''Clumsy'' is the second studio album by the Canadian

rock Rock most often refers to: * Rock (geology), a naturally occurring solid aggregate of minerals or mineraloids * Rock music, a genre of popular music Rock or Rocks may also refer to: Places United Kingdom * Rock, Caerphilly, a location in Wales ...

band

Our Lady Peace Our Lady Peace (sometimes shortened to OLP) is a Canadian rock band formed in Toronto, Ontario in 1992. Led by lead vocalist Raine Maida since its formation, the band currently also features Duncan Coutts on bass, Steve Mazur on guitars, and J ...

, released on January 23, 1997 by

Columbia Records Columbia Records is an American record label owned by Sony Music, Sony Music Entertainment, a subsidiary of Sony Corporation of America, the North American division of Japanese Conglomerate (company), conglomerate Sony. It was founded on Janua ...

. The album is the band's most successful to date, achieving diamond status in Canada (1 million units sold) and strong sales in other countries, including platinum status in the U.S. for another 1 million sales. In 2007, it ranked No. 76 on "

The Top 100 Canadian Albums ''The Top 100 Canadian Albums'' is a book by journalist Bob Mersereau, published in 2007 by Goose Lane Editions. Mersereau surveyed 600 music journalists, retailers, musicians and disc jockeys of all ages, from all parts of Canada, who each submi ...

" by

Bob Mersereau Bob Ellis Mersereau is a Canadian arts journalist.Rockingham, Graham �"Randy Bachman: lord of the song"''The Spec'' He is a music columnist and longtime arts reporter for CBC Television in New Brunswick.102.1 The Edge (in 2009). The album features five hit singles: "

Superman's Dead "Superman's Dead" is a song by Canadian alternative rock group Our Lady Peace. It was released in January 1997 as the lead single from their second album '' Clumsy''. This has become one of Our Lady Peace's most popular songs in both Canada and ...

", " Automatic Flowers", " Clumsy", " 4am" and "Carnival". Each single except "Carnival" has a music video.

Background

While on tour in support of ''Naveed'' the band attempted to begin writing for their next album. Like most bands, the challenges of writing a successful follow-up album was found to be difficult as each member now approached the writing process from a different set of experiences, personal goals, and influences from their time spent touring. Collaborations between band members and the co-writing producer broke down and writing sessions at the producer's studio resulted in nothing of use. The decision was made by Raine Maida that the way to resolve the situation was to change the line-up. It was either Mike Turner or Chris Eacrett. The concern then turned to what challenges would be faced with the task of replacing either. With Turner threatening legal recourse and Maida's school friend Duncan Coutts a bass player in his own band, the choice was simple. Immediately following the band's opening stint with

Van Halen Van Halen ( ) was an American rock band formed in Pasadena, California, in 1972. Credited with "restoring hard rock to the forefront of the music scene", Van Halen was known for its energetic live shows and for the virtuosity of its lead gu ...

, Coutts was asked to join the band to be its new permanent bass player. "I don't want to call our old bass player Chris a weak link...I think he's a talented musician, just different from us." claimed Maida at the time of the announcement. Turner would be later fired from the group in the first week of writing with producer Bob Rock (Aerosmith, Metallica, Bon Jovi, Motley Crue) on a subsequent album.

Writing

As touring continued, the band began writing again with Duncan. One of the first songs they wrote was the eventual concert favorite "Trapeze", which they played live along with two other newly written songs "Home" and "Disgusted". "Disgusted" would evolve into "Spider Gun" and eventually became the track "Big Dumb Rocket". In December 1995 the band began intensive writing and demoing sessions in a rented rehearsal space. Despite coming up with several new ideas, the band found that writing while on tour was very difficult because they couldn't give the songs their undivided attention and most of their early ideas were scrapped because the band wasn't satisfied with them.Ohler, Shawn
Our Lady Peace on track with new album
" – ''

The Edmonton Journal The ''Edmonton Journal'' is a daily newspaper in Edmonton, Alberta. It is part of the Postmedia Network. History The ''Journal'' was founded in 1903 by three local businessmen — John Macpherson, Arthur Moore and J.W. Cunningham — as ...

