Artist · chart history
The Donnas
Band Palo Alto United States Active 1992–2012
The Donnas formed in 1992 in Palo Alto, United States and was active until 2012. The Donnas has 31 chart appearances on 30 radio countdowns from 17 stations on RockLists, spanning 2002–2023. The most successful song on radio countdowns is “Take It Off”, which appears on 22 lists with a best position of #37. The station that charted The Donnas most often is CD101 (Columbus, OH), with 9 appearances. The artist’s biggest year on year-end countdowns was 2003.
The Donnas came out of Palo Alto having learned their rock and roll from the right records, Kiss, AC/DC, the Ramones, Girlschool, the Runaways and Bachman-Turner Overdrive, and they played it back louder and snottier than most of their heroes' imitators. Brett Anderson sang lead, Allison Robertson ripped out the guitar, Maya Ford played bass and Torry Castellano pounded the drums, with all 3 of them piling on backing vocals.
After their 1997 debut they spent the rest of the '90s building a cult following on the punk circuit, then jumped to Atlantic Records and the big leagues with Spend the Night in 2002. "Take It Off" is the one that busted through, a strutting come-on with a riff that sounds lifted off an old arena-rock stage, and "Too Bad About Your Girl" and "Who Invited You?" kept the party going. It's punk speed with metal crunch and classic rock swagger, and none of it takes itself too seriously. The band landed an MTV Video Music Award nomination for Best Group in 2003.
Gold Medal followed in 2004, and the moodier "Fall Behind Me" showed a little more polish on the attack. Castellano left in 2009 because of tendonitis and Amy Cesari took over behind the kit, and the band called it quits in 2012.
Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.
Songs by The Donnas on radio countdowns
| # | Song | Strength | Lists | Best | #1s | Peak year |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Take It Off | 22 | #37 | – | 2003 | |
| 2 | Fall Behind Me | 6 | #52 | – | 2004 | |
| 3 | Who Invited You? | 2 | #86 | – | 2003 | |
| 4 | Too Bad About Your Girl | 1 | #81 | – | 2003 |
Albums with charting songs
Where each song was first released, from MusicBrainz.
Year-end chart timeline
Combined year-end countdown points per year. Taller bars mean more songs placing higher across more stations.
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