Songoftheday 6/5/12 - This old town ain't the same, now nobody knows his name...

Journey - "Still They Ride"

from the album Escape (1981)

Billboard Hot 100 peak: #19 (three weeks)

Weeks in the top-40: 9

Today's song of the day is by the arena-rock group Journey, formed in the 70s from musicians that backed Santana, Neal Schon and Gregg Rolie, After a few albums as a strictly progressive-rock group, the band recruited singer Steve Perry in 1977 as lead vocalist, and wow, what a lead vocalist. Steve Perry is like the male Celine Dion. With his soaring power and wide range, Perry took Journey to another level, starting with their first chart single, "Wheel In The Sky" (which was co-written but a temp singer in the band, Robert Fleischman) in 1978.

A year later, Journey got their first top-20 pop single with "Lovin', Touchin' and Squeezin'", and established the band as the rock band girls could get into. After another successful studio and live album, Rolie left the band, to be replaced by synth whiz Jonathan Cain from the Babys. The group's first album with this revamped lineup was Escape, and it proved to be their biggest ever, selling over 9 million records and dishing out four top-20 singles, three of them making the pop top-ten, including the classics "Who's Crying Now" (#4), "Don't Stop Believin'" (#9), and "Open Arms" (#2).

"Still They Ride" was the fourth single, and the ballad made the top-20 on the pop chart, while reaching the top-40 on the soft-rock chart as well.

Escape proved to be their sole #1 album, even more striking since they didn't have a music video for any of the singles in the boom on MTV. After one more successful album and tour, the band would start to break, first with bassist Ross Valory and drummer Steve Smith expunged from the group (the former to be replaced by American Idol judge Randy Jackson), and then Steve Perry's departure first in the 80s (leaving band members to form Bad English with Cain's bandmate John Waite), then again after a reunion album in the 90s. Now the band performs with new lead singer Arnel Pineda, who was recruited after his videos on YouTube singing Journey songs went viral.

Up Tomorrow: Bella Donna goes country.