Five For Fighting's John Ondrasik On His New Song For 'Hawaii Five-O'
You've probably heard Five For Fighting (aka singer/songwriter John Ondrasik) in many different settings. It may have been in a film (The Blind Side, The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants) or maybe on a television show (Smallville or Dawson's Creek). If you follow hockey, you may even have heard him at an NHL game: Ondrasik is a hockey fanatic, and has performed at a couple of LA Kings games.
Now, Ondrasik is helping the CBS series Hawaii Five-O celebrate its one hundredth episode, which airs tonight (November 7). The song that he wrote for the occasion, "All For One," will air in its entirety on the episode.
"As a fan of the original show — I'm old enough to remember the original show," he says, referring to the show's original run from 1968 through 1980, "I was intrigued when [executive producer] Peter [Lenkov] pitched me on writing an original song for the 100th episode. He told me about his idea — they didn't have the script quite done yet. But I thought it was very unique, and he wanted a song that reflected the, as he would say, "ohana" vibe of his show—the family vibe. And I thought I could do that. I sat down at the piano and wrote a song that talked about the relationship these characters had formed."
Of course, Hawaii Five-O boasts one of the most iconic theme songs of any television show, ever. Was there any temptation to bring a surf vibe to his music?