Songoftheday 9/14/15 - I feel like I'm pounding on a big door no one can hear me knocking...

"Hourglass"- Squeeze
from the album Babylon and On (1987)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #15 (one week)
Weeks in the Top-40: 10

Today's Song of the Day comes from the British band Squeeze, who came together in the mid-70s under the songwriting duo of Chris Difford and Glenn Tillbrook, adding keyboardist Jools Holland to the five man lineup as well. Their debut album was mostly produced by Velvet Underground member JJ Cale, whose band's album provided this new one's name, but their first single "Take Me I'm Yours" was done all on their own, and the proto-new wave song became their first to make the top-40 in England at #19 in 1978. They suffered no "sophomore slump", as their second effort, Cool For Cats spun off a pair of #2 hits with the title track and "Up The Junction". After a less-successful third release, Holland left, to be replaced by singer/keyboardist Paul Carrack. Carrack would sing co-lead on what would probably be one of the most "robbed" hits of the 80s, "Tempted", which missed the top-40 in America (#49) and the UK (#41) but the blue-eyed soul number remains their most-loved song (the record climbed to #8 on Billboard's Mainstream Rock radio chart). Paul wouldn't stay for another album, and after an LP and a hits set, the band went on hiatus in the mid-80s, though Difford and Tillbrook put out a set in their own name.

After a reunion gig in 1985, the 'classic lineup' of Difford/Tillbrook/Holland along with bassist John Bentley, drummer Gilson Lavis, and eventually second keyboardist Andy Metcalfe started to record again, releasing Cosi Fan Tutti Frutti and then their biggest American success, Babylon and On. The first single from the set, "Hourglass", landed the band their first Top-40 pop hit in the States. It had their trademark witty wordplay...

"Hourglass" reached the top-20 on the Hot 100 in the U.S. in December of 1987. The song also crossed over to #22 on Billboard's Mainstream Rock radio chart, and #45 on their Adult Contemporary (or "easy listening") list. Internationally, the single climbed to #16 in their native Britain, as well as making the top-30 in both Canada and Ireland.

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Here's the band performing the song on Letterman in 1987...