70's, 80's 'Feel Good' Music

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https://www.mirror.co.uk/3am/celebrity-news/how-princes-charisma-helped-him-7814476

How Prince's charisma helped him bed the most beautiful girls in the world

• 23 APR 2016

He may have been tiny but the star's passion for beautiful women was huge and most of them seemed to agree he was a Sexy M.F

Prince and first wife Mayte Garcia


His provocative performances, erotic lyrics and mesmerising charisma made Prince pop’s tiniest sex god.
The Purple One’s huge sexual appetite influenced and pulsed through his songs – and made his personal life as colourful and complicated as his music.
He had two ex-wives and a list of former loves that reads like a Who’s Who of the most famous and beautiful women of the past four decades, including Madonna, Kim Basinger and Carmen Electra.
But growing up in Minnesota, Prince Rogers Nelson - who died aged 57 on Thursday at his Paisley Park mansion in Minneapolis - didn’t have much luck with girls. He said: “I couldn’t keep a girlfriend for two weeks.”
His luck changed after releasing his first album at 19 and he began collecting stunning muses and protegees.

Vanity (Image: Getty)


In 1983 Prince fell in love with Canadian actress and singer Denise Matthews, who took up his suggestion of changing her name to Vanity.
Prince believed she was the female reflection of himself and in the two intense years of their romance, he became her mentor and created a group for her called Vanity 6.
Vanity died two months ago at the age of 57 from renal failure as a result of her earlier addiction to crack cocaine.
She had written in her autobiography that Prince was the only man she had truly loved.
On hearing of Vanity’s death, Prince dedicated Little Red Corvette and Dirty Mind to her during the Melbourne leg of his recent tour.
He told the crowd: “Her and I used to love each other deeply. She loved me for the artist I was, I loved her for the artist she was trying to be.”
Susan Moonsie, also a member of Vanity 6, became Prince’s next girlfriend and is said to be the inspiration behind When Doves Cry.

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Susannah Melvoin inspired his music (Image: WireImage)


She ended their relationship, possibly because he began dating US singer Susannah Melvoin.
Susannah, who was Prince’s first serious relationship, is the inspiration behind hit single Nothing Compares 2 U which was famously sung by Sinead O’Connor.
The pair became engaged but never married.

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Photo credit Kevin Winter / Staff | Gareth Cattermole / Staff
https://www.radio.com/blogs/michael-cerio/remembering-prince-and-madonna-duet-prayer-album-turns-30


Then came a true A-List pairing when Prince and Madonna dated in 1985 after recording Love Song together.
Madonna allegedly left him after meeting Sean Penn, whom she went on to marry later that year.

Twin Peaks star Sherilyn Fenn dated Prince briefly in the 1980s and wrote a blog about their relationship which started when she, as starstruck fan, saw him across a nightclub and was approached by one of his flunkies.
She said: “He came over and said, ‘Prince wants to know if he can call you?’. Uh, of course. I sat and fumbled for something to write on.” The pair remained friends for the rest of his life.
Prince proposed on stage to drummer Sheila E in 1987.

Sheila E and Prince (Image: Getty)


She had became his protegee shortly after they met in 1978. Prince and his bassist approached, and Prince’s first line was: “We were just fighting about which one of us would be the first to be your husband.”
Scots singer Sheena Easton was linked to Prince after they duetted on U Got the Look.

Prince and Sheena Easton

And Bangles guitarist Susannah Hoffs was said to have had a brief liaison with Prince, who wrote the band’s career-making hit song Manic Monday.
Prince dated Kim Basinger, who starred in the 1989 film Batman, for which he wrote the soundtrack.
Widespread rumour suggests the moaning noises on the Scandalous Sex Suite song are the result of a liaison between the pair.

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Kim said: “It was a really special moment in time, and I have great memories.”

Kim Basinger with Prince (Image: Getty)

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Carmen Electra (Image: FameFlynet.uk.com)

When Prince spotted 18-year-old Tara Leigh Patrick in the early 1990s at a nightclub, he asked her to audition for him.
Prince signed her to his record label and came up with her new name: Carmen Electra.
After their romance the model went on to marry basketball player Dennis Rodman and singer Dave Navarro, but Carmen said of Prince: “I will always love him.”

Anna Fantastic and Prince (Image: Getty)

English actress Anna Garcia met Prince at a London gig when she was 16 and lived with him in his Minneapolis home at the age of 17.
Prince gave her the name Anna Fantastic and she inspired his songs Pink Cashmere and Lemon Crush.
Marvin Gaye’s daughter Nona fell in love with Prince but their relationship ended when he met Mayte Garcia , who would become his first wife.
The relationship with Nona came to a screeching halt when Prince invited her to a show and she saw Mayte wearing an engagement ring.

Nona Gaye (Image: Reuters)

Mayte had sent Prince a video of her bellydancing in 1990 when she was 16, and she was soon hired to be part of his Diamonds and Pearls tour.
On Valentine’s Day 1996, Mayte, then 22, married 37-year-old Prince. White doves were released when they said their vows. Prince wrote his 1995 hit song The Most Beautiful Girl In The World about her.
Mayte told the Mirror: “All the songs he wrote for me, that’s a pretty hard act to follow.
'I’ve dated a couple of guys, musicians, who have written me poems or songs and I’m like, ‘Seriously, don’t even go there. You can’t compete!’”

Mayte and Prince perform on stage in 1995 (Image: Redferns)

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Mayte and Prince had a son, Boy Gregory, who had a rare genetic skull disorder called Pfeiffer syndrome, and lived for only a week. Shortly afterwards Mayte suffered a miscarriage.
The tragedies sounded the end for the marriage. Mayte said: “I believe a child dying between a couple either makes you stronger or it doesn’t.
“For me, it was very, very hard to move forward and for us as a couple I think it probably broke us.”
In 2001 Prince married Canadian businesswoman Manuela Testolini. They met while she was working at his charitable foundation and she was 25, 19 years his junior.

Prince and second wife Manuela Testolini (Image: Getty)

Prince is said to have made no attempt to hide the hurt he felt when Manuela filed for divorce in 2006. She went on to marry Halle Berry’s ex-husband Eric Benet in 2011.
Bria Valente is believed to have been Prince’s last girlfriend.
They got together a year after the end of his second marriage and Bria became a Jehovah’s Witness while with Prince.

Prince and Bria Valenta (Image: Getty)

When he came to the UK two years ago he was said to be secretly dating singer-songwriter Delilah after spotting her on YouTube.
But if there was a relationship it didn’t last long.
For as Prince said in one of his most famous songs: “The beautiful ones U always seem 2 lose”.

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In April 2016, at the age of 57, Prince died of an accidental fentanyl overdose at his Paisley Park home and recording studio in Chanhassen, Minnesota. He sold over 130 million records worldwide, ranking him among the best-selling music artists of all time. His awards included the Grammy President's Merit Award, the American Music Awards for Achievement and of Merit, the Billboard Icon Award, an Academy Award and a Golden Globe Award. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2004, the UK Music Hall of Fame in 2006, and the Rhythm and Blues Music Hall of Fame in 2016.

 

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"Don't Let It End" is the third track and the second top 10 single on the 1983 album Kilroy Was Here, by Styx.
The song was written and sung by Dennis DeYoung. The track is a mid-tempo ballad about one who breaks up with a lover and pleads to get the person back. The song reached #6 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 the week of July 2, 1983 and #56 in the UK Singles Chart. It also reached #15 on the Canadian RPM Top Singles chart the week of July 2, 1983. At the time, it was the seventh Styx single to peak in the top 10 of the Billboard Hot 100.
According to Dennis DeYoung in a 2005 interview with classicrockrevisited.com, the track was originally slated as the first single from Kilroy Was Here until the staff at A&M suggested "Mr. Roboto".
Despite the song's enormous success along with "Show Me the Way", "Babe" and "The Best of Times", it has not been performed live by the band since singer Dennis DeYoung was dismissed in 1999. DeYoung, however, still performs the song regularly on his solo tours.
The video of the track was directed by Brian Gibson. It starts out with Dennis portraying Kilroy looking at a picture of a girlfriend he lost (the picture is of Dennis' wife in real life, Suzanne) and then gets up to go in another room which morphs into the prison that his character of Kilroy was in. Then Dennis morphs into the Kilroy as prisoner character and joins the members of Styx who play prisoners in the video performing the track and then the end shows Dennis as he appeared at the intro.
The reprise of the track was more to do with not letting rock and roll die and had a teaser of the riff to "Mr. Roboto" before ending like a 50s rocker with Tommy Shaw singing the first section and DeYoung the finale. The live version ends with the ending guitar chords from "Twist and Shout".

Styx - Don't Let It End

DeYoung and his wife of 50 years - Suzanne Feusi
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Dennis DeYoung (born February 18, 1947) is an American singer-songwriter, musician and producer. Best known for being a founding member of the rock band Styx as primary lead vocalist and keyboardist, a tenure that lasted from 1970 until June 1999. DeYoung has been credited as the writer of more Styx songs than any other Styx member. He was also the band's most successful writer, penning 7 of the band's 8 Billboard top 10 singles as well as a solo top 10 single.
Before the band met with success, DeYoung spent time as an elementary school teacher in the southern suburbs of Chicago, where he taught music at a variety of schools. During this period, the band played a number of small venues and school auditoriums, refining their craft before the song "Lady" propelled them to national, then international, stardom.
DeYoung met his high school sweetheart Suzanne when he was seventeen and she was fifteen. They married in 1970.
Within Styx, DeYoung acted as lead vocalist, keyboardist, accordion player, producer and songwriter. From the start of Styx's commercial success with the 1973 DeYoung-penned single "Lady", DeYoung became the creative force behind most of the band's hit songs. DeYoung wrote and sang lead on seven of the band's eight top 10 Billboard Hot 100-ranked hits during this period, with Tommy Shaw's "Too Much Time on My Hands" (#9) being the sole exception. The seven DeYoung penned-and-performed top 10 Billboard hits, in order of their peak chart placement are:

• "Babe", the band's only #1 hit to date
• "Mr. Roboto" (#3)
• "Show Me the Way" (#3)
• "The Best of Times" (#3)
• "Don't Let It End" (#6)
• "Lady", the band's 1973 breakthrough hit (#6 in March 1975)
• "Come Sail Away" (#8)

Styx - Babe


Styx - Show Me The Way

Music video directed by Michael Bay
Styx - "Come Sail Away"
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"Desert Moon" is a song written and performed by Dennis DeYoung, a former member of Styx, from his debut solo album of the same name in 1984. The song was originally intended to be a Styx song until the band broke up. The single reached the #10 position in the US Billboard Hot 100 during the fall of that year, and ended up at #97 on the Billboard top 100 hits for the year 1984.
The music video for the song, directed by Jack Cole, was filmed partly at the train depot and other historic buildings in and around Santa Paula, California.

Dennis DeYoung - Desert Moon

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https://www.theguardian.com/music/m...80s-synth-pop-anthem-that-took-over-the-world

Send Me an Angel: the 80s synth-pop anthem that took over the world
After three decades and endless cover versions, Australian act Real Life’s instantly recognisable hit is as enduring – and catchy – as ever

Doug Wallen
Published onWed 29 Mar 2017

Send Me an Angel: many people don’t realise the song is from Australia. Photograph: YouTube


It’s the song that won’t die. Three decades on, the 80s anthem Send Me an Angel is still being endlessly covered, remixed and piped through shopping centre speakers. And chances are you know it by heart, even if you don’t know you know it.
Maybe you heard it on the radio (then or now), or during a montage in a formative 80s movie like Teen Wolf Too, The Wizard or the BMX-bike fantasy Rad. It’s been streamed more than 10m times on YouTube alone, but often overlooked is the fact that this new wave staple is Australian.
Yes, the young Melbourne band Real Life scored a dream calling card with the lead single from their 1983 debut album, Heartland. The song went to No 1 in Germany and New Zealand, came close in Australia and cracked the US top 40. And with good reason: between its instantly recognisable synth hook and swooning chorus, haloed with singalong harmonies, Send Me an Angel is a stone-cold earworm from the golden age of fist-pumping synth pop.

Real Life - Send Me An Angel
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As for its Aussie pedigree, singer/guitarist David Sterry positions Real Life on a loose timeline of Antipodean new wave between forebears like Models and Icehouse and disciples like Pseudo Echo and Kids in the Kitchen. “[The] early 80s was a great time for us,” he tells Guardian Australia. “We used to open for INXS, Mi-Sex, the Church, Midnight Oil and many others. It was a great apprenticeship.”
So why don’t people realise the song is from Australia? Partly that’s down to Sterry’s lean and hungry singing, which doesn’t betray his accent. But Real Life also made a conscious decision to stand apart from other Aussie exports.
“In Europe and the USA at the time, it seemed like Aussie bands, films and books were the flavour of the month,” Sterry says. “When we made the first video, we were determined not to look like your average Aussie pub band in jeans and T-shirts … We very much embraced the androgyny of the new wave scene and wanted to present ourselves in a theatrical way, as overseas performers did.”
The song might have remained just a fleeting success, if not for a tighter and harder-hitting 1989 remix from the English producer Nigel Wright, best known today as Andrew Lloyd Webber’s longtime music producer. Despite coming near the end of that synth-mad decade, the latter version did even better in the US, especially on club charts, and sealed the song’s stubborn staying power.
“It started to take off all over again, to everybody’s surprise,” Sterry recalls. He points to the disparate cover versions that have sustained the song’s afterlife ever since, from rockabilly and punk to industrial metal and even Gregorian chant. Two of his favourites are a Chiptune take and Jessica Mauboy’s jazzy 1920s version from Underbelly: Razor. (The actor Pippa Grandison also recast it as a fragile piano ballad for the show.)

