🎤When the Boys Cover Whitney Houston #3: "I Wanna Dance With Somebody (Who Loves Me)," Merrill & Rubicam-1987
Andy, of the engaging "The Vinyl Room," joins us again for our FRONT ROW & BACKSTAGE continuing series, as we continue our romp through a legend's catalog! Care to hit the floor?💃🕺
Welcome to Part 3 of our musical road trip to the hits of Whitney Houston from the male perspective! Since Whitney’s award-winning career began in the mid-’80s, she’s not only had an abundance of mega-hits, but many recording artists have covered her hits, including a surprisingly large number of male artists!
…and, we’re happy to have him with us for Part 3!🕺
“I Wanna Dance With Somebody (Who Loves Me),” by George Merrill and Shannon Rubicam
The strategy is not so different from that behind Hollywood's blockbuster sequels: This is 'How Will I Know II’.—Vince Aletti, Rolling Stone
With three consecutive #1s, everyone at Whitney Houston Enterprises, Incorporated (Arista Records chief, Clive Davis, Whitney and her management team, et al) wanted to keep this overwhelming success rolling downhill!
So, with a brief break with the Michael Masser/Linda Creed #1, “Greatest Love of All” (spring 1986), the Houston brain trust went back to what got the #1 ball rolling back in the summer of ‘85 with Masser and Gerry Goffin’s “Saving All My Love For You”: A George Merrill/Shannon Rubicam (aka Boy Meets Girl) collab called “I Wanna Dance With Somebody (Who Loves Me)”; early working title, “Somebody Who Loves Me”:
In a recent sit-down at the piano, songwriters George Merrill (composer) and Shannon Rubicam (lyricist) share a bare-bones arrangement:
Wanting to Record it Themselves, A Legend Talks Them Out of It
Merrill, in an interview with Songfacts: “I think the biggest deal for Shannon and me was that we had had this meteoric success with ‘How Will I Know,’ that was the biggest thing that had ever happened for us in our career, and then to be asked to come up with another one, well, we just looked at each other.
“We thought, ‘Well, that’s kind of what this is about, it’s not about the one song and goodbye. This is part of the fun of it, this is gonna be something that we want to continue, so we just went to work.’”
Rubicam: “That song got written pretty quickly, as I recall. We had a funky little garage studio at the time, and we just hung out in there one afternoon and wrote the song, and I know we tweaked it the next day, and started recording it on our little Teac 4-track deck that we were using.”
Merrill: “Yeah, we were doing a lot of ping-ponging.”
Rubicam: “And, then a friend of ours had a larger, more comprehensive studio, so we recorded the demo there and the demo we made of ‘I Wanna Dance With Somebody’ was kind of a rock version” (and was recorded for inclusion on their 1985 album for A&M, produced by the longtime guitar- and rock-forward Tom Werman):
Merrill: “Shannon nailed the vocal on that one. I’m really proud of that demo; I think it still holds up. Our bass player, Leon Gaer, just really nailed it. I think that really contributed to when it was played for Clive (Davis), I know that it really came across strongly.”
Bassist Leon Gaer: Born in 1954 and raised in Los Angeles, Leon moved to Sydney in 1987. He has been a full-time professional musician since 1973, and as a bass player, has played on over 1,500 recording sessions.
Rubicam: “It was fun, too. We recorded the song, mixed it, and then George literally ran to the airport with it and met Clive, who was getting on a plane, because he wanted it. And we thought, ‘Well, best get it to him in person, and we’ll have more of an impact.’ So, he took it with him and listened to it on the plane.”
Merrill: “I gave him a cassette, by the way. I said, ‘You know, Clive, we’re feeling great about this, and we’re in the midst of doing a Boy Meets Girl album, and if you could get back to us on it and let us know if you don’t want it for Whitney, we’d like it for the Boy Meets Girl album.’ He had had a quick listen to it; he just looked at me and he said something I can’t repeat!” [Gee, Clive, does it rhyme with “no wuckin’ fay”?]
Shannon, classily, translates the expletive!👉“Yeah, he was very friendly. He meant they were gonna keep it, no way could we have it back!”
Sure enough, the song appears nowhere on the duo’s ‘85 album. Out of professional courtesy, Shannon and George, at this point, were not about to get in Clive’s creative way, and were quite happy to roll the Arista dice a second time within a year with this new star called Whitney.
From Davis’s POV, he wouldn’t have wanted rival A&M to have a leg up on a song they might’ve perceived as a possible hit for Boy Meets Girl, and risk the dreaded battle up the chart between two hit singles! Either way, it’s fascinating to see the unspoken obvious 2-way professionalism at play, here. Clive’s “no way could you have it back” made it crystal clear, as well!
Pretend you’re Clive, and you’ve never heard the song before, and start the duo’s version at the beginning just before your plane takes off! At what point in the song would you have heard enough to stop the actual songwriters from recording it, because you hear something about it that makes you certain it could be the next hit for your new star?
Forget that moment forward (that we now know so well)…just the fact that Clive made it clear to George and Shannon (after x-amount of notes) that he’d heard enough, and “we’re running with it,” must’ve been mind-blowing for the duo!
Seeking a formula (and seeing no reason to steer clear of one), Narada Michael Walden (above) was brought in to reprise his “How Will I Know” producing role. He also arranged the track, and was key in taking it from a rock-forward groove into a more dance/R&B/pop feel that was far more in Whitney’s naturally emerging wheelhouse. Whitney, of course, is credited with the vocal arranging.
Back to Songfacts: Houston sang this very upbeat and light, but the lyrics are quite emotional, which is why they included the parenthetical “(Who Loves Me)” after “I Wanna Dance With Somebody” in the song title.
