Mr. Jones

“Counting Crows” is the third track from American alternative rock band Counting Crows and their debut album “August and Everything After”, which was released in 1993. “Mr. Jones” was written by band members David Bryson and Adam Durits, with production done by T-Bone Burnett.

“Mr. Jones” was Counting Crows’ first hit single, and the song the band ended up being most known for. According to member Adam Duritz in an interview in 2013, the song was named for his friend Marty Jones, but the song is actually referring to Duritz himself: “”I wrote a song about me, I just happened to be out with him [Marty Jones] that night”. According to Duritz, the inspiration for the song came as Duritz and Jones were drunk at a bar after watching Jones’ father perform, when they saw Kenney Dale Johnson, longtime drummer for the musician Chris Isaak, sitting with three women. “It just seemed like, you know, we couldn’t even manage to talk to girls, … we were just thinking if we were rock stars, it’d be easier. I went home and wrote the song,” Duritz said

The video was directed by Charles Wittenmeier and was released in 1993. The video was uploaded to YouTube in 2009, and shows the band singing the song in a living room, interloped with videos of a building and a woman dancing on stage in a red dress. As of August 2020, the video has over 181 million views and 675 thousand likes.

Release Date: 1st December 1993

Songwriter/s: David Bryson & Adam Duritz

Producer: T-Bone Burnett

Label: Geffen

Music Video Release Date: 1993

Music Video Director: Charles Wittenmeier

Chart Rankings & Awards: In its year of release, “Mr. Jones” charted at #13 in Australia, #27 in Austria, #45 in Belgium, #1 in Canada, #7 in France, #10 in Iceland, #42 in the Netherlands, #49 in New Zealand, #10 in Poland, #77 in Scotland, #28 in the UK, and #5, #25 and #2 on various US Billboard charts. In 1994, Counting Crows wont the “Best New Artist” award at the MTV Music Video Awards.

The lyrics to “Mr. Jones” can be accessed here: https://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/countingcrows/mrjones.html