Songoftheday 3/29/16 - Don't ask me what you know is true, don't have to tell you I love your precious heart...

"Never Tear Us Apart" - INXS
from the album Kick (1987)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #7 (one week)
Weeks in the Top-40: 11

Today's song of the day is by the Australian modern rock/pop band INXS, whose landmark Kick album had granted them three huge hits in the U.S. with "New Sensation", "Devil Inside", and the #1 "Need You Tonight". The fourth single from the set was the sweeping grand ballad "Never Tear Us Apart", which played with rhythms in its 3/4 time signature and stop-start pacing in a tale of broken romance, written by lead singer Michael Hutchence with bandmate Andrew Farriss...

"Never Tear Us Apart" became the fourth single from Kick to reach the top ten on the American pop chart in November of 1988. The song went to #5 on Billboard's Mainstream Rock radio chart, while it slipped in on their inaugural Modern Rock list at #28. It also crossed over to the Adult Contemporary (or "easy listening") chart at #42, their first time on that format. Internationally, the record reached the top ten in Canada (#9), Belgium (#8), and the Netherlands (#9), but was a more modest hit in Britain (#24) and their native Australia (#11).

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Here's INXS performing the song in concert in 1991...

Pop icon Tom Jones included a cover of the song on his album Reload as a duet with Natalie Imbruglia, which was a #1 album in the UK...

Two years later, London-based DJ/remixer Tall Paul interpolated the track into his #6 club hit "Precious Heart"...

British songstress Paloma Faith had the most recent hit with the song, which climbed to #16 in the UK in 2012...

...and lastly, back to INXS live in 1994 for a stripped down version featuring songwriters Hutchence and Farris with sax from Kirk Pengilly...

Up tomorrow: a quirky British band heads for the sticks...