Wheatus — "Teenage Dirtbag"

Brendan B. Brown, frontman of Wheatus, wrote "Teenage Dirtbag" about the summer of 1984, when he was ten years old on Long Island. That summer, the Ricky Kasso murder — a killing the press covered as a Satanic, drug-fueled ritual — happened in the woods behind his house, and Kasso was arrested wearing an AC/DC T-shirt. Suddenly a kid carrying a tape case full of AC/DC, Iron Maiden, and Metallica had parents, teachers, and cops treating him like a Satan worshipper. The chorus is his defiance, sixteen years delayed. Wheatus recorded it in February and March of 2000 and released it as their debut single that June 20 on Columbia, leading off their self-titled album.

At home it peaked at number seven on Billboard's Modern Rock chart — respectable, not a phenomenon. Abroad it was a monster: four weeks at number one in Australia, where it finished as the second-best-selling single of 2000 and went triple platinum; number one in Austria and Flanders; number two in the UK, where it was still accumulating certifications a quarter-century later (quadruple platinum as of 2024). By 2014 it had sold five million copies worldwide. The video — built around the 2000 film Loser, which features the song — stars Jason Biggs as the nerdy narrator and Mena Suvari as the dream girl who unexpectedly produces those Iron Maiden tickets, prom-night dance included.

And it keeps coming back: a 2022 TikTok revival handed "Teenage Dirtbag" to yet another generation of self-declared outsiders. The story Brown's father told him about the song's endurance holds up — everyone goes through the outsider thing, so the song never runs out of teenagers.