Dan Hill’s touchy-feely song derided by the macho — except for a couple of boxers
Back in the days of yore, I thought Dan Hill was a great big wimp.
Man, was I wrong.
Pop fans might remember Hill as the ultra-sensitive guy who co-wrote and sang the 1977 ballad Sometimes When We Touch. You know it: “Sometimes when we touch/The honesty’s too much/And I have to close my eyes and hide.”
Every time it oozed from the radio in the ’70s I recoiled. As a Led Zeppelin/ZZ Top-loving teen, it seemed more saccharine than a truckload of … well, saccharine tablets. And the way Hill sang it was so breathy and vulnerable, it seemed almost creepy.
Hill visits Vancouver Island next week. He’s playing a concert June 26 at Courtenay’s Sid Williams Theatre with Sue Medley and others. And he’s a panelist for the Vancouver Island Music Business Conference, also in Courtenay.
These appearances seemed a good excuse to grill Hill on … you know, that song.
Don’t get me wrong, he is a very accomplished guy and all. He has written songs for folk like Vonda Shepard, Celine Dion, Tina Turner and George Benson. And Hill (whose brother is Lawrence Hill of “Book of Negroes fame) recently published a memoir, I Am My Father’s Son.
Still, I felt compelled to ask what moved him to write Sometimes When We Touch. Don’t ask me why. Sheer perversity, no doubt.
When we chatted by phone Friday morning, Hill dropped a bombshell. He said he’s slated to record a version of Sometimes When We Touch with — get this — boxer Manny Pacquiao. Pacquiao is a world welterweight champion, and therefore, one tough hombre.
The Toronto songwriter recently met up in New York with the boxer (who has already sung Sometimes When We Touch on Jimmy Kimmel Live!). For the recording, Pacquiao will sing lead, with Hill chiming in “on the sidelines.”
Why on earth would one of the world’s best boxers (Pacquiao is the first to win seven world titles in seven different weight divisions) want to record Sometimes When We Touch? Hill says it’s partly because the song contains the line about being “A hesitant prizefighter/ Still trapped within my youth.” Boxers like the song, apparently. He said boxing champ Joe Frazier once recorded the tune.
Smokin’ Joe? Say it ain’t so.
Hill does have a sense of humour about the occasional ridicule his ballad has attracted. In I Am My Father’s Son, he notes David Letterman named it “the number 1 worst record of all time” in one of his top 10 lists. Of course, the version Letterman was referring to wasn’t Hill’s, but rather, a version by the New York City Gay Men’s Chorus.
Some folk love Sometimes When We Touch. Others hate it. Hill suspects guys (with the exception of Pacquiao and Frazier) dislike the tune because it’s a man exposing his feelings in an unusually sensitive way. And back in the 1970s, that was an uncool thing for a fellow to do.
Yet if anyone’s laughing, it’s Mr. Dan Hill. All the way to the bank. Sometimes When We Touch has been played on the radio an estimated five million times. The song has been used in movies, on TV shows, even as a ring tone. A surprising number of singers have covered it: Tina Turner, Cleo Laine, Tammy Wynette, Rod Stewart and Tommy Steele.
Donny Osmond also recorded it. Hill recalls the New York radio station Z100 once had him play a trick on Osmond. They invited Hill to anonymously phone in and tell their guest, Donny O., how much he preferred his version to the original.
Osmond replied that, yes indeed, many fans share this sentiment. “And then I said, ‘Yeah. I’m Dan Hill, the guy you sing it so much better than.’ “
Ha! Good one. So, could Hill actually live on the proceeds from Sometimes When We Touch alone?
“Yeah. That is true,” said the 56-year-old songwriter. “It’s an industry unto itself, that song.”
While Hill was good-humoured about being grilled about this song for the millionth time, I suspect he’s getting tired of the subject. He said he once wrote an entire article about Sometimes When We Touch for Maclean’s magazine. Part of Hill’s point was, hey, what’s the big deal anyway?
“In the article I say, ‘Come on guys. It’s just a f—ing song. It’s just a song. Get over it.’ “
? Copyright (c) The Victoria Times Colonist
