Daylight in Your Eyes

"Daylight in Your Eyes" is a dance-pop song written by American musicians Tony Bruno and Tommy Byrnes. Originally composed for Colombian singer Victoria Faiella's debut album Drama (2000), it was re-recorded by German pop band No Angels' for their 2001 first studio album Elle'ments, following their participation in the first installment of the German adaption of the reality television program Popstars.

Released as the band's debut single on February 5, 2001 in German-speaking Europe and the following months in the United Kingdom and the United States, the single became a major international hit, reaching number-one in Austria, Estonia, Germany, and Switzerland, making it the No Angels' most successful single release to date.^[1][2]

The song became the best-selling single of the year 2001 in Germany,^[3] and emerged as one of the best-selling German recordings of the decade, ranking fifth on the highest-selling singles of the 2000s in Germany.^[4] It was nominated for an Amadeus Austrian Music Award and awarded for "Best National Single - Rock/Pop" at the 2002 ECHO Awards. "Daylight in Your Eyes" received a Platinum certification from the Bundesverband Musikindustrie for shipping half a million copies,^[5] and has since been covered by various artists.^[6]

Writing and recording

"Daylight in Your Eyes" was composed by American songwriters and guitarists Tony Bruno and Tommy Byrnes, and initially intended for inclusion on American rock band New Life Crisis' self-titled debut album on Tommy Boy Records.^[7] Recorded in 2000, their variation of the track received limited release in the United States in January 2001, and eventually ended on various sampler albums such as MTV's Party to Go (Remixed) compilation.^[7]

Plans for a Europe-wide release however fell through as Bruno and Byrnes had sold the song separately both stateside and abroad and the label lacked the right to release the band's version on any format throughout Europe. Further problems arose as Byrnes, Bruno, and the publishing company that bought the rights to the song were forced to not only acknowledge the writing contribution of Paul Mahos, but to also pay him back and continuing royalties, something which Byrnes and Bruno do not receive from the song.^[8] Well-known to writer Tony Bruno, whom she had met while working as background musicians on Enrique Iglesias' 1999 Cosas del Amor World Tour, he introduced Faiella to German producer Peter Plate, one half of the musical duo Rosenstolz, with whom she started working on her first solo album Drama on the Sony subsidiary Epic Records, resulting into the re-recording of "Daylight".^[8] Picked as the album's lead single, a music video for the song was produced and sent to music networks, but as the record lacked airplay support, it underperformed and the singer was eventually dropped from her label.^[7]

A few months later, Plate got known that Polydor Records, the RTL2 network and production company Tresor TV were searching songs for the soon-to-be-casted result of the debut season of the reality show Popstars.^[8] The producer offered the track a third time, and although the label favoured album cut "Go Ahead and Take It" as the album's lead single, "Daylight in Your Eyes" found general approval among the band members of the newly-formed No Angels.^[8] As reported, the song was eventually selected as the album's lead single out of a total of ten songs.^[8]

Music video

The original music video for "Daylight in Your Eyes" was directed and produced by Robert Bröllochs for Camelot Filmproduktionen and entirely filmed at the X-Sight-Studios in Groß-Gerau, Hesse in December 2000. Shot in a time span of twenty-one hours, the video primarily features close shots and dance sequences using bluescreen technique.^[9] As reported, the band worked with Popstars coach Detlef Soost on most of all choreographies.^[9] The video does not have a substantial plot, but as both the band's management and their label attempted to introduce aliases assigning each member of the group — similar to the Spice Girls pseudonyms — in due consideration of the polysemous album title, focus is on the personalization of the classical elements. While Nadja Benaissa ("Air"), Lucy Diakovska ("Fire"), Sandy Mölling ("Water"), and Vanessa Petruo ("Earth") incorporated one of the four archetypal type images for each themselves, a fifth element, "Spirit" was specially-created for Jessica Wahls because of a lack of another element.

The video for "Daylight in Your Eyes" premiered in January 2001 at the end of its Making of—episode on the first installment of Popstars. In April 2001, a second version for the North American market was shot by director Stephen Scott in a park in Toronto, Canada.^[10]

Chart performance

Although "Daylight in Your Eyes" was not officially released until February 5, 2001, it appeared a week early on the German Airplay Chart, instantly reaching number-one.^[11] The CD maxi single sold more than 500,000 copies within its first week of release and was certified gold after twenty-four hours only,^[12][13] making it both the third fastest-selling single ever in Germany (behind Elton John's 1997 version of "Candle in the Wind" and follow-up Popstars winners Bro'Sis' 2001 debut single "I Believe"), and one of the biggest-selling German singles of the 2000s.^[3] Thus, "Daylight" also debuted on top of the German Media Control singles chart, where it remained another five weeks atop due to constant sales, but quickly fell out of the top 100 in its fifteenth week.^[14] However, with more than one million copies shipped to stores "Daylight in Your Eyes" was ranked first on the German Media Control singles year-end charts, and received a platinum certification by the German IFPI.^[3][15]

In Switzerland, the single sat six weeks atop the Swiss Top 100 singles chart, making it the twelfth successful single of the year.^[16] The song remained within the top 50 until July 2001, but fell out of the chart in early August - one week prior to the release of the band's third single "There Must Be an Angel." In Austria, however, "Daylight in Your Eyes" debuted at number 4 on the Ö3 Austria Top 40 single chart, reaching the top position three weeks later for four consecutive weeks. The song charted until its nineteenth week on particular, and became the third successul single of the year behind Kylie Minogue's "Can't Get You out of My Head" and Gigi D'Agostino's "Super (1, 2, 3)."^[17]

Outside German-speaking Europe, the song also reached number one in Estonia, but failed to succeed on the French Singles Chart with a peak position of number 80 only.^[18] Released in early October 2001 in the UK and in the United States respectively, "Daylight in Your Eyes" also saw minor commercial success in both countries with peak positions of number 88 on the UK Singles Chart and a single entry at number 36 on the Billboard Hot Singles Sales chart.^[19][20]

Formats and tracklistings

These are the formats and track listings of major single-releases of "Daylight in Your Eyes."

Note that track times misprinted as: 1: 3:30, 2: 6:21, 3: 3:03 and that the fourth track is a video track.

Credits and personnel

Charts

Chart procession and succession

Release history

Cover versions

Following the success of the No Angels' interpretation of "Daylight in Your Eyes" the song has been covered by several artists. Among both versions by Victoria Faiella and New Life Crisis, German band Audiosmog released a rock version of the song, featuring Tobias Schlegl, as a single, which reached number 36 on the German Singles Chart in 2001.^[14] In addition, the track has been re-recorded by heavy metal band Lakehurst,^[29] German-Southafrican singer Howard Carpendale,^[29] and Stefan Raab's studio band Herb & The Heavytones.^[29] The cover version of Rockabilly band Boppin'B appeared on their 2003 studio album 42.^[29]

See also

• List of Austrian number-one hits of 2001
• List of Swiss number-one hits of 2001
• Number-one hits of 2001 (Germany)

References

External links

• NoAngels-Music.de — official site
• American "Daylight in Your Eyes" music video on YouTube