Real Life - Send Me An Angel '89
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It’s so malleable because the lyrics are vague enough to feel universal (“I’ve never been lucky in love”), while the underlying sentiment is reliably urgent (“Send me an angel right now”). The skittering electronics anticipate all the club remixes that followed, while the desperate undertones of Sterry’s vocals set the table for gloomier, heavier versions – as does Sterry’s short-lived yet potent guitar solo. And that hook shines just as brightly in instrumental versions.
Real Life had other minor hits, including the equally urgent Catch Me I’m Falling and the somewhat sillier God Tonight. Yet Send Me an Angel has always dogged Sterry, who still performs as Real Life on package tours under the Absolutely 80s banner.
That quite likable first album, Heartland, isn’t available on streaming services, while dozens of versions of Angel are. But rather than flee one-hit-wonder status, Sterry has embraced the song’s crowd-pleasing endurance. He cut a more danceable version in 2009 for the covers collection Send Me an Angel – 80s Synth Essentials, on which he also tackled Gary Numan’s Cars and New Order’s Blue Monday.
He’ll always be the voice of that song, whether he’s on stage or picking up groceries. “I remember hearing it in my local supermarket,” he says. “There was pretty much only the staff and me. They didn’t have the faintest idea who I was. Most of them were quietly mouthing the words. It was surreal.”

https://www.facebook.com/berlinoffi...ralian-band-real-life-send-m/997903570329208/

Berlin - Official Band

Pic from Melbourne w/ David Sterry, singer of the Australian band Real Life. "Send Me An Angel." "Catch Me I'm Falling." We toured together in '84, they opened for us in the States!
#BerlinInAustralia

 

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"Oh Sheila" is a 1985 single by Ready for the World. The song went to number one on the Billboard Hot 100, the Hot Black Singles and the Hot Dance Club Play charts. It was the first of two chart toppers for the band on the Billboard R&B chart, preceding their 1986 number-one R&B hit, "Love You Down".
The song is commonly misattributed to Prince, due to similarity to his vocal and musical style, as well as the belief that the song's lyrics allude to frequent Prince collaborator Sheila E.
The use of a faux British accent during parts of the song was the preference of singer Melvin Riley Jr., who said "I like that kind of accent, so I thought I'd use that sound."

Ready For The World - Oh Sheila
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"Lovergirl" is a song written, produced and recorded by American singer-songwriter Teena Marie for her 1984 album, Starchild. The song was Marie's first hit song under her new label, Epic, after a lawsuit with Motown. The song also became Marie's biggest hit, peaking at #4 on the Billboard Hot 100.
Marie received a nomination for Best Female R&B Vocal Performance for the single at the 28th Grammy Awards--her second nomination in that category. The award was won by "Freeway of Love" by Aretha Franklin.
The music video was directed by actress Cicely Tyson.

Teena Marie - Lovergirl


Aretha Franklin - Freeway Of Love
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Teena Marie (born Mary Christine Brockert; March 5, 1956 – December 26, 2010) was an American singer-songwriter and producer. She was known by her childhood nickname Tina before taking the stage name Teena Marie and later acquired the nickname Lady Tee (sometimes spelled Lady T), given to her by her collaborator and friend, Rick James.

Teena and Rick

Image Source: Getty / Michael Caulfield Archive

She was known for her distinctive soprano vocals, which caused many listeners to believe she was black. Her success in R&B and soul music, and loyalty to these genres would earn her the title Ivory Queen of Soul. She played rhythm guitar, keyboards, and congas, and wrote, produced, sang, and arranged virtually all of her songs since her 1980 release, Irons in the Fire, which she later said was her favorite album. Teena Marie was a three-time Grammy Award nominee.
Mary Christine Brockert was born on March 5, 1956, in Santa Monica, California, the daughter of construction worker Thomas Leslie Brockert and home renovator Mary Anne. She spent her early childhood in Mission Hills, California. Her ethnic heritage was Puerto Rican, Portuguese, Italian, Irish, and American Indian. In 2005, while visiting Louisiana, she discovered that her paternal ancestors once lived in New Orleans. She took to singing naturally, performing Harry Belafonte's "Banana Boat Song" by age two. She also developed a fondness for singing Motown songs, and her self-professed "gift from God" would become fine-tuned as the years progressed.
When she was eight years old, her parents began sending Teena on auditions which, among other things, netted her an acting role on The Beverly Hillbillies, credited as Tina Marie Brockert. She later taught herself the guitar, bass, and congas. She would go on to form a semi-professional R&B band with her younger brother Anthony and their cousin.
In the early 1970s, after the family moved to Venice, Los Angeles, Brockert spent her adolescent years in the historically black Venice enclave of Oakwood, nicknamed "Venice Harlem". There, she would acquire a strong spiritual influence from neighborhood matriarch Berthalynn Jackson, a black woman who would become her godmother.
While attending Venice High School, Brockert joined the Summer Dance Production and was the female lead in the school's production of The Music Man. She also fronted a local Venice rock band "Truvair" in 1974–1975; the band's members were her high school classmates. Following graduation, Brockert juggled auditioning for various record companies with studying English Literature at Santa Monica College. She credited her love of reading with helping her to write lyrics
In 1980, Teena Marie released her third LP, Irons in the Fire, for which she handled most of the writing and production herself, an achievement considered rare at the time for a female artist. The single "I Need Your Lovin'" (#37 Pop, No. 9 R&B Singles) brought Teena Marie her first top 40 hit; it also peaked at No. 28 in the UK chart.
That same year, Teena Marie appeared on James' album, Street Songs, with the duet "Fire and Desire". In an interview, Teena Marie said she had a fever at the time yet managed to record her vocals in one take. After the session, she was driven to a hospital. The two would perform the single at the 2004 BET Awards, which would be their last TV appearance with one another, as James died later that year.

RICK JAMES & TEENA MARIE - Fire & Desire
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Teena Marie continued her success with Motown in 1981, with the release of It Must Be Magic (#2 R&B Albums Chart), her first gold record, which included her then biggest hit on R&B, "Square Biz" (#3 R&B Singles). Other notable tracks include "Portuguese Love" (featuring a brief, uncredited cameo by James, No. 54 R&B Singles), the title track "It Must be Magic" (#30 R&B Singles), and the album only track "Yes Indeed", which she cited as a personal favorite.
In 1982, Teena Marie got into a heated legal battle with Motown Records over her contract and disagreements about releasing her new material. The lawsuit resulted in "The Brockert Initiative", which made it illegal for a record company to keep an artist under contract without releasing new material for that artist. In such instances, artists are able to sign and release with another label instead of being held back by an unsupportive one. Teena Marie commented on the law in an LA Times article, saying, "It wasn't something I set out to do. I just wanted to get away from Motown and have a good life. But it helped a lot of people, like Luther Vandross and the Mary Jane Girls, and a lot of different artists, to be able to get out of their contracts." She left Motown as the label's most successful white solo act.
Teena Marie never married. She gave birth to a daughter named Alia Rose in 1991. As of 2009, Alia Rose sings under the name Rose LeBeau.
Throughout her career, Teena Marie lived in Inglewood and Encino, Los Angeles, before settling in Pasadena, California in the mid-1980s.
Teena Marie was godmother to Marvin Gaye's daughter Nona Gaye as well as to American actress and comedienne Maya Rudolph, daughter of singer-songwriter Minnie Riperton and composer Richard Rudolph. She also cared for Rick James's son, Rick, Jr., and family friend Jeremiah O'Neal. Lenny Kravitz posted a video in which he said that Teena Marie had taken him into her home and helped him when he was struggling early in his career
In 2004, while Teena Marie was sleeping in a hotel room, a large picture frame fell and struck her on the head. The blow caused a serious concussion that caused momentary seizures for the rest of her life.
On the afternoon of December 26, 2010, Teena Marie was found dead at her Pasadena home by her daughter, Alia Rose. On December 30, 2010, an autopsy was performed by the Los Angeles County coroner, who found no signs of apparent trauma or a discernible cause of death, and concluded she had died from natural causes. She had suffered a tonic–clonic seizure a month before.
A memorial service was held at Forest Lawn Cemetery on January 10, 2011. Among those in attendance were Stevie Wonder, Deniece Williams, Smokey Robinson, Queen Latifah, LisaRaye, Sinbad, Tichina Arnold, Shanice Wilson, and Berry Gordy, Jr.

“I think my mom is dead...I’m scared, I’m so scared! She’s lost her color…her color is gone. She’s cold!” Quoting: Alia Rose

 

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Janet Jackson - What Have You Done For Me Lately
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"What Have You Done for Me Lately" is a song by American singer Janet Jackson from her third studio album, Control (1986). Jackson co-wrote the song with its producers Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis. It was released on January 13, 1986, by A&M Records as the album's lead single. After two unsuccessful albums and a management change, the singer began developing a new album. "What Have You Done for Me Lately" was originally penned for one of Jam and Lewis's own records, but the lyrics were rewritten to convey Jackson's feelings about her recent divorce from James DeBarge in January 1985. It revolves around a woman's frustration with her partner in a relationship.

Getty Images Janet Jackson's ex-husband, singer James DeBarge

Critical reviews for "What Have You Done for Me Lately" were positive, with music critics believing it erased the former "pop-ingénue image" of Jackson's first two albums, reestablishing her as an "independent woman" figure. The song has been featured in critic lists as one of the greatest songs of all time and received a nomination for Best Rhythm & Blues Song at the 1987 Grammy Awards. The song peaked at number four on the US Billboard Hot 100 and was certified gold by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). It also peaked at number two on the US Dance Club Songs and topped the US Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs charts. Outside of the US, it topped the singles chart in the Netherlands and peaked within the top ten in Germany, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom.
The accompanying music video for "What Have You Done for Me Lately" was directed by Brian Jones and Piers Ashworth and choreographed by singer Paula Abdul. In it, Jackson goes to a diner with her friends to talk about her relationship problems. The video won a Soul Train Music Award for Best R&B/Soul or Rap Music Video in 1987. The song was first performed live by Jackson at the 29th annual Grammy Awards in 1987. She has also performed it live in each of her concert tours, beginning with the Rhythm Nation World Tour 1990 through the State of the World Tour (2017). It has been included in each of Jackson's greatest hits albums Design of a Decade: 1986–1996 (1995), Number Ones (2009) and Icon: Number Ones (2010). "What Have You Done for Me Lately" has been sampled and covered by various artists, and is also regarded as one of Jackson's signature songs which helped establish her as a known artist.

After arranging a recording contract with A&M Records in 1982 for a then sixteen-year-old Janet, her father Joseph Jackson oversaw the entire production of her debut album, Janet Jackson, and its follow-up, Dream Street (1984); the latter of which was written and produced by Jesse Johnson and Janet's brothers Marlon and Michael. Jackson was initially reluctant to begin a recording career, commenting, "I was coming off of a TV show that I absolutely hated doing, Fame. I didn't want to do [the first record, Janet Jackson]. I wanted to go to college. But I did it for my father ..." and elaborated that she was often in conflict with her producers. Amidst her professional struggles, she rebelled against her family's wishes by marrying James DeBarge of the family recording group DeBarge in 1984. The Jacksons disapproved of the relationship, citing DeBarge's immaturity and substance abuse. Jackson left her husband in January 1985 and was granted an annulment later that year.
Jackson subsequently fired her father as her manager and hired John McClain, then A&M Records' senior vice president of artists and repertoire and general manager. She also subsequently left the Jackson home in Encino, California, and moved into her own apartment around this time. Commenting on the decision, she stated, "I just wanted to get out of the house, get out from under my father, which was one of the most difficult things that I had to do, telling him that I didn't want to work with him again." Joseph Jackson resented John McClain for what he saw as an underhanded attempt to steal his daughter's career out from under him. McClain responded by saying "I'm not trying to pimp Janet Jackson or steal her away from her father." He subsequently introduced her to the songwriting and production duo James "Jimmy Jam" Harris III and Terry Lewis, former Prince associates and ex-members of The Time
Although Joseph Jackson initially demanded that his daughter's new album be recorded in Los Angeles so that he could keep an eye on her, Jam and Lewis refused. They required the entire production of the album to be done at their own studio in Minneapolis, Minnesota, "far from the glitter and distractions of Hollywood and the interference of manager-fathers." Control was recorded at Flyte Tyme Studios, the site for Flyte Tyme Records, founded by Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis in Minneapolis. Jackson recorded the whole album, but A&M label executive and manager John McClain wanted one more uptempo song to compose the album. She then went back to Minneapolis to record one more track, titled "What Have You Done for Me Lately", which was originally penned for one of Jam and Lewis's own records. Jam remembered, "She was sitting outside in the lounge and said, 'Man, that's a funky track. Who's that for?' And we said, 'It's for you', and she said, 'Oh, cool'. I think she was very pleased when she heard the track".

The lyrics were rewritten to convey Jackson's feelings about her recent annulment from James DeBarge. It was the last song to be recorded for Control, and was ultimately chosen as the lead single for the album, as Jam and Lewis felt it best represented Jackson's outlook on life: "I think it was very representative of the sparseness and the funkiness that the rest of the album had and the attitude Janet had about being in control, being mature to the point where she had definite opinions about what she wanted to say". The song was inspired by one of her experiences in Minneapolis when a group of men made sexual advances towards her outside the hotel she resided at during the recording of Control. She recalled, "They were emotionally abusive. Sexually threatening. Instead of running to Jimmy or Terry for protection, I took a stand. I backed them down. That's how songs like 'Nasty' and 'What Have You Done for Me Lately' were born, out of a sense of self-defense."
Musically, "What Have You Done for Me Lately" is described as an uptempo dance song. It begins with a conversation with one of her friends, who asks Jackson the title question. Lyrically, it involves the singer asking why her lover was not as attentive as he once was. He was not treating her as well as he used to, and she calls him a "loser" in response. "I never ask for more than I deserve, you know it's the truth. You seem to think you're God's gift to this earth. I'm telling you no way", Jackson sings. Veda A. McCoy in the book Lifepower: Six Winning Strategies to a Life of Purpose, Passion & Power expressed that the song reminded that "life is about more than just what you say. Life is also about what you do". Vibe noted that with "What Have You Done for Me Lately", Jackson stands up to men. New York magazine's Chris Smith called the song's chorus "fully belligerent". In a Billboard publication, Nelson George noted its "taunting, tigerish" beat. Ed Gonzalez from Slant Magazine commented, "Nothing sends me into a trembling, corner-cowering stupor than a giggly, under-enunciated Janet Jackson jam.
The accompanying music video for "What Have You Done for Me Lately" was directed by Brian Jones and Piers Ashworth and filmed in December 1985. The video's choreographer was Paula Abdul, who appears in the video as Jackson's friend. According to a Jet magazine publication in 1990, in the video Abdul "combined sexual energy with classy, alluring moves. The combination propelled Janet into the classification of sexy superstar. Any who saw the videos witnessed the fact that Janet was, indeed, a full-grown woman." The video also featured Tina Landon who would later become Jackson's choreographer. Jackson shared in her book True You in 2011 that her recording company thought it was important that she appeared thinner in the video:

"I'd been told that my whole life, but at this critical juncture, with my career taking off, I didn't have the wherewithal to argue. [...] We [she and Paula Abdul] shared a house and spent weeks exercising [in Canyon Ranch]. [...] I was as motivated as ever to come out on top. [...] I felt good when it was over. I enjoyed the compliments about my "new" shape. I shot the video and did in fact reshape my image."

