Filter: The Story of 'Take a Picture'

The embarrassing story of Filter's take a picture .

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I cite my sources and they may differ than other people's accounts, so I don't guarantee the actual accuracy of my videos.

Filter ‘Take a Picture’

Prior to forming the band Filter in the early 90’s Richard Patrick would play guitar in the band Nine Inch Nails. While Trent Reznor would lead the band, Patrick would play on their debut album, appear in their early music videos and tour with the band over the course of 4 years from 1989 to 1993. After leaving Nine Inch Nails Patrick would go to form Filter and while they would have a good deal in the success in the 90’s they hit some turbulent times. Those turbulent times would inspire the band’s biggest hit ‘Take a Picture.’ Let’s explore the history of the song in today’s video. .

Living in Cleveland in the 80’s Richard Patrick become a member of the city’s music scene playing in a nu-wave band called The Act. He would soon have a chance meeting with another local musician named Trent Reznor at a music store who was playing a new wave pop act called Exotic Birds. Reznor would soon start his own band forming Nine Inch Nails and nabbed a deal with TVT Records who put out the band’s debut record Pretty Hate Machine in 1989. Patrick would join Nine Inch Nails make a brief appearance on the record on the track Sanctified and toured with the band staying with the group until 1993. Despite being part of a multiplatinum band, Patrick was dirt poor making $400 a month as a hired hand. It was at this point he had come up with a 4 song demo and left the band and soon signed his own recording contract with Atlantic owned Reprise Records taking Nine Inch Nails programmer Brian Leisgang with him.

In 1995 Filter would release their debut album Short Bus that would go platinum thanks to the single Hey Man Nice Shot. Four years would go by until the band released their follow up, 1999’s Title of Record. The long time between releases was attributed to a few factors.

Brian Leisgang left the group around 1997 after creative differences with Patrick
Drummer Matt Walker left and joined the smashing pumpkins to replace fired drummer Jimmy Chamberlin
Richard Patrick had spent a good deal of time building his own studio.

By Patrick’s own admission he wanted to always be in a band and not just have a group of hired hands. He would tell Spin ‘the only person talking to me was my girlfriend. I got so unbelievably depressed.” His first true love according to the magazine soon broke up with him. It would result in the track i’m not the only one. Touring members ,s guitarist Geno Lenardo, bassist Frank Cavanagh would take a bigger role in songwriting for the band’s second album named- Title of Record.


With Title of Record Filter didn’t want to repeat the sound of the band’s first album with frontman richard patrick telling billboard We had to goals in mind - make something for the fans and make something we are proud of. Something that shows our growth. Short-bus was a tall punk rock black record but it’s very early 20’s and juvenile sounding. ‘Title’ takes people to a new place with a ton of hills and valleys. The album would feature of course more electronic music, bombastic, acoustic and 70’s era sounding songs.

The lyrics on the group’s second album also took on a more serious tone with Patrick telling billboard “i think i took lyrics more seriously this time around as well. A lot of them are based on everyday things that happened in my life like breaking up with a girlfriend, getting angry or feeling like i’ve lost control of my life.I am the mouthpiece of this band and I’m always trying to answer the questions I have about life.

Title of Record would be another success thanks to the single Take a Picture which became Filter’s biggest hit to date peaking at number 12 on the billboard hot 100 charts. The album also produced another hit in welcome to the fold resulting in the album going platinum. Lenardo would tell billboard about the band’ s change in sound on the second album saying ‘everybody was expecting another hey man nice shot and we went in the complete opposite direction…some people probably felt alienated and they shouldn’t a good song is a good song. It doesn’t matter if we play it harder or softer or use distortion or not.