Songoftheday 5/3/14 - You're having a hard time and lately you don't feel so good, you're getting a bad reputation in your neighborhood...

Billy Joel - "You're Only Human (Second Wind)"
from the album Greatest Hits Vol. I & II  (1985)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #9 (two weeks)
Weeks in the Top-40: 11

Today's Song of the Day is by the "Piano Man" himself, Billy Joel, whose retro-pop classic An Innocent Man spun off a whopping six top-40 hits in America including a #1 in "Tell Her About it" and two more top-ten singles in "Uptown Girl" and the title track. After commanding the charts from 1983 until the start of 1985 with the releases from that project, he participated in the #1 charity record "We Are The World", as well as toured the planet. During all this relative down time he released his first "greatest hits" set in 1985, which included two new tracks which would be put out as singles. The first, "You're Only Human (Second Wind)", was Billy's public service announcement against suicide, somebody close to the artists' heart. With an It's A Wonderful Life-style video, it continued Joel's power of positive thinking in his work that coincided with his marriage to supermodel Christine Brinkley (coincidence?). (One of the graduating student was future Mythbuster Adam Savage)...

"You're Only Human" became Billy's eighth top-10 pop hit in America in August of 1985, while almost making it to the top of the Adult Contemporary radio chart at #2. It also was a moderate hit on rock radio, topping out at #26 on that chart in Billboard. Internationally, the single did best of all in Australia, peaking at #6, while making the top 40 in Canada, New Zealand, and the Netherlands, though in England it barely scraped the chart at #94. All the proceed from the single went to a charity helping to prevent teen suicide. Nice job, Billy (even though the song gave me the creepers)...


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...and here's Billy in concert with the song...

Up tomorrow: Another USA for Africa contributor goes to eternity.