WXPN's 885 Greatest Songs From Movies or TV, #9: The Wonders - That Thing You Do From The Movie Of The Same Name (1996)
This Academy Award nominated record for Best Original Song reminds me of
another fantastic one-hit wonder, The Knickerbockers' "Lies," a big hit from 1965 that many people believed was actually recorded by The Beatles when they first listened to it. I was one of them.
It's easy to be reminded of the Fab Four while listening to "That Thing You Do" - a minor hit that only reached #41 on the Hot 100 - especially when you realize the film's story takes place in 1964, the same year the Liverpool guys hit big time in America. It deserved a much better fate, but power-pop wasn't being played very
often on the radio during this grunge infested year of 1996. It charted higher in both Canada and the UK. The fictitious liner notes from the soundtrack CD claimed "That Thing You
Do" reached #2 on the Hot 100.
The four actors who played The Wonders in the movie didn't record the
song. Schlesinger played most of the instruments himself and sang backup
while Mike Viola - a producer who worked with Ryan Adams, Mandy Moore,
Dawes, Jenny Lewis, Semisonic, Andrew Bird and more - was the lead vocalist. He co-produced the
track with its composer.
The film was the first screenplay by Tom Hanks, and it was who also his debut as a
director.
"That Thing You Do" was only a moderate success at the box office, and it wasn't as critically acclaimed as the edgier High Fidelity and Almost Famous were as fictional films
using rock music as a major plot line, but it's still a nice little film.
It's hard to believe that it has been thirty years already since the movie
and song were released.
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