Ethan Hawke directed this video!!
If you were alive in the ‘90s and have been exposed to media (which I’m guessing you all are because you’re reading this blog about music), you probably heard the song “Stay” from Lisa Loeb. You may not know who Lisa Loeb is, but the song is unmistakably a top hit from the ‘90s.
Lisa does owe her big breakthrough to none other than Ethan Hawke (and perhaps her signature look of snazzy tortoise shell glasses). Yup, the two were buddies and met through mutual friends in the theater community in New York City. In fact, Ethan Hawke directed the one-take no-edit video at the beginning of this post. But back to the beginning of Lisa’s career. She gave Ethan a version of “Stay”, and Ethan passed it on to his people, and the rest is history. Girl knew how to network!
To be precise, Lisa’s hit “Stay” was released in 1994, reached Gold Status three months after, and was featured on Ben Stiller’s movie Reality Bites. The song went on to hit number one on the American music charts. Her other songs are also credited on TV shows like Family Guy, Grey’s Anatomy, Dawson’s Creek, Party of Five and Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Oftentimes she even makes cameo appearances on TV shows. Back when I was still watching Gossip Girl, Lisa performed “Stay” near the end of season one.
What’s even more impressive is that Lisa is the first artist to even hit the Hot 100 before getting signed on to any record label. Lisa also got a Grammy nom for her album Firecracker. In 2004, she released her album The Way It Really Is, and although it did not receive as much commercial success as her previous work, it still got critical recognition.
Source: newspaper.li
Nowadays Lisa is less in the limelight, but she sure isn’t running out of projects. She’s written children’s music and books, designed for the Lisa Loeb Eyewear collection (umm, awesome!), and launched the Camp Lisa Foundation to help underprivileged kids attend summer camp, did a few reality shows (like with her then-bf Dweezil on Dweezil & Lisa on the Food Network). And you know what’s super cool? She’s the voice of Mary Jane Watson in Spider-Man: The New Animated Series and lent her voice to a few other animated shows and movies, too. I’m pretty jealous about that last bit.