This Week In 1983: February 5th
After three weeks in the top spot, Men At Work finally slip one notch making way for Toto and their only #1 hit “Africa”.
The song was written by keyboardist, David Paich, who was playing around with a new keyboard (a Yamaha CS-80) and came up with the open riff. He wrote the the melody and lyrics for the chorus in about ten minutes and was amazed saying “I thought to myself ‘I’m talented, but not that talented. Something just happened here!'” Having never set foot in Africa, Paich wrote the lyrics based on a documentary he had seen, articles and pictures from National Geographic, and what he could picture in his head. His bandmates, Steve Porcaro and Steve Lukather, call the song a “dumb experiment” and say that some of the lyrics that actually ended up in the song were just “goofy placeholders”. The song almost didn’t make the album as the band was more focused on their song “Rosanna”.
Michael Jackson is quickly moving up the chart with “Billie Jean” but his duet with Paul McCartney is this week’s biggest drop as their single “The Girl Is Mine” drops eleven spots to #16. And while Hall & Oates jump fourteen spots into the Top 40 with “One on One” (#37), our biggest mover is Journey and “Separate Ways (Worlds Apart)” wich debuts one spot higher on the Billboard Hot 100 at #36.
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