Eddy of Rolling Stone gave the song a less enthusiastic review, calling it "an unappetizing artificial-sweetener marriage of down-tempo Nirvana chords and greasy Dave Matthews frat-minstrel sensitivity". Nathan Smith of the Houston Press put it on a list of the publication's least favorite one-hit wonders, calling it "one of the most despicable hits of the '90s" because it "refuses to rock and it refuses to go away. I hated it the first time I heard it, and I hate it now. I will die hating it." Joe Robinson of Diffuser.fm found the song's references to sex and mothers Freudian and disturbing. Commercial performance "Sex and Candy" was released to radio on the week of September 15, 1997. The Marcy Playground album drew little notice until a radio station in San Diego began playing "Sex and Candy". As the song became more popular, Wozniak was offered money for the publishing rights, offers that increased from $100,000 to $750,000. Wozniak decided that he would sell the rights to "Sex and Candy" if a buyer was willing to give him $1 million for the rights to the track and $750,000 for his next album. A week after the song reached the top position on Billboard Modern Rock Tracks, he got three offers for those amounts and sold the rights. "Sex and Candy" spent a then-record 15 weeks at number one on Billboard Modern Rock Tracks chart, a record bested four years later by Nickelback's "How You Remind Me". The track peaked at number 8 on the Billboard Hot 100 and number 2 on the Canadian Top Singles chart. In the US, only 175,000 copies of the single were sent to retail outlets, selling 37,500 units during its first week on sale. "Sex and Candy" was the band's only hit. The song became so successful that it had its own accountant. The head of radio promotion at Capitol Records, Marcy Playground's label, felt that "Sex and Candy"'s ubiquity hurt the band's career; Gil Kaufman of MTV News called the song a "career killer" and the band became known as a one-hit wonder. Wozniak said that, while he was pleased that the track "became a quintessential '90s moment," he was flabbergasted and overwhelmed by its success, adding that he would not want to produce another hit song of comparable popularity. Andrew Unterberger of Stylus Magazine wrote of its surprising success, calling it "easily one of