We’re launching a new segment on Radio Heartland called Classic Americana. Every Friday around 11 a.m. Central, we’ll pull a special track from the archives or from deep in the shelves to spotlight a particular artist or song.

This week, we’re spotlighting singer-songwriter Eddie Rabbitt, who was born Nov. 27, 1941, in Brooklyn, New York. The son of Irish immigrants, Rabbitt grew up in East Orange, New Jersey, and he became fascinated with music at an early age, performing in small venues around New Jersey as a teenager.

In 1969, Rabbitt moved to Nashville, where his career as a songwriter began in earnest — and was quickly rewarded with the songs “Kentucky Rain,” a hit for Elvis Presley in 1970, and “Pure Love,” a song that went to No. 1 for Ronnie Milsap in 1974. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, Eddie Rabbitt became a recording artist and touring musician in his own right, and enjoyed big crossover hits with songs like “Every Which Way But Loose,” “Driving My Life Away,” “I Love a Rainy Night,” and the massive hit he shared with Crystal Gayle, “You and I.”

For our Classic Americana spotlight, we’re going to listen to Rabbitt’s 1983 hit, “You Can’t Run From Love,” which went to No. 1 in the Billboard Country chart and No. 2 in Billboard’s Adult Contemporary chart; it also reached No. 55 in the Billboard Hot 100 in May 1983.

Sadly, Eddie Rabbitt died in 1998 at age 56 due to lung cancer, but in his short life and career, he brought a lot of great music to a wide range of music fans.

External Link

Eddie Rabbitt - official site