Songoftheday 4/3/19 - Saw my reflection in a window and didn't know my own face, Oh brother are you gonna leave me wastin' away...
from the album Philadelphia (Original Soundtrack) (1993)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #9 (one week)
Weeks in the Top-40: 15
Today's song of the day comes from Bruce Springsteen, who had started out the 1990s on a shaky foot, with his ambitious separate-double-album release, Human Touch and Lucky Town, had gotten a more cool reception than expected, with only the double-sided single "Human Touch"/"Better Days" reaching the top-40, and not even the top ten at that. Also, he appeared on MTV's Unplugged show with a full electric band set-up, which ticked off a few purists and soured the intent of the show to begin with. In 1993, Bruce was commissioned to write and record a song for the movie Philadelphia, which would become a groundbreaking work of film. Starring Tom Hanks as Andy, a lawyer who had contracted AIDS, and subsequently from it Kaposi's Sarcoma, and after having to take time from work was subsequently fired. Andy tries to get someone to represent him to no avail, until a scene in a library where Denzel Washington, playing Joe, a racial discrimination lawyer who at first was toxic towards him, to come to understand and take the case, eventually winning back pay and restitution, but in time for Andy to die in his lovers' (Antonio Banderas) arms. For a major-studio release this was a first, and I cannot go on enough about the effect it personally had on me (I'd have to write a whole other blog about that). And with mainstream American audiences seeing this portrayal for the first time, the result, though slow, started a turn-around on how people perceived not only the disease, but the people who were victims of it, during a time when it was still a death sentence for most. However, it was also a mixed bag, as the family of Geoffrey Bowers, the man this film clearly was based on, had passed during the lawsuit (as did his lover), with the studio and director initially refusing to say it was. (It was settled out of court in 1996). As for Bruce's track, the stark and simple ballad for the city of Brotherly love was one of his best, and the video has him singing live to track as he walks those streets...
"Streets Of Philadelphia" became Bruce's twelfth and so far most recent top ten pop hit in the U.S. in April of 1994. The song climbed to #3 on both the Mainstream Rock and Adult Contemporary (or "easy listening") radio format charts. Internationally, the single was an even bigger success, topping the charts in Canada, Germany, France, Italy, Ireland, Belgium, Austria, and Norway. It made the top ten as well in the UK (#2), Switzerland (#2), Sweden (#3), New Zealand (#3), Finland (#3), Australia (#4), and the Netherlands (#6). "Streets Of Philadelphia" won not only the Oscar for Best Song at the Academy Awards (where it was against another song from the movie, Neil Young's "Philadelphia"), but also four Grammy Awards, for Male Rock Vocal, Rock Song, Song from a Motion Picture, and most importantly Song Of The Year.
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Here is Bruce performing the song at the Academy Awards in 1994, and then receiving the award from Whitney Houston...
And here he is later that year on the MTV Video Music Awards...
And finally, the Boss singing this in a concert (a rarity), in Philadelphia, in 2016...
Up tomorrow: Alternative rock newcomer wins by being a dolt.
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