Hand in My Pocket

"Hand in My Pocket" is a song written by Alanis Morissette and Glen Ballard, and produced by Ballard for Morissette's third album, Jagged Little Pill (1995). It was released as the album's second single in 1995 (see 1995 in music) and became Morissette's second number-one hit on Billboard ' s U.S. Modern Rock Tracks chart. "Hand in My Pocket" also received substantial airplay on pop radio, reaching the top five on the Top 40 Mainstream chart, but its success in the United Kingdom was limited.

Track listing

 * 1) "Hand in My Pocket" – 3:39
 * 2) "Head over Feet" (live acoustic) – 4:09
 * 3) "Not the Doctor" (live acoustic) – 3:57

2005 acoustic version
In 2005, Morissette released Jagged Little Pill Acoustic, an acoustic version of Jagged Little Pill. "Hand in My Pocket" was its first U.S. single, and its video premiered in July 2005 (see 2005 in music).

Music video
The single's video features Morissette among a homecoming parade and was filmed in black-and-white and slow motion. It was directed by Mark Kohr.

Track listing

 * 1) "Hand in My Pocket" (live acoustic)

Popular culture
"Hand in My Pocket" served as the theme song in the unaired pilot episode of the television show Dawson's Creek, but Morissette decided not to have it used as the theme after the show was picked up.

Rhyming structure
The chorus of "Hand in My Pocket" utilized a poetry technique, "rhyme juxtaposition" (utilized by authors such as Lewis Carroll and musicians such as Bob Dylan and John Lennon), as its primary lyrical structure, as exemplified by the off-set coupling of the first and second stanzas of each chorus. In the first chorus for example, "fine, fine, fine" is coupled with "a high five", when it should, according to traditional rhyming schemes, be instead set against the "a peace sign" which closes the third chorus, and which is in turn, coupled with a first line ending with the phrase, "a cigarette", which is a clear rhyme with the end of the second chorus: "out just yet". While Morissette does not carry the scheme consistently throughout the song (there are, for instance, no rhymes for "hailing a taxicab" or "playing the piano"), it is, nonetheless, a fairly sophisticated literary device.

Covers and parodies
The song was covered by Rolf Harris on his 1997 album Can you tell what it is yet. It was parodied by ' Rockin Jock' but credit for this parody, 'Trouble', is usually wrongly accredited to Billy Connolly under the title 'Evil Scotsman'. The song has also been parodied by Amateur Transplants on the album Fitness to Practice as part of the song "Snippets". It was also covered by alt-country band The Cowlicks on their album Psychedelic Service Station. American Idol contestant Crystal Bowersox covered the song as a short cut in an early round of her Idol performances.