Hello (Lionel Richie song)

For other uses, see Hello (disambiguation).

"Hello"
Single by Lionel Richie
from the album Can't Slow Down
B-side	"You Mean More to Me"
Released	February 13, 1984 (1984-02-13)
Genre	R&B, soft rock
Length	4:11
Label	Motown
Writer(s)	Lionel Richie
Producer	Lionel Richie James Anthony Carmichael
Lionel Richie singles chronology
"Running with the Night" (1983) "Hello" (1984) "Stuck on You" (1984)

"Hello" is a song by Lionel Richie. Taken as the third single from Richie's multi-platinum album Can't Slow Down, the song was released in 1984 and reached number one on three Billboard music charts: the pop chart (for two weeks), the R&B chart (for three weeks), and the adult contemporary chart (for six weeks). The song also went to number one in the United Kingdom. It is considered by some to be Richie's signature song.

The song is particularly memorable for the line "Hello, is it me you're looking for?". In an interview broadcast in the UK on Channel 4's Top 100 Number One Hits, Richie said he had been thanked by a large number of normally tongue-tied men who had proposed marriage after a slow dance to the song.

The guitar solo on the song was played by session guitarist Louie Shelton. Synthesisers for the album were programmed by Brian Banks, whose name has been sometimes confused with UK guitarist Peter Banks. This has led to Peter Banks being erroneously attributed with the guitar part.

Music video

The music video features the story of Richie having a seemingly unrequited love for a blind art student (Laura Carrington) until he discovers she shares the feeling as demonstrated by the discovery that she is sculpting a likeness of his head.

Charts

Chart (1984)	Peak position
Australian Kent Music Report	1
Austrian Singles Chart	3
French Singles Chart	25
West German Singles Chart	2
Norwegian Singles Chart	5
Swedish Singles Chart	6
Swiss Singles Chart	1
UK Singles Chart	1
U.S. Billboard Hot 100	1
U.S. Billboard Adult Contemporary	1
U.S. Billboard Black Singles	1

Cover versions

• In 1985, Giannis Parios covered the song with Greek lyrics, written by him as "Pou pas" in his personal album "Ego kai esy"
• In 1985, Keith Almgren wrote lyrics in Swedish where the song was named "Du" ("You"), and covered by Kikki Danielsson on her album Bra vibrationer.
• In 1985, Orlando Netti, version of the song Qué Tal'.
• In 1986, The Shadows did an instrumental of the song on Moonlight Shadows.
• In 1993, Stephen Gately sang Hello as his first audition song for a part in Boyzone.
• In 1994, Luther Vandross covered the song on his album Songs.
• In 2003, Me First and the Gimme Gimmes covered a punk version on their album Take a Break.
• In 2005, Paul Anka covered a swing jazz version of the song on his album Rock Swings.
• In 2005, Sonata Arctica guitarist Elias Viljanen covered the song as an instrumental on his solo album The Leadstar.
• In 2007, Shirley Bassey covered a version on her album Get the Party Started.
• In 2007, Northern Kings featuring Jarkko Ahola from Teräsbetoni, Marco Hietala from Nightwish and Tarot, Tony Kakko from Sonata Arctica and Juha-Pekka Leppäluoto from Charon covered the song and released it as the second single from their album Reborn.
• In 2011, Macedonian singer Tose Proeski covered the song live during his concerts and on his album So Ljubav Ot Tose.
• In 2011, American bachata singer Berto La Voz covered the song which was released as the first single from his debut album Llego La Voz. This version peaked at #11 on the Billboard Tropical Songs chart.
• Canadian singer-songwriter Reid Jamieson recorded a cover of the song. An audio sample can be heard on his official website.

