Til I Hear It from You

"Til I Hear It from You"
Single by Gin Blossoms
from the album Empire Records OST and Congratulations I'm Sorry
Released	21 September 1995
Format	CD maxi single
Recorded	Ardent Studios 1995
Genre	Jangle pop, alternative rock
Length	3:47
Label	A&M
Writer(s)	Jesse Valenzuela, Robin Wilson, Marshall Crenshaw
Producer(s)	John Hampton
Gin Blossoms singles chronology
"Allison Road" (1994) "Til I Hear It from You" (1995) "Follow You Down" (1996) Audio sample file info · help

"Follow You Down/ Til I Hear It from You"
Single by Gin Blossoms
A-side	"Follow You Down"
B-side	"Til I Hear It from You"
Released	January 1996
Format	7" single
Recorded	Ardent Studios 1995
Genre	Jangle pop, alternative rock
Length	3:47
Label	A&M (US), Fontana (UK)
Writer(s)	Jesse Valenzuela, Robin Wilson, Marshall Crenshaw
Producer(s)	John Hampton
Gin Blossoms singles chronology
"Allison Road" (1994) "Til I Hear It from You"/ "Follow You Down" (1996) "Day Job" (1996)

"Til I Hear It from You" is a track by the Gin Blossoms which was released as the lead single from the soundtrack to the film Empire Records in August 1995. In January 1996 the track was re-released as a double-A side single with the track "Follow You Down". Billboard magazine described "Til I Hear It from You" as "the closest thing to a perfect pop song to hit radio in recent memory" lauding its "breezy and wonderfully infectious melody, the boy-needs-girl lyrics, and the earnest execution."^[1]

Writing/Empire Records soundtrack

Gin Blossoms' guitarist Jesse Valenzuela would recall writing the song with Marshall Crenshaw in a hotel in Austin, Texas where the Gin Blossoms and Crenshaw were both participating in South by Southwest.^[2] According to Crenshaw "Jesse Valenzuela had started the music and asked me to help him finish it. We didn't know each other but he sought me out...The verse melody is from me - I helped him figure out how to do the ending, the fade. [Gin Blossoms frontman] Robin Wilson wrote the lyrics, and I didn't even meet him until after I'd already heard the record on the radio."^[3]

Mitchell Leib, co-executive producer of the Empire Records soundtrack, would recall: "[With] so many other alternative [music] soundtracks out there, we had a tough time finding [a strong lead] single. I was chasing the Gin Blossoms for a while: [the group's label] A&M was interested, but they didn't want to lend them to us." Regency Enterprises, producers of the Empire Records film, had a distribution pact with Warner Bros and the film's soundtrack was originally attached to the Warner Bros affiliate Atlantic Records: Leib - "The only way to get [the Gin Blossoms] was to move [the soundtrack] to A&M."^[4]

Gin Blossoms lead vocalist Robin Wilson would recall: "Empire Records [is] a classic film that only a handful of people really saw, but it definitely made an impact on that generation. It was really cool to have been a part of that and to have co-written a song with Marshall Crenshaw that went to the top of the charts. It was the peak of our career, and it was at the peak of the machinery that was operating. A&M was so in tune, and so good at what they were doing that we recorded the song, made a video, and it was on the radio in like four months. It was an amazing experience putting that song together on so many levels. It was rewarding to co-write a song with one of my heroes and for it to succeed on that level and be part of a system that worked so well. It was a once in a lifetime experience, really."^[5]

Release history

The original 21 September 1995 US single release "Til I Hear It from You" was as the headline track on a four track CD maxi single formatted as below: "Til I Hear It from You" was identified as "the LP Version" and "taken from the forthcoming A&M CD Congratulations I'm Sorry". In fact when the album Congratulations I'm Sorry had its US release 13 February 1996, "Til I Hear It from You" was not a featured track.

