Way Back Wednesday: The Top Music of November 25, 1983

This Week In 1983: The Top Music of November 25, 1983

Lionel Richie and “All Night Long” still holds strong at the top again this week as our top five song remain unchanged. As a matter of fact, I could burn the top fifteen songs on a CD, duplicate it and sell it at the flea market as an 80’s greatest hits CD and make pretty penny. That’s how recognizable the list is.

One one song of note debuts on the chart this week – “Break My Stride” by Matthew Wilder and, to be honest, I thought it debuted later in the 80’s than 1983. Big movers this week include Duran Duran, The Police and Yes. And as we watch Bonnie Tyler, The Fixx and Prince start their decent down the chart, three new songs move into the Top Ten: “P.Y.T. (Pretty Young Thing)” from Michael Jackson (who is also sitting at #2 with Paul McCartney as well), “Crumblin’ Down” by John Cougar and this week’s featured song, “Heart and Soul” by Huey Lewis and The News.

Song Story: “Heart and Soul” by Huey Lewis and The News

“Heart and Soul” is the first single from Huey Lewis and The News’ breakthrough third album, Sports. The band had seen little success from their first two albums and there were rumblings at the record company that if their next album didn’t do well the band was going to get dropped from the label. As Huey tells it, when they convened to start recording the third album they did so with the thought in mind that “all of these songs have to be hits because we don’t have any other choice.” They must have done something right because not only did the album reach #1 the following year (1984) but it produced four Top 10 hits and one Top 20 hit. “Heart and Soul” was originally recorded by the band Exile in 1981 and again by The Bus Boys in 1982. Neither were able to crack the Hot 100. As with so many other artists that we’ve talked about in this weekly reader, the version by Huey and the boys was helped out immensely by MTV putting their video into heavy rotation and when MTV put a video into heavy rotation all the local market knockoff video shows followed suit. Huey’s leading lady in the video, Signy Coleman, makes an appearance in the band’s next video for “I Want A New Drug”. I’m a huge Huey Lewis fan and this was honestly one of my favorite videos. It’s funny and weird and the bass player as a random vampire always cracked me up.