It premiered on BET on February 17, 1986. In the video, Jackson goes to a diner with her friends to talk about her relationship problems. Her boyfriend (played by Rudy Huston) shows up with his friends, and Jackson decides to share her feelings about their relationship. In the video, Jackson's reality is a dark world with faded colors. In a more dreamscape world, the colors are vibrant and everything is 2D. The video won a Soul Train Music Award for Best R&B/Soul or Rap Music Video in 1987. While reviewing the video, Vanity Fair magazine said in 1986 that Jackson "might be Michael's androgynous twin in the sweep of her arm, the accusatory glare in her eyes, the collapsing diagonals of her dancing"

Super Bowl XXXVIII halftime show controversy
Jackson was chosen by the National Football League and MTV to perform at the Super Bowl XXXVIII halftime show in February 2004. She performed a medley of "All for You", "Rhythm Nation", and an excerpt of "The Knowledge" before performing "Rock Your Body" alongside surprise guest Justin Timberlake. As Timberlake sang the lyric "I'm gonna have you naked by the end of this song", he tore open her costume, exposing her right breast to 140 million viewers.
Jackson issued an apology after the performance, saying that the incident was accidental and unintended, explaining that Timberlake was only meant to pull away a bustier and leave the red-lace bra intact. She commented, "I am really sorry if I offended anyone. That was truly not my intention ... MTV, CBS, the NFL had no knowledge of this whatsoever, and unfortunately, the whole thing went wrong in the end." Timberlake also issued an apology, calling the accident a "wardrobe malfunction." The incident became the most recorded and replayed moment in TiVo history, enticing an estimated 35,000 new subscribers. Jawed Karim has stated that the incident inspired the creation of YouTube, as he noted that it was difficult for him to find videos of the incident online.
It is regarded as one of the most controversial television events in history, and Jackson was later listed in Guinness World Records as the "Most Searched in Internet History" and the "Most Searched for News Item". CBS, the NFL, and MTV denied any knowledge of the incident and all responsibility for it. The Federal Communications Commission heavily fined all companies involved and continued an investigation for eight years, ultimately losing its appeal for a $550,000 fine against CBS.

Janet Jackson Wardrobe Malfunction (Super Bowl 2004)
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Personal life
At age 18, Janet Jackson eloped with singer James DeBarge in September 1984. The marriage was annulled in November 1985. On March 31, 1991, Jackson married dancer/songwriter/director René Elizondo Jr. The marriage was kept a secret until the split was announced. In January 1999, the couple separated and were divorced in 2000. Elizondo filed a lawsuit against her, estimated to have been between $10–25 million, which did not reach a settlement for three years.
From 2002 to 2009, Jackson dated music producer/rapper/songwriter Jermaine Dupri. In 2010, Jackson met Qatari businessman Wissam Al Mana and began dating him shortly after that. The couple became engaged and married privately in 2012. In 2016, Jackson announced that they were expecting their first child together. On January 3, 2017, Jackson gave birth to a son, Eissa Al Mana. In April 2017, it was announced that the couple had separated and were pursuing a divorce.

Elizondo sued Janet for spousal support, claiming that he’d been forced under duress to sign a prenuptial agreement, so at the end of the legal battle, he came up with that cool $10 mill.

“I have a tattoo of her — but I know her,” the superproducer, who dated Jackson from 2002 to 2009 said.

Janet Jackson and Husband Wissam Al Mana

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"Jessie's Girl" is a song written and performed by Australian singer Rick Springfield. It was released on the album Working Class Dog, which was released in February 1981. The song is about unrequited love and centers on a young man in love with his best friend's girlfriend.
Upon its release in the United States in 1981, "Jessie's Girl" was slow to break out. It debuted on Billboard's Hot 100 chart on 28 March but took 19 weeks to hit No. 1 reaching that position on 1 August, one of the slowest climbs to No. 1 at that time. It remained in that position for two weeks and would be Springfield's only first-place hit. The song was at No. 1 when MTV launched on 1 August 1981. The song ultimately spent 32 weeks on the chart. Billboard ranked it as No. 5 for all of 1981.
The song also peaked at No. 1 in Springfield's native Australia and later won him a Grammy Award for Best Male Rock Vocal Performance.
"Jessie's Girl" was released in the United Kingdom in March 1984 and peaked at No. 43 on the UK Singles Chart in April 1984.
Springfield recorded an acoustic version of the song for his 1999 album, Karma.

Awards and nominations
Grammy Awards

Year	Category	Nominated work	Result
1982​	Best Rock Vocal Male Performance	"Jessie's Girl"	Won
1983​	Best Rock Vocal Male Performance	"I Get Excited"	Nominated
1983​	Best Pop Vocal Performance Male	"Don't Talk To Strangers"	Nominated
1984​	Best Rock Vocal Male Performance	"Affair of the Heart"	Nominated

On 9 May 2014, Springfield was honoured with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for his contributions to music.

BackGround
Springfield was taking a stained glass class. Also in the class were a friend of his named Gary and Gary's girlfriend. Springfield initially wanted to use the actual name of his friend, but instead decided to go with a different name. He chose "Jessie" because he was wearing a T-shirt with the name of football player Ron Jessie on it.
Springfield says that he does not remember the name of the girlfriend, and he believes that the real woman who inspired the song has no idea that she was "Jessie's Girl." He told Oprah Winfrey, "I was never really introduced to her. It was always just, like, panting from afar." Springfield told Songfacts that Oprah's people tried to find her, and they got as far back as finding out that the teacher of the class had died two years previously and that his class records were thrown out one year after his death. In 2006, the song was named No. 20 on VH1's "100 Greatest Songs of the 80s".

Jessies Girl" (Live 1985) -Rick SpringField

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Music video
The music video depicts Springfield watching a young couple with envy, desiring the girl's love. It opens with Jessie (played by Steve Antin) spray painting "Jessie's Girl" onto a brick wall, then leaving with his girlfriend, as Springfield watches and gives a monologue in the form of the song's first verse. Springfield runs into the couple one more time on the sidewalk, and he just stares as they walk away from him. Later, he goes home and looks in the mirror and grieves over why Jessie's girlfriend does not like him; he angrily smashes the mirror when an illusion of her appears in it.

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In regards to the song's use in films such as Boogie Nights (1997), 13 Going on 30 (2004), and Suicide Squad (2016) over 20 years after its original release, Springfield said, "I'm thrilled by it. As a writer, all you can ask is that a song has legs. It has an appeal that keeps coming back."

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"Jessie's Girl" was covered on Glee in the episode "Laryngitis" (2010). Finn Hudson (Cory Monteith) sings it to Rachel Berry (Lea Michele) to express his opinions about her relationship with her then-boyfriend, Jesse (Jonathan Groff). This version was certified gold by the Australian Recording Industry Association in 2010.

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Richard Lewis Springthorpe (born 23 August 1949), known professionally as Rick Springfield, is an Australian musician and actor. He was a member of the pop rock group Zoot from 1969 to 1971, then started his solo career with his debut single "Speak to the Sky" reaching the top 10 in Australia in mid-1972, when he moved to the United States. He had a No. 1 hit with "Jessie's Girl" in 1981 in both Australia and the U.S., for which he received the Grammy Award for Best Male Rock Vocal Performance. He followed with four more top 10 U.S. hits: "I've Done Everything for You", "Don't Talk to Strangers", "Affair of the Heart", and "Love Somebody". Springfield's two U.S. top 10 albums are Working Class Dog (1981) and Success Hasn't Spoiled Me Yet (1982).
As an actor, he starred in the television series High Tide, from 1994-97, and has appeared in supporting roles in Ricki and the Flash and True Detective (both 2015). He portrayed Dr. Noah Drake on the daytime drama General Hospital, 1981-83, 2005-08, and 2012, returning in 2013 for the show's 50th anniversary with his son, actor Liam Springthorpe. He played a depraved version of himself in Californication (2009). In 2010, Springfield published his autobiography, Late, Late at Night: A Memoir. In 2016 he starred as Vince Vincente/Lucifer in season 12 of The CW series Supernatural. In 2017, he starred as Pastor Charles in the American Horror Story episode entitled "Winter of Our Discontent".
When Springfield was 17, he attempted suicide by hanging himself. "I hang suspended for fifteen or twenty seconds and am just sliding into unconsciousness when the knot tying the rope to the beam somehow unravels. I'm slammed hard to the concrete floor, rather the worse for wear." Springfield has been dealing with depression for several decades. "I want them to have hope ... and know that the moment will pass," Springfield, 68, said in an exclusive interview with ABC News' Paula Faris. "I'm an example of the moment passing, because I've been there a couple of times, and haven't ... for want of a better phrase, pulled the trigger." From late 1974 to early 1976, Springfield was in a romantic relationship with actress Linda Blair, beginning when she was 15 and he 25.

Rick Springfield & Linda Blair

On 24 April 1981, Rick Springfield's father, Norman James Springthorpe, died. In October 1984, Springfield married his girlfriend, Barbara Porter, in his family's church in Australia. They had met several years earlier when Springfield was recording Working Class Dog and she was working as the recording studio receptionist.

They have two sons, Liam (born 1985) and Joshua (born 1989). In 1985, when his first son was born and after the release of his Tao album, Springfield took a break from his musical career, to spend more time with his family, and to deal with the depression that had affected him since his adolescence. In January 2018, Springfield stated in an interview that he contemplated suicide in 2017. "Last year I was close to it, really close to it," explained Springfield on how he considered killing himself. "When Robin Williams and Chester (Bennington and Chris Cornell) and those guys… I didn't go, 'Oh that's terrible.' I went, 'I get it.' I get being that lost and dark."
At a concert at the House of Blues in Orlando, FL on 2 March 2006, Springfield announced he had become a US citizen. He announced, "after 30 plus years of paying so many taxes he decided it was more than time to become an American". He continued to say, "I am not sure how this is going to go over here but I am a Republican...which in my house only means that I cancel out my wife's vote because she votes for 'the other side'...so it's a wash".

Memoir
Springfield's autobiography, Late, Late at Night: A Memoir, was released in 2010. In October, it peaked at No. 13 on The New York Times Best Seller list. In May 2014, Springfield published Magnificent Vibration: a novel, which also made The New York Times Best Seller list.

In August 2012, Late, Late at Night was named No. 23 of "The 25 Great Rock Memoirs of All Time" by Rolling Stone.

 

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"Make It Real" is a song by the American sibling group, The Jets, released as a single from their album, Magic in April 1988.
"Make It Real" was the group's fifth (and, to date, final) top-ten hit on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, where it spent two weeks at number four in late June and early July 1988. On the adult contemporary chart, the song was the group's second number-one hit (following "You Got It All" from the previous year). On the Hot Black Singles, "Make It Real" reached number twenty-four.

The Jets - Make It Real

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Moana Wolfgramm of the Jets would recall: "'Make It Real' was given to us at the eleventh hour [i.e. last minute]. We needed a slow ballad [when] we were finishing up the last tracks for the 'Magic' album. Our manager Don Powell, Linda Mallah and Rick Kelly wrote this song and it was simple yet very catchy. I remember Liz [Elizabeth Wolfgramm] recorded it on the road after one of our shows, I think somewhere in Texas." One of the two videos for "Make It Real" showed Elizabeth Wolfgramm singing in front of a basic blue screen background: although Elizabeth Wolfgramm was the only group member to sing on the track, still images of the other Jets were shown during the instrumental break. The other video features the entire band performing the song, with Elizabeth Wolfgramm standing in front of the other group members playing their individual instruments, interspersed with close-up shots of individual band members throughout the song.
The B-side of the cassette single is a non-album track written and produced by oldest member LeRoy entitled "So True".
"Make It Real" reflects back upon a past relationship one year since the singer met her lover. The singer is reminded of the happy times in their relationship and wants another opportunity to rekindle the passion: I loved you / You didn't feel the same / Though we're apart, you're in my heart / Give me one more chance to make it real.


Elizabeth Wolfgramm (born August 19, 1972, in Salt Lake City) is an American singer and a former member of the family group The Jets, composed of siblings: Eddie, Eugene, Elizabeth, Haini, Kathi, Leroy, Moana, and Rudy Wolfgramm. Some of her later work has appeared under her married name, Elizabeth Atuaia.
Wolfgramm was only 11 years old when her family band, The Jets, was signed to MCA Records. Frequently serving as the lead singer of the group, she is widely considered the face of "The Jets" and quickly became a fan favorite. She recorded their hit song "You Got It All" when she was only 12 years old. The song hit number 1 on the Billboard Adult Contemporary Charts and No. 3 on the Pop Charts. She remained in the group throughout four albums during the latter half of the 1980s, featuring as the lead vocalist on, in addition to "You Got It All," such major hit songs as "Crush on You," "Cross My Broken Heart," and "Make It Real."
Wolfgramm left the group in the early 1990s to pursue other projects. In 1990, she recorded the song entitled "Yourself Myself" featured in Tatsuro Song from L.A. (1990), Universal Music. Later, alongside sister Moana, she wrote a few songs for the compilation Return with Honor: 1995 EFY (Especially for Youth) released by Embryo Records. That same year, she teamed up with Marie Osmond's husband, record producer Brian Blosil to record a solo album through Treble V, though the album was never released. She reunited with Moana in 1997 to record the song "Do" (also featuring younger sister Jennifer) featured in the Be a Builder songbook and companion CD (Vol. 3) Sticks & Stones for the Utah Prevention/Dimension (PK-12) Prevention Program.
In 2002, she recorded the song "Faithful" featured on Love Is a Journey: Reflections on Marriage (2002) released by Shadow Mountain. In 2006, she, along with her sisters Kathi, Moana, Jennifer and Hinalei, released a gospel-themed album entitled My Sisters.
Her rendition of "Never a Better Hero" has also been recorded on CD for distribution
She is married to Hawaii-born, Samoan football star Mark Atuaia.

