I'd Do Anything was a single released by Simple Plan and appeared as track 1 on their debut album No Pads, No Helmets... Just Balls. This song is a little on the pop side of music (more than I usually care for being a punk/ska fan) but is still a definite keeper in my book.
Simple Plan had No Pads, No Helmets... Just Balls out for eight months before it ever pierced the Billboard charts. This breach can be greatly attributed to this song's release in single form. The song's popularity even spawned a ringtone for the cell phone endowed. Though it was their second single it was the release that boosted their fan base enormously. The music video for I'd Do Anything also took on the same flash fire fandom with its release on MTV. The video had a fantastic feel to it and was only further powered by the appearance of the band's friend and cameo vocals of Blink-182's Mark Hoppus. Billboard saw I'd Do Anything debut at #34 on the Billboard Top 40 at the end of January 2003 coinciding with the album jumping up 15 ranks on the album charts. Overall the album was pushed up over 100 ranks due to this single coupled with the band's intense tour schedule with Blink-182, Greenday, MxPx, and Bowling for Soup. By December of 2003, I'd Do Anything still retained the #51 position on the Billboard 200 with Simple Plan's Addicted and Perfect sitting pretty at ranks #45 and #24 respectively.
This song has carried some odd personal meanings for me. Simple Plan seems to be one of those bands with lyrics that sound so specific and yet specific to you. They work so well for so many different people regardless of an individual's love or disdain for punkesque music. I am surprised at how many people add this to their playlist after dramatic speeches professing hatred for this genre of music and spouting venomous rampages against Simple Plan. Running approximately 3:17, this punk-like song has some fantastic lyrics:
Another day is going by
I'm thinking about you all the time
Putting someone that special out of my mind regardless of the passage of time is impossible.
But you're out there
And I'm here waiting
Waiting for what? Ringing phones? Door knocks? Waiting for more waiting.
And I wrote this letter in my head
'Cuz so many things were left unsaid
The irony of not telling someone what they mean hardly speaks volumes.
But now you're gone
And I can't think straight
Hobbling through my daily life trying to consider so many other infinitely important factors of my world is hard enough without minute reminders that you are still gone.
This could be the one last chance
To make you understand
I'd do anything
Forget the poetic meaning, take the literal: anything.
Just to hold you in my arms
To try to make you laugh
The power of a memorable laugh is immeasurable. Crying from laughing and crying from loss can look the same and sometimes feel oddly the same.
Somehow I can't put you in the past
I'd do anything
Just to fall asleep with you
Will you remember me?
'Cuz I know
I won't forget you
How could I forget you? I built my world around you at one point. Is it even possible the value of my life in your life is even remotely close?
Together we broke all the rules
Dreaming of dropping out of school
And leave this place
To never come back
The plans that not only reinforced the perfect reality we lived in but perfect plans we laid to keep our lives intersecting for as long as we could hold on.
So now maybe after all these years
If you miss me have no fear
I'll be here
I'll be waiting
The important thing here to realize is no matter what has happened to drive any wedges of space or time between us; I'm not going anywhere.
This could be the one last chance to make you understand
And I just can't let you leave me once again
I close my eyes
And all I see is you
Mark's words here couldn't drive the point home with anymore intensity. If I could see more I wouldn't want to.
I close my eyes
I try to sleep
I can't forget you
The inner workings of my mind, heart, and life still try to intricately include you.
Nanana (....)
And I'd do anything for you
I'd do anything
To fall asleep with you
I'd do anything
There's nothing I won't do
I'd do anything
To fall asleep with you
I'd do anything
'Cuz I know
I won't forget you
I will never forget you.
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