Lionel Richie
By All Music Guide
By All Music Guide
Lionel Brockman Richie, Jr., was born on June 20, 1949, in Tuskegee, AL, and grew up on the campus of the Tuskegee Institute, where most of his family had worked for two generations prior. While attending college there, Richie joined the Commodores, who went on to become the most successful act on the Motown label during the latter half of the 70s. Richie served as a saxophonist, sometime vocalist, and songwriter, penning allads like Easy, Three Times a Lady, and Still (the latter two became the groups only number one pop hits). Although the Commodores maintained a democratic band structure through most of their chart run, things began to change when the 70s became the 80s. In 1980, Richie wrote and produced country-pop singer Kenny Rogers across-the-board number one smash Lady, and the following year, Richies duet with Diana Ross, Endless Love (recorded for the Brooke Shields film of the same title), became the most successful single in Motown history, topping the charts for a stunning nine weeks. With the medias attention now focused exclusively on Richie, tensions within the Commodores began to mount, and before the end of 1981, Richie decided to embark on a solo career.
Richie immediately set about recording his solo debut for Motown. Titled simply Lionel Richie, the album was released in late 1982 and was an immediate smash, reaching number three on the pop charts on its way to sales of over four million copies. It spun off three Top Five pop hits, including the first single, Truly, which became Richies first solo number one. If Lionel Richie made its creator a star, the follow-up, Cant Slow Down, made him a superstar. Boasting five Top Ten singles, including the number ones All Night Long (All Night) and Hello, Cant Slow Down hit number one, eventually sold over ten million copies, and won the 1984 Grammy for Album of the Year. Such was Richies stature that he was invited to perform at the closing ceremonies of the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles, a spectacular stage event that was broadcast worldwide.
In 1985, Richie put his superstar status to work for a greater good, joining Michael Jackson in co-writing the USA for Africa charity single We Are the World; the all-star recording helped raise millions of dollars for famine relief. By the end of the year, he was on top of the charts again with Say You, Say Me, a allad recorded for the film White Nights but not included on the soundtrack album. The song was slated to be the title track on Richies upcoming album, but delays in the recording process prevented the record from being released until August 1986, by which time the title was changed to Dancing on the Ceiling (in order to promote Richies next single release). Three more Top Tens followed Say You, Say Me, as did Se La, which became the first of Richies solo singles not to reach the pop Top Ten. Overall, Dancing on the Ceiling didnt match the success of Cant Slow Down, but it still sold an impressive four million copies, although Richies reputation for sentimental allads was beginning to incur a backlash in some quarters.
1987 saw Richies nine-year streak of writing at least one number one single (a feat matched only by Irving Berlin) come to an end. As a matter of fact, Richie all but disappeared from the music business, simply choosing to take some time off after nearly two decades of recording and performing (or, perhaps, quitting while he was ahead). His silence was broken only in 1992, when Motown released a compilation titled Back to Front; in addition to some of his solo hits and a few Commodores tracks, Back to Front also featured three new songs, including the number one R&B hit Do It to Me (which wasnt as successful on the pop charts).
Richie wasnt bitten by the recording bug again until 1996, by which time hed endured his share of personal loss: his father had passed away, and his marriage to wife Brenda -- the muse behind some of his most successful allads -- had fallen apart. In approaching his comeback, Richie attempted to update his sound to reflect a decades worth of developments in urban R&B. The result, Louder Than Words, was a moderate success, reaching the Top 30 and going gold. However, it didnt produce any major hit singles, and Richies nods to
ew jack swing and hip-hop were criticized as awkward. 1998s Time found Richie in a more familiar element, relying on his signature sound with only slight musical updates. However, the album flopped, spending only a few weeks in the lower reaches of the charts. Richies next album, Renaissance, was released to a favorable reception in Europe in late 2000; it was issued in the U.S. in early 2001. Three years later, on the heels of enduring a very public and bitter divorce with his second wife, Diane, Richie released Just for You. The 2006 album Coming Home found him working with an all-star cast of collaborators including Jermaine Dupri, Raphael Saadiq, Sean Garrett, and Dallas Austin.