The couple has 6 children: daughters Anessa, Alema, and Abi; and sons Tai, Teanekuma and Ropati. She is a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and a breast cancer survivor.

Elizabeth was only 22 when she was diagnosed with breast cancer in 1994. She eventually had her breast removed and has been in remission since. She was told by doctors at the time she would not be able to bear children, yet has now born six healthy children.

 

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"You Got It All" was the fourth single released by the 1980s dance-pop band, The Jets, from their commercially successful debut 1985 album, The Jets. It was written by Rupert Holmes, most famous for the song, "Escape (The Piña Colada Song)". "You Got It All" peaked at number three on the Billboard Hot 100 in the U.S. in early 1987. The song also topped the adult contemporary chart for two weeks and reached number two on the R&B chart. It was also featured in the film Jaws: The Revenge.

The Jets - You Got It All

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The Jets Lost MILLIONS & Revealed The “Humiliating” JOBS They Had AFTER Success
Posted On : April 1, 2017

The Jets - Rocket 2 U
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Remember The Jets? They were the 8 siblings who had us jammin’ to their hits, “You got It All, “Crush On You,” and many more in the mid 80’s. Then all of sudden we never heard from the Polynesian family with the R&B sound again.

The Jets - Crush on You
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So what happened? Well based on what one of The Jets’ singers, Moana Wolfgramm , explained in an interview with Classic Bands, a LOT happened -from being robbed of millions of dollars, stricken with cancer, and family turmoil. They faced some extremely tough times after their fame subsided and ended up having to work jobs they admitted were humiliating for them. Read excerpts from Moana’s interview below…

How The Jets Became Broke After Massive Music Success
Moana explained, in the interview, that their parents lack of knowledge about the business side of the music game and their then manager, Don Powell, were the main reasons for their financial downfall back then.

Moana: “We were signed I believe to his production deal. He had a company called Twin Town Sounds and he signed us to that. Then the record company signed that production company. I’m learning all this now that I’m older, but when you’re eleven, you have no idea what’s going on. We worked hundreds of shows every year. It was later on that you realized the good and bad that came from it.”

WAIT TIL U SEE HOW MUCH MONEY WAS REPORTEDLY STOLEN FROM THEM & THE JOBS THEY WORKED AFTERWARDS>>>

CB: How much money were you taken for? Any idea?

Moana: “In the ’80s, what I can remember, just for the four years, and it doesn’t seem like a lot now, but back then I think we made between four and eight million dollars. Eight million dollars is what we had made in our four year success for The Jets.”


CB: Did anyone at any time ever ask to see an accounting of the money coming in and the money going out? Your parents?

On their parents: “I don’t think my parents stayed on top of it. I wish they would have. I think they were kind of caught up in the whole excitement of it, trusting him that they didn’t ask any questions. It was when the money ran out… It took a long time for my parents to convince our manager we needed a house. We’d been working so hard, we’d been renting. We’d like to buy a house. We finally bought a home for the family. Not even a few years after that, people kept thinking; You guys are making so much money. You’re working all the time. You’re on tour. And we weren’t really seeing anything. We were still a family of seventeen. The Jets make up the eight oldest of a family of seventeen children. We weren’t living in these big cribs and had all these cars. We had two, fifteen passenger vans, a bigger home that we could finally call our home. It wasn’t anything extravagant considering what we were making at the time. But the questions weren’t asked until it was too late.”

On their then manager: “By the time the third album came out, our manager was already having issues with the record company and the record company didn’t want to deal with him. The Jets ended up getting screwed in the middle because we didn’t know anybody. I learned now that relationships mean everything. We never knew anybody in the business. We would go in and say hi to record company people, but we didn’t have real solid relationships. Everything he did, he had his contacts.”

The “Humiliating” Jobs- Working in Casinos After Fame

Moana: “For awhile, believe me, we were all really bitter. We were all really hurt by it because we were young. By the time our career was over…we were all in our late teens, early twenties. We had to go work in clubs and bars again. It was really humiliating for us to go back into casinos and get paid peanuts. We didn’t know anybody in the business. It was like they moved on. “The Jets? That’s old news. We’ve got New Kids On The Block. We don’t need this little group.”

“So, we were pretty much kicked to the curb. We started doing a few USO tours and then it started to hit us as a family. We fought a lot. We struggled on the road. None of us had a real education. It was like we all had G.E.D.s, education equivalent. None of us had gone to college. So, we really got tripped up and we didn’t know anybody in the business and then we were back in Minneapolis, just working the clubs.”

“It was very humiliating for a long time. We were bitter at our manager and just how everything went down. We all kind of walked away from the business. […] It was embarrassing to go back to our people thinking that we’re these big, rich, famous people and we’re trying to get work. That part really sucked. For a long time I didn’t speak to my family. We just kind of went our way.

The Extreme Tension It Caused Within Their Family
For a long time I didn’t speak to my family. We just kind of went our way. I got married and lived in Hawaii for ten years. We never were estranged from our family and our parents, but this business really did a number and we all walked away.”

Moana: “Luckily, we all are still very religious in our beliefs and we believe in our family and we all have children now. That alone I think kind of kept us together. It was just kind of like it’s not worth it. Among all of us children, my parents have fifty-three grandchildren. It just wasn’t worth it for us to be bitter for that long.”

Today The Jets are back at it and their bangin’ out a bunch of music, because they’ve said that music will always remain in their blood.

 

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"Escape (The Piña Colada Song)" is a song written and recorded by British-born American singer Rupert Holmes for his album Partners in Crime. As the lead single for the album, the pop song was recommended by Billboard for radio broadcasters on September 29, 1979, then added to prominent US radio playlists in October–November. Rising in popularity, the song peaked at the end of December to become the final US number one song of the 1970s.

Rupert Holmes - Escape (The Pina Colada Song)
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The song is featured in many films and TV shows such as Shrek, Guardians of the Galaxy, Grown Ups, Like Father,Third Watch, The Goldbergs, Splitting Up Together, Living with Yourself, Better Call Saul and It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia.

Grown Ups - Car Scene (Pina Colada song)
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The song speaks, in three verses and three choruses, of a man who is bored with his current relationship because it has become routine and he desires some variety. One day, he reads the personal advertisements in the newspaper and spots an ad that catches his attention: a woman seeking a man who, among other little things, must like piña coladas (hence it being known as "the piña colada" song.) Intrigued, he takes out an ad in reply and arranges to meet the woman "at a bar called O'Malley's", only to find upon the meeting that the woman is actually his current partner. The song ends on an upbeat note, showing the two lovers realized they have more in common than they had suspected and that they do not have to look any further than each other for what they seek in a relationship.

The song shot up through the US charts, becoming the country's last number-one Billboard Hot 100 hit of 1979 and of the 1970s. "Escape" was knocked out of the top spot but returned to number one on the Billboard Hot 100 chart during the second week of 1980, having been displaced for a week by KC and the Sunshine Band's "Please Don't Go". It was the first pop song to ascend to #1 on the Billboard pop chart in two different decades.

KC & The Sunshine Band - Please Don't Go

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The song was the US's 11th-best-selling single of 1980 on the Billboard Hot 100.
In 2019 the band Sugar Ray released a cover version on their album Little Yachty, duplicating Holmes's rhythm and feel.

Escape (The Pina Colada Song) · Sugar Ray

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The song was featured in radio and supermarket commercials for Bounty paper towels in 2019 and 2020
Recorded for Holmes's Partners in Crime (1979) album, the song came from an unused track for which Holmes wrote temporary or "dummy" lyrics:
This version, "The Law of The Jungle", was released as part of his Cast of Characters (2005) box set and was inspired by a want-ad he read whilst idly scanning the personals one day. As Holmes put it, "I thought, ‘what would happen to me if I answered this ad?’ I'd go and see if it was my own wife who was bored with me." The title of the song was originally going to be "People Need Other People", and was later to be revealed that it was a true story.

The chorus originally started with "If you like Humphrey Bogart", which Holmes changed at the last minute, replacing the actor with the name of the first exotic cocktail that came to mind and fit the music.

The original lyrics said, "If you like Humphrey Bogart and getting caught in the rain."…
As I was getting on mic I thought to myself, I’ve done so many movie references to Bogart and wide-screen cinema on my earlier albums, maybe I shouldn’t do one here.
I thought, What can I substitute? Well, this woman wants an escape, like she wants to go on vacation to the islands. When you go on vacation to the islands, when you sit on the beach and someone asks you if you’d like a drink, you never order a Budweiser, you don’t have a beer. You’re on vacation, you want a drink in a hollowed-out pineapple with the flags of all nations and a parasol. If the drink is blue you’d be very happy. And a long straw. I thought, What are those escape drinks? Let’s see, there’s daiquiri, mai tai, piña colada… I wonder what a piña colada tastes like? I’ve never even had one.
I thought that instead of singing, "If you like Humphrey Bogart," with the emphasis on like, I could start it a syllable earlier and go, "If you like piña-a coladas."
— Rupert Holmes

Holmes noted in 2019 that he still does not drink piña coladas.

In the romantic comedy The Sweetest Thing (2002), Rupert Holmes' Escape (The Pina Colada Song) plays
on the car radio while Cameron Diaz and Christina Applegate sing along, dance and wash the car …

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[postnew]

"Can't Fight This Feeling" is a power ballad performed by the American rock band REO Speedwagon. The single remained at the top of the Billboard Hot 100 chart for three consecutive weeks from March 9 to March 23, 1985.
The song first appeared on REO Speedwagon's 1984 album Wheels Are Turnin'. It was the group's second number-one hit on the U.S. charts (the first being 1981's "Keep on Loving You", also written by Kevin Cronin) and reached number sixteen in the UK. "Can't Fight This Feeling" has appeared on dozens of 'various artists' compilation albums, as well as several REO Speedwagon greatest hits albums.
REO Speedwagon performed the song at the 1985 Live Aid concert; they were introduced by Chevy Chase.

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Two different music videos exist for the song. Both videos have been shown at various times on VH1 Classic (now known as MTV Classic).
Version 1: Studio (videotape)
The videotaped version was produced by MTV for a special on REO Speedwagon and features the band in the studio. It begins with Kevin Cronin playing the piano, attempting to find the key in which he can best sing the song (starting off in G major, he later decides he can sing it better in A). After Cronin exchanges some laughs with his bandmates, the original track of the song plays, with the band members miming their respective parts. It concludes with Cronin uttering the line, "That warmed the cockles of my cockles!"

Can't FightThis Feeling - REO Speedwagon
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Version 2: Film
The second more famous version, directed by John Jopson, was considered a "more professional one" and makes various references to the life-cycle and shows the band singing the song.

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Kevin Patrick Cronin (born October 6, 1951) is the lead vocalist, rhythm guitarist, and occasional pianist for the American rock band, REO Speedwagon. REO Speedwagon had several hits on the Billboard Hot 100 throughout the 1970s and 1980s, including two chart-toppers written by Cronin: "Keep on Loving You" (1981) and "Can't Fight This Feeling" (1985).

REO Speedwagon - Keep on lovin' you


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"Keep On Loving You" is a soft rock power ballad written by Kevin Cronin and performed by American rock band REO Speedwagon. It features the lead guitar work of Gary Richrath. The song first appeared on REO Speedwagon's 1980 album Hi Infidelity. It was the first REO Speedwagon single to break the top 50 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100, reaching the number-one spot for one week in March 1981. The single was certified Platinum for U.S. sales of over one million copies. It peaked at number seven in the UK Singles Chart. "Keep On Loving You" has been a mainstay on 1980s soft rock compilations and has appeared on dozens of 'various artists' compilation albums, as well as several REO Speedwagon greatest hits albums.
Kevin Cronin stated that he wrote "Keep On Loving You" as a more traditional love ballad, and the band as a whole developed it into its final arrangement as a power ballad. He recounted:

I walked into rehearsal and sat down at the piano, which I rarely do because I’m a guitar player, and started playing "Keep on Loving You." ... And the guys in the band looked at me like I was from another planet. They were like, "What are you...?" because we were all bringing in songs for this record we were going to make and they looked at me like I was crazy. And I’m like, "Dude, this song really means a lot to me." [And they said] "So, dude, that’s not an REO Speedwagon song." And I kind of was like, "You know what? I’m the main songwriter for REO Speedwagon, so if I write a song, it’s an REO Speedwagon song. It’s the band's job to turn it into an REO Speedwagon song." I was so passionate about this song. Everyone kind of got it and sure enough, Gary [Richrath] went over, plugged in his guitar and started playing power chords to this little love song I wrote. The next thing we knew, it was a number one record and everyone was calling it a power ballad and acted like we had this strategy for success that made this song happen when really it was just an accident.

Music video
In 1981, the music video of the song was the 17th played on the first day of broadcast of MTV, on August 1. It was framed by a scene of Kevin Cronin talking about his relationship troubles with a female psychiatrist and contained a shot where a woman picked up a telephone connected to Gary Richrath's guitar, referencing the live version of "157 Riverside Avenue."

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Cronin joined REO Speedwagon shortly after the group recorded its debut album in 1971. He recorded one album with the band, 1972's R.E.O./T.W.O., but left the band soon after because of missed rehearsals and creative disagreements. Cronin returned to the fold in 1976.
Cronin's return came after Greg X. Volz turned down the position for lead vocals due to his conversion to Christianity. The band's success hit its peak in the late 1970s and early 1980s, but are still releasing records such as Find Your Own Way Home in 2007. Their most famous album, Hi Infidelity, sold over 10 million copies. Kevin has stated in various interviews that they "play for free but get paid for the traveling". He has written or co-written many of the band's hit songs such as "Keep on Loving You", "Can't Fight This Feeling", "Keep the Fire Burnin'", "I Do' Wanna Know", "Keep Pushin'", "Roll With the Changes", "Time for Me to Fly", "Here With Me", "In My Dreams", and "Don't Let Him Go".
Cronin was a celebrity contestant on Don't Forget the Lyrics! on March 27, 2008. He reached $350,000 before forgetting the lyrics to "Last Dance" by Donna Summer.
He appears on an infomercial advertising TimeLife's Ultimate Rock Ballads, which feature tracks by REO Speedwagon, mostly from the 1980s, when the band enjoyed their greatest success.
Kevin Cronin appeared on the Netflix original series Ozark along with bandmates from REO Speedwagon in S03E03. The episode was entitled "Kevin Cronin Was Here," and they performed "Time for Me to Fly." The popularity of the show lead to a resurgence onto the billboard charts for REO Speedwagon in April, 2020, and placement onto digital charts not in existence at the time of the initial hit songs.
Cronin's wife is named Lisa. His oldest child is a son named Paris from a previous marriage. He also has a daughter, Holly; his youngest are twins Josh and Shane.