'' January 23, 1997. Retrieved December 7, 2009 "Trapeze" would make it to recording but the track was eventually cut and has yet to be released. Pre-production for the album was set to begin in January 1996. Producer Arnold Lanni noticed the band's discontent with the songs they were writing. "I went down to see them and knew it wasn't happening", he recalled. "All their friends and family were calling them up. You sell that many records, you're on everybody's A-list, everybody blows sunshine up your butt and sometimes you believe the hype. We had to pull the plug on that scenario." At Lanni's suggestion, the band and him traveled to Duncan's rural lakeside cottage near

Muskoka, Ontario The District Municipality of Muskoka, more generally referred to as the District of Muskoka or Muskoka, is a regional municipality in Central Ontario, Canada. Muskoka extends from Georgian Bay in the west, to the northern tip of Lake Couchiching ...

, in order to concentrate on writing and recording demos for the album without distractions from family, friends or the media. While there, the band lived together in the cottage surrounded by instruments. A tape recorder was left on in the house all day to pick up any ideas being played. Lanni and the band members would usually play

ice hockey Ice hockey (or simply hockey) is a team sport played on ice skates, usually on an ice skating rink with lines and markings specific to the sport. It belongs to a family of sports called hockey. In ice hockey, two opposing teams use ice hock ...

in the afternoon and collaborate on songs in the evening and into the night. By the end of their stay, around 20 songs had been written. When they returned to the Toronto studio in February, according to Mike Turner, "When we came back to record, it just came together".

Recording and production

Recording sessions for the yet untitled album began on February 8, 1996. The band was asked to record the

Beatles The Beatles were an English rock band, formed in Liverpool in 1960, that comprised John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr. They are regarded as the most influential band of all time and were integral to the developme ...

song "

Tomorrow Never Knows "Tomorrow Never Knows" is a song by the English rock band the Beatles, written primarily by John Lennon and credited to Lennon–McCartney. It was released in August 1966 as the final track on their album ''Revolver'', although it was the firs ...

" for the soundtrack to the upcoming movie '' The Craft'' after several bands they had played with on tour knew them to play it well live. The song was recorded on the very first day of recording with Arnold Lanni and was mixed by

Ralph Sall Ralph Sall is an American record producer, music supervisor, composer, songwriter and screenwriter. He is the president of Bulletproof Entertainment, a company involved in several facets of the entertainment industry, including film, television ...

for the soundtrack. They then proceeded to pare down the twenty tracks they had written to the twelve they wanted to record. "The Story of 100 Aisles", originally called "Anacin", was the first song recorded and has a sound closer to ''Naveed'' than any other song on the album. "We just wanted to go in and give all these songs ideas their own life and play with them and rearrange them and all that until we're completely happy with it." said Duncan Coutts, "If they sound just like ''Naveed'' or if they don't, it wasn't a huge concern. We just wanted to make each song the best it could be." The album was recorded in two parts. Five or six tracks were recorded and finished by April 1996 so the band could review them. These included the base tracks for "Clumsy", "Hello Oskar", "Carnival", "Shaking", "Let You Down" and "Sleeping In", which didn't make the album. The band's feedback directed the next set of songs recorded around June, which included "

" and a re-recording of "Hello Oscar". Raine Maida said in an interview, "We took a lot of time experimenting. The album was really done in three months. We took another two months to really go back over stuff and re-record. It's neat to look back and know the extra time we took was important to the record." Around this time (April), the working title of the album was ''Propeller'', as Raine explained, "as in, that which causes forward movement." This was probably as a testament to the band's evolution since their debut album. Another working title was ''Trapeze'', named after the song that didn't make the album. The cover art proves that this title came close to being chosen. The name was changed to ''Clumsy'' in early September. Recording wrapped up by the end of that month. The album was mastered at Gateway Studios in

Portland, Maine Portland is the largest city in the U.S. state of Maine and the seat of Cumberland County. Portland's population was 68,408 in April 2020. The Greater Portland metropolitan area is home to over half a million people, the 104th-largest metropol ...

Bob Ludwig Robert C. Ludwig (born c. 1945) is an American mastering engineer. He has mastered recordings on all the major recording formats for all the major record labels, and on projects by more than 1,300 artists including Led Zeppelin, Lou Reed, Qu ...

Style and themes

Raine stated that there was a kind of "Carnival atmosphere" to the whole album and that many of the lyrics he wrote were set at the circus or a carnival.Sakamoto, John
Our Lady ready to fly with new release
– ''

Canoe.ca Canoe.com is an English-language Canadian portal site and website network, and is a subsidiary of Postmedia Network. The phrase Canadian Online Explorer appears in the header; the name is also evidently a play on words on canoe (or ''canoë'' i ...

