alone

Heart had their biggest hit with this power ballad that chilled us to the bone. The superstar songwriting team of Billy Steinberg and Tom Kelly wrote'Alone' before they had their big success and performed it together as the group i-Ten on their album 'Taking a Cold Look'.

Steinberg remembers: "On the song 'Alone', we didn't work with Nancy and Ann. Even though it was released after 'True Colors' and 'Like a Virgin' it was written well before those songs. Tom Kelly and I were signed to Epic Records and we made one album under the name i-Ten. It was sort of made out to look like a group, but it was really just the two of us. We made this album and it was co-produced by Keith Olsen and Steve Lukather. I wasn't really happy with the way it turned out, but it did have some good songs on it. One of the songs on it was 'Alone'. The i-Ten album didn't do anything. The album was titled 'Taking A Cold Look'. The album didn't do much although it has sort of a cult following in Europe. The most prominent song on it was 'Alone.' Tom and I recorded it for that record and just sort of set it aside when that record didn't succeed. In fact, all the songs on that i-Ten record had a slightly unpleasant association to me because the whole recording process was very unpleasant to me. I just put those songs in a drawer and forgot about them, but then Tom and I were having a good deal of success with 'Like a Virgin' and 'True Colors' and then we heard that Heart was looking for a power ballad and Tom said, 'What about 'Alone'?' I winced and said, 'Oh, I don't really want to look at that song.' He said, 'What do you mean? That's perfect.' And I said, 'Well, let me think. Specifically, I don't like the first line of the chorus,' and he said, 'Well let's re-write it.' So we took the song out and sure enough it was relatively easy to do because we liked everything about the song except the first line of the chorus. The version on i-Ten, the lyric said, 'I always fared well on my own.' Both lyrically and melodically it felt very stiff and unappealing. So I did a minor change on the lyric and it said, 'Til now, I always got by on my own', and Tom changed the melody in the first line of the chorus and he gave it much more movement and a slightly R&B feel. That really lifted the chorus and then all of a sudden I liked the song again. We made a new demo of the song very quickly and presented it to Ron Nevison who was producing Heart at that time and he loved it and they cut it. Tom and I were invited to the studio, at which time we met Ann and Nancy. Tom was invited to sing the high harmony parts on the record, which he did."

'Alone' became the first single from 'Bad Animals' and was an international smash, going to eighty-eight in France; twenty-two in Austria; eighteen in Germany; seven in Belgium; six in Australia, the Netherlands, and Poland; five in Norway; four in Switzerland; three in Ireland, Luxemburg, and the UK; and number one in Canada and the US.

http://www.heart-music.com/

I hear the ticking of the clock
I'm lying here the room's pitch dark
I wonder where you are tonight
No answer on the telephone
And the night goes by so very slow
Oh I hope that it won't end though
Alone

Till now I always got by on my own
I never really cared until I met you
And now it chills me to the bone
How do I get you alone
How do I get you alone

You don't know how long I have wanted
To touch your lips and hold you tight, oh
You don't know how long I have waited
And I was gonna tell you tonight
But the secret is still my own
And my love for you is still unknown
Alone

Till now I always got by on my own
I never really cared until I met you
And now it chills me to the bone
How do I get you alone
How do I get you alone

How do I get you alone
How do I get you alone

Alone, alone