Songoftheday 2/8/15 - Standing in line marking time waiting for the welfare dime, 'cause they can't buy a job...

"The Way It Is" - Bruce Hornsby & The Range
from the album The Way It Is (1986)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #1 (one week)
Weeks in the Top-40: 15

Today's Song of the Day comes from the Virginia musician Bruce Hornsby, who put together his band the Range in the mid-80s. Spotlighting his freestyle piano flair, the group released their debut album, The Way It Is, in 1986. The first single from the set, "Every Little Kiss", would be a decent hit on Mainstream Rock and Adult Contemporary radio, where it made the top-40, but didn't give as much on pop stations, stalling at #72. The second single, however, changed all that. "The Way It Is", written by Hornsby and co-produced with Elliot Scheiner, the song conversationally describes the social problems in America today and people's inertia in fighting them, only offering a glimmer of hope with the end-tag "but you don't believe them"...

"The Way It Is" became the band's first top-40 hit, going all the way to #1 in December of 1986. The single also crossed over to #1 on the Adult Contemporary (or "easy listening") and #3 on the Mainstream Rock radio charts. Internationally, the record went to #1 in Canada and the Netherlands, top-10 in Ireland and Belgium, and #15 in the UK. It was the biggest of the "expansive western rock" style records like those from Cock Robin and the sort...

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British dance act Undercover did a hi-nrg remake of the song in 1993 that made the top-40 in Germany, though it sooooo doesn't fit the meaning of the lyrics...

Remixing/production team Brothers In Rhythm tried to bring "The Way It Is" back to the dancefloor in 1996 under the name "Chameleon" with minimally better results...

That same year, rapper E-40 interpolated the song into his single "Things'll Never Change", which reached #29 on the pop chart and #19 on the R&B chart in 1997...

"The Way It Is" inspired another rap hit, "Changes" from the late 2Pac, which went to #32 on the US pop chart and #3 on the British chart in 2002...

Lastly, here's Bruce live at Woodstock '99...

Up tomorrow: Some football players help out on Patrick Bateman's favorite song.