Holly Cronin, Kevin Cronin, Lisa Cronin

Holly Cronin coming off after "Can’t Fight This Feeling" duet — at KAABOO San Diego.​

 

[postnew]

"Midnight Lady" is a song by English soft rock musician Chris Norman, released as a single in 1986. The song, produced and written by Dieter Bohlen, one half of Modern Talking, reached number one on the German singles chart in May 1986. Norman is popular in Germany where he scored his most hit records during the 1980s. "Midnight Lady" was also successful in Switzerland and Austria, where it also reached the number one spot. The song also went top 20 in the Netherlands and Belgium, reaching No. 9 and No. 16, respectively.

Chris Norman - Midnight Lady

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Christopher Ward Norman (born 25 October 1950) is an English soft rock singer. Norman was the lead singer of Smokie, an English soft rock band which found success in Europe in the 1970s. "Stumblin' In", a 1978 duet with Suzi Quatro, was a big US hit.

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With the advent of rock and roll, Norman acquired his first guitar at the age of seven. His early musical influences were Elvis Presley, Little Richard, and Lonnie Donegan.
In these early years, Norman's parents moved around the country a lot which resulted in him going to nine different schools, and living in various locations around England, such as, Redcar, Luton, Kimpton and Nottingham. By 1962 however, the family had moved back to Norman's mother's home city of Bradford. Approaching his twelfth birthday, Norman started at St. Bede's Grammar School where he was to meet Alan Silson and Terry Uttley, future members of Smokie.
As teenagers, influenced by the new era of groups such as The Beatles and The Rolling Stones and then folk singer, Bob Dylan, Norman and Silson began meeting up and spent nearly all their spare time learning new songs on their guitars. They managed to persuade Uttley to join them and, along with a drummer friend called Ron Kelly, they formed their first band. The Yen, Essence, and Long Side Down were just some of a variety of names they called themselves before settling on "The Elizabethans". When Ron Kelly left the group in 1973, an old friend called Pete Spencer was asked to take over on the drums, and the group, which was to become Smokie, was complete.
Between 1974 and the early 1980s, Smokie enjoyed success touring all over the world, but the strain and pressure of constantly being away from home and family was beginning to tell on Norman. By the early 1980s he decided to spend more time writing and working in the studio. Norman and Spencer now worked together on songs for other artists including hits for Kevin Keegan ("Head Over Heels in Love", a No. 31 UK hit), and the England football team song "This Time (We'll Get It Right)". He also worked with Agnetha Fältskog (on her solo album), Racey (co-writer of "Baby It's You"), Donovan (backing vocals on Donovan), and Heavy Metal Kids.
In 1978, Norman recorded a duet with Suzi Quatro, "Stumblin' In", which made No. 4 on the US Billboard Hot 100 and sold over one million copies.
Norman's solo career took off in 1986 with the song, "Midnight Lady", which was a hit throughout Europe holding the number one spot in Germany for six weeks (where it sold 900,000 copies). Further success followed by the songs "Some Hearts Are Diamonds", "No Arms Can Ever Hold You", "Broken Heroes", "Fearless Hearts", "Sarah" and "Baby I Miss You". In 1994, Norman was honoured by CMT Europe as their 'International Video Star of the Year'.

Chris Norman - Some Hearts Are Diamonds

Some Hearts Are Diamonds is the second solo album by Chris Norman, released in 1986 by Hansa Records. Dieter Bohlen, formerly of Modern Talking, produced the album and wrote several of the songs.

In 2004, he took part in the Comeback Show on the German TV station ProSieben and he performed "Stumblin' In" as a duet with C. C. Catch. In the final episode of the show, he was joined by Smokie for the final song.

Chris Norman C.C.Catch. Stumblin' in / 2013
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On 2 June 2007, Norman performed at the Peel Bay Festival, Isle of Man.
Norman continues to this day to record and to perform gigs throughout Europe and beyond.
Chris Norman met his future wife, Linda MacKenzie at the age of seventeen years, when a group of “Smokie” was just beginning his career on stage. There was this turning point in 1967 during a tour in Scotland.

Modest blonde infatuated with the future famous singer and he asked her to meet me. Three years later, the couple got married, the day Chris calls the happiest in his life, even after fifty years.

The pair were so inseparable that even Linda got a job as a stylist in the team of the group to be together on tour.

Photo: Smokie

 

[postnew]

Shel Silverstein

"Sylvia's Mother" is a 1972 single by Dr. Hook & the Medicine Show and the group's first hit song. It was written by Shel Silverstein, produced by Ron Haffkine and was highly successful in the United States, reaching #5 on the Billboard singles chart (tied with "Sexy Eyes" from the album Sometimes You Win for the band's best performing song), as well as #1 in Ireland and #2 in the United Kingdom. It spent 3 weeks at #1 on the Australian music charts, making it the 15th ranked single in Australia for 1972; and also reached #1 in South Africa, where it was the 3rd ranked song for the year. It appeared on the group's first album, Dr. Hook.

"Sylvia's Mother" is autobiographical, with songwriter Shel Silverstein drawing upon his unsuccessful attempt to revive a failed relationship. Silverstein had been in love with a woman named Sylvia Pandolfi, but she would later become engaged to another man and end up as a museum curator at the Museo de Arte Carrillo Gil, Mexico City. Desperate to continue the relationship, Silverstein called Pandolfi's mother, Louisa, but she told him that the love had ended.
The lyrics tell the story in much the same way: a man, despondent after learning that Sylvia, with whom he had an earlier relationship, is leaving town, tries to telephone her to say one last goodbye. However, Sylvia's mother (Mrs. Avery) tells him that Sylvia is engaged to be married, and is trying to start a new life in Galveston. She asks the man not to say anything to her because she might start crying and want to stay. She tells the man Sylvia is hurrying to catch a 9 o'clock train. She then returns to the phone conversation, thanks the (unnamed) narrator for calling. The pathos lies in the singer's awareness that Sylvia is right there with her mother, Sylvia being unaware that he is the man on the phone. Throughout the phone conversation, an operator interrupts to ask for more money ("40 cents more for the next three minutes") to continue the call.

Dr Hook – Sylvia’s Mother | The story behind the song

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‘Sylvia’s Mother’ was the first single released by Dr. Hook & the Medicine Show, who later became simply Dr. Hook. It was written by Shel Silverstein and many of the songs that he wrote for the band were works of comedy and he is also known for writing ‘A Boy Named Sue’ for Johnny Cash. This band had two lead singers, Ray Sawyer is the one with the eye patch the other is Dennis Locorriere. Locorriere was only 20 years old, but he delivered the vocal with a sincere sorrow. After this song became a hit, audience members would sometimes throw coins at the band when the line “40 cents more” was sung, and this could hurt, especially when they were launched from the balcony.
Shel Silverstein was a brilliant storyteller with a vivid imagination, but this story was real. The poor guy in the phone booth speaking with Sylvia’s mother who he calls Mrs. Avery, was actually him, trying to get through to his girlfriend Sylvia. Her real last name was changed, because it didn’t fit the rest of the story and the story may be a bit exaggerated, but it was mostly true. It happened around 1964 and when he called Sylvia, he was only able to reach her mother who told him, ‘She can’t talk to you.’ He asked her, ‘Why not?’ and her mother responded by saying that Sylvia was packing and she was leaving to get married, which was a big surprise to him. The guy was in Mexico and he was a bullfighter and a painter. After begging with Sylvia’s mother, “Please Mrs. Avery, I’ve just got to talk to her I’ll only keep her a while”, he finally got to talk with Sylvia, but not before Sylvia’s mother issued this warning, ‘Shel, don’t spoil it.’
The identity of Sylvia was always kept a big secret, but a Dutch public television producer named Arjan Vlakveld eventually found out who Sylvia was, and he also was able to track down Sylvia’s mother. He was at his brother’s place having a glass of wine in the garden when he met an American woman who he let know that he produced documentaries and did pop star interviews. The American told him the story about Sylvia and her mother, who she knew and from this information Arjan hoped he could trace Sylvia. Arjan ran down a few names and ended up in a telephone conversation with Sylvia Pandolfi, who at that time was a museum director in Mexico City. The line in the song, “Down Galveston way” meant that she was getting married to a Mexican and moving there.
So I asked her the question: Are you by any chance the Sylvia in the song 'Sylvia's Mother?' She was very surprised because nobody knew, it was a personal and family story, she never told anyone. I filmed the interview with her mother in Homewood, Illinois. The same house where she had the telephone call with Shell Silverstein, probably even the same telephone number. She was 95 years at that time."
After the band had been performing this song for a while, Shel Silverstein wrote a new version for them called "Sylvia's Father." Only the end of the song was different, with the last verse changed to:
Sylvia's father says Sylvia's pregnant and you went and made her that way
Sylvia's father says you motherf--ker I'm gonna kill you someday
At this point, Dennis Locorriere would do a rant about the no-good scoundrel that knocked up Sylvia. This version was never recorded.

https://www.songfacts.com/facts/dr-hook-the-medicine-show/sylvias-mother

Dr Hook - "Sylvia's Father"
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In the UK, this was kept out of the #1 spot by Donny Osmond's "Puppy Love."

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[postnew]

"Wouldn't It Be Good" is a song by English singer-songwriter Nik Kershaw. It was released one month prior to his debut studio album Human Racing. The release was Kershaw's second single, and features the non-album track "Monkey Business" as the B-side, which was also released as a bonus track on the 2012 re-release of the album.
"Wouldn't It Be Good" was the second single from Kershaw's debut solo album Human Racing and turned out to be among his more popular single releases. It spent three weeks at #4 in the UK charts and became a hit throughout Europe, as well as a top 10 hit in Canada and Australia. Kershaw is also most closely associated with this song in the U.S., where it narrowly missed going Top 40. Kershaw performed this song at Live Aid in London's Wembley Stadium in July 1985.

Nik Kershaw - Wouldn't It Be Good

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The music video for "Wouldn't It Be Good", which features Kershaw cast as an alien visitor who observes the characteristics of the people around him, was directed by graphic designer Storm Thorgerson, was released in 1984 and received heavy rotation on MTV, which helped the song reach No. 46 on the US charts. It used chroma key technology to achieve the alien suit's special effects. The music video was filmed primarily in and around St. James' Court Hotel, London. The closing scenes were recorded at the Mullard Radio Astronomy Observatory, near Cambridge

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Nicholas David Kershaw (born 1 March 1958) is an English singer, songwriter, composer, multi-instrumentalist and record producer.

Kershaw came to prominence in 1984 as a solo artist. He released eight singles that entered the Top 40 charts in the UK during the decade, including "Wouldn't It Be Good", "Dancing Girls", "I Won't Let the Sun Go Down on Me", "Human Racing", "The Riddle", "Wide Boy", "Don Quixote" and "When a Heart Beats". His 62 weeks on the UK Singles Chart through 1984 and 1985 beat all other solo artists. Kershaw appeared at the dual-venue concert Live Aid in 1985 and has also penned a number of hits for other artists, including a UK No. 1 single in 1991 for Chesney Hawkes, "The One and Only".

Kershaw was born on 1 March 1958 in Bristol, England, and grew up in Ipswich, Suffolk. His father was a flautist and his mother was an opera singer. He was educated at Northgate Grammar School for Boys where he played the guitar – he was self-taught on this instrument. He left school in the middle of his A-levels and got a job at an unemployment benefit office. He also sang in a number of underground Ipswich bands. However, when the last of these, Fusion, split up in 1982, he embarked on a full-time solo career as a musician and songwriter.
Kershaw was unemployed for a year after leaving Fusion, but during this time he found manager Mickey Modern after placing an advertisement in the magazine Melody Maker. Modern secured a record deal for Kershaw at MCA. In September 1983, Kershaw released his first single "I Won't Let the Sun Go Down on Me", which reached No. 47 in the UK Singles Chart. It became a major hit in Scandinavia, Switzerland and the Netherlands.
At the beginning of 1984 Kershaw released his breakthrough song "Wouldn't It Be Good", which reached No. 4 in the UK, and was a big success in Europe, particularly in Ireland, Germany, Italy, Switzerland and Scandinavia, and also in Canada, Australia and New Zealand. The music video, featuring Kershaw as a chroma key-suited alien, received heavy rotation from MTV, helping the song to reach No. 46 in the United States. He enjoyed three more Top 20 hits from his debut solo album Human Racing, including the title track and a successful re-issue of "I Won't Let the Sun Go Down on Me". This track ultimately proved his biggest hit as a performer when it reached No. 2 in the UK.
Kershaw's second album was The Riddle. The title-track, released in November 1984, proved to be his third international hit single, reaching No. 3 in the UK and Ireland, and No. 6 in New Zealand. The album also spawned two more UK Top 10 hits, "Wide Boy" and "Don Quixote", as it went multi-platinum. During this time, Kershaw toured extensively with his backing band the Krew, consisting of Keith Airey, Tim Moore, Mark Price and Dennis Smith.

