Then for seven weeks in early 1985, a song with those two titles were in the Top 40 at the same time. And on the week of February 23, 1985, they were both having great runs in the countdown. "Lovergirl" by Teena Marie was one of the bigger movers in the countdown, moving from No. 24 to No. 16, while "Loverboy" by Billy Ocean moved from No. 4 to No. 2 and threatened to get to No. 1, which would make it the second straight No. 1 hit for Ocean after "Caribbean Queen (No More Love On The Run)."
Ocean's hit was first to hit the Top 40, debuting at No. 40 the week of December 8, 1984. Ocean, born Leslie Sebastian Charles in Fyzabad, Trinidad & Tobago on January 21, 1950, had gone eight years without a Top 40 hit until "Caribbean Queen (No More Love On The Run)" landed him back in it and got him all the way to No. 1. From the album, "Suddenly," "Loverboy" proved to be the same uptempo song as "Caribbean Queen" was, but with a harder edge, thanks to the guitar work of Geoff Whitehorn. The song also featured a music video that seemed to come out of the cantina scene from "Star Wars" -- futuristic and freaky."Loverboy" romped up the Top 40 landscape into the Top 10. And about the same time as that was happening, the "Loverboy" got joined on the countdown by a "Lovergirl." She was provided by singer-songwriter-producer Teena Marie, born Mary Christine Brockert in Santa Monica, Calif., on March 5, 1956.
Immediately, young Mary Christine was getting offers, from acting at 8 years old on The Beverly Hillbillies to singing as a 10-year-old at the wedding for the son of actor-comedian Jerry Lewis. In the early 1970s, the family moved to Venice, Calif., and young Mary, who had now formed an R&B group with her younger brother and cousin, began hanging out in an African-American section of the town called Oakwood, nicknamed "Venice Harlem." While cutting her teeth on the R&B music of the day in Venice Harlem, she was earning the lead in the play The Music Man at Venice High School. After graduating from high school, Mary Christine led a band called Truvair, which consisted of some of her high school classmates, and they performed locally between 1974-75.
While studying English literature at Santa Monica College, Mary Christine was auditioning for a record label, using the English lit influence to write lyrics for her songs. And one of those auditions landed her a record label -- it was for producer-songwriter Hal Davis at Motown Records. He had plans for both she and her band to perform songs for an upcoming Motown-produced movie, but the project got shelved. Still, Motown's leader, Berry Gordy Jr., liked what he heard from Mary Christine and the band, but he had no room in his company at the time for a band. So he signed her to a solo deal.
However, none of her recording sessions were working out, as if there was no magic between the artist and producers sent her way. But one fellow Motown artist was interested in working with her. His name was Rick James. On his way to taking off as a singer himself on the 1978 smash "You & I," James took Mary Christine under his wing and worked on what would be her first solo album titled "Wild And Peaceful." James wrote most of the songs on the album, bringing out his protege's talents and her soulful vocals.
Released in March 1979, "Wild And Peaceful" was released with the cover picture of swirling dark clouds. No picture of the artist was on the cover and there was a reason for that: James wanted the record buyers to hear the voice and not really picture what the white singer looked like ... not yet, at least. It worked as the album got to the Top 20 on the R&B album chart and peaked at No. 94 on the Top 200 album chart.
By now, she had changed her name to Teena Marie. She went on to make the scenes with other R&B singers as well. Then in 1980, Marie went back into the studio to make what would be her breakthrough album, "Lady T." This time around, James, with his career in full bloom, turned the producing honors over to veteran Richard Rudolph, the widow of the great Minnie Riperton. They connected, too, and on one track, "Too Many Colors," Rudolph had backing vocals done by his 7-year-old daughter, Maya, who would eventually become Marie's goddaughter.
The work with Rudolph and continuing prodding and positive reinforcement from James allowed 24-year-old Teena Marie to go out and do her third album, "Irons In The Fire," on her own in late 1980. And in 1981 with Marie doing the producing and songwriting, she scored her first Top 10 R&B hit, "I Need Your Lovin'," which would cross over and be Marie's first-ever Top 40 pop hit, peaking at No. 37 in the spring of 1981.
