Robbed hit of the week 10/26/15 - Earth, Wind & Fire's "System Of Survival"...

"System Of Survival" - Earth, Wind & Fire
from the album Touch The World (1987)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #60

This week's 'robbed hit' comes from the long-standing soul/funk/disco band Earth, Wind & Fire, who had sold truckloads of albums and singles in the 70s, though they were still trying to beat the post-disco blacklash by the next mid-decade. After their last top-40 pop hit in 1983, "Fall In Love With Me", their following album's lead-off single, the new-wave pastiche "Magnetic", stalled down at #57 (it was a top-10 soul hit, however). Both lead singers Maurice White and Philip Bailey released solo albums, with Bailey's producing a huge single with "Easy Lover", while White's remake of "Stand By Me" stopped at #50. After two albums in a single year, another EWF record didn't emerge until four years later, in 1987, with Touch The World. The first single from the project was "System Of Survival", a semi-topical dance-soul song written by Skylark and produced by White, thankfully straying away from new wave to a more Janet Jackson/Flyte Tyme vibe...

While "System Of Survival" returned Earth, Wind & Fire to the #1 spot on both the R&B and Dance Club Play charts in Billboard magazine, the single stopped down at #60 on the pop Hot 100 in December of 1987. Internationally, the song made the top-10 in New Zealand, #14 in the Netherlands, and down at #54 in Britain.

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Here's the 12" remix that topped the dance chart...

...and here's the band live in 1994...

...and from 2004 after Maurice had retired from touring...