f Grey’s Anatomy has an unofficial theme song, it’s the Fray’s “How to Save a Life.” It’s been played over a montage of the doctors racing to help patients, sung by the cast during the infamous musical episode, and stripped down by singer-songwriter Nilu and used as a tear-jerking soundtrack in the aftermath of Derek Shepherd’s shocking death. And it even returned in episode 400.
“Is that true?” Joe King asks after hearing about the song’s extensive impact on the show. The Fray’s frontman isn’t unaware of the song’s popularity. But 21 years after the song was released, he’s still impressed by how many lives the alt-rock track has touched.
“We were just writing continually,” says King about the band’s early days, which were mostly spent working on music and playing small gigs in Denver and Boulder, Colorado. “We met this kid that was really struggling in his mental health journey. I grew up in a household where my sister deeply struggles, and I saw her hospitalized multiple times growing up. No one knew the answer — especially at that time, it was such a stigma. Then, meeting this kid caused more questions [to come up] for me, and wrestling with them, that’s how ‘How to Save a Life’ came around. We didn’t know what it would become. We didn’t even know it would be a single. It felt like it was too intimate.”
The Fray’s debut album, How to Save a Life, was released on September 13, 2005. “How to Save a Life,” the album’s second single, entered the Billboard Hot 100 on April 15, 2006, debuting at No. 93. It was a modest premiere. That is, until Grey’s used the song in both season two and the show’s promotional videos. King admits that at first he had some reservations about the exposure. But King’s mom — a nurse — was a fan of the show, and he felt a certain affinity for the show’s setting, having spent his childhood hanging out in doctors’ office lobbies. And it didn’t hurt that the Fray were in good company. A true relic of the time, there was a serious panic regarding art and commercial usage in the early 2000s.
“Wilco had licensed a song,” King says. “They got blowback, and they made a big statement publicly. A year or two later, they licensed another song. There were a couple of other artists that did [as well], like Snow Patrol. We were like, ‘Okay, other bands that we love are doing this.’ When you’re a young artist, you’re just so worried about anything that can go wrong.”
It went very right. As King recalls, the Fray almost immediately started performing in larger rooms. And despite his initial misgivings, he found himself really enjoying the season two placement.
“I was watching the show on my couch, and the song came on,” he recalls. “The song felt really tied in to the moment. It was emotional watching it.”
As for watching the cast of Grey’s belt out “How to Save a Life” over the body of a close-to-death Callie Torres? Surprisingly, King hasn’t seen it. “I’ll have to check it out after we finish this call,” he promises. But there is something about the idea of the musical episode that appeals to him. He likes the sincerity and is honored at having the song used once again during such a pivotal moment. But most of all, he’s simply a fan of seeing how other musicians interpret his band’s work.
“I see it on TikTok, and I’m so humbled by it,” he says. “That’s what I used to do growing up. I learned songs I loved and then played them at a high school talent show or in front of friends. I’m totally supportive of people that want to express themselves through singing. Yes, use us; use our songs.”
The song’s placements on Grey’s (and subsequent appearances on the soundtracks of Scrubs, One Tree Hill, Cold Case, and New Girl) meant the band had to spend more time writing, performing, and promoting. They released four studio albums between 2005 and 2014 before going on hiatus, which lasted more than a decade. King emphasizes that their return was because they finally felt like they had more to say. In March this year, the band released their fifth studio album, A Light That Waits. And while the elation of creating an album might not measure up to the joy about the two children he added to his family during the hiatus, King is extremely proud of bringing new music into the world.
“I’m having the time of my life!” he says. “When you think something dies or goes away, and you come to peace with that, and then life surprises you and brings it back, you find yourself in it in new ways. It becomes a gift, even more than you previously knew. We get to go into incredible cities all over the world, and we get to experience our fans in these incredible venues. It’s giving me life.”
Ultimately, King is thankful for the role Grey’s Anatomy has played in the Fray’s history. It’s helped remind him that the best art isn’t created in a vacuum.
“I’ve always been grateful that art inspires art,” he says. “Whether that’s another artist inspired by a song, and then they go off and write a song, or a show that was inspired by a song, there’s a collaboration. I just love that — art and people meet, and they tell a story.”
Laura Studarus is a Los Angeles-based travel writer who has contributed to Fast Company, BBC Travel, and Thrillist.