Girls (The 1975 song)

"Girls" is a song by English rock band the 1975, released as the fourth single from their self-titled debut album. A music video for "Girls" was released on 23 October 2013 and the song was released on 11 November.

"Girls"
Single by the 1975
from the album The 1975
Released	11 November 2013 (2013-11-11)
Genre	Pop rock[1][2] funk[3] pop[3]
Length	4:15
Label	Dirty Hit
Songwriter(s)	Matthew Healy George Daniel Adam Hann Ross MacDonald
Producer(s)	Matthew Healy George Daniel Adam Hann Ross MacDonald Mike Crossey
The 1975 singles chronology
"Sex" (2013) "Girls" (2013) "Settle Down" (2014)
Music video
"Girls" on YouTube

Music video

The official music video for "Girls" was released on 23 October 2013.^[4] It follows the video for "Sex", which changed the art style of the band's music videos that were originally monochrome. Rather than reverting to the black-and-white style, the band decided to continue making music videos in color. Speaking about the music video, lead singer and guitarist Matty Healy said:

When we released our last video ['Sex'], people really reacted to the fact that it was in colour. There was a lot of conjecture and talk surrounding it – due to the fact that it was an unexpected stylistic change. It was brought to our attention that certain people thought we were 'conforming to a record company's wishes' along with other expected and unexpected clichés. Obviously this couldn't be further from the truth, we are lucky enough to be surrounded by a group of individuals whose mantra centres on facilitating our creative wishes, we found the whole idea of us being told what to do fascinating. The story of the band who suffer at the hands of a record label shortly after a delirious rise is a tale as old as time. So we kinda wanted to make a tongue-in-cheek video about it. Twinned with our love of '80s pop, its innocence, grandiosity and conceptual ideas in music videos – we wanted to make a video about a record label's attempt at enforced conformity. We got our mate Adam down to a studio in Los Angeles at the start of our USA tour, got four models and made a video about us not wanting to make a video.^[5]

Other versions

In 2017, musician Cameron Hurley, under the alias new.wav, released a cover version of "Girls" in style of Blink-182. This iteration attracted press from NME and Alternative Press, among others, and was shared on Twitter by both Healy and Blink's Mark Hoppus; Healy wrote, "I'm in love."^[6][7]

Track listing

UK promotional single

No.	Title	Length
1.	"Girls" (Radio edit)	3:37
2.	"Girls" (Instrumental)	3:37
3.	"Girls" (Album version)	4:15
Total length:		8:43

Personnel

Adapted from liner notes.^[8]

Matthew Healy – vocals, guitar, songwriter, producer Adam Hann – guitar, songwriter, producer George Daniel – drums, songwriter, producer Ross MacDonald – bass guitar, songwriter, producer

Additional personnel Mike Crossey – producer Mike Spink – engineer Robin Schmidt – mastering

Charts

Weekly charts Chart (2013–14) Peak position Belgium (Ultratip Bubbling Under Flanders)[9] 13 Czech Republic (Singles Digitál Top 100)[10] 62 Denmark (Tracklisten)[11] 3 Scotland (OCC)[12] 42 Slovakia (Singles Digitál Top 100)[13] 67 UK Singles (OCC)[14] 45 US Bubbling Under Hot 100 (Billboard)[15] 19 US Hot Rock & Alternative Songs (Billboard)[16] 12 US Pop Airplay (Billboard)[17] 28

Year-end charts Chart (2014) Position US Hot Rock Songs (Billboard)[18] 66

Certifications

Region	Certification	Certified units/sales
United Kingdom (BPI)[19]	Platinum	600,000‡
United States (RIAA)[20]	Platinum	1,000,000‡
‡ Sales+streaming figures based on certification alone.

Release history

Region	Date	Format	Label
United Kingdom[21]	11 November 2013	Contemporary hit radio	Dirty Hit
Italy[22]	7 March 2014		Universal
United States[23]	15 July 2014		Vargant Interscope

See also

• The 1975 discography
• List of songs by Matty Healy