Endless Love (song)

"Endless Love"
Song

"Endless Love" is a song originally recorded as a duet between soul singers Diana Ross and Lionel Richie, who wrote the song. In this ballad, the singers declare their "endless love" for one another. It was covered by soul singer Luther Vandross with pop/R&B singer Mariah Carey, and also by country music singer Kenny Rogers.

The song ranks at number 13 on Billboard's All Time Top 100.[1]

About the record

Ross and Richie recorded the song for the Motown Records, and it was used as the theme for the film Endless Love starring Brooke Shields. Produced by Richie and arranged by Gene Page, it was released as a single from the film's soundtrack in 1981. While the film Endless Love was a failure, the song became the second biggest-selling single of the year (first was "Physical" by Olivia Newton-John) in the U.S. and landed at number 1 on Billboard's Pop chart, where it stayed for nine weeks from August 9 to October 10, 1981. It also topped the Billboard R&B chart and the Adult Contemporary chart, and landed at number 7 in the UK.

The soulful composition became the biggest-selling single of Ross' career, while it was one of several hits for Richie as the 1980s progressed. Ross recorded a solo version of the song for her first RCA Records album, Why Do Fools Fall in Love?, but the famous version was her last hit on Motown. The song was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Original Song for Richie, and was the second song with which Ross was involved that was nominated for an Oscar. It also won a 1982 American Music Award for Favorite Pop/Rock Single.

The song was included in Adam Sandler's movie Happy Gilmore when Happy and his girlfriend Virginia are ice skating, and the song begins to play. Virginia says to Happy "I thought we were just going to be friends." To which he responds, "Friends listen to Endless Love in the dark."

The song was included as well in the third season of Friends, in which Phoebe walks into Chandler and Joey´s flat, just to find Chandler singing the song and holding Lionel Ritchie's first album, even though the song is included in his fourth album, Back to Front and also in a special 1981 single.

The song was also one of the most popular wedding dedication songs in the 1980's.

Charts

Chart (1981)	Peak position
Dutch Singles Chart	10
Norwegian Singles Chart	8
Swedish Singles Chart	5
Swiss Singles Chart	6
UK Singles Chart	7
U.S. Billboard Hot 100	1
U.S. Billboard Adult Contemporary	1
U.S. Billboard Black Singles	1

Luther Vandross and Mariah Carey version

"Endless Love"
Song

Walter Afanasieff produced Luther Vandross and Mariah Carey's cover of the song for Vandross' Epic Records-released album Songs, and it is known for being Carey's first "high-profile" duet (an earlier duet, "I'll Be There," was with the then-unknown background singer Trey Lorenz). At the 1995 Grammy Awards, the song was nominated in the new category of Best Pop Collaboration with Vocals, losing to "Funny How Time Slips Away" by Al Green and Lyle Lovett. Columbia Records later included the song on Carey's compilation album Greatest Hits (2001) and then again on her next compilation album, The Ballads (2008). It was released as the second single from Songs in 1994.

Recording

Sony Music Entertainment President Tommy Mottola suggested that Vandross record Songs, an album of cover versions. Featuring Vandross' versions of songs like Stephen Stills' "Love the One You're With," Heatwave's "Always And Forever," and Roberta Flack's "Killing Me Softly," the album was shaping up to be a major career accomplishment. To give the album a bigger boost, Mottola's wife, Mariah Carey, came up with the idea to remake "Endless Love" as a duet with her. Lionel Richie and Diana Ross had originally recorded "Endless Love" in 1981, and the song spent nine weeks at number 1. Although Luther's album was already set to contain one Lionel Riche composition, "Hello," it was obvious that having the most-popular female singer on the Sony label singing on the album would be a benefit.

Chart performance

"Endless Love" debuted on September 10, 1994 at 31 and peaked at number two. The song became Luther Vandross' biggest pop hit ever and gave Lionel Richie his first top ten as a songwriter in seven years. It became Vandross's fifth top ten single and Carey's twelfth. It remained in the top forty for thirteen weeks, and was ranked number 56 on the Hot 100 1994 year-end charts. It was also an improvement over Carey's previous single, "Anytime You Need a Friend," which had missed the top ten. It was certified gold by the RIAA.

The song was a success outside the U.S, reaching the top of the chart in New Zealand (for five weeks) and the top five in the United Kingdom, Australia, Ireland, and the Netherlands. It also reached the top twenty in most of the countries. It was certified gold in Australia by ARIA and in New Zealand by RIANZ.

Music video and other versions

Two music videos were released for the single; one features Carey and Vandross recording the song in a studio, and the other shows the two performing the song live at Royal Albert Hall.

Some versions of the song itself were released, in which Carey or Vandross sings solo.

It has been sung by John O'Connell.

The song was also covered by contestant Laura White on UK singing competition The X Factor, during a Mariah Carey themed week. Despite receiving high praise from Carey herself and most of the show's judges, Laura was eliminated, leading to huge controversy in the UK media.

The Sean Hannity Show occasionally plays a mashup of this song with clips of various news outlets' coverage of President Barack Obama to demonstrate what Hannity felt was overly positive coverage of Obama.

Charts

Chart (1994)	Peak position
Australian Singles Chart	2
Austrian Singles Chart	13
Canadian Singles Chart	14
Dutch Singles Chart	6
European Singles Chart	7
Finnish Singles Chart	11
French Singles Chart	12
German Singles Chart	14
Irish Singles Chart	4
New Zealand Singles Chart	1
Norwegian Singles Chart	6
Swedish Singles Chart	10
Swiss Singles Chart	6
UK Singles Chart	3
U.S. Billboard Hot 100	2
U.S. Billboard Hot Adult Contemporary Tracks	11
U.S. Billboard Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs	7

Other cover versions

• Taiwanese singer Teresa Teng and Hong Kong singer George Lam recorded a cover version of the song.
• Country music singer Kenny Rogers' cover of "Endless Love" was recorded for his album Vote for Love (1996). It also appeared on Always and Forever (1996), which went on to sell over four million copies. His version was not released as a single.
• The song was covered in 2006 by British glamour model Katie Price and her now estranged husband, pop singer Peter Andre. The track is included on their 2006 album of duets A Whole New World.

Live cover performances

The song has been performed three times on American Idol, by Rickey Smith, Chris Sligh, and Danny Gokey.

See also

• Hot 100 number-one hits of 1981 (USA)