'' May 15, 1996. Retrieved August 1, 2009 ''Clumsys songs feature the striking vocals of lead vocalist Raine Maida, who utilizes an often jarring

falsetto ''Falsetto'' (, ; Italian diminutive of , "false") is the vocal register occupying the frequency range just above the modal voice register and overlapping with it by approximately one octave. It is produced by the vibration of the ligamentous ed ...

technique: Maida jumps from lower octaves in his vocal range to higher ones. Raine's vocals provide most of the melody of the songs, with guitars quieted down in this album compared to '' Naveed'', their previous album. This aspect of singing has become the staple sound of the band, continuing with this fashion in their next studio album '' Happiness...Is Not a Fish That You Can Catch,'' and since lost on their 2005 album ''

Healthy in Paranoid Times ''Healthy in Paranoid Times'' is the sixth studio album by Canadian rock band Our Lady Peace, released on August 30, 2005, by Columbia Records. The disc was released on a standard CD as well as a DualDisc, with the reverse side containing a docu ...

.''. In a January 1997 interview, the band stated that then new bassist Duncan Coutts, who also plays cello, keyboards and sings background vocals, influenced the sound on ''Clumsy'' even though he doesn't have any songwriting credits.Stevenson, Jane
Our Lady Peace building on fanbase
– ''

Toronto Sun The ''Toronto Sun'' is an English-language tabloid format, tabloid newspaper published daily in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The newspaper is one of several ''Sun'' tabloids published by Postmedia Network. The newspaper's offices is located at Pos ...

'' January 21, 1997. Retrieved August 1, 2009 He broadened the band's palette of sounds. Given those new parameters, the band couldn't help but change their sound.Hudecek, Lukas
Falling with Talent
" – ''

UWO Gazette The University of Western Ontario (UWO), also known as Western University or Western, is a public research university in London, Ontario, Canada. The main campus is located on of land, surrounded by residential neighbourhoods and the Thames Ri ...

'' January 22, 1997. Retrieved December 7, 2009

Release

In early 1996, Our Lady Peace's American label,

Relativity Records Relativity Records was an American record label founded by Barry Kobrin at the site of his company, Important Record Distributors (IRD) in metro New York. Relativity released music that covers a wide variety of musical genres. When it entered in ...

, in a decision to switch to an urban format, eliminated ten label positions in their Rock category, including OLP. They moved to another Sony-owned label,

for the release of ''Clumsys first single in Canada, "Superman's Dead". Columbia would handle all of the band's releases in both Canada and the United States.

Commercial performance

''Clumsy'' debuted at #1 in Canada, selling 26,000 copies in Canada during its first week. It would go on to become Our Lady Peace's best-selling album. On February 28, 2001, the album was certified Diamond in Canada. On July 12, 2004, ''Clumsy'' was certified Platinum in the United States. Between 1996 and 2016, ''Clumsy'' was the best-selling album by a Canadian band in Canada and the eight best-selling album by a Canadian artist overall in Canada. Radio station Edge 102 (aka CFNY), the most-listened to alternative rock station in Canada, listed ''Clumsy'' as the No. 1 album for 1997, based on sales, listener requests for songs and listener votes for the year's top album.

Tours

Our Lady Peace toured in support of ''Clumsy'' from a month before the album's release in early 1997 and into 1998. The first leg of the tour, focusing on Canadian colleges, kicked off at

Loyalist College Loyalist College (formally Loyalist College of Applied Arts and Technology) is an English-language college in Belleville, Ontario, Canada. History Prior to the 1960s, only trade schools co-existed with universities in the province of Ontario ...

Belleville, Ontario Belleville is a city in Ontario, Canada situated on the eastern end of Lake Ontario, located at the mouth of the Moira River and on the Bay of Quinte. Belleville is between Ottawa and Toronto, along the Quebec City-Windsor Corridor. Its population ...

on January 13, 1997 where eight of the album's eleven tracks were premiered including "Superman's Dead", "4 AM" and others. This leg of the tour continued until March 1997, ending with a private music industry show at the Elbow Room in New York City. The tour's second leg began on May 2, with the band playing two shows in Michigan before going off to Europe to promote the album's recent release there. The band returned and toured across the United States, only dipping into Canada to play at the very first Summersault festival. The North American tour continued until the end of September 1997 when Our Lady Peace joined Everclear as an opening act with whom they would tour until the end of 1997. In January 1998, the band embarked on a 22-date headlining tour across Canada which included several shows opening for ''

The Rolling Stones The Rolling Stones are an English rock band formed in London in 1962. Active for six decades, they are one of the most popular and enduring bands of the rock era. In the early 1960s, the Rolling Stones pioneered the gritty, rhythmically d ...

''. On February 26, Our Lady Peace began their first headlining tour in the United States with

Headswim Headswim are an English alternative rock band active during the 1990s, best known for their 1997 single "Tourniquet". Band members subsequently went on to projects including BlackCar, Tenebrous Liar and Mew. History The band originally forme ...

and

Black Lab Black Lab is an alternative rock band founded by Paul Durham in Berkeley, California and currently based in Los Angeles and Montana. They released their debut album on Geffen Records, entitled '' Your Body Above Me'', and scored two rock radio ...

opening. Following this they returned to Europe again for a 14-show tour across

Belgium Belgium, ; french: Belgique ; german: Belgien officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a country in Northwestern Europe. The country is bordered by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeast, France to th ...

, the

Netherlands ) , anthem = ( en, "William of Nassau") , image_map = , map_caption = , subdivision_type = Sovereign state , subdivision_name = Kingdom of the Netherlands , established_title = Before independence , established_date = Spanish Netherl ...

, France and Germany. Further touring in the U.S. with

Third Eye Blind Third Eye Blind is an American rock band formed in San Francisco, California, in 1993. After years of lineup changes in the early and mid-1990s, the songwriting duo of Stephan Jenkins and Kevin Cadogan signed the band's first major-label recor ...

and

Eve 6 Eve 6 is an American rock band formed in 1995 in Southern California, best known for their hit singles " Inside Out," "Leech," " Here's to the Night," and "Promise." They disbanded in 2004, returned for numerous tours in 2007 with a new lineup ...

lasted into September 1998. The year of touring was concluded with the second Summersault festival being held. Our Lady Peace would spend the rest of the year working on their third studio album, '' Happiness... Is Not a Fish That You Can Catch''.

Re-creation tour

In December 2009, the band announced that they would be "recreating"An Evening with Our Lady Peace
— Ourladypeace.net. Retrieved December 7, 2009. both ''Clumsy'' and their 2000 record '' Spiritual Machines'' by performing them live in their entiretiesRaine Maida
— ''Twitter.com''. Retrieved December 7, 2009. throughout a new tour that began in March 2010; only nine months before the 10-year anniversary of the release of ''Spiritual Machines''.

Track listing

Personnel

As listed in liner notes.

Musicians

Raine Maida Raine Maida (born Michael Anthony Maida; February 18, 1970)
– Ourladypeace.cc. Retrieved April 30, 2010. is a C ...

– vocals,

acoustic guitar An acoustic guitar is a musical instrument in the string family. When a string is plucked its vibration is transmitted from the bridge, resonating throughout the top of the guitar. It is also transmitted to the side and back of the instrument, ...

, piano * Duncan Coutts – bass guitar *

Jeremy Taggart Jeremy Ronald John Taggart (born April 7, 1975) is a Canadian drummer, radio host, and author, best known for playing with Our Lady Peace from 1993 until 2014. Early life Taggart was born in Toronto, Ontario, later growing up in Mansfield, On ...

– drums, percussion *

Mike Turner Michael Ray Turner (born January 11, 1960) is an American politician serving as the U.S. representative for since 2003. He is a member of the Republican Party. Turner's district, numbered as the 3rd district from 2003 to 2013, is based in Dayt ...

– electric guitar

Production

* Angelo Caruso – additional engineering *

Arnold Lanni Arnold David Lanni (born May 4, 1956) is a Canadian record producer and former member of Frōzen Ghōst and Sheriff. He wrote Sheriff's most successful song, " When I'm with You." History Lanni was a founding member of Canadian rock band Sh ...

– production, engineering, mixing *

–

mastering engineer A mastering engineer is a person skilled in the practice of taking audio (typically musical content) that has been previously mixed in either the analog or digital domain as mono, stereo, or multichannel formats and preparing it for use in distr ...

* Terrance Sawchuck – 2nd engineer

Artwork

* Sonia D'Aloisio – inside photos * Helios – design, art direction, color retouch * Neil Hodge – inside photos * Catherine McRae – art direction * Our Lady Peace – art direction, individual band photos * Kevin Westenberg – cover and tray photo

Charts

Weekly charts

Year-end charts

Certifications

Release history

References

External links

''Clumsy'' lyrics
at

Rhapsody Rhapsody may refer to: * A work of epic poetry, or part of one, that is suitable for recitation at one time ** Rhapsode, a classical Greek professional performer of epic poetry Computer software * Rhapsody (online music service), an online m ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Clumsy (Album) 1997 albums Albums produced by Arnold Lanni Columbia Records albums Our Lady Peace albums Juno Award for Rock Album of the Year albums