Days Go By (Dirty Vegas song)

"Days Go By"
Single by Dirty Vegas
from the album Dirty Vegas
Released	April 30, 2001
Recorded	2001
Genre	Electronica, dance, house, Nu-Disco
Length	7:07 (album version) 3:33 (radio edit)
Label	Capitol
Writer(s)	Victoria Horn, Steve Smith
Dirty Vegas singles chronology
"Days Go By" (2001) "Ghosts" (2002)

"Days Go By" is a 2001 song by the English electronic band Dirty Vegas from their eponymous album. The song became a radio hit in 2002, peaking at #14 in the U.S., and received the Grammy Award for Best Dance Recording. It also peaked at #16 in Dirty Vegas' home country of the United Kingdom ^[1] "Days Go By" received significant public exposure in a commercial for the 2003 Mitsubishi Eclipse. The album artwork is done by American artist Richard Phillips [1].

Music video

The music video for the song is unusual in that it largely consists of two dancers representing one character performing a routine of popping, locking, the robot and breakdancing. The performance occurs in front of Chroni's Famous Sandwich Shop in East Los Angeles, California, and tells the story of a dancer who shows up once a year and dances all day from sunrise to sunset. He dances in hopes of bringing back a lost love, who left him because he couldn't stop dancing. (The video even halts abruptly while some of the bystanders interject what they think happened to the aforementioned love.) The young dancer in the video is Garland Spencer. The older dancer is Byron McIntyre. The clue that both men represent the same character at different ages is provided by the dancer's shoes. The older dancer wears high-top Converse sneakers ("Chuck Taylor All-Stars" or "Chucks") that are faded, scuffed, and one shoe is actually taped to hold it together; whereas the young dancer wears a clean, bright-red version of the same sneakers. According to the video's story, the man's lost love purchased the original sneakers for him as a gift, and now he wears them as part of his annual dance ritual. The sneakers match the style and attire of the young dancer in his sweatsuit (presumably in the 1980s), but pose a striking contrast for the older dancer who is otherwised attired in a suit, tie, and suspenders.

There are two versions of the music video; one has three of the onlookers observing from the restaurant while the other replaces those shots with shots of the same onlookers in a silver Mitsubishi Eclipse sitting at a stoplight. In addition to the replaced shots, the Eclipse version of the video includes footage of the approach to and departure from the stoplight. The implication in the Eclipse version is that the onlookers within the automobile arrived at the stoplight in the morning and remained in that same spot watching the dance ritual all day, before leaving the stoplight at sunset.

Official versions

• "Days Go By" (Album Version) - 7:07
• "Days Go By" (7" Mix) - 3:33
• "Days Go By" (Acoustic) - 2:43
• "Days Go By" (Full Vocal Mix) - 8:12

Appearances in popular culture

• The song was featured in a commercial for the 2003 Mitsubishi Eclipse. In the commercial, a man is driving the Eclipse while a woman (Dusty Paik) dances to the beat of the song in the passenger seat.
  • The Eclipse commercial was in turn parodied by a skit on Chappelle's Show in which Dave Chappelle is driving a car and the woman is dancing in the passenger seat. Dave says, "What the fuck are you doing?" (due to the weird moves she is making) and then leaves her by the side of the road. He then puts on some hip-hop music and a black woman sits in the passenger seat and starts dancing. Although this is a parody of the Eclipse commercial, the car actually used in the commercial was Dave's own Nissan 350Z.
• The song is featured in the rhythm game DDRMAX2 Dance Dance Revolution.
• This song also appears in the game Dance Central for the Kinect peripheral on the Xbox 360. The routine performed is similar to the one in the music video.

Chart positions

Chart (2002)	Peak position
Belgian (Flanders) Singles Chart	14
Canadian Singles Chart	6
New Zealand Singles Chart	27
Swiss Singles Chart	97
UK Singles Chart	16
U.S. Billboard Hot Dance Play	1
U.S. Billboard Hot 100	14

Preceded by Janet Jackson for All For You	Grammy Award for Best Dance Recording 2003	Succeeded by Kylie Minogue for Come Into My World
Preceded by "Soak Up the Sun" by Sheryl Crow	Billboard Hot Dance Club Play number-one single June 8, 2002	Succeeded by "Hella Good" by No Doubt

References

1. ^ "Days Go By". Songfacts.com. http://www.songfacts.com/detail.php?id=2340. Retrieved 2009-12-31.