"Say Hey" is a single by Michael Franti

Michael Franti

Michael Franti is an American poet, musician, and composer. He is the creator and lead vocalist of Michael Franti & Spearhead, a band that blends hip hop with a variety of other styles including funk, reggae, jazz, folk, and rock...

 & Spearhead featuring Jamaica soulstress Cherine Anderson

Cherine Anderson

Cherine Anderson is a Jamaican actress and dancehall/reggae vocalist.-Biography:Anderson's acting career began with a role in Dancehall Queen ; she is also known for playing the character Serena in the 2003 Jamaican film, One Love.Anderson has worked and performed with Sly and Robbie, Sting,...

 released in 2009 from their album All Rebel Rockers

All Rebel Rockers

All Rebel Rockers is an album by Michael Franti & Spearhead released on September 9, 2008 on Boo Boo Wax Records. It peaked at #37 on the U.S. Billboard 200, making it their most successful album....

. The single is produced by Sly & Robbie. The music video peaked at number five on the VH1

VH1

VH1 or Vh1 is an American cable television network based in New York City. Launched on January 1, 1985 in the old space of Turner Broadcasting's short-lived Cable Music Channel, the original purpose of the channel was to build on the success of MTV by playing music videos, but targeting a slightly...

 Top 20 countdown and the single has peaked at number 18 on the Billboard Hot 100

Billboard Hot 100

The Billboard Hot 100 is the United States music industry standard singles popularity chart issued weekly by Billboard magazine. Chart rankings are based on radio play and sales; the tracking-week for sales begins on Monday and ends on Sunday, while the radio play tracking-week runs from Wednesday...

, making it Franti's first Hot 100 chart entry. Digital sales of "Say Hey (I Love You)" have topped 120,000 downloads.

In a January 2010 interview Franti said he wrote the lyrics to this song in the steam of a mirror just after a shower. He joked to noted UK R&B writer Pete Lewis of the award-winning Blues & Soul

Blues & Soul

Blues & Soul is a British music magazine covering black music. Genres covered include soul, R&B, jazz, hip hop, reggae and world music. It was first published in 1966 and is known for first using the term Northern Soul....

: "I was staying at (US actor) Woody Harrelson's

Woody Harrelson

Woodrow Tracy "Woody" Harrelson is an American actor.Harrelson's breakthrough role came in the television sitcom Cheers as bartender Woody Boyd...

 house. And, when Woody called and asked how the songwriting was going, I was like 'It's going great! I think I just wrote a hit song in the bathroom!'... And straightaway he was like 'So, is it a Number One or a Number Two?'!!"

The video for this song was filmed at Vigário Geral

Vigário Geral

Vigário Geral is a neighbourhood in Rio de Janeiro with a large favela. It is infamous for a massacre that happened there in 1993. The movie Favela Rising follows the development of the Afro Reggae in this neighborhood, as well as focusing on life there....

 favela

Favela

A favela is the generally used term for a shanty town in Brazil. In the late 18th century, the first settlements were called bairros africanos . This was the place where former slaves with no land ownership and no options for work lived. Over the years, many freed black slaves moved in...

 in Rio de Janeiro

Rio de Janeiro

Rio de Janeiro , commonly referred to simply as Rio, is the capital city of the State of Rio de Janeiro, the second largest city of Brazil, and the third largest metropolitan area and agglomeration in South America, boasting approximately 6.3 million people within the city proper, making it the 6th...

, Brazil

Brazil

Brazil , officially the Federative Republic of Brazil , is the largest country in South America. It is the world's fifth largest country, both by geographical area and by population with over 192 million people...

.

Use in Other Media

The song appeared in the Showtime series Weeds

Weeds (TV series)

Weeds is an American television comedy created by Jenji Kohan and produced by Tilted Productions in association with Lionsgate Television. The central character is Nancy Botwin , a widowed mother of two boys who begins selling marijuana to support her family after her husband dies suddenly of a...

for a flash mob

Flash mob

A flash mob is a group of people who assemble suddenly in a public place, perform an unusual and sometimes seemingly pointless act for a brief time, then disperse, often for the purposes of entertainment, satire, artistic expression...

 in the season five premiere episode and during the opening credits of the 2010 film Valentine's Day

Valentine's Day (film)

Valentine's Day is a 2010 American romantic comedy film directed by Garry Marshall and based on the novel by Michael Connelly. The screenplay and the story was written by Katherine Fugate, Ivan Reitman, Jason Reitman, Akiva Goldsman, Rob Reiner, P. J...

