Flagpole Sitta
by Harvey Danger
- 145
- BPM
- G major
- Key
- 9B
- Camelot
- 36
- Danceability
- 1
- Acousticness
Harvey Danger recorded "Flagpole Sitta" in June 1996 at John and Stu's Place in Seattle, during the sessions for Where Have All the Merrymakers Gone? Drummer Evan Sult said the song was written in response to the Seattle music scene of the 1990s and its effect on mainstream culture. The title came from the 1930 Marx Brothers film Animal Crackers, which has a line about the pole-sitting fad of the 1920s. The band spelled it "sitta" after Pavement's "Fame Throwa" and the N.W.A album Straight Outta Compton.
The album came out in 1997 on the Arena Rock Recording Company and did not do much at first. Seattle station KNDD put the song into rotation. London Records sent a copy of the album to KROQ-FM in Los Angeles, where listeners responded. The band signed with Slash Records, a London subsidiary, and the single was reissued in April 1998.
It was officially serviced to US rock radio on April 27, 1998, and to contemporary hit radio on June 9. Trailers and TV spots for the film Disturbing Behavior used it. It reached No. 38 on the Hot 100 Airplay chart, No. 3 on Modern Rock Tracks and No. 9 on the Canadian RPM Alternative 30.
Flagpole Sitta runs at 145 BPM, the tempo of dubstep and trap counted in half time, and hardstyle. In classical terms it sits in allegro territory. A bar of 4/4 lasts 1.66 seconds, and a quarter-note delay is 414 ms. It is in G major, Camelot 9B, which shares its notes with E minor and mixes cleanly with C major and D major.
We use multiple sources as part of our online research for the song story including Wikipedia.