(Love Is) Thicker Than Water

Album: Flowing Rivers (1977)
Charted: 1
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Songfacts®:

  • "(Love Is) Thicker Than Water" was the second of three #1 hits for not-quite-Bee-Gee Andy Gibb in his solo career. It followed "I Just Want To Be Your Everything" and preceded "Shadow Dancing." But that's just #1 hits by Andy Gibb; in the general scheme of things, this song bumped the Bee Gees' "Stayin' Alive" from #1 and was itself bumped by the Bee Gee's "Night Fever."

    Is that not enough Gibbs for you in the #1 spot? "Night Fever" was seceded by "If I Can't Have You" - which also happened to be written and produced by the Gibb brothers. Basically anybody who remembers 1977 will tell you that the whole year was one big blur of Gibb, and then at the end there there was Star Wars and somebody lit up Debby Boone's life.
  • Barry Gibb had a hand in writing this song for Andy, which makes Barry Gibb the only person in music history so far to have written four consecutive #1 Billboard hits in a row. Eat your heart out, Elvis!
  • Collectors take note: Andy's solo albums tend not to be released on their own as much as get included in Bee Gees' boxed sets; such is the case for most of the tracks from Flowing Rivers, available in the Bee Gees' 4-disc set Mythology.
  • And now, if you're tired of all this Bee Gee worship, here is a specter at the banquet in Ken Emerson's essay Britain: The Second Wave as printed in The Rolling Stone Illustrated History of Rock and Roll: "The Bee Gees' ornate orchestrations and tremulous romanticism scarcely concealed a solipsistic nightmare... in which the obsessed singer (most often Robin Gibb with his choked, inconsolable quaver) floated or flew in frightening isolation as everything dissolved into tears or rain. The violins and silken harp sugarcoated a bitter pill, and the Bee Gees laced their confections with musical dissonances." Hey, just so you know, it wasn't just rainbows and unicorns back there.

Comments: 4

  • Pete from Nowra AustraliaBarry did virtually everything for Andy , wrote the song organised the music sang harmonies and backing vocals, he was a bit of a control freak
  • Barry from Sauquoit, NyOn October 30th 1977, "(Love Is) Thicker Than Water" by Andy Gibb entered Billboard's Hot Top 100 chart at position #89; and 17 weeks later on February 26th, 1978 it peaked at #1 {for 2 weeks} and spent over a half-year on the Top 100 {29 weeks}...
    The week it peaked at #1 half the Top 10 had a Gibb family involvement; at #2 was "Stayin' Alive", #3 was "Emotion" by Samantha Sang {written by Barry & Robin Gibb}, #5 was "Night Fever", and down at #10 was "How Deep Is Your Love"...
    And at #29 was "If I Can't Have You" by Yvonne Elliman and #80 was "More Than a Woman" by Tavares, both were penned by Barry, Robin, & Maurice Gibb.
  • Dave from Oak Park, MiI don't see any "relevance" in the last fact here, either, regarding this song... Almost as though someone is putting something or someone down... -- Dave
  • Karen from Manchester, NhI refuse to see the relevance of the final "fact". It has NOTHING to do with this particular song, or even Andy Gibb in general.
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