Dionne Warwick 1990s to present
 The late 1960s and early 1970s became a very successful time period for Warwick, who saw a string of Gold selling albums and Top 20 and Top 10 hit singles. Message to Michael, a Bacharach-David song that the duo was certain was a man's song, became a huge hit for Warwick in May of 1966. The 1967 LP called Here Where There Is Love was her first RIAA Gold Album and featured the hits Alfie, Trains and Boats and Planes, and I Just Don't Know What to Do With Myself. Bacharach had been contracted to produce Alfie for the Michael Caine film of the same name and wanted Dionne Warwick to sing the tune but the British producers wanted a British subject to cut the tune. Cilla Black was selected to record the song, and her version peaked at #95 upon its release in the USA. A cover version by Cher used in the USA prints of the film peaked at #33. In the UK, Europe and Australia Cilla Black's version was a Top 10 hit. Warwick states she was the 43rd person to record Alfie, at Bacharach's insistence, and her version peaked at #15 on the Billboard Hot 100 and #1 on both the R & B Chart and the AC Charts, and became the bestselling version of the tune. Warwick performed the song at the Academy Awards in 1967 to a worldwide audience of many millions. Today, Alfie is considered a signature song for Warwick, and is performed in almost every concert she does.
Later that same year, Warwick earned her first RIAA Gold Single for the single I Say a Little Prayer (from her album The Windows of the World). When disc jockeys across the nation began to play the track from album in the fall of 1967 and demanded its release as a single, Florence Greenberg, President of Scepter Records, complied and I Say a Little Prayer became Warwick's biggest hit to that point.
Her follow-up to I Say a Little Prayer was unusual in several respects. It was not written by Burt Bacharach and Hal David, it was the B side of her I Say a Little Prayer single, and it was a song that she almost didn't record. While the film version of Valley of the Dolls was being made, actress Barbara Parkins suggested that Warwick be considered to sing the film's theme song, written by songwriting team Andre and Dory Previn. The song was to be given to Judy Garland who had been fired from the film. Warwick performed the song, and when the film became a success in the early weeks of 1968, disc jockeys flipped the single and made the single one of the biggest double-sided hits of the rock era. Warwick re-recorded a Pat Williams-arranged version of the theme at A&R Studios in New York because contractual restrictions would not allow the Warwick version from the film to be included in the 20th Century-Fox soundtrack LP. Her re-recorded (Theme From) Valley of the Dolls was a smash success (#2-4 weeks), as was the Bacharach/David-penned follow-up, Do You Know the Way to San Jos?. The LP Dionne Warwick in Valley of the Dolls, released in early 1968, which contained the rerecorded version and Do You Know the Way to San Jos?, hit the #6 position on the Billboard Hot 100 Album Chart and would remain on the chart for over a year. The film soundtrack LP, sans Warwick vocals failed to impress the public, while Dionne Warwick in Valley of the Dolls earned an RIAA Gold certification. The single Do You Know the Way to San Jose was also a double sided hit with the B side Let Me Be Lonely charting at #79.
More hits (Promises, Promises-#19 1968; Who Is Gonna Love Me-#32 1968 with B side Always Something There to Remind Me becoming another double sided hit, I'll Never Fall In Love Again-#6 1969; You've Lost That Lovin' Feeling-#15 1969; This Girl's In Love With You-#7 1969; Make It Easy On Yourself-#37 1970; Who Is Gonna Love Me-#33 1968; The April Fools-#37 1969 (from the film of the same name); Let Me Go To Him-#32 1970; Paper Mache-#43 1970; The Green Grass Starts to Grow-#43-1971) followed into 1971. Warwick's final Bacharach/David penned single was March 1971's Who Gets the Guy and her final official Scepter single release was He's Moving On backed with Amanda both from the soundtrack of the motion picture adaptation of Jacqueline Susann's The Love Machine. Other Scepter LPs certified RIAA Gold include Dionne Warwick's Golden Hits Part 1 released in 1967 and The Dionne Warwick Story: A Decade of Gold released in 1971. By the end of 1971 Dionne Warwick had sold an estimated thirty-five million singles and albums internationally in less than nine years and more than 16 million singles in the USA alone. Exact figures of Warwick's sales are unknown, and probably underestimated, due to Scepter Records lax accounting policies and the company policy of not submitting recordings for RIAA audit. Dionne Warwick became the first Scepter artist to request RIAA audits of her recordings in 1968 with the release of I Say A Little Prayer.
Warwick had become the priority act of Scepter Records with the release of Anyone Who Had a Heart in 1963. However, in the post-Woodstock era of the late 1960s, changing tastes in music and the dispute between Bacharach and David's production company and Scepter resulted in the decision that she would begin looking for a major label. Warwick's last LP for Scepter was the aforementioned soundtrack for the motion picture The Love Machine (in which she appeared in an uncredited cameo), released in June 1971. In 1975, Bacharach/David sued Scepter Records for an accurate accounting of royalties due the team from Warwick and labelmate B.J. Thomas recordings and was awarded almost $600,000 and the rights to all Bacharach/David recording on the Scepter label. The label, with the defection of Warwick to Warner Brothers, filed bankruptcy in 1975 and was sold to Springboard International Records in 1976.
In 1971, Warwick was signed to Warner Brothers Records for what was at the time the most lucrative recording contract ever given a female vocalist according to Variety. Her debut on the Warner Brothers label was the self-titled album Dionne (not to be confused with her later Arista debut album) in January of 1972. The album peaked at #57 on the Billboard Hot 100 Album Chart.
Warwick had signed with Warners with Bacharach and David as writers and producers. However, after the Lost Horizon disaster of 1973, the songwriting duo not only wasn't working together, they weren't even speaking. While this situation worked itself out in the courts, Warwick would team with a variety of producers, looking for an elusive hit.
Faced with the prospect of being sued by Warner Brothers due to the breakup of Bacharach/David and their failure to honor their contract with Dionne, in 1975 Warwick was forced to file a $5.5 million lawsuit against Bacharach and David for breach of contract. Warwick was forced to find other producers for her albums and singles she was contractually to provide to Warner Brothers due to the breakup. The suit was settled out of court in 1979, reportedly for $5 million including the rights to all Warwick recordings produced by Bacharach and David.
Warwick, for years an aficionado of psychic phonomena, was advised by numerologist Linda Goodman in 1971 to add an e to her last name, making Warwick Warwicke for good luck. The extra e brought more bad luck than good, and the singer removed it in 1975.
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