| "Here Comes the Rain Again" | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Single by Eurythmics | ||||
| from the album Touch | ||||
| B-side | "Paint a Rumour" | |||
| Released | January 16, 1984 | |||
| Format | 7", 12" | |||
| Recorded | 1983 | |||
| Genre | New Wave, Post-disco, synthpop | |||
| Length | 4:56 5:08 (7") |
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| Label | RCA | |||
| Producer | David A. Stewart | |||
| Eurythmics singles chronology | ||||
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"Here Comes the Rain Again" is a song by British pop duo Eurythmics. It was written by group members Annie Lennox and David A. Stewart and produced by Stewart. The song was released as the third single in the UK from the album Touch and in the United States as the first single. It became Eurythmics' second Top 10 U.S. hit, peaking at number 4 on the Billboard Hot 100. "Here Comes the Rain Again" hit number eight in the UK singles chart, becoming their fifth consecutive Top 10 single in that country.
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The track is similar in musical style to past Eurythmics singles and its melancholy lyrics draw a comparison between the painful and tragic feelings of unrequited love with falling rain. Notably, the group adorned the recording with the composition and arrangement skills of Michael Kamen, resulting in more natural feel to the overall finished product (versus the heavily synthetic aesthetic of the Sweet Dreams album and its singles). Stewart explained to Songfacts that creating a melancholy mood in his songs is something he excels at. He said: "'Here Comes The Rain Again' is kind of a perfect one where it has a mixture of things, because I'm playing a b-minor, but then I change it to put a b-natural in, and so it kind of feels like that minor is suspended, or major. So it's kind of a weird course. And of course that starts the whole song, and the whole song was about that undecided thing, like here comes depression, or here comes that downward spiral. But then it goes, 'so talk to me like lovers do.' It's the wandering in and out of melancholy, a dark beauty that sort of is like the rose that's when it's darkest unfolding and bloodred just before the garden, dies. And capturing that in kind of oblique statements and sentiments." [1]
The string arrangements by Michael Kamen were performed by members of the British Philharmonic Orchestra. However, due to the limited space in the studio, the Church, the players had to improvise by recording their parts in other parts of the studio. Once the improvisations seem to match the finished synthesized track, the song was mixed by having the orchestral tracks laid down on top of the original backing track.[1]
During Eurythmics reunion "Peacetour" they performed an in-studio concert for the A&E Network in the U.S. Dave Stewart revealed that the lyrics to the song came into being after an argument between himself and Lennox while they were doing some songwriting in New York City's Columbus Hotel. The basic melody had already been written and Lennox looked out the window after their fight and noticed it was starting to rain. She announced, "Here comes the rain again."
The running time for "Here Comes the Rain Again" is in actuality about five minutes long and was edited on the Touch album (fading out at approximately four-and-a-half minutes). Although it was edited even further for its single and video release, many U.S. radio stations played the full-length version of it. The entire five-minute version did not appear on any Eurythmics album until the US edition of Greatest Hits in 1991.
The music video, featuring Lennox and Stewart, was directed by Jonathan Gershfield and released in December 1983, a month before the single came out. The video opens showing The Old Man of Hoy on the Island of Hoy in the Orkney Islands, with Lennox walking along the rocky shore and cliff top and later entering a derelict cottage in a nightgown, holding a lantern. Stewart stalks her with a video camera. In many scenes the two are filmed separately, then superimposed into the same frame. The result is that the viewer may perceive one as being a ghost in the world of the other.
7"
12"
* both these versions are longer than the ones found on the "Touch" album
| Chart (1984) | Peak position |
|---|---|
| Belgian Singles Chart | 12 |
| Canadian Adult Contemporary Chart[2] | 7 |
| Canadian Singles Chart[2] | 8 |
| Dutch Singles Chart[3] | 33 |
| French Singles Chart[4] | 33 |
| German Singles Chart[5] | 14 |
| Irish Singles Chart[6] | 8 |
| New Zealand Singles Chart[7] | 32 |
| Norwegian Singles Chart[8] | 10 |
| Polish Singles Chart | 4 |
| Swedish Singles Chart[9] | 20 |
| Swiss Singles Chart[10] | 19 |
| UK Singles Chart[11] | 8 |
| U.S. Billboard Hot 100[12] | 4 |
| U.S. Billboard Adult Contemporary Chart[13] | 6 |
| U.S. Billboard Dance/Club Play Songs Chart[12] | 4 |
| Chart (1991) | Peak position |
|---|---|
| French Singles Chart[4] | 92 |
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