... was released in October 1979. It was the last No. 1 of the 1970s in the USA; Britain's was Another Brick in the Wall, by Pink Floyd. Rupert Holmes was knocked off the top of the US chart in the first week of 1980, by KC and the Sunshine Band with Please Don't Go; but he returned a week later, making this the first record to reach the top of the Billboard chart in two separate decades.
I reckon most visitors to this website will be familiar with The Piña Colada Song, but some may (like me) be less familiar with Him. I called it up on You Tube, and recognised it as soon as it got to the chorus, which goes "Him, him, him, what's she gonna do about him?" Comments on YouTube include "It makes me sad that he will likely be most remembered for Escape, when THIS is the jewel in his pop music crown" and "This is the best from Rupert Holmes hands down."
They might say that; I couldn't possibly comment!
These were the only two recordings by Rupert Holmes to make the UK chart. Because they were pretty much equally successful, he doesn't qualify (in my book) as a one–hit wonder.
According to Wikipedia, "Rupert Holmes was born David Goldstein in Northwich, Cheshire. His father, Leonard Eliot Goldstein, was a US Army warrant officer and bandleader. His mother, Gwendolen Mary (nee Pynn), was English, and both were musical. Holmes has dual British and American citizenship. The family moved when Holmes was six years old to the northern New York City suburb of Nanuet, where Holmes grew up and [after leaving school] attended the Manhattan School of Music (majoring in clarinet). Holmes's brother Richard is the principal lyric baritone of the New York Gilbert and Sullivan Players ... and has appeared with the Metropolitan Opera."
© Haydn Thompson 2020