Songoftheday 9/18/13 - Needed a friend and the way I feel now I guess I'll be with you 'til the end....

Lionel Richie - "Stuck On You"
from the album Can't Slow Down (1983)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #3 (two weeks)
Weeks in the Top-40: 14

Today's Song of the Day is the fourth single released from Lionel Richie's mega-successful album Can't Slow Down. After reaching the top of the pop chart with the lite-calypso "All Night Long (All Night)", he scored another top-10 hit with the rock-infused "Running With The Night", and then returned to the #1 spot with the adult contemporary ballad "Hello". To complete his kaleidoscope of genres Lionel put out the country-tinged track "Stuck On You", which surprisingly came without a video, but with Lionel donning a cowboy hat on the cover. And as opposed to simply copping out to a crossover, he truly delivered a beautiful country love song that rivals his folksy material with the Commodores ("Easy", "Sail On")...

"Stuck On You" became the fourth top-10 pop hit from the album in August of 1984, as well as topping the adult contemporary radio chart. It proved accessible to everybody as it made both the R&B chart at #8 and the country chart at #24. Across the pond, the single made it to #12 in England.

With this record, Lionel really proved how versatile an artist he was, and that Can't Slow Down was just as viable as an iconic album of the 80s as Thriller. To top it off, right as this record was peaking, Lionel closed out the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles to his "All Night Long"...

(Click below to see the rest of the post)


Here's Lionel performing "Stuck On You" live on TV back in the 80s...

The R&B vocal group 3T, consisting of Tito Jackson's three sons (ergo Michael Jackson's nephews), covered "Stuck On You" for a single in 2003, and went to the top-10 in the Netherlands...

That same year, German dance musician Mark 'Oh (Marko Albrecht) had a top-10 single in Germany with a rave version of the song...

A couple years later, DJ Bongz did a dance cover of the track..

In 2010, German trance stars Scooter interpolated the chorus of the record for their homeland top-40 hit "Stuck On Replay"...

Lastly, it was a sure thing to include "Stuck On You", his biggest "country-styled" solo hit on the Hot 100, to be included on his recent country collab album Tuskegee. Lionel duetted with Darius Rucker, a fellow refugee from the pop side, on the song..

Up tomorrow: a Journey-man takes possession of her.