Robbed hit of the week 12/18/17 - Peabo Bryson's "Can You Stop The Rain"...
from the album Can You Stop The Rain (1991)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #52
This week's "robbed hit" comes from R&B singer Peabo Bryson, who after years of success in the urban contemporary music world finally scored a top ten pop hit in the summer of 1984 with "If Ever You're In My Arms Again". However, since adult contemporary music, most specifically soul-based easy-listening music was waning on mainstream pop radio, Peabo was having a hard time following that success up. It wasn't until 1987 when a duet with Regina Belle, "Without You", from the Bill Cosby movie Leonard Pt. 6, landed him a #8 hit on Billboard's Adult Contemporary radio chart (as well as #89 pop and #14 R&B) that things began to turn around. Two years later, with his album All My Love, Peabo's new jack swing-lite cover of the Al Wilson soul classic "Show & Tell" ended up going to #1 on Billboard's R&B chart for a week.
In 1991, Peabo released his thirteenth solo album, Can You Stop The Rain. The quiet-storm style title track, written by producer Walter Afanasieff with John Bettis, was a huge succes on R&B radio, landing the singer his first #1 hit...
While "Can You Stop The Rain" went to #1 on Billboard's R&B singles for one week, the song stalled right under the halfway mark on the magazine's pop Hot 100 chart in August of 1991. However, on their Adult Contemporary (or "easy listening") format radio chart, the song climbed to #11. A second single from the album, "Closer Than Close", went to #10 on the R&B chart, but missed the pop chart completely. Two more minor R&B hits came from the album, "Lost In The Night" (#43) and "Shower You With Love" (#47). But during the course of the promotion of this album, Peabo ended up with a top ten pop hit with "Beauty And The Best" from the Disney movie.
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Here's Peabo appearing live on Arsenio Hall to sing "Can You Stop The Rain"...
And lastly, Bryson in concert in 2016...
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