Eight years had gone by for Cheap Trick having a Top 40 hit. As a matter of fact, casual music fans were wondering if they were still together by 1988.
Truth was, they were. But the bigger truth was that nothing seemed to hit for the band from Rockford, Ill. Every album the band released between in the 1980s had limited success, none climbing any higher than No. 24 on the chart. And after "Voices" hit No. 32 in early 1980, the band released 16 singles in the next seven years with only five of them charting in the Hot 100 and a frustrating four of them getting to the Top 50, but never breaking the Top 40 -- "Everything Works If You Let It" peaking at No. 44, "Stop This Game" going to No. 48, "If You Want My Love" peaking at No. 45 and "Tonight It's You" stopping at No. 44.
Still, Epic Records kept them on the payroll in late 1987, but there was much strife between the band and the record label. They knew the group had not had a winning formula for years. So Epic put the rules down on the band -- they were going to bring in outside help for the band. Rick Nielsen, the band's flamboyant lead guitarist, had written all but one of the songs for the band's previous 1986 album, "The Doctor." For this album, which would be called "Lap Of Luxury," Nielsen only co-wrote four of the 10 tracks. You could almost hear the grumbling over that.
Nielsen co-wrote "Let Go" and "Wrong Side Of Love" with an up-and-coming songwriter-guitarist named Todd Cerney. Greg Giuffria, the leader of the band Giuffria who had the one-hit wonder "Call To The Heart" in 1985, co-wrote "All We Need To Do Is Dream" with Nielsen and lead singer Robin Zander. And "Ghost Town," which would be a future Top 40 hit for the band in early 1989, was co-written by Nielsen with one of the hottest songwriters in the business at the time, Diane Warren. Janna Allen, who was a co-writer of "Kiss On My List" and "Private Eyes" for Daryl Hall & John Oates, co-wrote "All Wound Up" with Zander and Tom Petersson, Cheap Trick's bass player who had just returned to the band after a long hiatus. And the veteran writing duo of Mike Chapman and Holly Knight co-wrote "Space." Then there was "No Mercy," co-written by a pair of newcomers, Jon Lind and Jim Scott.
Record producer Richie Zito was firmly behind what the record company wanted -- even if the band wasn't. And he had a song that was in his hand via a cassette called "The Flame," written by a pair of Brits, Bob Mitchell and Nick Graham, the latter a member of such groups as Atomic Rooster, Skin Alley and Alibi. So Zito played the cassette for the band members in the room together.
The reaction? It was mixed at best. Reportedly, Nielsen took the tape, dropped it on the ground and buried it under his boot -- that's how bad he thought of the song. But according to drummer Bun E. Carlos, the vice-president of Epic Records had come to the band with two songs for the album, claiming he thought the songs were so good that they were "both No. 1 singles." One of the songs was going to be recorded by the band, the other by the band Chicago. Cheap Trick heard this song and chose it over the other one which had a female's voice on the vocal -- that song was called "Look Away," which would be Chicago's third and last No. 1 hit in December 1988, written by Warren.
Begrudgingly, the band recorded "The Flame." Zito highlighted on two parts of the song that made it hit-worthy. The first was Zander's haunting vocals, describing the sadness and frustration of a jilted lover who will always have his ex in his thoughts, partially in the same vain as The Police's "Every Breath You Take" five years earlier. The second was Nielsen's guitar work on the song, including his solo in the middle.
The song, clocking in at 5:37 for the album and 4:44 for the single release, was the first release from "Lap Of Luxury" when the album was released in April 1988. The single entered the Billboard Hot 100 on April 9, 1988, at an unimpressive No. 92, their first chart single since "Tonight It's You."
The very next week, "The Flame" began to ignite on the chart, leaping 19 places to No. 73. Two weeks later, it was at No. 59. The next week, it became "the next Top 50 song" for the band when it leaped to No. 50.
There was no stopping in between spots 41 and 50 on the chart, though. Two weeks later and in its seventh week on the Hot 100, "The Flame" made its Top 40 debut at No. 33, the band's first Top 40 hit in over eight years since "Voices." Two weeks later, it got to No. 19. Two more weeks later, it moved up from No. 13 to No. 9 to become the band's second Top 10 hit and first since "I Want You To Want Me," their breakthrough hit from their "Live At Budokan" album, hit No. 7 in 1979. The next week, June 25, "The Flame" gave Cheap Trick their first Top 5 hit when it leaped from No. 9 to No. 5. One week later, it was No. 3 and then on July 9, 1988, exactly three months after starting its climb on the chart, "The Flame" was right where that Epic Records vice-president predicted where the song would be ... No. 1, where it would spend two weeks.
The power ballad had succeeded for the band whose controls were all but stripped from them by their record label who felt the need to start calling the shots. Their follow-up hit, a rockin' remake of Elvis Presley's 1956 classic, "Don't Be Cruel," would also be a smash in the fall of '88, peaking at No. 4. "Ghost Town" would peak at No. 33. And the album it came from, "Lap Of Luxury," would peak at No. 16 on the Top 200 chart, the first Top 20 album for the band since "Dream Police" nine years earlier.
But it wasn't just that Epic Records vice-president who felt "The Flame" was a No. 1 hit. According to Zander, he said he saw the light when a fan thought the song had huge potential. He said, "The band was very skeptical about performing this song live, because we only liked to perform songs written by us. However, a young man from, oh, I don't know, somewhere, confirmed to us after a show in Florida about a week after the song was released that the song was great and -- get this -- would be a No. 1 single. As we joked about the guy's prediction, we later realized, 'Whoa! This guy was right.' I thank him for that."
The band continues to rock out with Zander, Nielsen and Petersson continuing along with Nielsen's son, Daxx, playing the drums now that Carlos, still a member of the band, does not record or tour with the group anymore. The band's last CD/album, "The Latest," got to No. 78 on the Top 200 album chart in 2009. And the band continues to tour endlessly, doing so again in 2015.
And yes, "The Flame" is a part of the set list every night as Zander pours his heart out on stage singing that song and Nielsen commands the guitar solo the same way he did in 1988 when he and the band recorded that song.
The same song they didn't like, but really had no choice but to record.
The one that became their only No. 1 hit in their career.
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