Live cover performances

• Cuban nightclub singer Margarita Pracatan covered the song to great popular success on the BBC series Saturday Night Clive, hosted by Clive James.
• Dutch singer/actor Gerard Cox performed it as a bilingual duet with actress Marjolein Keuning on a 1999 nostalgia-show; Keuning sang the English-parts and during the third chorus Cox reminded that love doesn't come for free.
• American Idol (Season 7) winner David Cook covered the song during the Top 16 week, getting huge praise from the judges.

Sampling

• Techno artist The Field sampled the song for the track "A Paw in My Face", off the 2007 album From Here We Go Sublime.

Appearances and references in other media

• Richie's version of "Hello" has been featured in the films Bitter Moon (1992), The 40-Year-Old Virgin (2005), Herbie: Fully Loaded (2005), Scary Movie 4 (2006), Are We Done Yet? (2007), and Shrek Forever After (2010).
• The line "Are you somewhere feeling lonely, or is someone loving you?" is used as a code in the 1992 Chinese John Woo action film Hard Boiled, and sung by Teresa Mo.
• In the sitcom Seinfeld, "Hello" was used as the background song during the scenes in which the characters of Seinfeld and George were on a pier, thinking about their lives.
• The song is performed by British comedian Jim Davidson in the 2006 film Colour Me Kubrick.
• The line "Hello, is it me you're looking for?" is sung by a male penguin in the film Happy Feet (2006). The line is also included with Richie's face on a t-shirt sold at kiosks in shopping malls.
• In the season six Family Guy episode from 2007, "Stewie Kills Lois/Lois Kills Stewie", Peter gives Lois, Richie's album, "Can't Slow Down", claiming "I didn't know who I was until I heard this album." In a cutaway, Peter is listening to "Hello" as he dramatically pleads with Richie to tell him "who hurt you."
• In the season three Community episode, "Geography of Global Conflict", the song is heard 3 times, all during the scenes involving Britta and Chang.
• The TV show Glee covered this song in the episode "Hell-O", sung by Lea Michele and Jonathan Groff.
• The song was used in a 2010 TV commercial for Yahoo!, Starburst, as well as in an IKEA commercial.
• In March 2011, the "Hello, Is it me you're looking for" Missing person sign became a popular viral photo. The sign was placed on telephone poles, much like a missing pet sign, with a picture of Richie and in place of the "Call Now Number" tags at the bottom of, were the full lyrics. Another meme featured a tea set that featured a caricature of Richie's face that said "Hello"/"Is it TEA you're looking for?"
• In season 13 of Dancing with the Stars the song was danced as a rumba by Rob Kardashian and Cheryl Burke.
• Disney featured a music video of "Hello" in D-TV Romancin' set to a scene from Bambi where adult Bambi and his friends Thumper and Flower meet and fall in love with females of their respective species.
• In the season three Don't Trust the B---- in Apartment 23 episode "Daddy's Girl", the song appears in the beginning of the episode as June looks at a baby.
• In the episode "Friendship Fish" from the second season of the television series Suburgatory, the song appears when Malik imagines himself with Lisa.
• In December 2012, the song featured on an advert for the supermarket chain "Tesco".
• The song also appeared in the trailer for the new season of National Geographic Channel Asia's "Dog Whisperer, but lyrics were altered which contains Cesar Millan dreaming with his dog cuddling him in all white but eventually awaken with infatuation by an alarm clock."
• In February 2013, Taco Bell used a Spanish version of the song, sung by Coffey Anderson, in their Cool Ranch Doritos Loco Taco commercial.

See also

• List of number-one singles in Australia during the 1980s
• List of RPM number-one singles of 1984
• List of Dutch Top 40 number-one singles of 1984
• List of European number-one hits of 1984
• List of number-one singles in 1984 (New Zealand)
• List of number-one hits of 1984 (Switzerland)
• List of number-one singles from the 1980s (UK)
• List of Hot 100 number-one singles of 1984 (U.S.)
• List of number-one adult contemporary singles of 1984 (U.S.)
• List of number-one R&B singles of 1984 (U.S.)

External links

• Full lyrics of this song at MetroLyrics