The Bad Penny (beta)

Fifteen years ago, yours truly – while serving as Editor of Santa Monica Patch, a hyper-local news website owned by AOL – was fortunate enough to rope in Art Alexakis, frontman for hit-single machine Everclear, for a special interview. The premise? Our conversation would revolve entirely around the alt-rock band’s biggest song, “Santa Monica,” and be conducted as we walked along Palisades Park, which overlooks the setting where the song took place and what inspired him to write it.

For such a seemingly simple, radio-friendly song, Alexakis revealed that there was a genuine, heartbreaking story behind it. He spared nary a detail about “Santa Monica” during our 90-minute journey together; while the song’s lyrics consist of about 300 words, our conversation – presented in its entirety here, for posterity’s sake – totaled more than 5,100 words.

Everclear completists and pop fans curious about the stories behind some of the best-known hits in the past three decades, prepare for a quasi-extension course revolving around a single song and taught by one of the best alt-rock lyricists of the ’90s. We’re rolling it out in celebration of the 30th anniversary of Sparkle and Fade, on which “Santa Monica” appears; the 15th anniversary of our interview with Alexakis; and as Everclear tour into early November in commemoration of the former anniversary.