Songoftheday 10/24/16 - Keep on whispering in my ear, tell me all the things that I wanna hear 'cause it's true...
from the album Michael Morales (1989)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #28 (one week)
Weeks in the Top-40: 6
Today's song of the day comes from Michael Morales, not the famous mass murderer but rather the singer/guitarist from Texas who had an enjoyable if not totally memorable top-40 pop hit in the summer of 1989 with "Who Do You Give Your Love To?". For his follow-up Morales covered a post-punk classic that still has legs, the Romantics' "What I Like About You". Even though that record didn't make the top-40 back in 1980, stopping at #49, it remains probably their most known and beloved hit, even though they reached the top-3 a few years later with "Talking In Your Sleep"...
Almost ten years later, Morales, who bears a resemblance to the Romantics' drummer Jimmy Marinos who sang lead, kept it rather faithful to the original, and pop radio felt ready to give the song another try...
Morales' version of "What I Like About You" became his second and most recent top-40 pop hit in the U.S. in October of 1989. A third single from the album, the mid-tempo power-pop love song "I Don't Know", was a minor hit at #81. Two years later, Michael released a second album, Thump, with the lead single, "I Don't Wanna See You", landing him his last chart appearance at #81, as that style of straightforward pop/rock was being totally eclipsed by grunge and rap. Since then, he's concentrated on musical work behind the scenes, and his recording studio in Texas has been very successful.
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In 2007, Glam-metal vets Poison covered the song as well for their most recent studio album Poison'd, and while it didn't make the charts, the album sold respectably, reaching #32 on the BIllboard 200...
Australian heartthrob rockers 5 Seconds Of Summer also took on the song, and it went to #30 on the American pop radio chart...
Up tomorrow: New wave emo duo get to some romantic gardening.
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