Marie's star was rising, following that album up in late 1981 with "It Must Be Magic," that led to her first Top 5 R&B hit, "Square Biz," which would later become the theme song re-done in 2002 for the early 21st century version of the game show The Hollywood Squares, hosted by Tom Bergeron.
But after that album peaked at No. 2 on the R&B chart, Marie suffered a setback with her Epic Records debut, the 1983 album, "Robbery," which missed the Top 10 on the R&B album chart and only got as high as No. 119 on the album chart. The white girl with the R&B chops was suffering a bit of a slump and took a year off to regroup.
When she came back, it was with the album "Starchild," which featured her not only on the production and writing of all the songs again, but it featured her on lead vocal, drum machine, guitar, synthesizer, percussion, piano and on backing vocals as well as all the programming.
That's her playing all those instruments and producing her own track, "Lovergirl," a song very much sounding like James himself had a hand in it, but in this case, he didn't. This was Teena Marie learning from her musical master.
The debut single from the new album would saunter into the Top 40 at No. 39 on February 2, 1985, in its eighth week on the Hot 100. But not missing a beat, it jumped up to No. 32, then No. 24, then to No. 16 on February 23, 1985.
Ocean, meanwhile, was now a challenger to the song at the top for the second straight week, "Careless Whisper" by Wham! featuring George Michael.
It was uncertain if the "Loverboy" and "Lovergirl" would meet up with one another, but they were both flying high on the chart. However, after getting to No. 2 for one week, Ocean got the tide turned on him and "Loverboy" began to sink, dropping to No. 5. Meanwhile, "Lovergirl" was poised to go into the Top 10 after a two-notch climb to No. 14.
And then on March 9, 1985, an unprecedented Top 40 moment took place -- "Loverboy," co-written by Ocean, his songwriting partner, the late Keith Diamond, and Robert John "Mutt" Lange, dropped from No. 5 down to No. 11 and out of the Top 10. And one notch below that song at No. 12 was ... you guessed it! ... "Lovergirl," moving up two notches from No. 14 to No. 12.
The "Loverboy" and the "Lovergirl" had found each other! It would only be a seven-day romance, though as "Loverboy" dropped to No. 20 and "Lovergirl," more importantly, became Marie's first Top 10 pop hit at No. 8 the next week. Two weeks later on the week of March 30, 1985, "Lovergirl" would peak at No. 4, five notches higher than its peak position on the R&B chart.
Once "Loverboy" left the Top 40, Ocean was already on to the next Top 40 hit, the title track from "Suddenly," which would peak at No. 4. Once "Lovergirl" left the Top 40 the week of May 4, 1985, that unfortunately was it for Marie on that chart. She was still an R&B chart star and on April 9, 1988, she scored her only No. 1 hit on that chart when "Ooo La La La" reached the top. "Work It" and "If I Were A Bell" would give her two more Top 10 R&B hits in the next two years and she would continue to perform and put out records for the next decade and a half.
In 2004, she was back on the R&B Top 5 and Top 10 on the respective album charts with "La Dona" at 48 years old. But 2004 turned out to be a bad year for Marie -- her teacher and close friend, Rick James, died suddenly of a heart attack at the age of 56 as he was getting his life back together after fighting the demons of drug abuse. And while sleeping in a hotel room one night that year, a picture hanging over the bed she was in fell of its foundation and knocked her unconscious. It led to a serious concussion she suffered. From that time on, she would suffer from momentary seizures because of the trauma she suffered.
On December 26, 2010, Marie was found unresponsive in her home by her daughter, Alia, in Pasadena, Calif. She was taken to a nearby hospital where she was pronounced dead at the age of 54. An autopsy performed four days later found she had died from natural causes, though it came one month after she had suffered a tonic-clonic seizure, which affects the brain.
In 2016, Ocean, who would score three No. 1 hits during the 1980s in the U.S., was about to release his 11th studio CD/album and first since 2013's "Here You Are," and did a medley of "Suddenly" and "Caribbean Queen" on The Tonight Show With Jimmy Fallon.
He's gray now, but at 66 years old, Ocean can still bring it on vocally. And if and when he goes out on tour, he'll be doing his old songs without doubt. That would include "Loverboy," which really didn't ever think it would meet its "Lovergirl," but sure did during the winter of 1985.
Oh, what an experience!
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