Jesus Jones had already played several American gigs in 1990. In 1991, they embarked upon a global tour, playing an extensive number of concerts across North America. Meanwhile, their American label SBK saw the potential in “Right Here, Right Now,” which was released in the U.S. in March 1991, investing time and resources in ensuring it was picked up by alternative record stores and local radio stations, although some balked at the band’s potentially blasphemous name. Aided by MTV playing the video, the song gradually climbed the Billboard charts, eventually reaching No. 2 and selling over a million copies in total. It was the most played song on College Radio in 1991 and earned Jesus Jones an MTV award for best video.
Yet global politics continued to move fast, and the context in which “Right Here, Right Now” was received was not quite the same as the one in which it was made. In August 1990, Iraq had invaded and occupied neighboring Kuwait, a move influenced in part by dictator Saddam Hussein’s concern about American dominance in the region. The invasion was universally condemned, and a U.S.-led military coalition rapidly drove Iraqi forces out of the country by the end of February 1991.
“Right Here, Right Now” tapped into the mood of post-Gulf War optimism that swept the U.S. in 1991. One news program there played it over footage of American troops landing in their initial staging area in Saudi Arabia, which displeased Edwards; he supported the Coalition, but did not want the song to be reinterpreted as a nationalistic, pro-war anthem. Yet he also recognized, as he had done in Romania, that fans took music they liked to articulate their feelings in ways quite different from the intentions of its creators. Speaking to British music magazine Rage in 1991, he explained:
For better or worse people reinterpret pop music for their own uses. I know that people are doing what they want with my music – but that’s important. I want them to. When I wrote that song, I was trying to get a feeling of optimism, a feel for the times. The end of the 80s was a fantastic time to be alive and the world really did look like it was changing for the better. Very naive, I agree.
Edwards attributed the ecstatic American response to the Gulf War to their apprehension about repeating the long and costly experience of Vietnam. He was particularly touched, he said, by one girl who had come up to him after a concert and said the song had brought her comfort and hope at a time when friends of hers were serving in the Middle East. Edwards said:
For most people I don’t believe that lyrics in rock music matter a damn, but if “Right Here, Right Now” makes people feel good – and the Americans I spoke to weren’t the ones who went and murdered people – or they see it as bringing them confidence and optimism then that’s not a bad achievement.