Says lyricist Rubicam: “Many of our friends were in this boat… 5 o’clock comes around, they start getting restless and it’s, ‘What am I gonna do?’ and ‘I can’t stand to be alone again tonight,’ and ‘I really don’t wanna just go party, I’d really like to find somebody, try and find somebody to love.’ So, it’s more of that long-term partnership that people want!”
The single sold 3 million copies in America, while the album (her second, called Whitney, released on June 2, 1987) moved 9 million units. The upbeat tune was the perfect song to kick off the album. According to producer Walden, Houston came up with the “Don’t you wanna dance, say you wanna dance” part in the studio.
Brian Grant, who did Houston’s video for “How Will I Know,” also directed this one. Dance is a key component of the clip, so he had a tough challenge because Houston couldn’t dance!
Working with choreographer Arlene Phillips (above), they solved this problem by surrounding Houston with real dancers and keeping her dance moves minimal. Work-around, ‘80s style!:
1987 appearance on UK’s Top of the Pops, with the best presentation one could hope for: Live mic for Whitney, with her hit studio track, backing:
“The best presentation one could hope for,” unless you can get a live performance from Whitney with full orchestra backing: Arista Records’ 15th Anniversary Concert, titled That’s What Friends Are For, was a benefit for AIDS research held on March 17, 1990 at Radio City Music Hall in New York City. She was 26.
Point-of-reference note: One of Whitney’s biggest fans in the ‘80s was a budding young singer named Mariah Carey. A mere three months after Whitney’s performance at this Arista Records fete, Mariah, 21, released her self-titled debut album on Columbia Records, the label Clive Davis left in May 1973 to found Arista in November 1974.
The magnificently-gifted pure singer/belter has matured, now, into the complete performer, able to command the enormous expanse of a completely bare stage with bold confidence, and allows herself to unabashedly dance freely and exultantly. In short, she owns the room.
In the audience? Fellow performers, fans, execs and industry insiders.
At the finale, after her chorus singers belt a final, “I wanna dance,” she holds that horn-sting finale with arms outstretched for as long as she can….finally, she can’t help herself: That million-watt smile lights the room! She did it!
“I Wanna Dance With Somebody (Who Loves Me)” won the Grammy Award for Best Pop Vocal Performance, Female. It also took the American Music Award for Favorite Pop/Rock Single.
The song was re-released in 2012 following Houston’s death. It went to #25 in the U.S., and #20 in UK.
How long does it take you to recognise this song? Specifically, how many seconds?
Even if you’re not a Whitney fan, or generally not the fastest at identifying tunes, this song is your wild card if you want to beat Shazam like a pro.
Not only did it become one of Whitney’s signature records—it redefined the possibilities of what an R&B/pop crossover hit could achieve, creatively and commercially.
With an infectious melody and a captivating beat even the most rigid dancers can’t resist, this record helped solidify Whitney’s international stardom and got many a party started throughout the decades.
Singing this song with its original vocal arrangement and expecting to sound as natural as Ms. Houston will leave you in a hospital bed questioning your life choices.
Remember, I said the melody was infectious? Not a euphemism!
Singing the very first line (clock strikes upon the hour and the sun begins to fade) will already see you travel over an octave in your range. The verses themselves are a collection of ascending and descending notes, like sinuous steps in an intricate choreography. Talk about a well-written song!
Out of curiosity, I listened to several covers, simply because there isn’t a straightforward way of covering this song from a male perspective.
But, the cover that impressed me the most was Matt Alber’s beautiful slow country rendition. Astutely, he turned it into a completely different song and built an entire parallel universe around it. By the end of his performance, we don’t even stop to think whether he actually managed to hit all of Whitney’s notes. We’ve been transported, persuaded and seduced—in full knowledge that he hit the right spot:
In the running, IMO, for best cover of this song is These Kids Wear Crowns’, from Canada. I celebrated their exciting 2011 pop/punk arrangement in 2022, here:
With 150 covers of “I Wanna Dance With Somebody,” many were easy to dismiss, but two grabbed me immediately, and when pressed, I couldn’t choose. They’re radically different, though, so that’s a plus! One’s a delicate tenor solo with electric piano accompaniment, indoors. The other’s a festive acapella sextet performing outdoors!
Above: Multi-instrumentalist, Joey Stamper (piano, guitar, drums), recorded his cover in 2018. In May 2012, he joined Anthem Lights, a Christian vocal quartet formed at Liberty University in 2007.
The following year, 2019, Six Appeal performed this fun’n’festive cover. They’re from Minneapolis, and play about 150 dates in the States each year.
This just in! Dan Pal of PalCinema, Television, & Music, alerted me with this Note on the day this article was published: “What are the chances that you write about this song and a group I love, Blossoms, releases a cover the same day??”
Suddenly, one of the best covers emerges:
Jami Smith of Songs That Saved Your Life, took the song on a unique spin, recently:
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I’m always amazed by your ability to dig out all these juicy bits and crafting the story (the history, rather) of how a certain song came to be what it became. Thank you so much for the opportunity to make my humble contributions. I’m really enjoying this.
Well done guys ! Great read ! Never was a big fan of the song and the covers don't really change that. Never heard the Boy meets Girl original though, so if I have to hand out the "douze points" they will go to B.M.G. And as a sidetone: how old is Clive Davies now ? 144 ?
I’m always amazed by your ability to dig out all these juicy bits and crafting the story (the history, rather) of how a certain song came to be what it became. Thank you so much for the opportunity to make my humble contributions. I’m really enjoying this.
Well done guys ! Great read ! Never was a big fan of the song and the covers don't really change that. Never heard the Boy meets Girl original though, so if I have to hand out the "douze points" they will go to B.M.G. And as a sidetone: how old is Clive Davies now ? 144 ?