You Oughta Know

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“You Oughta Know”
Single by Alanis Morissette from the album Jagged Little Pill
Released	1995
Format	CD single, cassette single, 12" single
Recorded	1995
Genre	Hard Rock, Alternative Rock, Post-Grunge
Length	4:09
Label	Maverick
Writer(s)	Alanis Morissette, Glen Ballard
Producer	Glen Ballard
Alanis Morissette singles chronology
"(Change Is) Never a Waste of Time" (1993) "You Oughta Know" (1995) "Hand in My Pocket" (1995)

"You Oughta Know" is a Grammy-winning song written by Alanis Morissette and Glen Ballard, and produced by Ballard for Morissette's third album Jagged Little Pill (1995). The song, the lyrics of which describe Morissette's fouled relationship with an unnamed lover, introduced her harsh, angst-ridden lyrics to the public.

[edit] History

The song reached number one on Billboard magazine's Modern Rock Tracks chart in the U.S. and charted at number four in Australia and number twenty-two in the United Kingdom. Launching Morissette's career, and the album, Jagged Little Pill, to the top, the coarse language, violent revenge scenarios, and piercing vocals were a jolt to mainstream pop music. "You Oughta Know" was not eligible for the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 in 1995 because a retail single was not released, but it reached number thirteen on the Hot 100 Airplay chart and the top ten on the Top 40 Mainstream chart. A live version of the song, recorded at the 1996 Grammy Awards ceremony on February 28, was a B-side on the retail single for "You Learn", and Billboard credited the single's Hot 100 number-six peak position to "You Learn"/"You Oughta Know".

Flea, from the band Red Hot Chili Peppers, played the bass on the song, while former Peppers member Dave Navarro played guitar; Taylor Hawkins, who became the drummer for the Foo Fighters in 1997, played drums. The music video was directed by Nick Egan and features a dimly lit Morissette hitchhiking across a desert. Morissette has reimagined the song numerous times, most recently on her 2005 album Jagged Little Pill Acoustic, which featured mellowed vocals and chord progressions; the lyrics, however, were not softened. It is widely considered Morissette's most recognizable song.^{[citation needed]}

It won two Grammy Awards, Best Rock Song and Best Female Rock Vocal Performance. Also was nominated for Song of the Year, losing to "Kiss from a Rose" by Seal, at the Grammy Awards of 1996.

[edit] Subject

A common rumor about the song is that it was written about Morissette's one-time boyfriend Dave Coulier of the television sitcom Full House. According to an ABC News Web article, ^[1] "Ex-girlfriend Alanis Morissette revealed that her angst-ridden hit 'You Oughta Know' was about her relationship with Coulier." The Urban Legends Reference Pages places this rumor in the context of the credence fans have given contradictory or demonstrably false accounts of songs' relationships to singers' lives,^[2] and in fact there are other celebrities who have been rumored to be the lover in the song, including:

• Bob Saget, Coulier's co-star on Full House^[2] (appearing on the Opie & Anthony show on June 28, 2006, Saget denied ever having a relationship with Morissette and tended to agree with speculation that the song was about Coulier)
• Hockey player Doug Gilmour of the Toronto Maple Leafs. When Keith Olbermann used to work for the ESPN program SportsCenter, he would say during Toronto highlights relating to Gilmour, "Here's this for Alanis's pain."^[2]
• Hockey player Mike Peluso of the New Jersey Devils (he played for the Ottawa Senators in 1992-93). ^[2]
• Actor Matt LeBlanc, who appeared in the video for Morissette's single "Walk Away" (1991)^[2]
• Musician Leslie Howe, the producer of Morissette's first two albums in the early 1990s^[2]

The topic of the song is discussed in an episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm. Morissette told star Larry David who the song is about (then David to a disappointed friend), but the audience never hears who Morissette said the song was about. In one of the Jay and Silent Bob promos created for MTV, Jay told Silent Bob that he was the boyfriend that inspired the song. Jay told the story of the break up, and after he finished Silent Bob wiped a tear from his eye while Jay laughed at him confessing to have been lying the whole time. Morissette appeared with the two as God, in the 1999 film Dogma.

On an AL-TV special "Weird Al" Yankovic joked that he and Morissette "used to date. I especially liked it when we went to the movies", a reference to the song's lyric about the singer performing oral sex in a theater. Yankovic also included the song in his polka medley "The Alternative Polka", on his 1996 album Bad Hair Day.

The mystery surrounding the song brought comparison to Carly Simon's "You're So Vain".

[edit] Charts

¹ "You Learn"/"You Oughta Know"

[edit] Notes