"Celebrity Skin" is the tenth single by American alternative rock bandHole, released on September 1, 1998 by DGC Records. It is the debut single from their third studio albumof the same name and is Hole's most commercially successful single, being the only one to reach number one on the US Modern Rock Tracks chart. In October 2011, NME placed it at number 126 on its list "150 Best Tracks of the Past 15 Years".
Composition
Music and arrangements
The song was written and recorded in 1997 after Hole's reported hiatus in 1996 due to frontwoman Courtney Love's rising movie career. According to Love, cowriter Billy Corgan wrote the song's main guitar riff during his time at the Celebrity Skin sessions.
Lyrics
The lyrics, written by Love, contain several literary references; the line "Oh, look at my face / My name is might-have-been" is directly lifted from the opening verse of Dante Gabriel Rossetti's poem, "A Superscription," while the phrase "pound of flesh" originates from William Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice. Commenting on the theme of celebrity, Love said: "Once you've stood onstage bleating your schoolgirl poetry, are you going to stay there, when you have the power and ability to give yourself a platform? I mean, here's the celebrity, and we all know it's stupid and ephemeral, but why not foster it? Why not feed it? Because all that it will do is give the thing that has substance – the art – more power." The song's title shares the name of an independent pornographic magazine of the same name showing celebrity nudity, as well as a short-lived punk rock group from Los Angeles that featured ex-Germs drummer Don Bolles. Love joked on Later... with Jools Holland in 1995 that the song was entitled "Celebrity Skin" "'cause touched a lot of it." Journalist Carrie Bell of Billboard noted in 1998 that the song dissects "the problem of maintaining an image and living in the public eye." Guitarist Eric Erlandson responded to this statement: "Courtney writes what she feels, and this is obviously one of her observations of Hollywood. We used this great hollow city as inspiration for the album."
Release
"Celebrity Skin" was released as the debut single of its eponymous album, Celebrity Skin, on September 1, 1998, reaching the top 10 of the BillboardModern Rock Tracks chart. It spent a total of 26 weeks on the Modern Rock Tracks chart, peaking at number 1 on October 10, 1998.
Critical response
NME referred to the track's musical elements as featuring a "balls-in-the-air guitar riff the size of Australia, and a production sheen that was the sonic equivalent of looking directly at the sun." James Hunter of Rolling Stone wrote of the song: "Hole are immediately in your face with the cheese-metal riffs and cuddly dissolves," deeming it "a track full of cloudless energy that seems to explode the malaise that has surrounded Love."
Music video
The music video for "Celebrity Skin" was directed by Nancy Bardawil. The video features the band performing the song on a stage, women wearing pink-purple ball gowns hanging from the ceiling and the women later lifting up their skirts as they amble around the stage. The video design bears resemblance to a key sequence in the Marilyn Monroe film Gentlemen Prefer Blondes. As well as performance footage, there are also a number of close-ups of Courtney Love and Melissa Auf der Maur lying in coffins. Patty Schemel, although still a member of the band at the time of shooting, does not appear in the video. Schemel was replaced by a lookalike and only informed a music video was planned after it was shot. The video was shot in black and white and the footage was colorized by Cerulean Fx in post-production.
Legacy
In 2011, NME ranked the song number 126 on a list of the "150 Best Tracks of the Last 15 Years." The song was used in the film American Pie, but did not appear on the soundtrack, as well as being featured in the intro of the video game NHL Rock The Rink, as well as the video games Rock Band and Sing Star as a playable track and downloadable content. The song received two Grammy nominations for Best Rock Song, losing to "Uninvited" by Alanis Morissette and Best Rock Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal, losing to "Pink" by Aerosmith. It also appeared in the 2011 family film Hop. In 2012, the song was performed by Heather Morris and Chord Overstreet in the Glee episode "Makeover" A line from the song inspired the alternative rock group Garbage to name their third album Beautiful Garbage. The song was used in the "lip sync for your life" segment on the third episode of the tenth season of RuPaul's Drag Race, where Love was a guest judge. In 2018 Love performed the song with Rockin'1000 in Florence being backed by 1500 musicians. The song plays during the end credits of the 2019 film Captain Marvel.
Formats and track listings
All songs written by Courtney Love, Eric Erlandson, and Billy Corgan except where noted. UK CD single
