Hanginaround

"Hanginaround"
Single by Counting Crows
from the album This Desert Life
Released	October 18, 1999
Format	CD single
Genre	Alternative Rock
Length	4:16
Label	Geffen
Writer(s)	Adam Duritz, David Bryson, Dan Vickrey, Ben Mize
Producer(s)	David Lowery, Dennis Herring
Counting Crows singles chronology
"Daylight Fading" (1997) "Hanginaround" (1999) "Mrs. Potter's Lullaby" (2000)

"Hanginaround" is a hit single by the American rock band Counting Crows. It is the first track on their third album This Desert Life (1999). The song managed to hit number 28 on the Billboard Hot 100, being their biggest hit on the chart to this date. It also reached the #17 on the Modern Rock Tracks chart, being their last entry on the chart to date.

The chorus of the song was used as the main theme for the 2006 NBC sitcom Four Kings.

Track listing

1. "Hanginaround" - 4:16
2. "Baby I'm a Big Star Now" - 5:59

Background

As with on much of the This Desert Life album, Hanging around saw the band experimenting with different recording techniques - in this case, utilizing looping. The song consists of eight different piano loops arranged in various configurations in setup inspired by Brian Wilson's Smile project.^[1] According to Counting Crows fansite anna-begins.com, Duritz says: ""So I was sort of ... semi-celebratory about that but also [thinking] 'Where am I going?' It's about a wild time when I was growing' up. Living a bit of a wild life, celebrating that. It's also about being scared that you don't have a future, but I don't think that's a waste. In the end, the guy just decides to continue having fun and to worry about it later. "^[2] In an interview with Songfacts Adam Duritz summed up his thought process behind the lyrics by stating "The idea of a song created with loops made me think of being on a loop myself. I wrote that song about when I was younger and the latter years in Berkeley and how I loved it there, but I was kind of going nowhere" ^[1]

Charts

Chart (1999)	Peak Position
Canadian RPM Singles Chart	3
Canadian RPM Rock Chart	2
UK Singles Chart	46
U.S. Billboard Hot 100	28
U.S. Billboard Hot 100 Airplay	19
U.S. Billboard Top 40 Mainstream	21
U.S. Billboard Adult Top 40	5
U.S. Billboard Modern Rock Tracks	17

References

1. Wiser, Carl. "Adam Duritz of Counting Crows-Songwriter Interviews". Songfacts. Retrieved July 8, 2014.
2. "Lisa's Counting Crows Shrine". Anna-begins.com. Retrieved 2012-02-20.