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In July 1985, Kershaw was among the performers at Live Aid, held at Wembley Stadium. He described the experience as "absolutely terrifying". The concert turned out to be the peak of his career, as his stardom began to wane soon afterwards and he enjoyed only one more UK Top 40 hit. He continued to record and release records and collaborated with others on a number of projects. Also in 1985, Elton John asked Kershaw to play guitar on John's hit single, "Nikita".
A cover of "Wouldn't it be Good" by the Danny Hutton Hitters appeared on the soundtrack of the 1986 teen romantic comedy-drama Pretty in Pink. Later that same year, Kershaw's third solo album, Radio Musicola, was released to critical acclaim but to little commercial success. The Works was released in 1989, also to little success. Two singles were released from the album, "One Step Ahead" and "Elisabeth's Eyes".
Kershaw's prowess as a songwriter served him well in 1991, when his song "The One and Only" appeared on the soundtrack to the British film Buddy's Song, and in the American movie Doc Hollywood. "The One and Only" proved to be a UK No. 1 hit for the star of Buddy's Song, Chesney Hawkes.

Chesney Hawkes - The One and Only
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During 1991, he worked with Tony Banks, the keyboard player of Genesis, on Banks' third solo album Still. Kershaw wrote two songs for the album and co-wrote a third with Banks, singing on all three.
In 1993, the Hollies had a minor hit with another of Kershaw's songs, "The Woman I Love". During the mid-1990s he also wrote and produced material for the boy band Let Loose, with two of the tracks ("Seventeen" and "Everybody Say Everybody Do") achieving reasonable success. Following this year, Kershaw appeared on Elton John's 1993 'Duets' album, where Kershaw not only wrote the song but produced, and played all the instruments on the track.
The year 1999 saw the release of the album 15 Minutes. Kershaw decided to record the tracks himself, when he could not envisage them being recorded by other artists. The album spawned two singles, "Somebody Loves You" and "What Do You Think of It So Far?", the latter a song described as "an elegant and soaring ode to the transience of time, infused with both self-doubt and an acceptance of life that can only come with maturity"

Personal life
Kershaw's first wife was Canadian Sheri Kershaw, herself a musician who featured on several of Kershaw's early albums. The couple married in July 1983, had three children together, and divorced in 2003. His second son was born with Down syndrome.

Sheri

Kershaw remarried in 2009 and has also had a child with his second wife Sarah.

Sarah

In 2019, Kershaw received an Honorary Doctorate from the University of Suffolk for his services to the music industry.

Receiving an Honorary Doctorate, music icon Nik will become Dr Kershaw Picture: UNIVERSITY OF SUFFOLK

Nik Kershaw speaking to the graduands and families at the University of Suffolk on October 15 Picture: UNIVERSITY OF SUFFOLK


Music legend Nik Kershaw was awarded the title at a ceremony at the university this week along side five other Suffolk celebrities. The Wouldn't It Be Good singer was honoured for his service to the music industry, after he went from playing in Ipswich pubs on a Sunday night to performing in front of thousands at Wembley Stadium as part of the historic Live Aid concert in 1985, alongside the biggest artists of the time.
Talking at the graduation, the 61-year-old spoke of his fondness of the town he grew up in.
"It is nice to come back," he said. "I still play gigs at the Regent from time to time. It's nice to see all the old haunts, a lot of them are still here.
"Coming here I drove past my old place of work in Grimwade Street. I spent 20 years in this town so I remember it well. I had some really good times, perhaps some that I wouldn't want to share with you, but some good times. I grew up here."
The pop singer, who was once described as the "best songwriter of his generation" by super star Elton John, also reflected on how the Suffolk town helped shape his career. The musician, who wrote the hit song The One and Only for Chesney Hawkes, has previously said: "I used to play at the pubs around here.
"We used to play at the Mulberry Tree quite a lot and a pub called the Kingfisher that we used to make a pilgrimage to every Sunday evening to see the local bands. I don't think you ever lose the passion for your home town. My parents who are no longer with us lived on the Gainsborough Estate. I don't come back that often but when I do it feels really comfortable. I mean it has all changed so much. I'm looking out at the docks and everything, I used to come down here and take photographs of the boats but it really looks beautiful now."

 

[postnew]

"I Don't Like Mondays" is a song by Irish new wave group The Boomtown Rats about the 1979 Cleveland Elementary School shooting in San Diego. It was released in 1979 as the lead single from their third album, The Fine Art of Surfacing. The song was a number one single in the UK Singles Chart for four weeks during the summer of 1979,[3] and ranks as the sixth biggest hit of the UK in 1979. Written by Bob Geldof and Johnnie Fingers, the piano ballad was the band's second single to reach number one on the UK chart.

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According to Geldof, he wrote the song after reading a telex report at Georgia State University's campus radio station, WRAS, on the shooting spree of 16-year-old Brenda Ann Spencer, who fired at children in a school playground at Grover Cleveland Elementary School in San Diego, California, on 29 January 1979, killing two adults and injuring eight children and one police officer. Spencer showed no remorse for her crime; her explanation for her actions was "I don't like Mondays. This livens up the day". Geldof had been contacted by Steve Jobs to play a gig for Apple, inspiring the opening line about a "silicon chip". The song was first performed less than a month later.
Geldof explained how he wrote the song:

I was doing a radio interview in Atlanta with Johnnie Fingers and there was a telex machine beside me. I read it as it came out. Not liking Mondays as a reason for doing somebody in is a bit strange. I was thinking about it on the way back to the hotel and I just said 'silicon chip inside her head had switched to overload'. I wrote that down. And the journalists interviewing her said, 'Tell me why?' It was such a senseless act. It was the perfect senseless act and this was the perfect senseless reason for doing it. So perhaps I wrote the perfect senseless song to illustrate it. It wasn't an attempt to exploit tragedy.[8]

Geldof had originally intended the song as a B-side, but changed his mind after the song was successful with audiences on the Rats' US tour.[8] Spencer's family tried to prevent the single from being released in the United States.
In later years, Geldof admitted that he regretted writing the song because he "made Brenda Spencer famous".
In 2019 Bob Geldof and Johnnie Fingers reached an agreement in their dispute over who wrote the song, until then credited solely to Geldof. Fingers received a financial settlement and co-credit.

Spencer was 16 when she opened fire at a San Diego elementary school from a window in her home, leaving two dead and nine more injured in 1979

The incident inspired Bob Geldof to write the Number 1 hit song in the UK I Don’t Like Mondays by the Boomtown Rats which was released weeks after the shooting.

Spencer famously said that her motive was, 'I just don't like Mondays… I did this because it's a way to cheer up the day'

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/ar...ondays-killer-inducted-Golden-Girls-club.html

Despite reaching number-one in the United Kingdom, it only reached number 73 on the US Billboard Hot 100.The song was played regularly by album-oriented rock format radio stations in the United States throughout the 1980s, although radio stations in San Diego refrained from playing the track for some years to respect local sensitivities about the shooting.
In the UK the song won the Best Pop Song and Outstanding British Lyric categories at the Ivor Novello Awards.
On 9 September 1981, Geldof was joined on stage by fellow Boomtown Rat Johnnie Fingers to perform the song for The Secret Policeman's Ball sponsored by Amnesty International. A recording of that performance appears on the 1982 album The Secret Policeman's Other Ball.
The Boomtown Rats performed the song for Live Aid at Wembley Stadium in 1985. This was the band's final major appearance. On singing the line, "And the lesson today is how to die", Geldof paused for 20 seconds while the crowd applauded the significance to those starving in Africa that Live Aid was intended to help.

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At a concert in London in 1995, almost ten years later to the day, Bon Jovi covered the song after being joined on stage by Geldof at Wembley Stadium. This recorded performance features on Bon Jovi's live album One Wild Night Live 1985–2001, as well as on the bonus 2-CD edition of These Days. Bon Jovi was again joined by Geldof for a performance of the song at The O2 Arena on 23 June 2010, the 10th night of their 12-night residency. Geldof himself performed a version of the song while hosting the Live 8 concert in London, on 2 July 2005

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[postnew]

Robert Frederick Zenon Geldof KBE (/ˈɡɛldɒf/; born 5 October 1951), is an Irish singer-songwriter, author, political activist, and occasional actor. He rose to prominence as the lead singer of the Irish rock band the Boomtown Rats in the late 1970s, who achieved popularity at the time of the punk rock movement. The band had UK number one hits with his compositions "Rat Trap" and "I Don't Like Mondays". Geldof co-wrote "Do They Know It's Christmas?", one of the best-selling singles of all time, and starred in Pink Floyd's 1982 film Pink Floyd – The Wall as "Pink".

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Geldof is widely recognised for his activism, especially anti-poverty efforts concerning Africa. In 1984, he and Midge Ure founded the charity supergroup Band Aid to raise money for famine relief in Ethiopia. They went on to organise the charity super-concert Live Aid the following year and the Live 8 concerts in 2005. Geldof currently serves as an adviser to the ONE Campaign, co-founded by fellow Irish rock singer and activist Bono, and is a member of the Africa Progress Panel (APP), a group of ten distinguished individuals who advocate at the highest levels for equitable and sustainable development in Africa. A single father, Geldof has also been outspoken for the fathers' rights movement.
Geldof was granted an honorary knighthood (KBE) by Elizabeth II in 1986 for his charity work in Africa; although it is an honorary award as Geldof is an Irish citizen he is often referred to as 'Sir Bob'. He is a recipient of the Man of Peace title which recognises individuals who have made "an outstanding contribution to international social justice and peace", among numerous other awards and nominations. In 2005, he received the Brit Award for Outstanding Contribution to Music.
Geldof was born and brought up in Dún Laoghaire, Ireland, a son of Robert and Evelyn Geldof. His paternal grandfather, Zenon Geldof, was a Belgian immigrant and a hotel chef. His paternal grandmother, Amelia Falk, was a British Jew from London. When Geldof was seven, his mother, Evelyn, 41, died of a cerebral haemorrhage.
Geldof attended Blackrock College, where he was bullied for being a poor rugby player and for his middle name, Zenon. After work as a slaughterman, a road navvy and pea canner in Wisbech, he was hired as a music journalist in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, for The Georgia Straight. He briefly guest hosted the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation children's program Switchback.
Returning to Ireland in 1975, he became lead singer of the Boomtown Rats, a rock group closely linked with the punk movement.
In 1978, The Boomtown Rats had their first No. 1 single in the UK with "Rat Trap", the first new wave chart-topper in Britain. In 1979, they gained international attention with their second UK No. 1, "I Don't Like Mondays". This was both successful and controversial. Geldof had written it in the aftermath of Brenda Ann Spencer's attempted massacre at an elementary school in San Diego, California in 1979.
In 1980, The Boomtown Rats released the album Mondo Bongo. Its single "Up All Night" was a huge hit in the U.S. and its video was played frequently on MTV.

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Geldof became known as a colourful interview subject. The Boomtown Rats' first appearance on Ireland's The Late Late Show saw Geldof as deliberately brusque to host Gay Byrne and during his interview he attacked Irish politicians and the Catholic Church, which he blamed for many of the country's problems. He responded to nuns in the audience who tried to shout him down by saying they had "an easy life with no material worries in return for which they gave themselves body and soul to the church". He also criticised Blackrock College. The interview caused uproar, making it impossible for The Boomtown Rats to play in Ireland again.
In January 2013, Geldof announced The Boomtown Rats would be reforming to play together for the first time since 1986 at that year's Isle of Wight Festival in June. They have subsequently announced further tour dates and released a new CD Back to Boomtown: Classic Rats Hits.

After the Boomtown Rats
Geldof left the Boomtown Rats in 1986 to launch a solo career and publish his autobiography, Is That It?, which was a UK best-seller.

Geldof left the Boomtown Rats in 1986 to launch a solo career and publish his autobiography, Is That It?, which was a UK best-seller.
His first solo records sold reasonably well and spawned the hit singles "This Is The World Calling" (co-written with Dave Stewart of Eurythmics) and "The Great Song of Indifference". He also occasionally performed with other artists, such as David Gilmour and Thin Lizzy. A performance of "Comfortably Numb" with Gilmour is documented in the 2002 DVD David Gilmour in Concert. In 1992, he performed at the Freddie Mercury Tribute Concert with the surviving members of Queen at the old Wembley Stadium, singing a song he jokingly claimed to have co-written with Mercury, called "Too Late God". The song was actually co-written by Karl Hyde.
Geldof has also worked as a DJ for XFM radio. In 1998, he erroneously announced Ian Dury's death from cancer, possibly due to hoax information from a listener who was disgruntled at the station's change of ownership. The event caused music paper NME (who had been involved in a running feud with Geldof since his Boomtown Rats days—primarily due to his disparagement of The Clash) to call Geldof "the world's worst DJ".
Along with U2's Bono, he has devoted much time since 2000 to campaigning for debt relief for developing countries. His commitments in this field, including the organisation of the Live 8 concerts, kept Geldof from producing any more musical output since 2001's Sex, Age & Death album.
In 2002, he was listed as one of the 100 Greatest Britons in a poll conducted among the general public, despite not being British.
After Live 8, Geldof returned to his career as a musician by releasing a box set containing all of his solo albums entitled Great Songs of Indifference – The Anthology 1986–2001 in late 2005. Following that release, Geldof toured, albeit with mixed success.
In July 2006, Geldof arrived at Milan's Arena Civica, a venue capable of holding 12,000 people, to play a scheduled concert to find that the organisers had not put the tickets on general sale and that only 45 people had shown up. Geldof refused to go on stage once he found out how small the attendance was. To offer some compensation for fans, Geldof stopped to sign autographs to those who had shown up. He then played a well-attended free "Storytellers" concert for MTV Italy in Naples in October 2006.

Charity work
Geldof's first major charity involvement took place in September 1981, when he performed as a solo artist for Amnesty International's benefit show The Secret Policeman's Other Ball, at the invitation of Amnesty show producer Martin Lewis; he performed a solo version of "I Don't Like Mondays". Other rock artists had 'planted a seed' and appeared to have affected Geldof in a similar manner.

Band Aid

In 1984, Geldof responded to a BBC news report from Michael Buerk about the famine in Ethiopia by mobilising the pop world to do something about the images he had seen. With Midge Ure of Ultravox he wrote "Do They Know It's Christmas?" in order to raise funds. The song was recorded by various artists under the name of Band Aid.
In its first week of release, the single became the UK's fastest-seller of all time, entering the chart at number one and going on to sell over 3 million copies, making it the biggest-selling single in UK history up to that point, a title it held for almost 13 years. The single was also a major US hit, peaking at number 13 on the Billboard Hot 100. "Do They Know It's Christmas?" returned to the UK chart a year later, reaching number three, and eventually it raised over £8 million. Following this massive success, preparations were started for the biggest rock concerts the world had ever seen, the following summer.

