Metallica and Veruca Salt have both covered the group's 1979 smash hit "My Sharona," which, if you missed it the first time around, was revived in 1994's Reality Bites, starring Wynona Ryder.

That song, the centrepiece of a cute lip-synch bit where Ryder and her pals croon the ditty into their junk food, got back on the charts thanks to the movie.

It was only the tenth number Number 1 ever hit to do so.

"It's the golden albatross," says the guy who co-wrote it, Doug Fieger. He's now 46 and still lead singer of The Knack. " 'My Sharona' does pay a lot of bills, but we made a lot of money at a lot of other things as well."

Fieger, bassist Prescott Niles, guitarist/keyboardist Berton Averre ("My Sharona's" other writer) and new drummer Terry Bozzio (who played with Frank Zappa) are currently on a 23-city tour that brings them to Queen St.'s Opera House on Monday night (tickets are $ 15).

"My Sharona" was the lead-off single from Get The Knack, which climbed the charts in 1979 to become the fastest-selling album since the Beatles in their heyday.

It spawned another Top 10 hit, "Good Girls Don't," and eventually sold six million copies worldwide, making it one of the biggest debuts in rock history.

"We started in 1978, post-Sex Pistols," Fieger says. "We were different than disco and easy listening ruling the charts. We got lucky in a lot of respects and we happened to happen at a time when people were ready to hear a fresh approach to rock 'n' roll."

The followup LP, . . . But The Little Girls Understand, sold 2.5 million and for a while there things were smoking for the peppy L.A. quartet.

"We were nominated for two Grammy Awards, we toured the world for years and knocked disco off the charts, we really did a start another rock 'n' roll wave on the radio . . . but all those accomplishments pale in comparison to 'My Sharona.' "

Fieger and Averre wrote it "to end the set and give it a big bang and maybe get an encore from it," he says.

"It's about a real girl, the girl I was chasing and later caught."

She also appeared on the cover of the single and album jacket for . . . But The Little Girls Understand.

Fieger and Sharona lived together for four years, almost got married and then broke up. "We're still really good friends and she's one of the biggest real estate agents in southern California," he says.

The Knack's knack for success ground to a halt in 1981. Band infighting (with drummer Bruce Gary), a record that didn't take off (1981's Round Trip) and a barrage of criticism that the group was ripping off the Beatles and arrogantly shutting out the press took their toll and The Knack called it a day in 1982.

"I was in bad physical, mental and chemical shape and basically could not get along with the drummer in the band, who basically couldn't get along with anybody in the band, but I just had had it."

The Detroit-born, twice-divorced singer spent five years recovering and cleaning his life up before reuniting with his former bandmates in 1986.

In 1991 they released Serious Fun, which attempted a harder-rocking sound. It sold 100,000 copies, but Fieger blames the record company for letting it die.

"They decided who we were didn't fit the image that the label wanted. Basically they shelved that record and in poetic justice they folded six months later."

But the band resurfaced in 1994 after the release of Reality Bites and mounted a 32-city tour.

Then last year the group played a surprise gig at the Viper Room on L.A.'s Sunset Strip.

(Incidentally, at the time ex-Nirvana drummer turned Foo Fighter frontman Dave Grohl raved about that show in an interview to promote the Foos' last CD, The Colour And The Shape.)

At the gig, Harold Bronson, co-founder of Rhino Records, a label known more for re-issues and one-hit-wonder compilations than current releases, encouraged the band to record a disc.

So they got into the studio and made Zoom, a full-on return to power pop at a time when pop, not rock, rules the charts (contrary to the disc's ironic opening cut, "Pop Is Dead").

"I don't know what other people do," says Fieger, assuring the lyric is not a commentary on the state of pop music in '98 for one very good reason. "I basically don't listen. I listen to the old stuff that influenced me because it's the stuff that gets me off."

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