I hope you’ve enjoyed our latest Random Runners-Up series. We’ve been back to the ’60s, to the ’70s, the ’90s, even the ’50s. For the final runner-up of the weekend, it’s the turn of the 1980s…
‘Let’s Hear It for the Boy’, by Deniece Williams
#2 for 2 weeks, from 27th May – 10th June 1984 (behind ‘Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go’)
I’m always wary of the term ‘feel good’, as most things specifically designed to make the average person feel good just end up as annoying. But I challenge anyone to hear the intro to ‘Let’s Hear It for the Boy’ and not feel their heart soar, just a teeny a bit.
It is so 1984. The purest, extra-virgin mid-eighties pressing, mixing together drum machine, squelchy bass, and a synthesised piano line. And when Deniece Williams comes in, you can hear the smile on her face as she sings. My baby he don’t talk sweet, He ain’t got much to say… It’s a riff on the old idea that a guy don’t gotta have money, looks, or charisma, as long as he gives good loving… What he does he does so well, Makes me want to yell…
It would be easy to read a smutty subtext into lines like he’s my lovin’ one-man show… or let’s give the boy a hand… but I’m above that. Plus the rest of the song is so bright and breezy, so gosh-darned wholesome, that it would feel forced. Adding to the eighties-ness of this tune is the fact that it’s from one of the decade’s best-loved films, ‘Footloose’, and was kept off top spot by one of the era’s best-remembered pop hits, Wham’s ‘Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go’ (what a joyous guilty pleasure of a top two!)
Deniece Williams had been to the top of the UK charts once, seven years earlier, when the rather more understated ‘Free’ spent a fortnight at #1. This was her fourth and final appearance in the Top 10, but she remains active in her seventies, and in 2021 became one of the first inductees to the Women Songwriters Hall of Fame.
Of course, a song as fun and frothy as this, and with a title like ‘Let’s Hear It for the Boy’, was always going to become something of a gay anthem. I probably first heard it in what may well be the best episode of ‘Will and Grace’, featuring a ‘sneaky hetero’ Matt Damon.
Up next we return to 1998, and the first solo chart-topper for one of Britain’s biggest ever pop stars…
The UK Number Ones Blog 
I prefer the title song from the film (not a great film Footloose, but the soundtrack is filled with great pop/rock), but this is a really fun and super catchy pop song. You’re right – it’s so indicative of mid-80s pop. The pure pop stuff, not the new wave/synth-pop stuff or pop rock. Very sweet and bubbly vocals from Deniece Williams.
I have to admit I’ve always found ‘Footloose’ the song…. kind of annoying. I’d probably say this, while a very sugary confection, is the better song.
Wake Me Up Before You GoGo was number one and this song at number two when I sat my A levels. Whole life ahead of me then. Wonderful memories! This is such a joyful track too, and so mid 80’s
Great stuff. I couldn’t resist having a look what was at the top of the charts when I was doing my A-levels. A motley crew of Ronan Keating, Eminem and Liberty X…
I remember ‘Free’ and Deniece’s earlier hits, but they did nothing for me at all. But I loved this – one of the ultimate feel good dance hits of the day. In fact, most of the ‘Footloose’ soundtrack album tracks hit the right buttons for me. Admittedly, my memory of 1984 might be somewhat coloured by the fact that I had just started a DJ residency at a newly-opened disco adjoining one of the local pubs, which meant that nearly every weekend was a great time for yours truly!
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I’ve never seen Footloose. I know….!! I had no money, no job, depression, and no friends in 1984 (moving South to find work) so that’s prob why, but the music was fab.
I have to admit…I always liked this song…I wouldn’t have bought it but you didn’t need to back then…it was on the radio constantly.