Songoftheday 5/28/14 - I spend my time thinkin' 'bout you constantly, it's true that I want you you're the meaning of success to me...

John Waite - "Every Step Of The Way"
from the album Mask Of Smiles (1985)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #25 (two weeks)
Weeks in the Top-40: 6

Today's Song of the Day comes from British rock singer John Waite, who had left his power-pop band the Babys to score a #1 pop hit in America in 1984 with "Missing You" and a top-40 follow-up with "Tears". The following year, John released his third solo album Mask Of Smiles, and the first single from the project, "Every Step Of The Way", co-written by the artist with Czech rock/punk songwriter Ivan Kral. Behold the wall of hair in the video...

"Every Step Of The Way" became Waite's third and final solo top-40 pop hit in September of 1985. It was a much bigger hit on rock radio, climbing to #4 on Billboard magazine's Mainstream Rock radio chart. Internationally, while it popped in the top-40 at #39 in Canada, it failed to even make the singles chart in Waite's native England.

The single would be his last solo trip in the pop top-40. though he would go on to have a bunch of minor hits, including one, "These Times Are Hard For Lovers", that made the top-10 on the rock chart at #6 in 1987. However, that year he joined the hair-rock "supergroup" Bad English with Journey's Jonathan Cain and Neal Schon, and returned to the top of the American pop chart with "When I See You Smile" in 1989. After they dissolved after their second album, Waite went back to being a solo artist, and made it back on the pop chart in 1995 with "How Did I Get By Without You" (#89 pop, #20 rock). He would continue to have a couple more singles make the adult-contemporary radio chart, the latest being 2005's "New York City Girl". Most recently, he remade "Missing You" as a duet with bluegrass artist Alison Krauss and made the top-40 on the country chart.

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...and here's John appearing on Dutch TV rather awkwardly to promote the song...

Up tomorrow: a former "Cruiser" spells urban life out for you.