Kenny Loggins — “Forever”

Entered Top 40:   July 20, 1985
1 week 
Peaked at: 40

Between work on two blockbuster film soundtracks (Footloose and Top Gun), Kenny Loggins released Vox Humana, in which Team Loggins stepped away from the yacht and tried a mishmash of modern (at the time) R&B and synthy pop. It also leaned a little too hard on the sounds of past successes; the title track sounds like a “Footloose” and “I’m Alright” pastiche. But that was enough to make it a moderate hit (#29).

I don’t see the appeal in “Forever” at all. Cowritten by David Foster, whom we’ve already encountered working with Paul Anka and Kenny Rogers, it sounds like it could be a castoff from Foster’s work for Chicago. But it ended up being a Top 5 Adult Contemporary hit for Loggins (#5); his first there since “Heart to Heart” (#3).

Loggins would release one more Vox Humana single; that one didn’t crack the Top 40 at all. But Top Gun was right around the corner, and “Danger Zone” would be a #2 hit. He’d continue to get songs on soundtrack albums into the ’90s, and “Danger Zone” would get some late cultural cachet thanks to Archer, but curiously Loggins did not cut a new song for Top Gun: Maverick.