The Exies released “Ugly” in 2004 as the first single from Head for the Door. The song introduced a record shaped by the Los Angeles band’s experience onstage, then found another audience through WWE’s Survivor Series.
The band had already released a self-titled album in 2000 before moving to Virgin Records for Inertia in 2003. That made Head for the Door their third studio album and second for Virgin. “Ugly” followed the radio breakthrough of “My Goddess,” giving listeners their first introduction to the next record.
More than a year of touring behind Inertia informed the sessions. Back in Los Angeles, The Exies wanted their recordings to reflect the energy of their performances. They recruited Nick Raskulinecz, whose credits included Foo Fighters, to produce the new material. The work grew from a practical question facing a band that had spent so much time on the road: how to capture that experience in the studio.
The video helped establish “Ugly” before the album reached stores. It won Fuse’s “Oven Fresh Keepers” competition, leading to an appearance on The Daily Download. The band also performed “Ugly” and “Tired of You” on The WB’s drama The Mountain, while MTV2 featured the video in its “New Faces of Rock” programming. Head for the Door followed on November 30, 2004.
WWE placed “Ugly” in the promotion for Survivor Series, the November pay-per-view featuring wrestlers from its Raw and SmackDown brands. Contemporary coverage of Raw identified the track as the event’s theme. Its connection to the show continued on home video: the Survivor Series 2004 DVD included the “Ugly” music video among its extras, as John Crichton documented in his February 2005 review for DVD Talk.
The single also reached No. 13 on the U.S. Modern Rock chart, a result later noted by the band’s video promotion company, HIP Video Promo. Between radio, music television and wrestling, “Ugly” circulated through several distinct parts of the band’s original album campaign.
Its role in Scott Stevens’ songwriting continued beyond that release. After The Exies stopped working together, he concentrated on writing for other artists, including Theory and Halestorm. During the pandemic, he began developing material that sounded increasingly familiar to him.
Speaking with Chuck Armstrong on Loudwire Nights in March 2024, Stevens recalled playing the opening chord progression of what became “Spirits High.” His immediate reaction was, “That sounds like ‘Ugly.’”
That recognition helped guide his return to The Exies. Stevens revisited the band’s recordings and began writing material that connected their earlier work with his experiences during the pandemic. “Spirits High” was released in 2023. A song that had introduced Head for the Door had become a reference point for finding his way back to writing for his own band.
