Songfacts®:

• Along with "Possession" by Sarah McLachlan, "#1 Crush" is one of the most menacing songs sung from the perspective of a stalker. McLachlan's song is about her actual stalker, but in "#1 Crush" Garbage frontwoman Shirley Manson drew from her own impulses, telling Melody Maker the song is "slightly autobiography."
  
  "I've felt crazy about somebody before," she said, adding that it's about "that feeling – usually when you've split up with somebody – when you're absolutely obsessed with what they are doing. It's all to do with being pathetic."
• The title doesn't show up in the lyric, so it's often referred to as "that 'I would die for you, I would kill for you' song." In teenage girl vernacular, a "#1 Crush" is the guy she's most into - very innocent, which strikes a sharp contrast with lines like, "I will twist the knife and bleed my aching heart."
  
  This wasn't the first time the word "crush" was used in an ironically sinister fashion. In 1993, Alicia Silverstone played a dangerously obsessed teenager in the movie The Crush.
• The song was recorded for Garbage's 1995 self-titled debut album, but their record company had them leave it off the album, fearing it was too dark. It was banished to the B-side of their single "Vow," but surfaced in 1996 when a remix was used on the soundtrack to Baz Luhrmann's 1996 film Romeo + Juliet, a tragic love story that suits the song. It started getting a lot of airplay, and on January 4, 1997 it went to #1 on the Modern Rock chart, where it stayed for four weeks. It because one of their most popular songs and one they usually play in concert.
• The remix, which is the best-known version of the song, is by Nellee Hooper from the group Soul II Soul. His production credits include "Nothing Compares 2 U" by Sinead O'Connor and "Cool" by Gwen Stefani.
• The original version was used as the theme song to the British TV series Hex, which ran for two seasons starting in 2004.