"An Honest Mistake" is the debut single

Single (music)

In music, a single or record single is a type of release, typically a recording of fewer tracks than an LP or a CD. This can be released for sale to the public in a variety of different formats. In most cases, the single is a song that is released separately from an album, but it can still appear...

 by New York City

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

-based American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 indie

Indie (music)

In music, independent music, often shortened to indie music or "indie" is a term used to describe independence from major commercial record labels or their subsidiaries, and an autonomous, Do-It-Yourself approach to recording and publishing....

/alternative rock

Alternative rock

Alternative rock is a genre of rock music and a term used to describe a diverse musical movement that emerged from the independent music underground of the 1980s and became widely popular by the 1990s...

 band

Rock Band

Rock Band is a music video game developed by Harmonix Music Systems, published by MTV Games and Electronic Arts. It is the first title in the Rock Band series. The PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 versions were released in the United States on November 20, 2007, while the PlayStation 2 version was...

 The Bravery

The Bravery

The Bravery is an American rock band from New York City that consists of Sam Endicott , Michael Zakarin , John Conway , Mike Hindert , and Anthony Burulcich...

. The song is the lead track on the band's self-titled debut album The Bravery

The Bravery (album)

The Bravery is the self-titled debut album by New York alternative rock band The Bravery, released in March 2005. It peaked at #18 on the U.S. charts and at #5 on the U.K. charts....

as well. It was released in the UK

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

 on February 28, 2005 and charted as high as #7 in the UK Singles Chart

UK Singles Chart

The UK Singles Chart is compiled by The Official Charts Company on behalf of the British record-industry. The full chart contains the top selling 200 singles in the United Kingdom based upon combined record sales and download numbers, though some media outlets only list the Top 40 or the Top 75 ...

. The song was also featured on the soundtrack of the video game Burnout Revenge

Burnout Revenge

Burnout Revenge is the fourth video game in the Burnout series of racing games, released for the PlayStation 2 and Xbox on September 13, 2005 and Xbox 360 on March 7, 2006, alongside the PlayStation Portable and Nintendo DS title Burnout Legends....

(as a remix) and MVP Baseball 2005

MVP Baseball 2005

MVP Baseball 2005 is a baseball video game developed and published by Electronic Arts. It features former Boston Red Sox left fielder Manny Ramirez on its game cover. The game features full Major League Baseball, Minor League Baseball, and Major League Baseball Players Association licenses. It...

; in MVP, the song is listed as "Honest Mistake". The song is also featured in the video game True Crime: New York City

True Crime: New York City

True Crime: New York City is an urban sandbox-style action-adventure videogame published by Activision and developed by Luxoflux for the Xbox, PlayStation 2, and GameCube consoles and Windows based computers. It is the second game of the True Crime series, released after True Crime: Streets of LA...

, in The O.C.

The O.C.

The O.C. is an American teen drama television series that originally aired on the Fox television network in the United States from August 5, 2003, to February 21, 2007, running a total of four seasons...

season 2

The O.C. (season 2)

The second season of The O.C., an American television series, commenced airing in the United States on November 5, 2004, and concluded on May 19, 2005, with a total of 24 episodes. It aired Thursdays at 8:00 p.m. ET in the US on FOX, a terrestrial television network. In addition to the regular 24...

 finale "The Dearly Beloved" and in the CSI: NY

CSI: NY

CSI: NY is an American police procedural television series that premiered on September 22, 2004, on CBS. The show follows the investigations of a team of NYPD forensic scientists and police officers as they unveil the circumstances behind mysterious and unusual deaths as well as other crimes...

season 2 episode "Youngblood". The song is playable on the UK version of the game SingStar Rocks!. The song was also played in the Heroes episode "Orientation" in Season 4.

Music video

The video for "An Honest Mistake" was directed by Michael "Mike" Palmieri (Foo Fighters, The Strokes

Juicebox (song)

"Juicebox" is a song by the American rock band The Strokes. It is the second track and first single from The Strokes' third album, First Impressions of Earth, released in the US in October 2005...

) and features the band performing the song in the middle of a Rube Goldberg machine

Rube Goldberg machine

A Rube Goldberg machine, contraption, device, or apparatus is a deliberately over-engineered or overdone machine that performs a very simple task in a very complex fashion, usually including a chain reaction...

. The chain start with several strings of dominoes

Dominoes

Dominoes generally refers to the collective gaming pieces making up a domino set or to the subcategory of tile games played with domino pieces. In the area of mathematical tilings and polyominoes, the word domino often refers to any rectangle formed from joining two congruent squares edge to edge...

 and includes many other objects, such as light bulbs, eggs

Egg (biology)

An egg is an organic vessel in which an embryo first begins to develop. In most birds, reptiles, insects, molluscs, fish, and monotremes, an egg is the zygote, resulting from fertilization of the ovum, which is expelled from the body and permitted to develop outside the body until the developing...

, and an aquarium

Aquarium

An aquarium is a vivarium consisting of at least one transparent side in which water-dwelling plants or animals are kept. Fishkeepers use aquaria to keep fish, invertebrates, amphibians, marine mammals, turtles, and aquatic plants...

. Different parts of the action are shown from multiple views, often showing it one way, switching to another angle, then switching back to the original view. Eventually a flaming arrow

Arrow

An arrow is a shafted projectile that is shot with a bow. It predates recorded history and is common to most cultures.An arrow usually consists of a shaft with an arrowhead attached to the front end, with fletchings and a nock at the other.- History:...

 shoots toward a target, but the arrow misses to the right. While filming the video the cameramen got in the way several times, causing dominoes to knock over when they shouldn't have and forcing them to redo the set all over again.

