(The Hit Hammer is where I'm reviewing each #1 song on the Billboard Hot 100. Starting from when the chart started in 1958 and eventually working my way to the present. To see my inspiration and more information about this blog, please CLICK HERE)
Dionne Warwick & the Spinners - "Then Came You"
Hit Number 1: October 26, 1974
Stay at Number 1: 1 Week
Today, everyone likely thinks of Dionne Warwick as a very successful singer. That's for good reason, of course, but it doesn't tell you the misfortune she went through for a time. The '60s were very kind to her, as she rattled off numerous top ten hits in the decade. Though she never hit #1, she still had an enviable career as a singer. Then the '70s hit, and everything came crashing down. Warwick was signed to Warner Bros. Records, and her lack of success wasn't because she wasn't releasing anything. That's one of the weird things about music, you never know what's going to stick. Warwick's material from the early '70s was still pretty good, and I have no real explanation for why her stuff wouldn't chart. One band that was finding success, though, were the Spinners, an R&B group from Ferndale, Michigan. Unlike Warwick, they performed in the '60s but never did anything too special until the '70s. They were regulars on the charts and performed music that was very similar to what Warwick was doing. You get the feeling that a collab between her and the Spinners is what needed to happen.
The Spinners got their first top ten hit in 1972 with "I'll Be Around", and then got into the top ten again in 1973 with "Could It Be I'm Falling in Love". ("I'll Be Around got to #3. It's an 8. "Could It Be I'm Falling in Love" got to #4. It's also an 8) The Spinners also saw some songs just miss the top ten, but they still were able to crack the top 40. The point being, this was a very popular band in the early '70s. I can't find how Warwick and the Spinners decided to collab with each other, seeing as they were signed to different record companies, but it was an agreement that would give great fortune to Warwick from that point on. Warwick decided to play with the Spinners with their Atlantic deal, and that song, as you can probably guess, is "Then Came You".
"Then Came You" is exactly what you'd expect from a Warwick/Spinners collab. It's just pure R&B. There's a cool piano riff as an introduction. In fact, there's some swooping strings and some cool "wah wah" guitar work at play, like in a lot of '70s pop hits, but the piano is the driving force, instrumentally. It keeps the rhythm of the song alive. Warwick and the Spinners' lead vocalist, Bobby Smith, sound good together. "Then Came You" is basically a duet, and it's a song about finally finding a true love. As the chorus goes: "I never knew love before, then came you." The two narrators can't imagine a life without their lover, and they can't believe that they used to ever live without them. Those are the characters that Warwick and Smith play as, and in reality, "Then Came You" is just a regurgitation of countless other songs. It's message is the same as a lot of other songs, which makes it generic on one level, but Warwick and the Spinners are able to spice it up a little bit. They put their own touch of R&B on it, which might have saved the song from obscurity. For me, "Then Came You" is still a wildly generic song, concerning its message and its sound still not quite separating itself from the rest of the pack. It's a good song, but not great. There's not much here that I can say excites me.
With that being said, "Then Came You" still had to feel like a godsend for Warwick. After the success of the song, she went on to Arista Records and got a "second wind" to her career. She'll eventually appear in this blog again. As for the Spinners, they will not, but they still remained present on the charts, even continuing to crack the top ten on the Hot 100 into the '80s. "Then Came You" was a great moment for both Warwick's and the Spinners' careers.
GRADE: 6/10
IN POP CULTURE:
I can't find any instances of "Then Came You" being played in any TV shows, movies, or even other artists covering the song. But there are some aspiring musicians on YouTube that sometimes cover these old songs. Here's a YouTuber by the name of Carol Kay covering "Then Came You" in a much more mellow format:
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