"One of Us" is a song recorded by American singer Joan Osborne for her debut studio albumRelish. Written by Eric Bazilian of The Hooters and produced by Rick Chertoff, the song was released on February 21, 1995 as Osborne's debut single and lead single from Relish, and it became a hit in November of that year, peaking at number four on the US Billboard Hot 100 and earning three Grammy nominations. "One of Us" was also a big hit around the globe, topping the charts in Australia, Belgium, Canada and Sweden, reaching number six on the UK Singles Chart and becoming a top 20 hit in at least thirteen other countries.
Background
Regarding his experience with "One of Us", Bazilian said, "I wrote that song one night — the quickest song I ever wrote — to impress a girl. Which worked, because we're married and have two kids. But we were in the middle of writing Joan's album, which was a group effort with Rick Chertoff and Joan and Rob and I, and I did a demo of 'One of Us,' this wacky little demo which I ended up putting as a hidden track on the CD of my first solo record, and I played for them. And it really hadn't even occurred to me that it was something that Joan might do, but Rick, in his wisdom, asked Joan if she thought she could sing it. And I think it was better that he asked it that way rather than 'Do you want to sing it?' Because the answer to that might not have been yes. But she definitely said she could sing it, and we did a little live demo of a guitar and her singing it. And when I got into my car and popped the cassette in, I started practicing the Grammy speech that I should've gotten to give." For the lead and solo, Bazilian used his 1954 Gibson Gold Top Les Paul for the studio recording.
Lyrics
The song deals with various aspects of belief in God by asking questions inviting the listener to consider how one might relate to God, such as "Would you call to his face?" or "Would you want to see if seeing meant that you would have to believe in things like heaven and in Jesus and the saints and all the prophets?" The album version starts off with the first four lines of a recording titled "The Aeroplane Ride", made on October 27, 1937, by American folklorist Alan Lomax and his wife Elizabeth for the Archive of American Folk Song at the Library of Congress, with Mrs. Nell Hampton of Salyersville, Kentucky, singing a variation of the 1928 John S. McConnell hymn "Heavenly Aeroplane".
Critical reception
called the song "a simple, direct statement of faith, honest and unadorned, one framed in a near-perfect chorus and delectable Neil Young-ish guitar riff". In 2007, the song was ranked at number 54 on VH1's "100 Greatest Songs of the '90s" and number ten on the network's "40 Greatest One Hit Wonders of the '90s".
Bob Rivers wrote the parody "What If God Smoked Cannabis?" in 1997. A less well-known parody with the same title but different lyrics was produced in 1995 by Cincinnati radio station WEBN.
Indiana Gregg included a cover of this song on her album Woman at Work.
