Dionne Warwick The 80s: Move to Arista

1960s and early 1970s

The Warner era (1972-1978)

The 80s: Move to Arista

1990s to present

Dionne Warwick 1990s to present



Dionne WarwickThis trend ended with the move to a new label and the release of I'll Never Love This Way Again in 1979. The song was produced by Barry Manilow. The accompanying album Dionne (1979 Album) (not to be confused with the Warner Bros. album of the same name) was her first to go Platinum. This was her debut on Arista Records, to which she had been personally signed and guided by the label's founder Clive Davis. Her 1980 album, No Night So Long featured the quality title track which became a major hit and the album performed solidly and peaked at #23 on the Billboard Hot 100 Albums Chart and #22 on the Billboard Hot R & B Albums Chart.

In January 1980, while under contract to Arista Records, Dionne Warwick hosted a two-hour TV special called Solid Gold '79. This was adapted into the weekly one-hour show Solid Gold, which she hosted throughout 1980 and again in 1985-86.

After a moderate hit recorded in early 1982 with her friend and fellow musical legend Johnny Mathis -- the Jay Graydon-produced Friends in Love -- Warwick's next big hit later that same year was her full-length collaboration with Barry Gibb of The Bee Gees for Heartbreaker. Heartbreaker became one of Dionne's biggest international hits, peaking on Billboard's Hot 100 at #10 in January 1983 and #1 AC in the USA and #2 in the UK. Internationally, the tune was also a smash in continential Europe, Australia, Japan, South Africa, Canada, and Asia. The title track was taken from the album of the same name which sold over 3 million internationally and earned Dionne an RIAA USA gold record award for the album. The album peaked at #25 on the Hot 100 Album Chart, #13 on the R&B Chart and #3 in the UK. Dionne stated to Wesley Hyatt in his The Billboard Book of Number One Adult Contemporary Hits that she was not fond of Heartbreaker but recorded the tune because she trusted The Bee Gees' judgment that it would be a hit. The project come about when Clive Davis was attending his aunt's wedding in Florida and spoke with Barry Gibb. Barry mentioned that he had always been a fan of Dionne's and Clive arranged for Dionne and The Bee Gees to discuss a project. Dionne and the brothers Gibb hit it off and the album and the title single were released in October 1982.

In 1983, Dionne released another notable album titled How Many Times Can We Say Goodbye which was produced by Luther Vandross. Their collaboration had been a lifelong dream of Vandross, who had maintained that he wanted to work with Warwick, Aretha Franklin, and Diana Ross. The album's most successful single was the title track, How Many Times Can Say Goodbye, a duet with Warwick, which despite the production by Vandross, peaked at #27 on the Billboard Hot 100. The second single, the Dance-pop song Got a Date, became a moderate hit on the R&B chart. The album peaked at Number 57 on The Billboard 200 album chart, but it did fare better on the R&B chart. Still, it was not as commercially successful as the Heartbreaker album the previous year. Of note was a reunion with The Shirelles on Warwick's cover of Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow. Warwick would not release another studio album until two years later, 1984's Finder of Lost Loves -- an album that would reunite her with both Barry Manilow and Burt Bacharach, who was now writing with his new lyricist partner and wife, Carole Bayer Sager.

In 1985, Warwick contributed her voice to the Multi-Grammy award winning charity song: We Are the World, along with vocalists like Michael Jackson, Lionel Richie, Tina Turner and Diana Ross.

In 1985, Warwick recorded the American Foundation for AIDS Research (AmFAR) benefit single That's What Friends Are For alongside Gladys Knight, Elton John, and Stevie Wonder. The single, credited to Dionne and Friends raised over three million dollars for that cause. The tune peaked at #1 for four weeks on the Billboard Hot 100 in January 1986. In 1988, the Washington Post wrote: So working against AIDS, especially after years of raising money for work on many blood-related diseases such as sickle-cell anemia, seemed the right thing to do. You have to be granite not to want to help people with AIDS, because the devastation that it causes is so painful to see. I was so hurt to see my friend die with such agony, Warwick remembers. I am tired of hurting and it does hurt. The single won the performers the NARAS Grammy Award for Best Pop Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal, as well as Song of the Year for its writers, Bacharach and Bayer Sager. It also was ranked by Billboard magazine as the most popular song of 1986. With this single, Warwick also released her second most successful album of the decade, titled Friends. The overwhelming success of the title track, however, overshadowed much of the other tracks on the album.

In July 1987, Dionne scored another Billboard Top 20 pop hit (#12) and Top 10 R&B chart hit (and #1 AC hit) with the song, Love Power, a duet with Jeffrey Osborne. This song, another written by Bacharach and Carole Bayer Sager, was featured in Warwick's album Reservations for Two. The album's title song, a duet with Kashif, was also a moderate hit. Other artists featured on the album included Smokey Robinson and June Pointer.






Video Dionne Warwick : Anyone Who Had A Heart 1963 Rare Photos Dionne Warwick Anyone Who Had A Heart 1963 Rare Photos

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