100 Airplay
Hot 100 Airplay
The Hot 100 Airplay chart is a chart released weekly by Billboard magazine in the United States. It measures radio airplay, and is one of the three component charts, along with the Hot Singles Sales and the Hot Digital Songs charts, that determine the chart positions of singles on the Billboard...
.
On the Pop 100
Pop 100
The Pop 100 was a songs chart that debuted in February 2005 and was released weekly by Billboard magazine in the United States until its discontinuation in 2009...
chart, "Sugar, We're Goin Down" displayed a slightly better performance. With the same digital download stats, but with an airplay panel to its advantage, the song reached a peak position of No. 6 on the Pop 100 with its component airplay, Pop 100 Airplay
Pop 100 Airplay
The Pop 100 Airplay was a chart created in 2005 and released weekly by Billboard in the United States. It measured mainstream radio airplay, and was one of the three component charts, along with the Hot 100 Singles Sales and Hot Digital Songs charts, that determined the chart positions of singles...
, being No. 6. In terms of total spins versus total impressions, the single also peaked at No. 6 on the Top 40 Mainstream chart. It reached No. 3 on the Hot Modern Rock Tracks chart and became a rock-radio staple.
In the UK
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
, the song first charted on January 15, 2006 at No. 54, hitting outside of
the top 20 at No. 24 on February 5. However, it continued rising in the charts in February, and entered the chart in the top 10, at its peak position of No. 8. It remained in the top 75 of the UK Singles Chart
UK Singles Chart
The UK Singles Chart is compiled by The Official Charts Company on behalf of the British record-industry. The full chart contains the top selling 200 singles in the United Kingdom based upon combined record sales and download numbers, though some media outlets only list the Top 40 or the Top 75 ...
for 21 weeks.
Music video
The music video for "Sugar, We're Goin Down", directed by Matt LenskiMatt Lenski
Matt Lenski is an American director. Lenski has directed multiple projects for television. After seven years at Viacom, working for MTV, MTV2, Nickelodeon, Logo and other affiliates, he moved on to writing and directing projects at Mekanism...
follows the persecution and subsequent redemption of a boy with antler
Antler
Antlers are the usually large, branching bony appendages on the heads of most deer species.-Etymology:Antler originally meant the lowest tine, the "brow tine"...
s. The video establishes the life of a socially outcast boy with antlers (played by Donald Cumming of The Virgins
The Virgins
The Virgins are an American band formed in 2006 in New York, consisting of Donald Cumming , Wade Oates , and Nick Ackerman .Their first outing on the road was a 7-week American tour in direct support for the Australian band Jet...
), and his feelings for a neighborhood girl. It is made clear that the girl's father (played by Gerald McRaney
Gerald McRaney
Gerald Lee "Mac" McRaney is an American television and movie actor. McRaney is best known as one of the stars of the television shows Simon & Simon, Major Dad, and Promised Land. He was a series regular for the first season of Jericho.-Early life:McRaney was born in Collins, Mississippi, the son...
) disapproves. Distraught, the boy tries to cut his antlers off, but is stopped by the girl. Later on, the father attempts to shoot the boy with an arrow, but is hit by a car. When he rushes to the man's aid, the boy finds that the father has hooves. They connect, and the father accepts him, allowing him to date his daughter. Shots of the band performing in a VFW hall (actually a NY soundstage) are featured.
The video was shot in the town of Margaretville, New York
Margaretville, New York
Margaretville is a village in Delaware County, New York, United States. The population was 643 at the 2000 census.The Village of Margaretville is in the Town of Middletown. The village is on the border of the Catskill Park...
found in the Catskill Mountains.
The antlers in the video can be seen in Fall Out Boy's music video for their 2008 single "What a Catch, Donnie
What a Catch, Donnie
"What a Catch, Donnie" is Fall Out Boy's second digital download single and third radio single from their fifth studio album Folie à Deux . It was released as part of the build up to the new album on iTunes on October 14, 2008 and charted on the US and Canadian singles chart...
."
Another version of the video exists, and has been played on some UK and Australian music channels. The video simply features the footage of the band playing from the main video, added to footage of the band's live performances and tour movies. This version won the "MTV2 Award" at the 2005 MTV Video Music Awards
2005 MTV Video Music Awards
The 2005 MTV Video Music Awards aired live on August 28, 2005, honoring the best music videos from July 1, 2004 to June 30, 2005. The show was hosted by Diddy at the AmericanAirlines Arena in Miami, Florida...
.
Charts
| Chart (2005-06) | Peak position |
|---|---|
| European Hot 100 | 36 |
| Ireland Singles Chart | 33 |
| UK Singles Chart UK Singles Chart The UK Singles Chart is compiled by The Official Charts Company on behalf of the British record-industry. The full chart contains the top selling 200 singles in the United Kingdom based upon combined record sales and download numbers, though some media outlets only list the Top 40 or the Top 75 ... |
8 |
| US Billboard Hot 100 Billboard Hot 100 The Billboard Hot 100 is the United States music industry standard singles popularity chart issued weekly by Billboard magazine. Chart rankings are based on radio play and sales; the tracking-week for sales begins on Monday and ends on Sunday, while the radio play tracking-week runs from Wednesday... |
8 |
| US Billboard Alternative Songs | 3 |
| US Billboard Pop 100 Pop 100 The Pop 100 was a songs chart that debuted in February 2005 and was released weekly by Billboard magazine in the United States until its discontinuation in 2009... |
6 |