Lionel Richie -- Love Will Find a Way

 

With "Love Will Conquer All" and "Love Will Find a Way", I swear that singer-songwriter Lionel Richie could have opted to become one of America's most reassuring therapists. Incidentally, I have already brought the 80s crooner onto KKP through a ROY article on the former song from 1986 which I dearly loved and listened to as a high school kid back then.

But then I stumbled across his earlier "Love Will Find a Way" which is a track on his Grammy-winning October 1983 album "Can't Slow Down" and fell in love with this Quiet Storm ballad, too. This album certainly didn't slow down, not only winning Album of the Year but sprouting five hit singles, not one of which is "Love Will Find a Way" and strangely enough, it's the song that is my favourite out of all of the tracks (I finally did get my own copy of the album) and it's my favourite Richie song, period. Created by Richie and Greg Phillinganes (a name that I will always pay attention to), it may go on a bit long at over 6 minutes, but man, it is one of the grooviest soul songs about trying to get out of the doldrums. Phillinganes himself is on the keyboards and Nathan East is on bass so they are the groove masters, and I had no idea that singer Richard Marx was helping out on backing vocals. This is the type of tune that you want to hear at night with some sherry and maybe that significant other.

Because "Love Will Find a Way" wasn't ever released as its own single, it didn't get onto the radio all that much but when it did, I quickly heard its merits. It wasn't easy at first because I had the bad luck of missing out on the DJ announcing its title but when I finally figured it out, I made sure that the title stayed within long and short-term memories.

So what was being released as singles in October 1983?

Chiemi Hori -- Yuugure Kibun （夕暮れ気分）

Kiyotaka Sugiyama & Omega Tribe -- Asphalt Lady

Seiko Matsuda -- Hitomi wa Diamond （瞳はダイアモンド）

Lionel Richie -- Love Will Conquer All

 

I knew that I had mentioned the great 80s soul crooner Lionel Richie in a past article on KKP years ago but not given him that Reminiscings of Youth attention for that particular song (at least, not yet anyways), but it was still a surprise to realize that after a few years of regular ROY articles as this is, Richie still hadn't made his debut here. Well, that ends right here and now.

Of course, for all those Richie fans, there is "All Night Long", "Running with the Night" and "Dancing on the Ceiling" as those huge hits for the singer from Alabama. However for me, there was one single that came out in September 1986 that perhaps didn't become a classic like the ones above, but it still hits me as one of my favourites. I first heard "Love Will Conquer All" on the radio ranking shows on the Toronto stations as a university student and it has stuck with me ever since. It's got the Quiet Storm vibe along with the feeling that this is a content soulful stroll as illustrated by Richie and his co-vocalist Marva King. 

Created by Greg Phillinganes, Cynthia Weil, and Richie, "Love Will Conquer All" just has those amazing keyboards and whenever I hear those "Ooooohs" in the intro by the singer and King, I know that I'm going to be in a world of aural good. I always waited in anticipation for those "Ooooohs" on the ranking shows and then once I really started to appreciate this song, I always wanted to hear the longer version at 6 to 7 minutes. Several years would pass until I realized that there was a music video for "Love Will Conquer All" in which Richie drove hundreds of miles up California to make amends with his girlfriend. It certainly looked like love conquered all although maybe distance may have also conquered the car tires.

All joking aside, it still remains one of my favourite R&B tunes from the 1980s. Plus, "Love Will Conquer All" didn't do too shabbily on the rankings either since it hit No. 9 on the Billboard Hot 100 in the States while it reached No. 19 here in Canada. The song was also a track on "Dancing on the Ceiling" the album. And so what was also doing well on the Oricon charts when this song was released? I have Nos. 1, 3 and 5.

1. Akemi Ishii -- Cha-Cha-Cha

3. Miho Nakayama -- Tsuiteru ne, Notteru ne（ツイてるねノッてるね）

5. Momoko Kikuchi -- Say Yes!