Bowling for Soup
Bowling for Soup is an American rock band formed in Wichita Falls, Texas, in 1994. The band consists of Jaret Reddick, Gary Wiseman, and Rob Felicetti. The band is best known for its singles "Girl All the Bad Guys Want", "1985", "Almost", "Punk Rock 101", and "High School Never Ends". The band is also known for performing the theme song for the Disney Channel animated series Phineas and Ferb. Following lead guitarist Chris Burney's retirement in 2025, Reddick is the sole remaining original member.
History
Formation and early years (1994–1999)
Bowling for Soup has its origins in Wichita Falls, Texas, where Jaret Reddick and other members of the band grew up. Reddick and original drummer Lance Morrill met in the fall of 1976. Reddick began playing music in 1985, at 13 years old. Reddick and guitarist Chris Burney knew each other in high school and as students in the 1980s, they grew up on the commercially successful heavy metal music of bands such as Quiet Riot, RATT, and Mötley Crüe, but were also influenced by the faster punk rock of the Ramones and later Green Day. Burney's family owned a Wichita Falls coffeehouse called "The Refuge" with a music stage and he played there with his first band, the Persecuted, where he and Reddick met bassist Erik Chandler and drummer Gary Wiseman in the early 1990s.Burney and Chandler soon formed the Folkadots, while Wiseman formed Gary & the Wiseman. Burney and Chandler, along with Morrill, also formed the band Slaw. Around this time, Reddick formed the band Terminal Seasons. Not too long after, Reddick and Morrill formed coolfork! which Burney later joined. The band was in full swing by 1993, playing such venues as the Refuge. A few months later, after forming a band called Rubberneck, the group changed their name to Bowling for Soup, which was derived from the phrase "bowling for shit" from a comedy act by Steve Martin, and the band was officially formed in Wichita Falls on June 4, 1994, by Reddick, Burney, Chandler, and Morrill.
In 1996, Bowling for Soup relocated to Denton, Texas, and released a split album, Cell Mates, with Denton band The V.I.M.S that same year, and in 1998 released their second studio album, Rock on Honorable Ones!! for the Denton music label FFROE. The group released its first EP, Tell Me When to Whoa, through FFROE later that year. The album sold over 10,000 copies, prompting Jive Records to sign the band. Morrill left the band on good terms and was replaced in July 1998 by Wiseman. As a side project, beginning around 1999, Reddick and Chandler performed acoustic shows at smaller venues and showcases, playing primarily Bowling for Soup songs in an acoustic fashion, billed as Jaret & Erik.
''Let's Do It For Johnny!'' and ''Drunk Enough To Dance'' (2000–2003)
Let's Do It for Johnny!!, Bowling for Soup's major label debut, was released on Jive in 2000. The album mostly contained re-recordings of the group's previous material along with a few new tracks and a cover of Bryan Adams' song "Summer of '69". Drunk Enough to Dance is Bowling for Soup's second album with Jive Records, released August 6, 2002. It was recorded at Tree Sound Studios and Sonica Recording in Atlanta and Big Time Audio in Dallas. One of the album's two singles, "Girl All The Bad Guys Want", was nominated for a Grammy Award in 2003 in the "Best Pop Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal" category. Reddick considers the Grammies one of his shining moments, not for the nomination, but for winning "worst dressed" from Joan Rivers.A re-release in 2003 added "Punk Rock 101", a cover of the 1980s new wave band A Flock of Seagulls' "I Ran ", and "Star Song". An acoustic version of the song "Belgium" exists at the end of the album, as well as at the very end of the initial release. The cover of "I Ran " was used as the opening theme song of the anime television show Saint Seiya: Knights of the Zodiac in North America.
The band appeared in the 2002 film Crossroads, playing at a graduation party.
''A Hangover You Don't Deserve'', ''Goes to the Movies'' and ''The Great Burrito Extortion Case'' (2004–2008)
A Hangover You Don't Deserve was released on September 14, 2004, and has become the band's only Top 40 album. Sales of the album were driven in large part by the radio airplay of the single "1985", a song written by Mitch Allan of SR-71 and covered by Bowling For Soup with his permission. Bowling for Soup did make some modifications to the lyrics to better fit their style with Mitch Allan, lead vocalist of SR-71, contributed backing vocals to the song and appeared in the music video. "1985" became Bowling for Soup's biggest hit in the U.S., reaching No. 23 on the Billboard Hot 100. A second single from A Hangover You Don't Deserve, "Almost", charted on the UK Singles Chart, No. 46 on the U.S. Top 100, and No. 23 on U.S. Pop 100. "Ohio", better known as "Come Back to Texas", was released as a radio single in the U.S., but was not as popular as "1985" or "Almost", reaching only No. 59 on the U.S. Pop 100.Bowling for Soup Goes to the Movies, a compilation album of cover songs and contributions to movie soundtracks, was released by the band in 2005. Later that year, Reddick and Burney made several appearances on VH1's I Love the '90s: Part Deux. Bowling for Soup appeared briefly at the start of the 2005 film Cursed, playing the song "Li'l Red Riding Hood". The group's cover version of Modern English's "I Melt With You" was used in the Disney movie Sky High and was on the movie's soundtrack album. A music video of the song was made, which aired on the Disney Channel and is included on the movie's DVD.