John Hampton, the Ardent Studios in-house producer who co-produced the Gin Blossoms recordings, would recall: "'Til I Hear It from You' not only sold the Empire [Records] soundtrack record, but it reinvigorated sales of [Gin Blossoms' debut album] New Miserable...There was money EVERYWHERE!! And we were so fired up about the [follow-up album's prospective] sales with the inclusion of 'Til I Hear It...', we thought [that album] was going to be huge. But...we could not have 'Til I Hear It from You' for [the second Gin Blossoms album] because the label that released the Empire Records soundtrack was justifiably concerned that the A&M sales might dwarf their soundtrack record sales." ^[6] As the Empire Records soundtrack album was in fact also issued on A&M, any conflict of interest concern which prevented inclusion of the track "Til I Hear It from You" on the second Gin Blossoms' album Congratulations I'm Sorry would not have been a record label issue. It has also been alleged that the omission of "Til I Hear It from You" from Congratulations I'm Sorry was due to the Gin Blossoms' own insistence that the group's albums feature only material written by the group's members among themselves - 'Til I Hear It from You" would not meet these criteria as one of its composers, Marshall Crenshaw, was not a member of the Gin Blossoms. ^[7]

"Til I Hear It from You" was a featured track on all evident editions of the Congratulations I'm Sorry album released in territories other than the US, these editions - including those released in Australia, Canada, Europe, Japan, and the UK - omit the track "7th Inning Stretch" which was featured on the album's original US edition.

"Til I Hear It from You" began receiving radio airplay in August 1995, appearing that year on the Adult Contemporary chart in Billboard magazine - with a December peak of #5 - and also appearing on both the magazine's Album Rock Tracks and Modern Rock Tracks in with respective chart peaks of #4 and #5 in September. The track did not appear on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1995 or early 1996 due to the track not originally being available in a format then eligible for Hot 100 ranking. In Canada "Til I Hear It from You" reached #1 on the singles chart dated 25 September 1995, based on airplay: the track became Canada's longest-running #1 hit of 1995, its #1 tenure being six weeks.

When the advance single from Congratulations I'm Sorry, "Follow You Down", was issued as a single in January 1996, "Til I Hear It from You" served as B-side. Both featured sides debuted as a double A-side hit, identified as "Til I Hear It from You"/ "Follow You Down", on the Hot 100 dated 10 February 1996, with the single becoming the Gin Blossoms' first Top 20 single with its #12 debut. The positioning of the titles of the single's two sides in its debut Hot 100 ranking, with "Til I Hear It from You" appearing first, was due to the current airplay for "Til I Hear It from You" being heavier, and on the subsequent two weeks' Hot 100 charts the single, ranked both weeks at #11, again appeared as "Til I Hear It from You"/ "Follow You Down": as of the Hot 100 chart dated 6 March 1996 the single's ranking appeared as "Follow You Down"/ "Til I Hear It from You", "Follow You Down" now being the favored airplay side. As the single's highest Hot 100 position with "Til I Hear It from You" acknowledged first was #11 that peak position is generally cited as the Hot 100 peak for "Til I Hear It from You": however, the Hot 100 continued to rank both "Follow You Down" and "Til I Hear It from You" as a double A-side hit throughout the single's 46 week chart tenure, and the highest Hot 100 position attained by "Follow You Down"/ "Til I Hear It from You" was #9 where it held for four weeks in March 1996.

"Follow You Down" was also issued January 23, 1996 as the headline track on a four-track CD maxi single which featured "Til I Hear It from You" plus two tracks from the "Til I Hear It from You" CD maxi single release of September 1995: "Seeing Stars" and "Idiot Summer". ("Idiot Summer" was also included on the soundtrack to Wayne's World 2.)

Charts

Other versions

America remade "Til I Hear It from You" for their 2012 release Back Pages a cover album that according to group member Gerry Beckley comprises "killer songs that are great examples that come from our best songwriters. In the case of the Gin Blossoms [cover], it just so happens that Marshall [Crenshaw] co-wrote the song. I think the song stands on its own, and I love their version of it."^[12] It was Gerry Beckley who suggested "Til I Hear It from You" for the Back Pages project to his group co-member Dewey Bunnell who previously was unfamiliar with the song.^[13] "Til I Hear It from You" is one of three songs from Back Pages which America has added to its regular live set list - the others being "Time of the Season" and "Woodstock".

Dale Ann Bradley remade "Til I Hear It from You" for her 2015 album Pocket Full of Keys: personnel on the track include Michael Cleveland on fiddle, Phil Leadbetter on resonator guitar, and Steve Thomas on guitar and mandolin.^[14]

References

External links

• Lyrics of this song at MetroLyrics