Songoftheday 12/21/12 - she had a sulky smile, she took a standard pose as she presented herself....

Daryl Hall & John Oates - "Family Man"
from the album H2O (1982)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #6 (one week)
Weeks in the Top-40: 12

Today's Song of the Day is by the 80s' biggest pop duo, Hall & Oates, who by the summer of '83 were riding high off their third consecutive mega-hit album. Within the last 12 months, they had went to the Top-10 with "Did It In A Minute", the third from their Private Eyes album. They then released H2O at the end of 1982, which already gave them the biggest hit of their career, "Maneater", and followed that up with "One On One" which made the top-10 on the pop, R&B, and adult-contemporary chart.

With the Philly boys' next single, "Family Man", they covered a minor UK hit by British composer/musician Mike Oldfield, the guy who brought us the Exorcist theme, "Tubular Bells". His version, featuring Scottish vocalist Maggie Reilly, was a top-40 hit in Canada and peaked just outside the top-40 in his native country. It's about an "honorable" man rebuffing the advances of a streetwalker...

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Daryl and John took the general production ideas from Oldfield's recording and added his stronger and more soulful growling vocals, pushing the perspective from an outside observer to the conflicted man, and slightly altering the ending to him chasing the now-disinterested callgirl to declare his innocence...

"Family Man" went to the top-10 on the pop chart, thus equaling the number of top-10 singles from his last album. It also was a minor R&B hit, peaking at #81, and a top-20 single in Britain, bettering Oldfield's original there by a mile.

...and here's the duo performing the song live at Liberty Park in 1985..

...and more recently in 2003 in New York City...

Up tomorrow: A Cash stepdaughter has to affirm it.