The group went on the Star 102.1 StarJam tour with Simple Plan in 2006 and were the opening act. They joined again the following year with Quietdrive and Army of Freshmen.
Bowling for Soup spent most of 2006 readying The Great Burrito Extortion Case, the group's seventh album, which was released on November 7, 2006. The group released the first single from that album, "High School Never Ends", to iTunes on September 19, 2006. The song did sell well at first, and Jive Records pulled promotion for it, releasing "When We Die" as a single. Online demand grew steadily for "High School Never Ends", prompting Reddick to express regret for not standing up for its initial release. He said the song has "a poetic quality... that everyone can relate to." The UK release of the album was on February 5, 2007.
In 2006, the band embarked on The Get Happy Tour, which was set up as a joint venture with alongside Army of Freshmen. The original tour was planned with Bowling for Soup headlining, Army of Freshmen opening and two other bands playing between. The tour kicked off in Austin, Texas on June 23, 2006, with the Vanished taking Lucky Boys Confusion's spot for the first three dates. The band toured the U.S. over the summer and autumn of 2006 with the Get Happy Tour and ended on August 27, 2006, in Amarillo, Tex. This was followed by a UK tour in early February 2007. Coinciding with this UK tour was the UK release of "High School Never Ends". The tour included Bowling for Soup as main headliners, Wheatus, Son of Dork and Army of Freshmen on the 12 date trek, which concluded at Hammersmith Palais in London, on the February 18.
The band released "I'm Gay" as the second UK single in early 2007. The release was on CD and 7" vinyl. A music video for the single was released in the UK, made up of live performances of the song from the "Get Happy Tour", of which the band had performed in the UK during February 2007. On September 25, 2007, it was announced on the official Bowling for Soup forums that "When We Die" would be released as a download only single in the UK on October 22, 2007, as the third single. Following this, the music video was added to the Kerrang television playlist and was played on Scuzz TV.
The group created an album called On Your Mark... Get Set... Smoke a Cigarette which consisted of three songs: "Bipolar", "Somebody Get My Mom", "Li'l Red Riding Hood".
Bowling for Soup confirmed during the Get Happy Tour that the group would be performing another tour of the UK in October 2007, called the Get Happy Tour 2, gracing the U.S. over the summer and featuring support acts Melee, Quietdrive, and Army of Freshmen. The UK tour bands were confirmed at the Download Festival, along with the lineup in Kerrang! on an advertisement poster for the new tour. The lineup consisted of Bowling for Soup, Bloodhound Gang, Zebrahead and Army of Freshmen.
File:Bowling for Soup.jpg|thumb|Bowling for Soup performing before the Dallas Stars' run in the 2008 Stanley Cup playoffs
Bowling for Soup produced an hour-long special that airs on DirecTV's concert series and made an appearance at the Download Festival at Donington Park, England. Bowling for Soup cowrote and sang the theme song for Disney's Phineas and Ferb, "Today Is Gonna Be A Great Day". The group briefly appears in one episode of Phineas and Ferb, called "Phineas and Ferb's Quantum Boogaloo". "Greatest Day" was the opening song to the Nickelodeon film The Last Day of Summer.
The band's first live DVD, Bowling for Soup: Live and Very Attractive was filmed over the course of the UK Get Happy Tour October 2007 and premiered at the AFI Dallas International Film Festival with the DVD released in the summer. A three-disk edition was released in the UK on July 7, 2008. There was a limited edition pre-order deal for the DVD which included a T-shirt, drinks mug, exclusive poster and more besides the DVD. Reddick sang lead vocals and Chandler sang backing vocals for the song "Endless Possibility" for the video game Sonic Unleashed, which released on November 18, 2008.
''Sorry for Partyin'' and departure from Jive (2009–2010)
On January 20, 2009, Reddick released a video onto the web via the band's Myspace page and both YouTube accounts about a new album by the group. According to him, the band's eighth full-length album was set to be released in September 2009, and the band had very recently started recording. He said it was to be titled Sorry for Partyin. The video was the first of a few released during the recording process of the album.Sorry for Partyin was released on October 12, 2009. "My Wena" was the first promotional single from the album. The single was first previewed on May 5, 2009, on the Lex and Terry show. A music video for the song was filmed and the video was released on July 21, 2009. The song was released to iTunes on July 28, 2009. "No Hablo Ingles" was supposed to be the first single released to the radio for the album, however, Jive split with the band and shelved Sorry for Partyin after only four weeks of being on sale, thus no single was ever released to radio.
To promote the release of the album, the band embarked on a headline tour of the UK in October 2009 under the title of The Party in Your Pants Tour. Main support on the tour came from Zebrahead, with additional support coming from MC Lars and the Leftovers. During the last show of this tour at the Camden Town Roundhouse in London Reddick announced to the crowd that Bowling for Soup would return to the UK in "The Spring" and will be hitting the European summer festival circuit and then again returning to the UK for another headlining tour in the Autumn. On Christmas Eve 2009, Bowling for Soup announced through the band's website, a UK Acoustic Tour in April 2010.
Bowling for Soup released Merry Flippin' Christmas Volume 1 digitally on November 26, 2009.