"Laughing" is a popular song by Canadian rock

Rock music

Rock music is a genre of popular music that developed during and after the 1960s, particularly in the United Kingdom and the United States. It has its roots in 1940s and 1950s rock and roll, itself heavily influenced by rhythm and blues and country music...

 band The Guess Who

The Guess Who

The Guess Who are a Canadian rock band from Winnipeg, Manitoba. Initially gaining recognition in Canada, they also found international success from the late 1960s through the mid-1970s with numerous hit singles, including "American Woman", "These Eyes" and "Share the Land"...

. It peaked at #1 on the Canadian Singles Chart and at #10 on the Billboard Hot 100

Billboard Hot 100

The Billboard Hot 100 is the United States music industry standard singles popularity chart issued weekly by Billboard magazine. Chart rankings are based on radio play and sales; the tracking-week for sales begins on Monday and ends on Sunday, while the radio play tracking-week runs from Wednesday...

, becoming the band's second single to reach the Top 10 on the latter. The track also reached number one on RPM

RPM (magazine)

RPM was a Canadian music industry publication that featured song and album charts for Canada. The publication was founded by Walt Grealis in February 1964, supported through its existence by record label owner Stan Klees. RPM ceased publication in November 2000.RPM stood for "Records, Promotion,...

's music chart.

Written by Randy Bachman

Randy Bachman

Randolph Charles "Randy" Bachman, OC, OM is a Canadian musician best known as lead guitarist, songwriter and a founding member for both the 1960s–70s rock band The Guess Who, and the 1970s rock band Bachman–Turner Overdrive...

 and Burton Cummings

Burton Cummings

Burton L. Cummings, OC, OM is a Canadian musician and songwriter.He was the lead singer and frequent keyboardist for the Canadian rock band The Guess Who...

 in only ten minutes,
it appeared on their 1969 album, Canned Wheat

Canned Wheat

Canned Wheat is an album released in 1969 by Canadian rock band The Guess Who. It peaked at #91 on the Billboard Pop Albums charts. Two of the band's hits were taken from the album: "Laughing" and "Undun"...

, and was released as a single that year. It sold more than 350,000 copies in its first three weeks of release.

Critical reception

Dave Bist of The Montreal Gazette has written that the song gave its audience the impression that the group only made music for the money. The group's later song, "Undun," he wrote, changed that impression.