Songoftheday 11/5/18 - For the morning sun in all it's glory meets the day with hope and comfort too, you fill my life with laughter somehow you make it better ease my troubles that's what you do...
from the album Unplugged...and Seated (1993)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #5 (three weeks)
Weeks in the Top-40: 17
Today's song of the day comes from Scottish rock icon Rod Stewart, who's first studio album of the 1990s, Vagabond Heart, had scored the singer three top-40 pop hits with "Rhythm Of My Heart", "The Motown Song", and "Broken Arrow". In 1992, Rod contributed a cover of Elton John's classic "Your Song" from Elton's "tribute-ish" album Two Rooms, and nearly made the pop top-40 at #48, while climbing to #6 on Billboard magazine's Adult Contemporary (or "easy listening") chart. A year later, Rod received a special award at the BRITS (the UK's Grammys), and there he released a compilation of cover songs and older hits, Lead Vocalist, that grabbed him a top ten hit in the UK, Ireland, and the Netherlands with the Tom Waits tune "Tom Traubert's Blues (Waltzing Matilda)". At the same time, Stewart recorded a concert for the series MTV Unplugged, which would be released as its own album as well. He reunited with Ronnie Wood, who he had played in the band The Faces with in the 1970s. In the spring of 1993, the Vagabond Heart album version of Rod's cover of Van Morrison's song "Have I Told You That I Love You" had enough radio airplay to reach #43 on Billboard's Hot 100 Airplay chart without a proper single. On the release of Stewart's Unplugged...and Seated album, the live version of that song got a proper physical single, and in no time overtook his original cover to become one of his biggest hits, for many people even overshadowing Morrison's...
Stewart's take on "Have I Told You Lately" became his so-far most recent solo top ten pop hit in the U.S. in June of 1993. The song was massive on easy-listening radio, topping Billboard's Adult Contemporary format chart for five weeks (earlier that year the studio version climbed to #33). Internationally, the single topped the pop chart in Canada for a week, and went to #5 in the UK. It also reached the top-40 in Australia (#12), Ireland (#13), and Sweden (#39).
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Here's the original from Irish songwriter Van Morrison, which came from his 1989 album Avalon Sunset. His song missed the pop chart in America, but climbed to #12 on Billboard's Adult Contemporary radio chart...
...and next, Rod's version from his Vagabond Heart album, which did respectably as a fourth radio single even before the live single came out...
Stewart and Wood performed the song live on the British tv series Aspel and Company in 1993...
Although Rod ended up with the most popular version of the song, Morrison collected a Grammy Award in 1996 for his remake of his classic with the Chieftains. It won for best Pop Collaboration with Vocals, beating out such powerhouse nominees like Michael Jackson and Janet Jackson's "Scream", and Mariah Carey and Boyz II Men's record-breaking #1 hit "One Sweet Day"...
Finally, back to Rod in concert with the song, backed with a quite lovely string section...
Up tomorrow: A TV show about Law and Order spins off a top ten pop hit.
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