Favorite 100 Songs of the 80s: (#81) Billy Squier – Everybody Wants You

While even as an 11-year old I learned rather quickly I’d never be the next Jimi Hendrix, Eric Clapton or Robert Townsend, I dreamed of mastering the electric guitar. Since I didn’t own one (or any instrument for that matter) I’d resort to visualizing banging out riffs with my composition notebook or nearly anything I could hold in my left hand as my Gibson limited edition guitar.

Literally, I wanted to play guitar because of this song.

Mind you, my guitar hero dreams went awry before actually touching the real thing let alone learning how to play one, but the loops to open this song are as memorable to me today as anything else musically from the 80s.

Da-Dum… Da Da Dum … Da Da Da Da Da Dum Dum. Just a killer flow, man.

“Everybody Wants You” wasn’t Squier’s biggest commercial hit. That distinction belongs to “The Stroke” off his “Don’t Say No” album one year earlier in 1981. While I give mad props to “The Stroke” for having a catchy ass rhythm and course that helped make Squier a household name, it never quite make the cut as my favorite song of his.

“Everybody Wants You” has the better guitar grooves and for me anyway is 3 minutes and 47 seconds of non-stop ass kicking— and a highpoint of commercial rock in the early 80s.

Chart Success: Peaked as high as No. 32 on the Billboard Top 100 chart of 1982 after debuting on October 2^nd. It spent 17 weeks on the chart but didn’t make the year-end Billboard Top 100, which is some bullshit if you ask me.

Great Lyrics: This song goes much deeper than many give credit for. For me this song is the quandary of a former rock star well past his prime, craving the attention he once had and drowning away his sorrows in “loneliness and alcohol”.

“Nights of confusion and impossible dreams
Days at the mirror, patching up around the seams
You got your glory, you paid for it all
You take your pension in loneliness and alcohol
Say goodbye to conventional ways
You can’t escape the hours, you lose track of the days”

Fun Fact: This was the first single off his “Emotions in Motions” album, which ended up triple-platinum certified.