Songoftheday 12/1/12 - I still remember how much I used to need you, tried so hard to please you but you didn't need me...

Laura Branigan - "Solitaire"
from the album Branigan 2 (1983)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #7 (two weeks)
Weeks in the top-40: 13

Today's song of the day is by native upstate New Yorker Laura Branigan, who ended 1982 on a high note with the huge hit single "Gloria", which was a rendering of an Italian pop song from the early 80s. Instead of issuing another single from her debut album, Laura released a second album in 1983, and the first single from the set, "Solitaire", was again another adaptation of a foreign-language hit. The original, written and performed by French singer Martine Clemenceau in 1981, was a darker tale of a man waiting the nuclear apocalypse (like "99 Luftballons" would be)...The song starts at the minute and a half mark...

(Click below to see the rest of the post)


For Laura's version, her producer Jack White recruited newcomer songwriter Diane Warren to rewrite the lyrics to the song, not just translate them, but to transform them to a woman's perspective on a failing love. It would be Warren's first big success as a songwriter...

"Solitaire" became her second consecutive top-10 hit on the American pop chart, as well as making the top-20 on the adult-contemporary (soft-rock) and top-30 on the dance charts. The record also went top-10 in Australia, Canada, and France. Branigan 2 also made the top-40 on the albums chart, like her debut.

...and for something different, here's German singer Milva singing a version in her language of the original...

...finally, here's Laura herself live from 1990 performing the hit...

Up tomorrow: A "Foxy" singer has a hit about a dervishly woman.