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New versions of Do They Know It's Christmas were recorded in 1989 and 2004. In November 2014, Geldof announced that he would be forming a further incarnation of Band Aid, to be known as Band Aid 30, to record an updated version of the charity single, with the proceeds going to treat victims of the Ebola virus in West Africa.

Live Aid


As Geldof began to learn more about the situation, he discovered that one of the main reasons why African nations were in such dire peril was the obligation to make repayments on loans that their countries had taken from Western banks. For every pound donated in aid, ten times as much would have to leave the country in loan repayments. It became obvious that one song was not enough.

On 13 July 1985, Geldof and Ure organised Live Aid, a huge event staged simultaneously at the Wembley Stadium in London and John F. Kennedy Stadium in Philadelphia. Thanks to an unprecedented decision by the BBC to clear its schedules for 16 hours of rock music, the event was also broadcast live in the UK on television and radio.
It was one of the most monumental stage shows in history, with Phil Collins flying on Concorde so that he could play at both Wembley and Philadelphia on the same day.

Singer Phil Collins and wife Jill Travelman at Heathrow, about to board a Concorde flight to JFK in order to perform in Philadelphia for LiveAid (Photo Dennis/Mirrorpix/Getty Images)

During the broadcast of Live Aid, Geldof shocked viewers into giving cash by not only twice mouthing profanities but also by slamming his fist on the table and ordering them not to go out to the pub but to stay in and watch the show.
Nearly seven hours into the concert in London, Geldof gave an infamous interview in which he used the word fuck. The BBC presenter David Hepworth, conducting the interview, had attempted to provide a list of addresses to which potential donations should be sent; Geldof interrupted him in mid-flow and shouted: "Fuck the address, let's get the [phone] numbers!" It has passed into folklore that he yelled at the audience, "Give us your fucking money!" although Geldof has stated that this phrase was never uttered. Due to his Irish accent, the profanity was stated to be misheard as "fock" and "focking" respectively. After the outburst, giving increased to £300 per second.

The harrowing video of dying, skeletal children—introduced by David Bowie following the end of his set—that had been made by CBC photo-journalists setting their films to the tune of "Drive" by The Cars, contributed to the concert's success.
In total, Live Aid raised over £150 million for famine relief. Geldof subsequently received an honorary knighthood, at age 34, for his efforts. His autobiography, written soon after with Paul Vallely, was entitled Is That It?. The book achieved further fame for being featured on the General Certificate of Secondary Education examination syllabus in a following year.
Much of the money raised by Live Aid went to NGOs in Ethiopia, some of which were under the influence or control of the Derg military junta. Some journalists have suggested that the Derg was able to use Live Aid and Oxfam money to fund its enforced resettlement and "villagification" programmes, under which at least 3 million people are said to have been displaced and between 50,000 and 100,000 killed. However, in November 2010 the BBC formally apologised to Geldof for misleading implications in its stories on the subject of Band Aid, saying it had 'no evidence' that Band Aid money specifically went to buy weapons.

Commission for Africa

In January 2004, on a visit to friends in Africa, Geldof came to believe that more people were at risk of starvation there than had died in the famine of 1984/85 which had prompted Live Aid. He telephoned the British Prime Minister Tony Blair from Addis Ababa. According to the Live 8 programme notes by Geldof's biographer and friend, Paul Vallely, the Prime Minister responded: "Calm down Bob. ... And come and see me as soon as you get back."
The result was the Commission for Africa. Blair invited Geldof and 16 other Commissioners, the majority from Africa and many of them politicians in power, to undertake a year-long study of Africa's problems. They came up with two conclusions: that Africa needed to change, to improve its governance and combat corruption, and that the rich world needed to support that change in new ways. That meant doubling aid, delivering debt cancellation, and reforming trade rules. The Commission drew up a detailed plan of how that could be done. It reported in March 2005. To force the issue Geldof decided to create a new international lobby for Africa with eight simultaneous concerts around the world to put pressure on the G8. He called it Live 8. The commission's recommendations later became the blueprint for the G8 Gleneagles African debt and aid package.

Africa Progress Panel
Geldof is a member of the Africa Progress Panel (APP), a group of ten distinguished individuals who advocate at the highest levels for equitable and sustainable development in Africa. Every year, the Panel releases a report, the Africa Progress Report, that outlines an issue of immediate importance to the continent and suggests a set of associated policies. In 2012, the Africa Progress Report highlighted issues of Jobs, Justice and Equity. The 2013 report outlined issues relating to oil, gas and mining in Africa.

Awards and honours
Geldof has received many awards for his fund-raising work including being invested by Elizabeth II as an honorary Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 1986. Geldof is entitled to use the post-nominal letters "KBE" but not to be styled "Sir", as he is not a citizen of a Commonwealth realm;[92] nevertheless the nickname "Sir Bob" has stuck and media reports continue to refer to him as "Sir Bob Geldof".

In 1986 Geldof was made a Freeman of the Borough of Swale, in north Kent, England. Geldof had for some years been resident in the borough, at Davington Priory, Faversham, and was still living there as of 2013. He received his award during a special meeting of the Swale Borough Council from the mayor, Councillor Richard Moreton, and the mayoress, Rose Moreton.

In 2006 the New Statesman magazine conducted a survey of their readers to find the Heroes of our Time, Geldof was voted third behind Aung San Suu Kyi and Nelson Mandela.

Other awards:

2005: received a Man of Peace Award.

2006: awarded the medal of Chevalier de l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres.

2006: awarded the Freedom of Dublin City for his humanitarian work. On 13 November 2017, Geldof returned the award as a protest over Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi also holding the accolade, stating that he does not "wish to be associated in any way with an individual currently engaged in the mass ethnic cleansing of the Rohingya people of north-west Burma."[99] He added that if Suu Kyi "is stripped of her Dublin Freedom perhaps the council would see fit to restore to me that which I take such pride in. If not, so be it."[99] One month later, the Dublin City Council voted 59–2 (with one abstention) to revoke Aung San Suu Kyi's Freedom of the City award over Myanmar's treatment of the Rohingya people, though Lord Mayor of Dublin Mícheál Mac Donncha denied the decision was influenced by protests by Geldof and members of U2. At the same meeting, the Councillors voted 37–7 (with 5 abstentions) to remove Geldof's name from the Roll of Honorary Freemen.

2010: awarded Hon. Master of Arts degree from the University for the Creative Arts.

2013: awarded the Freedom of the City of London.

2014: awarded with BASCA Gold Badge Award in recognition of his unique contribution to the music industry.

Personal life

Geldof's longtime girlfriend and first wife was Paula Yates. Yates was a rock journalist, and later became the presenter of the music show The Tube which ran from 1982 to 1987. She was known for her in-bed interviews on the show The Big Breakfast from 1992. Geldof met Yates when she became an obsessed fan of The Boomtown Rats during the band's early days. They became a couple in 1976 when Yates flew to Paris to surprise him when the band was playing there.

Before they were married, the couple had their first daughter, Fifi Trixibelle Geldof, born 31 March 1983 (and while Geldof was still conducting an affair with Claire King). She was named Fifi after Bob's aunt Fifi and Trixibelle because Yates wanted a 'belle' in the family.
After 10 years together, Geldof and Yates married in June 1986 in Las Vegas, with Simon Le Bon (of Duran Duran) acting as Geldof's best man. The couple later had two more daughters, Peaches Honeyblossom Geldof (known as Peaches Geldof) on 13 March 1989, and Little Pixie Geldof (known as Pixie Geldof) on 17 September 1990. Pixie is said to be named after a celebrity daughter character from the cartoon Celeb in the satirical magazine Private Eye, itself a lampoon of the names the Geldofs gave to their other children.
Geldof has stated that his children find his music 'crap' and him an 'embarrassment.'

In February 1995, Yates left Geldof for Michael Hutchence, the lead singer of Australian band INXS. Yates had first met Hutchence in 1985 when she interviewed him on The Tube. Geldof and Yates divorced in May 1996.Yates and Hutchence had a daughter, Heavenly Hiraani Tiger Lily Hutchence (known as Tiger) in July 1996.

Hutchence committed suicide in a Sydney, Australia, hotel room on 22 November 1997. After Hutchence's death, Geldof and Yates each gave police statements on the phone calls they exchanged with Hutchence that morning but did not volunteer their phone records. Yates' statement on 26 November included "He was frightened and couldn't stand a minute more without his baby ... [he] was terribly upset and he said, 'I don't know how I'll live without seeing Tiger.'" Yates contended that Geldof had repeatedly said, "Don't forget, I am above the law," referring to his influence since Live Aid. Geldof's police statements and evidence to the coroner indicated that he patiently listened to Hutchence who was "hectoring and abusive and threatening." A friend of Yates and Geldof confirmed the substance of this call and added that Geldof had said, "I know what time the call ended, it was 20 to 7, I was going to log it as a threatening call." The occupant in the hotel room next to Hutchence's heard a loud male voice and swearing at about 5:00 a.m. The coroner was satisfied that this voice was Hutchence arguing with Geldof.

Geldof later went to court and obtained full custody of his three children. He has since become an outspoken advocate of fathers' rights. After Yates' death from a heroin overdose in 2000, Geldof became the legal guardian of Tiger Hutchence and later adopted her in 2007. As of 2019, Tiger's legal name is Heavenly Hiraani Tiger Lily Hutchence Geldof.

In 2014, Geldof hoped to become the first Irish person in space as he is set to be one of the first ever astronauts on the Space XC commercial service, a $100,000 per person flight.

In April 2014, his daughter Peaches died at the age of 25, of a heroin overdose. Geldof stated the family was "beyond pain" after he confirmed the news of her death.

Peaches Geldof

Geldof announced his engagement to French actress Jeanne Marine, his partner of 18 years, on 1 May 2014, and they were married in France on 28 April 2015. They currently reside in Battersea, South London.

Bob Geldof and Jeanne Marine

Regarding his Jewish ancestry, in an interview with the Manchester Jewish Telegraph, Geldof said "I was a quarter Catholic, a quarter Protestant, a quarter Jewish and a quarter nothing – the nothing won."

According to The Sunday Times Rich List, Geldof was worth £32 million in 2012

 

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Taylor Dayne (born Leslie Wunderman; March 7, 1962) is an American singer, songwriter, and actress. She rose to fame in 1987 after her debut single "Tell It to My Heart". Dayne achieved six additional U.S. top-10 singles, including "Love Will Lead You Back", "Prove Your Love", and "I'll Always Love You".

Love Will Lead You Back
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Dayne has sold over 75 million records worldwide, making her one of the world's best-selling music artists. She has earned three Grammy Award nominations, an American Music Award, and multiple New York Music Awards. She has also received New York Hall of Fame honors and was ranked number 18 on Rolling Stone's list of the best female dance artists of all time. In December 2016, Billboard magazine ranked her the 28th most successful dance artist of all time.
Leslie Wunderman began singing professionally after graduating from high school in Baldwin, Nassau County, New York, singing in little-known rock bands such as Felony and Next. She began singing solo after finishing college and, under the name Les Lee, recorded two dance singles, "I'm The One You Want" (1985) and "Tell Me Can You Love Me" (1986), which were released on New York indie label Mega Bolt.

Taylor Dayne - Tell It to My Heart
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Signed to Arista Records as Taylor Dayne, her first song to crack the top ten was the dance-pop hit "Tell It to My Heart" in late 1987. The song was an instant smash worldwide, peaking in the top five of most major markets worldwide, and reaching number one in many countries, including West Germany. Six more U.S. top-ten hits followed, including "Prove Your Love", "I'll Always Love You", "Don't Rush Me", "With Every Beat of My Heart", "Love Will Lead You Back" and "I'll Be Your Shelter". These were followed by the No. 12 hit "Heart of Stone".

I'll Always Love You
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In the United States, she achieved three gold singles, "Tell It to My Heart", "I'll Always Love You," and "Love Will Lead You Back." "I'll Always Love You," a change-of-pace ballad compared to Dayne's earlier releases, was her breakout hit on the Adult Contemporary charts in 1988 and paved the way for future uptempo dance tracks such as "Don't Rush Me" (1988) and "With Every Beat Of My Heart" (1989) to gain acceptance on Adult Contemporary radio. In 1990, "Love Will Lead You Back", a Diane Warren composition, peaked at No. 1 on both the Billboard Hot 100 and the Hot Adult Contemporary Tracks chart.
The string of hits from her first two albums, Tell It to My Heart (1988) and Can't Fight Fate (1989), proved to be the peak of her career. She went on to release two more albums in the 1990s, but had only one more U.S. Top 40 hit, her 1993 cover of Barry White's 1974 hit "Can't Get Enough of Your Love" (from her 1993 album Soul Dancing), which reached No. 2 in the ARIA Charts in Australia but only No. 20 in the U.S.
Together with Arthur Baker and Fred Zarr, Dayne wrote "Whatever You Want" for Tina Turner's 1996 album Wildest Dreams. Dayne later recorded and released the song herself in 1998 as a single from her album Naked Without You. That album failed to chart, but Dayne continued to have hits on the dance charts into the 2000s.

Personal life
Dayne has never married. She has three children, two of whom were born via a surrogate. Dayne became a supporter of same-sex marriage (after having been opposed to it) in 2005, and stated in 2014 that she considers the LGBT community to be her most loyal fanbase.
Dayne is Jewish. She grew up in Baldwin and Freeport, New York.

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Kim Wilde (born Kim Smith; 18 November 1960) is an English pop singer, author, DJ and television presenter. She first saw success in 1981 with her debut single "Kids in America", which reached number two in the UK. In 1983, she received the Brit Award for Best British Female solo artist. In 1986, she had a UK number two hit with a reworked version of the Supremes' song "You Keep Me Hangin' On", which also topped the US Billboard Hot 100 in 1987. Between 1981 and 1996, she had 25 singles reach the Top 50 of the UK singles chart. Her other hits include "Chequered Love" (1981), "You Came" (1988) and "Never Trust a Stranger" (1988). In 2003, she collaborated with Nena on the song "Anyplace, Anywhere, Anytime", which topped the Dutch charts.

