Midway through 1986, “Your Love” by The Outfield cracked the “Top 10” of the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart, fueling sales of the 1985 debut Outfield album Play Deep, which has sold in excess of three million copies in America.
But while the song remains beloved more than thirty years later, it wasn't an immediate success.
In fact, it wasn’t even the first single released from the album. “Say It Isn’t So” came first, finding modest success – but it wasn’t a nationwide hit.
The group’s label, Columbia Records, released “Your Love” next as a bit of a stopgap to keep the group in the public eye as they took a break from the road circa Christmas 1985.
“We went back on the road literally like [the following] spring and it wasn’t until the middle of spring, summer [of 1986], that the song was really, really getting bigger and bigger. It didn't happen overnight,” recalled co-founding Outfield singer and bassist Tony Lewis of the song's trajectory. “I remember when we were told we had our first gold album for Play Deep. We were at a truck stop somewhere and we were all covering each other in car parts. And it was bizarre. Very bizarre. But it was a great feeling.”
Lewis returned to the road this summer for the first time in fourteen years alongside artists like Belinda Carlisle, Modern English and ABC as part of “Retro Futura,” touring in support of his first solo album.
Going solo wasn’t the plan. But following the death of co-founding Outfield guitarist and songwriter John Spinks, who succumbed to a battle with cancer in 2014, Lewis was left with little choice.
“Our trademark was our harmonies. Obviously John’s voice is not on this album. I didn’t want to reproduce his voice. That’s what made The Outfield,” Lewis explained. “That’s why I didn’t want to continue the band’s name. When John passed, for me, The Outfield just stopped.”
Out of the Darkness was released in June on Madison Records and is defined lyrically by the ideas of letting go of the past and embracing the future, as Lewis makes his return to the music industry.
“The first year after John passed, I didn’t even want to listen to music. I didn’t even want to pick up a guitar. I didn’t know where I was. I was just so lost,” Lewis said. “Another year had passed and me and my wife went out to eat. She said to me, 'Why don’t you just do what you do best? Start recording. Start doing something. Get back out there. You know you love doing it. It’s what you do best.' So I put some backing tracks together.”
Once the songs started to come, they came quick. So quick, that he’s about 75% done with the next record too.
Lewis worked with his wife Carol who helped with lyrics on several tracks. Madison Records owner Tanner Hendon, who drummed with Paul Rodgers and Bad Company, added live drums to five tracks. Otherwise, Lewis handled keyboards, guitar, backing vocals and the rest of the drums himself, self-producing the record in a much different atmosphere from that of The Outfield’s hey-day, delivering to his new label a fully realized body of work.
“It’s just been like a breath of fresh air. There was no producer involved. There was no, 'We think this should be…' There was no input from anyone on the arrangement. I did all of it myself. All they did was mix it,” said Lewis. “It’s just been like a hobby to me. I’ve not seen it as a pressure project. I’ve really enjoyed it.”
As the internet continues to drive music industry upheaval, streaming music services have allowed fans to embrace nostalgia like never before, offering easy access to virtually any song in the history of recorded music within seconds.
Coupled with heavy rotation on classic hits radio, it's put a number of 80s hits back in the limelight. Toto benefited recently, as 90s alternative rockers Weezer covered their 1982 hit “Africa,” the result of a Twitter campaign that went viral. But few songs have found the second life that “Your Love” has.
On Spotify, “Your Love” has been streamed more than 126 million times while the song's video has received nearly 117 million views on YouTube.
To put that in perspective, The Beatles' “Hey Jude” has 111 million streams while “Beast of Burden” by the Rolling Stones sits at just under 97 million.
It’s a second life few, including Lewis, saw coming.
“When you think back to the fact that it was written in John’s flat... I’ve still got the original lyric sheet. We did it in twenty minutes. We both said, 'That’s a great little pop song! Can’t wait to record it!' Because we had a little local recording studio where we recorded demos until two in the morning,” recalled Lewis. “For it to come back like that is mind blowing for me. Who would’ve thought?”
The songwriting formula that has rendered “Your Love” such an enduring radio staple is an approach Lewis applied to Out of the Darkness too.
“To be successful on radio, you have to grab the listener right from the beginning. It’s got to pop in the first sort of ten seconds. Me and John always understood that. That’s why 'Your Love' was such a big song. It’s that big high vocal and chunky guitars. It just grabs the listener,” Lewis explained. “I used that as the blueprint for this album. After the third or fourth song, it’s more sort of my style and input. I’m Tony from The Outfield but this is how I'm doing it now."
