If You Like Pina Coladas!

Escape (The Pina Colada Song)

1979

Rupert Holmes

Everyone who was alive in 1979 and able to comprehend the concept of 'Music' knows this one...and I bet most of them (OK, Us) have sung along with the chorus more than a a few times.  You only have to hear the first few notes of the intro of this one to know exactly what song I'm talking about. If the intro doesn't clue you in (And you have never listened to the radio at all if it doesn't) the first line of the song should.

'If You Like Pina Coladas!'

Escape (The Pina Colada Song) was a huge hit for Rupert Holmes, and became his best known song, something he actually regarded with a little chagrin because he felt it took attention away from his more serious songs.

'Escape' was written for Holmes' 'Partner’s In Crime' album, and almost had nothing to do with Pina Coladas...the first line was originally 'If You Like Humphrey Bogart...' with the emphasis on 'like' instead of 'you', but Holmes didn't like the feel of it and decided to change it at the last minute, using the first exotic drink that came to mind. Millions of lovers of the song are glad he did...'If You Like Humphrey Bogart' just would not have sounded right!

The song was released on Sept 21, 1979 and hard as it may be to believe, sales of the single started out slow. It took a title change to fix it. See, people loved the song but when they looked for it at the record stores (Remember record stores? ) they didn't realize that the title was 'Escape'. Pina Colada is repeated numerous times very prominently during the song, and most people assumed that was the title...or at least that the name of the drink was in the title somewhere, so they asked for 'The Pina Colada Song' or 'That song about Pina Coladas. So Holmes reluctantly agreed to a title change,  'Escape' became 'Escape (The Pina Colada Song), and record sales immediately went through the roof. As in it climbed the charts fifteen to twenty points a week, hitting number one on The Billboard Hot 100 on December 22^nd 1979 and hanging on until the year wound down, becoming the last Number 1 song of The Seventies.

And it gets better! Escape (The Pina Colada Song) dropped to number 2 in the first week of January 1980...then had a resurgence and climbed back to number one on the Hot 100 chart that was released on January 12^th, 1980, making it the only US single to climb to Number 1 in two separate decades.

It became one of those songs that everyone's heard, everyone knows at least the chorus to, and just about everyone likes. And it became the song that ended out the decade that my generation became teenagers in, went to middle school, high school and college in, and made most of our best memories in.

So enjoy!

Escape (The Pina Colada Song) by Rupert Holmes