How has the Internet affected the career of the American alternative rock band They Might Be Giants?
Combining a knack for infectious melodies with a quirky, bizarre sense of humor and a vaguely avant-garde aesthetic borrowed from the New York post-punk underground, They Might Be Giants became one of the most unlikely alternative success stories of the late ’80s and early ’90s. Musically, the duo of John Flansburgh and John Linnell borrowed from everywhere, but their freewheeling eclecticism was enhanced by their arcane, geeky sense of humor. They would reference everything from British Invasion to Tin Pan Alley, while making allusion to pulp fiction and President Polk. Through their string of indie releases and constant touring as a duo, They Might Be Giants built up a huge following on college campuses during the late ’80s, switching to a major label in the early ’90s. With support from MTV, 1990’s Flood became a gold album, and with it, the band began to reap commercial rewards, moving into the status of one of the most popular alternative bands before grunge. However, the group’s
As early as 1992, the band was sending news updates to their fans via Usenet newsgroups. In 1999, They Might Be Giants became the first major label recording artist to release an entire album exclusively in mp3 format. The album, Long Tall Weekend, is sold through Emusic. Also in 1999, the band contributed the song “Dr. Evil” to the motion picture Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me. Over their career, the band has performed on numerous movie and television soundtracks, including The Oblongs, the ABC News miniseries Brave New World and Ed and His Dead Mother. They also performed the theme music “Dog on Fire”, composed by Bob Mould, for The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. More recently, they composed and performed the music for the TLC series Resident Life, the theme song for the Disney Channel program Higglytown Heroes, and a song about the cartoon Courage the Cowardly Dog. Sources: http://en.wikipedia.
