Songfacts®:

• With bands like Vertical Horizon and Lifehouse all over the airwaves, Nine Days was a welcome addition to playlists with "Absolutely (Story of a Girl)." The song was written by their lead singer John Hampson, and the girl who "Cried a river and drown the whole world" was his girlfriend, Teresa Savino, who later became his wife. The song was a huge success, but Nine Days was not able to follow it up; Epic Records dropped the band and wouldn't release their second album because they didn't hear a hit. Hampson became a high school English teacher.
• "'Story of a Girl,' is autobiographical," Hampson tells Impose magazine. "I exaggerated things and used tons of figurative language to express something, but it's about me, and it's about my wife - who was then my girlfriend - and her wanting to get engaged. I just wasn't ready. I was basically stalling her and making her cry. I was good at that."
• This was used in the TV shows Dawson's Creek (in the 1999 episode "None of the Above") and Daria (in the 2001 episode "Boxing Daria").