Songoftheday 6/8/16 - Every generation blames the one before, and all of their frustrations come beating on your door...

"The Living Years" - Mike + The Mechanics 
from the album The Living Years (1988)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #1 (one week)
Weeks in the Top-40: 14

Today's song of the day comes from Mike + The Mechanics, the side-project of  guitarist Mike Rutherford of the progressive rock giant Genesis. With two lead singers in Paul Carrack (Squeeze, Ace) and Paul Young (Sad Cafe'), their debut album scored them a pair of top-10 pop hits in America with "Silent Running" and "All I Need Is A Miracle", along with a gem of a third single in "Taken In". After releasing and touring behind Genesis' massive Invisible Touch album, the Mechanics set out to record their second album together. The first single from the project, the peculiarly rhythmic "Nobody's Perfect", went to #3 for two weeks on Billboard's Mainstream Rock radio chart, but stalled down at #63 on the American pop Hot 100. The second release, though, dug deep into the hearts of many, with "The Living Years" written by Rutherford and keyboardist B.A. Robertson (who also penned "Silent Running" together). With B.A.'s lyrics reminiscing about his just-deceased father (Rutherford also lost his as well), sung soulfully by Paul Carrack, it became the go-to "dad song", with the universal them of regretting communication issues with their fathers. Mike's own son appeared in the music video...

"The Living Years" climbed all the way to #1 on the American pop chart in March of 1989. The single also went to the top of Billboard's Adult Contemporary (or 'easy listening') radio chart for four weeks, and made it to #5 on their Mainstream Rock list. Internationally, the song peaked at #2 in their native Britain, went to #1 in Canada, Ireland, and Australia, and top ten in Sweden and Norway.

The band slipped out another single from the Living Years album, "Seeing Is Believing", which went to #18 rock and #62 pop in the U.S. Instead of waiting for another Genesis break, they issued a third album, Word Of Mouth, in the spring of 1991 (months before Genesis' We Can't Dance set). The title track went to #30 on the rock chart, #78 pop, and #13 in the UK, while "Everybody Gets A Second Chance" (which sounded much like Carrack's on retro solo work) was a #24 hit on the Adult Contemporary list. The former would be the band's last time on the Hot 100, and they pared down to just the trio of Rutherford, Carrack, and Young, but they continued to have success in their homeland, with "Over My Shoulder" from their 1995 Beggar On A Beach Of Gold album made it to #12 in the UK. A fifth album gave them another top-40 British hit with "Now That You're Gone" in 1999.  Sadly, Young died of a heart attack a year later, leaving the fate of the act in limbo. Mike did end up releasing two more albums so far under the Mechanics moniker, one with Carrack and one without, both minor album successes but neither producing any pop hits. He continues his work with Genesis, while Carrack concentrates on his own solo career.

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Here's the band performing the song live at the 1990 Grammys, where the song was nominated for Best Pop Duo/Group Vocal Performance (losing to Linda Ronstadt and Aaron Neville's "Don't Know Much")...

...and here's Mike, Paul, and band keyboardist Adrian Lee live at the Prince's Trust with Level 42...

...and lastly, a more recent TV live appearance (with Paul still looking fiiiine)...

Up tomorrow: Double-dubbed debonair dudes with dangling participles.