. It also appeared on the 2010 films Ramona and Beezus

Ramona and Beezus

Ramona and Beezus is a 2010 Fox-Walden film adaptation of the Ramona series of novels by Beverly Cleary. The film's title derives from Beezus and Ramona, the first of Cleary's Ramona books, though the plot is mostly based on the sequels, particularly Ramona Forever and Ramona's World.-Plot:The film...

and The Back-Up Plan

The Back-Up Plan

The Back-up Plan is a 2010 romantic comedy film, starring Jennifer Lopez and Alex O'Loughlin. It was released theatrically in the U.S. on April 23, 2010, and later in other regions...

. This song is featured in EA Sports

EA Sports

EA Sports is a brand of Electronic Arts that creates and develops sports video games. Formerly a marketing gimmick of Electronic Arts, in which they tried to mimic real-life sports networks by calling themselves "EA Sports Network" with pictures or endorsements of real commentators such as John...

 video game 2010 FIFA World Cup South Africa

2010 FIFA World Cup South Africa (video game)

2010 FIFA World Cup South Africa is the official video game for the 2010 FIFA World Cup, published by EA Sports.The game was announced on 26 January 2010 during a GameSpot interview with Simon Humber, one of the producers of the game, and released April 27, 2010 in North America...

. It was also featured in a 2010 advertisement for Corona Light beer, and in advertisements for The Oprah Winfrey Show

The Oprah Winfrey Show

The Oprah Winfrey Show is an American syndicated talk show hosted and produced by its namesake Oprah Winfrey. It ran nationally for 25 seasons beginning in 1986, before concluding in 2011. It is the highest-rated talk show in American television history....

's final season. Franti recorded a version with alternate lyrics in support of the San Francisco Giants

San Francisco Giants

The San Francisco Giants are a Major League Baseball team based in San Francisco, California, playing in the National League West Division....

 in connection with their World Series

World Series

The World Series is the annual championship series of Major League Baseball, played between the American League and National League champions since 1903. The winner of the World Series championship is determined through a best-of-seven playoff and awarded the Commissioner's Trophy...

 appearance in 2010.

Cover versions

The Chipmunks

Alvin and the Chipmunks

Alvin and the Chipmunks is an American animated music group created by Ross Bagdasarian, Sr. in 1958. The group consists of three singing animated anthropomorphic chipmunks: Alvin, the mischievous troublemaker, who quickly became the star of the group; Simon, the tall, bespectacled intellectual;...

 and The Chipettes

The Chipettes

The Chipettes are a fictional group of anthropomorphic chipmunk singers first appearing on the cartoon series Alvin and the Chipmunks in 1983. In this and related materials, the Chipettes served as female featured characters in their own right, starring in numerous episodes...

 covered this song for both the Alvin and the Chipmunks: Chipwrecked: Music from the Motion Picture

Alvin and the Chipmunks: Chipwrecked: Music from the Motion Picture

Alvin and the Chipmunks: Chipwrecked: Music from the Motion Picture is the licensed soundtrack based on the 2011 film Alvin and the Chipmunks: Chipwrecked...

 album and the upcoming film "Alvin and the Chipmunks: Chipwrecked

Alvin and the Chipmunks: Chipwrecked

Alvin and the Chipmunks: Chipwrecked is an upcoming 2011 American comedy film. The film stars Jason Lee. It is to be distributed by 20th Century Fox, and produced by Regency Enterprises and Bagdasarian Productions...

".

Certifications

{| class="wikitable"
|-
! Country
! Certification

Music recording sales certification

Music recording sales certification is a system of certifying that a music recording has shipped or sold a certain number of copies, where the threshold quantity varies by type and by nation or territory .Almost all countries follow variations of the RIAA certification categories,...

(sales thresholds)
|-
| United States

Recording Industry Association of America

The Recording Industry Association of America is a trade organization that represents the recording industry distributors in the United States...

| 2x Platinum