Throughout the video, the only colors seen are red

Red

Red is any of a number of similar colors evoked by light consisting predominantly of the longest wavelengths of light discernible by the human eye, in the wavelength range of roughly 630–740 nm. Longer wavelengths than this are called infrared , and cannot be seen by the naked eye...

 and yellow

Yellow

Yellow is the color evoked by light that stimulates both the L and M cone cells of the retina about equally, with no significant stimulation of the S cone cells. Light with a wavelength of 570–590 nm is yellow, as is light with a suitable mixture of red and green...

.

The Rube Goldberg machine follows a complex sequence of actions from the domino falling to the arrow shooting:

1. The band’s tapping and bass causes a domino to fall
2. The domino causes a long line of dominos to fall
3. The line causes an intricate pattern of domino lines
4. The pattern of dominos causes a rectangle of dominos to fall, revealing an arrow pattern
5. The dominos merge into one line, which topples the lower line of dominos
6. The lower line activates a wheel and counterweight
7. A washer to slides up and knock down 6 higher rows of dominos
8. The second floor’s domino starts a staircase of dominos
9. The staircase hits a stick on a pivot, starting another line of dominos toppling
10. The domino line hits another stick, hitting another line, and so forth until the top line
11. The top line of dominos hits a domino on a zip line
12. The zip line domino hits over two blocks of metal
13. The blocks fall onto the exposed wires of a Polaroid camera, completing the circuit
14. The camera takes a picture
15. The Polaroid rolls out of the camera, starting another line of dominos
16. The domino splits into a double helix, then re-converges into one line again
17. The last of a line of dominos falls off the table, into the center of a star of dominos
18. One of the spokes of the star leads to another line of dominos, which splits into three parallel lines
19. Two of the lines end, while one continues on
20. A line of dominos trips a mousetrap with a razor on it
21. The razor cuts a piece of twine
22. The cut twine releases a dangling anvil
23. The anvil hits a billow
24. The billow blows feathers off a scale
25. The other end of the scale tips, flipping a switch
26. The switch turns on a fan
27. The fan blows away a kite attached to a string
28. The string pulls on a hammer, releasing a wheel
29. The wheel goes down a trough, hitting a tire
30. The tire rolls down a latter, then up a lever with a string attached to the end
31. The string releases a torpedo on a zip line
32. The torpedo stops suddenly just above the ground, releasing numerous ball bearings
33. One of the bearings rolls to a piece of wood where two wires come close, and completes the circuit
34. The circuit activates a Jacob’s ladder
35. The Jacob’s ladder lights a piece of tissue paper on fire
36. The tissue paper lights a fuse
37. The fuse lights a cannon
38. The cannon fires a ball
39. The ball hits a metal block on the edge of a fish tank (with fish in it)
40. The block knocks down a line of blocks
41. The last block in line falls on a lever connected to a pole
42. The pole pushes a lever on top of the fish tank
43. A weight slides off the lever
44. The weight pulls a rope through pulleys, which pull a miter saw down
45. The miter saw cuts into a rod, causing sparks
46. The sparks light a pile of gunpowder
47. The gunpowder lights a fuse
48. The fuse lights a rocket
49. The rocket pushes a dummy in a wheelchair through swinging doors and to a guillotine
50. The wheelchair falls over, pushing the dummy’s neck into the neck rest and activating the guillotine
51. The blade comes down, chopping off the dummy’s head
52. The head falls into a whicker basket on top of a lever
53. The lever lifts up a panel restricting a toy car’s movement
54. The RC electric motor toy car with a lit candle on it begins to drive
55. The car drives to a fuse running down a pole
56. The fuse lights a liquid on the pole on fire
57. The fire lights a ball and releases it
58. The ball unwinds and spins around
59. The lead singer sees the ball on fire out of the corner of his eye and moves out of the way
60. The ball hits a pile of gunpowder
61. The explosion severs a string
62. The string releases a lever with a boxing glove on one end and a counterweight on the other
63. The boxing glove hits a bowling ball
64. The bowling ball rolls down a smooth ramp, then a ramp of light bulbs
65. The bowling ball rolls across the floor, smashing a light bulb with a string tied to it
66. The smashed light bulb releases a spring with a razor on the end
67. The razor cuts a collection of ropes, causing skylights to crash to the ground
68. The bowling ball continues to a stack of milk bottles, knocking the lowest one
69. The topmost bottle tips into a trough
70. Milk pushes an egg out of a socket
71. The egg starts a line of dominos
72. The domino line climbs stairs and pushes the topmost domino, attached to a string
73. The domino swings down, hitting another line of dominos
74. The last domino falls onto a lever
75. The lever swings up, hitting a cam
76. The cam swings around, starting another line
77. The last in line pushes a weight, which falls into a bucket attached to a string
78. The bucket falls, pulling another bucket up
79. The bucket stops suddenly at the top, causing a line of dominos to fall over
80. The last in line falls off the edge into a bear trap
81. The trap closes, severing a rope
82. The rope releases a TV attached to another rope, which falls, crushing a toy dog
83. The TV lifts a box, activating a toy robot with string tied to its arm
84. The robot takes a few steps forward, then spins
85. The string tightens, activating the trigger of a crossbow
86. The crossbow fires
87. The arrow exits the crossbow, but misses right of the target

Track listings

• 7" 9880264

1. "An Honest Mistake"
2. "Hot Pursuit"
   • CD 9880300
3. "An Honest Mistake"
4. "Hey Sunshiney Day"
   • CD (AUS) 9881709
5. "An Honest Mistake"
6. "Hey Sunshiney Day"
7. "An Honest Mistake"
   • DVD 9880301
8. "An Honest Mistake" (video)
9. "Unconditional" (video)
10. "Unconditional" (making of)

Official remixes

• Acoustic version
• Superdiscount remix