"Innocent" is a song by Canadian

alternative rock Alternative rock (also known as alternative music, alt-rock or simply alternative) is a category of rock music that evolved from the independent music underground of the 1970s. Alternative rock acts achieved mainstream success in the 1990s w ...

band

Our Lady Peace Our Lady Peace (sometimes shortened to OLP) is a Canadian alternative 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 guit ...

. Written by lead vocalist

Raine Maida Raine Maida ( ; born Michael Anthony Maida; February 18, 1970) – Ourladypeace.cc. Retrieved April 30, 2010. is a Canadian musician best known as being the lead vocalist and primary songwriter of the alternative rock band Our Lady Peace. He ha ...

, it was released in August 2002 as the second single from the band's fifth studio album, ''

Gravity In physics, gravity (), also known as gravitation or a gravitational interaction, is a fundamental interaction, a mutual attraction between all massive particles. On Earth, gravity takes a slightly different meaning: the observed force b ...

''. It reached the top 40 on two US ''

Billboard A billboard (also called a hoarding in the UK and many other parts of the world) is a large outdoor advertising structure (a billing board), typically found in high-traffic areas such as alongside busy roads. Billboards present large advertis ...

'' rock charts, as well as on the

New Zealand Singles Chart The Official Aotearoa Music Charts, formerly the Official New Zealand Music Chart (), is the weekly New Zealand top 40 singles and albums charts, issued weekly by Recorded Music NZ (formerly Recording Industry Association of New Zealand). The M ...

Background and writing

Maida said in 2002 that "Innocent" was one of his favorite songs from ''Gravity''. "I wrote this song over a year ago and I was originally hesitant to play it for the band, but once we got into the studio and began working with Bob we were able to make it an Our Lady Peace song."Anon (2002)
"Bio"
Ourladypeace.com at the Internet Archive. Retrieved September 19, 2009 According to Maida, the song's title was originally "Arrogant" and it had different lyrics. The producer, Bob Rock, made him rewrite most of the songs from ''Gravity'' in order to make them more accessible and easier to understand.

Content

The song is about young people who are going through a difficult phase in their lives, namely Johnny, who wants to be a famous musician but struggles with writing songs, and Tina, who is insecure about her body and appearance. The song refers to the legendary rock musicians

John Lennon John Winston Ono Lennon (born John Winston Lennon; 9 October 19408 December 1980) was an English singer-songwriter, musician and activist. He gained global fame as the founder, co-lead vocalist and rhythm guitarist of the Beatles. Lennon's ...

and

Kurt Cobain Kurt Donald Cobain (February 20, 1967 – ) was an American musician. He was the lead vocalist, guitarist, primary songwriter, and a founding member of the grunge band Nirvana (band), Nirvana. Through his angsty songwriting and anti-establis ...

Recording

Local school children in Hawaii sang backing vocals on the chorus of the song. Before

Mike Turner Michael Ray Turner (born January 11, 1960) is an American politician serving as the United States House of Representatives, U.S. representative from since 2013. A member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party, he was previous ...

left the band, he recorded the rhythm guitar for this track. It was later interlaced with Steve Mazur's guitar playing for the final recording, but Turner's style of playing is still recognizable.

Music video

The music video for "Innocent" was filmed on August 31, 2002, in

Syracuse Syracuse most commonly refers to: * Syracuse, Sicily, Italy; in the province of Syracuse * Syracuse, New York, USA; in the Syracuse metropolitan area Syracuse may also refer to: Places * Syracuse railway station (disambiguation) Italy * Provi ...

Los Angeles Los Angeles, often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, most populous city in the U.S. state of California, and the commercial, Financial District, Los Angeles, financial, and Culture of Los Angeles, ...

New Orleans New Orleans (commonly known as NOLA or The Big Easy among other nicknames) is a Consolidated city-county, consolidated city-parish located along the Mississippi River in the U.S. state of Louisiana. With a population of 383,997 at the 2020 ...

and a school parking lot in

Toronto Toronto ( , locally pronounced or ) is the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, most populous city in Canada. It is the capital city of the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Ontario. With a p ...

. It shows the band performing in an alley while showing people going through various struggles. The video won two

MuchMusic Video Awards The iHeartRadio Much Music Video Awards were an annual awards show broadcast annually on Much (TV channel), Much from 1990 to 2018, and Fuse (TV channel), Fuse from 2010 to 2013 that honoured the year's best music videos. Originally debuting in ...

in 2003, including "Best Video".

Track listing

Canadian CD single # "Innocent" (album version) – 3:42 # "Whatever" (live) – 4:00

Charts

Weekly charts

Year-end charts

Release history

References

{{Authority control 2002 singles 2002 songs Columbia Records singles Epic Records singles Our Lady Peace songs Song recordings produced by Bob Rock Songs written by Raine Maida