New Radicals: Why did Biden pick band for inauguration?

Band will play ‘You Get What You Give’ for first time in 22 years

New Radicals are set to reunite for a performance of their 1998 hit “You Get What You Give” at Joe Biden’s inauguration parade.

For the first time since splitting in 1999, the band will publicly play their chart-topping single for the virtual “Parade Across America” event taking place today (20 January).

The ceremony marks Biden and vice president-elect Kamala Harris’s arrival in office.

But why did the pair pick the band to perform this song?

As highlighted by Rolling Stone, Biden’s 2017 autobiography, Promise Me, Dad, reveals that “You Get What You Give” became the family’s“theme song” during his son Beau’s battle with cancer.

“During breakfast, Beau would often make me listen to what I thought was his theme song, ‘You Get What You Give’ by the New Radicals,” Biden wrote in the book. 

He continued: “Even though Beau never stopped fighting and his will to live was stronger than most – I think he knew that this day might come. The words to the song are: ‘This whole damn world can fall apart. You’ll be OK, follow your heart.’”

Beau, who served as the attorney general of Delaware from 2007 until 2015, died from brain cancer on 30 May 2015 when he was 46.

At the funeral, Beau was awarded the Legion of Merit Award for his services in Iraq.

New Radicals frontman Gregg Alexander said: “Performing the song again after such a long time is a huge honour because we all have deep respect for Beau’s military service and such high hopes for the unity and normalcy Joe and Kamala will bring our country again in this time of crisis.”

Meanwhile, Harris's husband, the lawyer Doug Emhoff, chose the track as his “walk-on” song for every appearance he made during his wife's 2020 campaign.