Daniel Powter ~ Bad Day

I love that a song about a negative fraction of time became a "One Hit Wonder." If only those negative fractions of time could remain "One Hit Wonders" themselves...




My fellow Canadian, Daniel Powter, grew up in Vernon, BC. Like many other artistically-inclined little boys, he was bullied throughout school. Thank goodness for that, too! He began out playing the violin, but changed to piano after a group of children destroyed his violin. Music was where Mr. Powter could find his zen, though, and he continued to pursue it, even attempting to study it in university. Sadly, as a dyslexic, Powter struggled in university, and later dropped out. He chose, instead, Life University, which I'm currently enrolled in as a Masters students (and like my friends working on their Masters as well, I hope it takes me a long time to finish!). Powter knew his gift early on, though, and has used his time at the University of Life to learn music by ear and the business of the music industry by trial and error...

Powter's first album was released in 2000, to a small fanbase. He got some airtime on a small Canadian television show, Higher Ground, and things started to gain momentum. Then, in 2005, supported by Warner Bros. Records, Powter released this, his first single...and it exploded in Europe. Warner had submitted the record for some commercial production, and all across Europe, music lovers and pop addicts couldn't get the tune out of his head. Thank you, Coca-Cola, for continuing to support the capitalist growth of good talent... (and I'm serious about that. I like that artists can get through big breaks through capitalism just as much as they get it through socialism...as long as they don't get it through nepotism, I'm pretty much okay with it ;-D)

In December 2009, Powter was named as the decade's top One-Hit Wonder by Billboard Magazine. The magazine describes one-hit wonders as acts whose second hit did not reach the top 25...that was last decade, though...we'll see how the day following "Bad Day" goes...