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Worldwide, Wilde has sold over 10 million albums and 20 million singles. She holds the record for being the most-charted British female solo act of the 1980s, with seventeen UK Top 40 hit singles. Starting in 1998, while still active in music, she has branched into an alternative career as a landscape gardener, which has included presenting gardening shows on the BBC and Channel 4. In 2005, she won a Gold award for her courtyard garden at the Royal Horticultural Society’s Chelsea Flower Show.


Wilde released her debut single "Kids in America" in January 1981. An instant success, it reached number two in the UK Singles Chart and scaled the Top 5 in other countries such as Germany, France and Australia. Although it achieved only moderate success in the US, peaking at number 25 when released in 1982, it is often regarded today as Wilde's signature song. Her debut album Kim Wilde repeated the success of the single, spawning two further hits in "Chequered Love" (Top 5 in the UK, France, Australia and Germany) and the UK-only single "Water on Glass".

Wilde's follow-up album was 1982's Select, led by the hit singles "Cambodia" and "View from a Bridge". Both were number 1 hits in France and reached Top 10 positions in Germany and Australia. At the time, there was some controversy about Wilde's hesitation to do live concerts. Her first concerts in September 1982 took place in Denmark, before embarking on a UK-wide tour in October. Wilde's third album, Catch as Catch Can (1983) was a relative failure. The first single from the album, "Love Blonde", was another success in France and Scandinavia, but failed to have major success in other countries. The failure of the album led to her leaving RAK and signing with MCA Records in the summer of 1984.

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In 1988, Wilde released her biggest selling album to date, Close, which returned her to the UK top 10 and spent almost eight months on the UK album chart. It produced four major European hits: "Hey Mister Heartache", "You Came", "Never Trust a Stranger" and "Four Letter Word" (the last 3 were Top 10 hits in the UK). The release of the album coincided with a tour of Europe, where she was the opening act for Michael Jackson's Bad World Tour. Wilde released her next album, Love Moves, in 1990. The album barely made the UK Top 40, and, although it was a Top 10 success in Scandinavian countries, it failed to sell as well as its predecessor and only spawned two minor hits, "It's Here" a Top 20 success in Middle and Northern Europe as well as "Can't Get Enough (Of Your Love)", her last Top 20 hit in France. She toured Europe again, this time opening for fellow Briton David Bowie.

A collaboration with Rick Nowels, who had produced hits for Stevie Nicks and Belinda Carlisle, resulted in the guitar-driven pop of the single "Love Is Holy" and the album Love Is (1992). The album's success was again limited to a small number of countries, though the single became another Top 20 hit in the UK, and the second single ("Heart Over Mind") also made the top 40. In 1993, she released her first official compilation album The Singles Collection 1981–1993, which was a success throughout Europe and Australia and the dancefloor-influenced single "If I Can't Have You" (a cover of the Yvonne Elliman song from the film Saturday Night Fever that was penned by the Bee Gees), became her last UK Top 20 Hit as well as a number 3 hit in Australia

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Awards

• 1996 RSH-GOLD Female Classic of 1995 (Germany)
• 1993 Bambi Award for "The Singles Collection" (Germany)
• 1990 Diamond Award (Netherlands)
• 1988 European Platinum Award as female singer who sold the most records across Europe (she shared this award with equally successful 80s singer Sandra)
• 1984 Golden Otto Best Singer (Germany)
• 1983 BRIT Awards - Best British Female Solo Artist (UK)
• 1983 Silver Otto Second Best Singer (Germany)
• 1982 Silver Otto Second Best Singer (Germany)
• 1981 Golden Otto Best Singer (Germany)
• 1981 Rockbjörnen - Best female singer (Sweden)

Gardening career
During her first pregnancy, an old interest in gardening resurfaced and she attended Capel Manor college to learn about horticulture, so as to create a garden for her children. As a celebrity, she was asked by Channel 4 to act as a designer for their programme Better Gardens. A year later, she started a two-year commitment with the BBC, recording two series of Garden Invaders.

In 2001, she (along with fellow horticulturist David Fountain) created the "All About Alice" garden for the Tatton Flower Show and was awarded the 'Best Show Garden' award. In 2005, she won a Gold award for her courtyard garden at the Royal Horticultural Society's Chelsea Flower Show. She has designed and created numerous gardens during her involvement in the Better Gardens and Garden Invaders TV programmes and commissioned by individuals and organisations. She has also created gardens for flower shows across the UK. In 2001 she was involved in setting a world record for the largest tree transplantation, when a 58 feet (18 m) London plane was moved from Belgium to a development site in Warrington. After standing in its new location for six years, however, the tree was toppled by a storm in January 2007.

Publications
Wilde has written two books as part of her gardening career. The first, Gardening with Children, was released on 4 April 2005 by Collins publishers. Translations of the book were released at the same time in Spain, France, Denmark and the Netherlands, and later in Germany.

Her second book, The First-Time Gardener, was released on 3 April 2006 (again by Collins), and is a beginner's guide to gardening

Personal life
On 1 September 1996, Wilde married her co-star in Tommy, Hal Fowler, and expressed a desire to have children as soon as possible.

On 3 January 1998 she gave birth to Harry Tristan. On 13 January 2000, Rose Elisabeth was born

'I once saw a UFO in my back garden. It was the day after Michael Jackson died and I thought, ‘He is coming back to haunt me!’ said Kim (pictured in 1983 with Jackson, Pete Townshend and Paul McCartney)

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/ev...-thought-Michael-Jackson-coming-haunt-me.html

I once saw a UFO in my back garden. It was the day after Michael Jackson died and I thought, ‘He is coming back to haunt me!’ [Kim was the support act on Jackson’s Bad tour in 1988]. It was on a Friday night and I saw two lights in the sky that were static and silent. I stood watching them above my garden from about 11pm till one in the morning. It had a profound effect on me. It makes me think that somebody is looking after us.

https://www.standard.co.uk/showbiz/...o-sing-kids-in-america-in-space-a3759306.html

 

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"Hot Child in the City" is a song by English-Canadian musician Nick Gilder. It was released in June 1978 as a single from the album City Nights. It went to No. 1 both in Canada (October 14, 1978) and in the United States (October 28, 1978). It was not his first No. 1 single: as the lead singer of Sweeney Todd, he had hit No. 1 in Canada on June 26, 1976 (in the RPM listing) with the single "Roxy Roller", which remained at the top for three weeks. He won 2 Juno Awards in Canada and a People's Choice Award in the US. According to The Billboard Book of Number 1 Hits it held the record for taking the longest amount of time to reach No. 1. The song became a platinum record.
Despite the song's innocent and catchy pop stylings, the tune is based on Gilder's experiences witnessing child prostitution. "I've seen a lot of young girls, 15 and 16, walking down Hollywood Boulevard with their pimps. Their home environment drove them to distraction so they ran away, only to be trapped by something even worse. It hurts to see that so I tried writing from the perspective of a lecher – in the guise of an innocent pop song."

Nick Gilder - Hot Child In The City

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Donna Consuelos Wilkes (born November 14, 1961 is an American film actress. She began her career as a child actor in commercials before making her feature film debut in Jaws 2 (1978). She subsequently had a supporting role in Almost Summer (1978), followed by lead roles in the horror films Schizoid (1980) and Blood Song (1982). She also appeared in several television programs, including the soap opera Days of Our Lives (1982–1983), portraying Pamela Prentiss.

Wilkes is perhaps best known for her starring role in the thriller Angel (1984), in which she portrayed a preparatory student in Los Angeles who lives a double life a prostitute by night. Other credits include the horror film Grotesque (1988), opposite Linda Blair and Tab Hunter, and guest-starring roles on the series Dragnet (1989) and FBI: The Untold Stories (1991).

Donna Wilkes in Schizoid (1980)

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Early life
Wilkes was born in Manhattan, New York City, in Spanish Harlem to a Spanish and French mother and Irish father. Her father was a doctor and her mother was a nightclub singer who divorced when she was 3 months old. According to public records, Donna was born on November 14, 1958.

When she was six she made her first commercial, for Keds sneakers. She trained in acting at Dominica American Theatre of Performing Arts, but stopped her training at age 11 to become a "normal student." At age 12, she went to live with her aunt and uncle in the Dominican Republic. Being a good student at high school, she skipped a few grades, graduating at the Collegio Santo Domingo at the age of 14. At age 15, she moved to Los Angeles, California, but, unable to work at such a young age, convinced many employers that she was 18 and married. Her first jobs included being a computer operator for an ambulance service, and secretarial work for a large corporation in Culver City, adding up to 16 hours a day for five days a week.

Career
Wilkes began acting again at age 17. Her first role was the part of Jackie Peters in the 1978 Universal Pictures film Jaws 2. That same year, she starred as Meredith in Almost Summer, on which she earned a SAG card. At around age 18, she married 39-year-old actor Billy Gray, known for his work on Father Knows Best. The marriage soon ended in divorce. Wilkes played Pamela Prentiss on the soap opera Days of Our Lives, from 1983 to 1984.

Her best known role was in the 1984 cult classic sexploitation film Angel, in which she played Molly Stewart/Angel, a high school honor student by day, and a prostitute by night. The film spawned three unsuccessful sequels in which Wilkes had no involvement. Wilkes was 22 at the time she played the 15-year-old character. To prepare for the role she spent time in halfway houses and rehabilitation centers in LA. "I actually walked on the streets with these girls and talked with them... and I also talked to the people with the group called Children of the Night, and to the Hollywood Police Department, too."

http://www.donnawilkes.com/gallery.htm

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"You Make Me Feel Brand New" is a 1974 single by the Philadelphia soul group The Stylistics. The song was written by Thom Bell and Linda Creed. Stylistics tenor Airrion Love starts out the song and then alternates with Russell Thompkins, Jr.

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An R&B ballad, it was the fifth track from their 1974 album, Let's Put It All Together and was released as a single and reached No. 2 on the US Billboard Hot 100 for 2 weeks. "You Make Me Feel Brand New" was kept from the No. 1 spot by "Billy Don't Be a Hero" by Bo Donaldson and The Heywoods. In addition, it climbed to No. 5 on the Billboard R&B chart. Billboard ranked it as the No. 14 song for 1974.
"You Make Me Feel Brand New" also reached No. 2 on the UK Singles Chart in August 1974. The Stylistics' recording sold over one million copies in the USA, earning the band a gold disc The award was presented by the RIAA on May 22, 1974. It was the band's fifth gold disc.
The song, in a longer five-minute version, had first appeared as a track on the Stylistics' 1973 album, Rockin' Roll Baby, though that version was not released as a single.
Neil Sedaka used the song as inspiration to compose the melody of "The Hungry Years", noting that it contained a three-semitone key change that he found particularly appealing and called a "drop-dead chord."

Russell Allen Thompkins Jr. (born March 21, 1951) is an American soul singer. Noted for his high tenor, countertenor, and falsetto vocals, Thompkins is the former lead singer of the Philadelphia soul vocal group The Stylistics.
In 2000, Thompkins left the group saying he even regretted he had not left much earlier. After his split from the group, Thompkins studied music formally and learned to play the piano. In 2002, he released a solo album entitled A Matter of Style, which includes cover versions of George and Ira Gershwin's "Embraceable You" and the Thom Bell and Linda Creed song "Jealousy", originally recorded by Dionne Warwick.
In 2004, Thompkins Jr. started a new group, Russell Thompkins Jr. and the New Stylistics, with Raymond Johnson, James Ranton, and Jonathan Buckson. They continue to tour and are featured on the DVD Old School Soul Party Live!, which was part of the PBS My Music series. James Ranton left the group due to health reasons but the group continues as a trio.

You Make Me Feel Brand New - Russell Thompkins, Jr & The New Stylistics


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Linda Diane Creed (December 6, 1948 – April 10, 1986), also known by her married name Linda Epstein, was an American singer-songwriter and lyricist who teamed up with songwriter-producer Thom Bell to produce some of the most successful Philadelphia soul groups of the 1970s.

Linda and Thom

Born in the Mount Airy section of Philadelphia in December 1948, Creed was active in music at Germantown High School. After graduation, Creed decided against college and devoted her energies to writing and producing music. Her career was launched in 1970 when singer Dusty Springfield recorded her song "Free Girl." That same year, Creed teamed with Bell, a staff writer, producer, and arranger at Kenny Gamble and Leon Huff's record label Philadelphia International Records.
Their first songwriting collaboration, "Stop, Look, Listen (To Your Heart)", became a Top 40 pop hit for the Stylistics, beginning an extended collaboration that also yielded the group's most successful recordings, including "You Are Everything", "Betcha by Golly, Wow", "Break Up to Make Up", "People Make the World Go Round", "You Make Me Feel Brand New," and "I'm Stone in Love with You" (the latter with Anthony Bell). Creed and Bell also paired on a number of hits for the Spinners, including "Ghetto Child", "I'm Coming Home", "Living a Little, Laughing a Little", and "The Rubberband Man." Linda Creed also worked with fellow Pennsylvania native Phyllis Hyman on many of her songs, most notably "Old Friend."

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Though diagnosed with breast cancer at 26, Creed kept on working, teaming with composer Michael Masser and writing the lyrics to the song "The Greatest Love of All", the main theme of the film "The Greatest", a biopic of the great boxer Muhammad Ali, launched in 1977.

THE GREATEST LOVE OF ALL - GEORGE BENSON
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The song was originally recorded by George Benson and released as a single in 1977, becoming a big hit, peaked at #2 on the R&B chart. The lyrics of the song were written in the midst of her struggle with breast cancer. The words describe her feelings about coping with great challenges that one must face in life, being strong during those challenges whether you succeed or fail, and passing that strength on to children to carry with them into their adult lives. In December of 1984, the song was recorded by Whitney Houston for her 1985 self-titled debut album and it would top the charts in May of 1986. Weeks before Houston reached number one, Creed died of breast cancer on April 10, 1986, at the age of 37. She was survived by her husband, Stephen "Eppy" Epstein, a longtime music promoter around Philadelphia, and their two daughters, Roni Lee and Dana Creed.

Whitney Houston - Greatest Love Of All
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The following year, her family and friends established the Linda Creed Breast Cancer Foundation. In 1992 she was posthumously inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame.