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"It's Time" is the debut single by American rock band
Imagine Dragons Imagine Dragons is an American pop rock band from Las Vegas, Nevada, consisting of lead singer Dan Reynolds, guitarist Wayne Sermon, bassist Ben McKee and drummer Daniel Platzman. The band first gained exposure with the release of their sing ...
, taken from the band's 2011 EP, '' It's Time'', their major label debut EP, ''
Continued Silence ''Continued Silence EP'' is the fifth EP by American rock band Imagine Dragons, released on February 14, 2012 by KIDinaKORNER and Interscope Records. It was recorded at Westlake Recording Studios. All songs were written by Imagine Dragons and pr ...
'', as well as their major debut studio album, '' Night Visions'' (2012). The song's production is handled by
Brandon Darner Brandon Darner is an American record producer, songwriter and musician. He has produced albums for a number of artists, including Imagine Dragons, To My Surprise, and his own alternative rock band, The Envy Corps among others. Darner is a foundi ...
, and its lyrics describe the narrator's resistance to change in the face of great turmoil. The single was created prior to the recruitment of Daniel Platzman, and also prior to the departure of Andrew and Brittany Tolman. The song was first uploaded to YouTube on December 20, 2010, but did not receive an official single release until 2012. After the song was covered on '' Glee'' and heavy rotation in commercials and television shows, the song received commercial success and reached number 15 on the ''Billboard'' Hot 100, making it the band's first Top 40 single, as well as number four on the
Alternative Songs Alternative Airplay (formerly known as Modern Rock Tracks (1988–2009) and Alternative Songs (2009–2020)) is a music chart in the United States that has appeared in ''Billboard'' magazine since September 10, 1988. It ranks the 40 most-played ...
chart and number three on the Rock Songs chart. With 32 weeks, it had the longest run on the Alternative Songs Top 10 in 2012. The single reached the top 10 in Austria (#6), Czech Republic (#10), Ireland (#9), India (#17)
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(#7), ''Billboard'' Pop Songs (#10), and Portugal (#6) and peaked at number 23 in the United Kingdom. It was certified Platinum by the
RIAA The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) is a trade organization that represents the music recording industry in the United States. Its members consist of record labels and distributors that the RIAA says "create, manufacture, and/o ...
and CRIA, and Platinum by the ARIA. It was also nominated for
Best Rock Video The MTV Video Music Award for Best Rock was first given out in , one of the four original genre categories added to the VMAs that year. In its first year, the award was called Best Heavy Metal Video, and from 1990 to 1995, it was renamed Best Meta ...
at the
2012 MTV Video Music Awards The 2012 MTV Video Music Awards, hosted by Kevin Hart, took place on Thursday, September 6, 2012, honoring the best music videos from the previous year. The awards were broadcast from the Staples Center arena at L.A. Live in Downtown Los Angeles. ...
.


Background

Dan Reynolds told '' The Huffington Post'' about the writing process for the song:
There's so many times you wake up at 3 a.m., grab a recorder on the iPhone and say something - a lyrical idea or melody - and then you lay it out in logic later on and sometimes it makes no sense. We sat with 'It's Time' for a year or year-and-a-half. Sometimes you just have to let a song sit for awhile. There's just something really special about it. I wrote it during a very hard time in my life. I had dropped out of college, and I was just sitting down at my computer, and I came up with this rhythm. And the words just wrote themselves. I knew I had something special coming. When a song is most honest and most raw that’s when you know you’re doing something right. A lot of my favorite artists are able to be in touch with their problems and put it through melodies. It happens all the time with bands."


Music video

The music video debuted on April 17, 2012, on all
MTV MTV (Originally an initialism of Music Television) is an American cable channel that launched on August 1, 1981. Based in New York City, it serves as the flagship property of the MTV Entertainment Group, part of Paramount Media Networks, a di ...
affiliates and the band was named PUSH Artist of the Week and later featured on PUSH Live. A first teaser released March 28, 2012. The video also reached #1 on Yahoo Music's Top Videos. The video starts with the band walking through a barren wasteland beneath a dark and ominous looking sky. The sky begins to grow more turbulent as the band walks past flags and boat wreckage, a destroyed bridge, and dead trees. Bassist McKee opens a box he has been carrying and a pale light glows from within. The band removes a pebble-sized, glowing orb from the box. The band members dig a hole for it with their hands, and then drop the orb into the ground. Lead singer Dan Reynolds then shouts, and in the next scene the band members are shown running away from their dig site. A large explosion throws Reynolds into the air where he seems to levitate (similarly to the ''
Continued Silence ''Continued Silence EP'' is the fifth EP by American rock band Imagine Dragons, released on February 14, 2012 by KIDinaKORNER and Interscope Records. It was recorded at Westlake Recording Studios. All songs were written by Imagine Dragons and pr ...
'' album cover). Finally, the sky begins to part and the sunlight shines through. The music video was produced by Todd Makurath and directed by Anthony Leonardi III. Ian Clemmer, who created some of the visual effects, wrote on his website that he "was asked to create big, large scale smoke explosions in a short amount of time, these are the end shots of the video ...." About 2 months after the original music video, another one was created for the Jailbreaks remix.


Usage in media

*Voted by '' Entertainment Weekly'' readers #8 on "The Best Singles of 2012". *Featured in BYUtv's '' AUDIO-FILES'' pilot episode about the band'' *Featured in ''
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'' in the series finale episode ''
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'' *Featured in the theatrical trailer for the 2012 film adaptation of the 1999 coming-of-age novel '' The Perks of Being a Wallflower''. * The song was featured in the "Explorer TOP 125" ad for the
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. * The song was used in the long ending montage on Sky Sports after England won the Ashes Series in 2013 * The song was used for promotional clip for French television channel D8. * In 2012, Darren Criss (as his character Blaine Anderson) covered "It's Time" in the season 4
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of the musical TV series '' Glee''. The song also charted on the ''Billboard'' Hot 100 at #15 as well as the
Canadian Hot 100 The Canadian Hot 100 is a music industry record chart in Canada for songs, published weekly by '' Billboard'' magazine. The Canadian Hot 100 was launched on the issue dated March 31, 2007, and is currently the standard record chart in Canada; a n ...
at #30. * The song is frequently used in the background in the British observational documentary series '' Gogglebox''. * The song is used in commercials of the Chilean telecommunications company VTR.


Live performances

On July 16, 2012, Imagine Dragons performed "It's Time" on '' The Tonight Show with Jay Leno''. They also performed the song live on ''
Jimmy Kimmel Live! ''Jimmy Kimmel Live!'' is an American late-night talk show, created and hosted by Jimmy Kimmel, broadcast on American Broadcasting Company, ABC. The nightly hour-long show debuted on January 26, 2003, at Hollywood Masonic Temple in Hollywood, Los ...
'' on September 4, 2012 and on '' Conan'' on January 9, 2013. They also performed the song on ''
Late Night with Jimmy Fallon ''Late Night with Jimmy Fallon'' is an American late-night talk show hosted by comedian Jimmy Fallon. About pag ...
'' on October 29, 2012, notable for being broadcast during Hurricane Sandy. As a result, they performed the song to an empty audience, with only the cast and crew of Late Night being present. The band also performed and singer Dan Reynolds was interviewed on Norwegian and Swedish television show ''
Skavlan ''Skavlan'' was a Norwegian-Swedish television talk show hosted by Norwegian journalist Fredrik Skavlan. It premiered in Sweden on Sveriges Television (SVT) in January 2009, and the first guests to appear on the show were former Prime Minister o ...
'' on February 1, 2013. Imagine Dragons plays "It's Time" at its live concerts, and although it's a "bigger single", the band plays it early in their set list rather than last, as might be expected. On December 5, 2014, the group played an acoustic version at the end of The Game Awards ( the inaugural ceremonies of said award show), with Nintendo composer
Koji Kondo is a Japanese music composer, pianist, and music director who works for the video game company Nintendo. He is best known for his numerous contributions to the '' Super Mario'' and ''The Legend of Zelda'' series of video games, among others pr ...
playing on the piano as part of a medley of music from '' The Legend of Zelda'' series.


Personnel

* Dan Reynolds – vocals * Wayne Sermon – guitar, mandolin * Ben McKee – bass guitar * Andrew Tolman – drums, backing vocals, acoustic rhythm guitar *Brittany Tolman – keyboard, backing vocals


Track listing


Charts


Weekly charts


Year-end charts


Decade-end charts


Certifications


Accolades


Release history


References

{{authority control Imagine Dragons songs 2012 debut singles Song recordings produced by Alex da Kid 2010 songs Kidinakorner singles Interscope Records singles Songs written by Wayne Sermon Songs written by Dan Reynolds (musician) Songs written by Daniel Platzman Songs written by Ben McKee