“Easy Lover” is a song performed by Philip Bailey, of Earth, Wind & Fire, and Phil Collins, of Genesis, and jointly written and composed by Bailey, Collins, and Nathan East. The song appeared on Bailey’s solo album, Chinese Wall. Collins has performed the song in his live concerts. It is Bailey’s only US Top 40 hit as a solo artist.
The song was a #1 hit in several countries, including Canada, the Netherlands, Ireland, and the UK. In the U.S., it spent 23 weeks on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, including 7 weeks in the Top 10, and peaked at #2 the weeks of 2 February 1985 and 9 February 1985, behind the chart-topping “I Want to Know What Love Is” by Foreigner. In the UK Singles Chart, it reached #1, staying there for 4 weeks. The single sold over a million copies in the U.S. and was certified gold, as the RIAA requirement for a platinum single disc was not lowered to one million units until 1989. In addition, “Easy Lover” has been certified gold by the British Phonographic Industry for sales of over 400,000 in the UK and platinum in Canada by Music Canada.
“Easy Lover” won an MTV Video Music Award for Best Overall Performance in a Video in 1985 and was Grammy Award nominated for Best Pop Performance by a Duo or Group With Vocals in 1986.
In 1984, Phil Collins was hired as the producer for Philip Bailey‘s solo album, Chinese Wall. According to Collins, Bailey approached him at the end of the sessions for the album and asked him to write a song together. In “Phil Collins: My Life in 15 Songs”, a 2016 interview he gave to Rolling Stone magazine, Collins said of the song: “So we just started having a jam one night, and went round and round and turned it into a verse and a chorus. We recorded it that night so we wouldn’t forget it. That song doesn’t sound like any particular era. It’s just fantastic.” According to the official sheet music, the song has a tempo of 105 BPM, though the studio recording has a tempo of 130 BPM.
The song’s music video, filmed at Etward Studios, London, England, humorously depicts the making of a music video. It was produced by Paul Flattery and directed by Jim Yukich.
