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It's Raining Again
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Wikipedia article
{{Infobox song
| name = It's Raining Again
| cover = Supertramp It's Raining Again single cover.jpg
| alt =
| type = single
| artist = Supertramp
| album = ...Famous Last Words...
| B-side = Bonnie
| released =
| recorded =
| studio =
| venue =
| genre = Pop rock, art pop, soft rock
| length = 4:24
| label = A&M
| writer = Rick Davies, Roger Hodgson
| producer = Supertramp, Peter Henderson
| prev_title = Breakfast in America (live)
| prev_year = 1981
| next_title = My Kind of Lady
| next_year = 1983
| misc =
}}
"'It's Raining Again'" is a song recorded by the English progressive rock band Supertramp and released as a single from their 1982 album 'Famous Last Words' with credits given to Rick Davies and Roger Hodgson, although as indicated on the album sleeve, it is a Hodgson composition. The end of the song incorporates the old nursery rhyme "It's Raining, It's Pouring".
Reception
'Cash Box' said it is "vintage Supertramp with all of the elements that have made the groups sound so distinctive" and that it is "bouncy and hook-laden."
The song debuted at No. 31 on 30 October 1982 on the 'Billboard' Hot 100, becoming the second highest debut on that chart for all of 1982 (bested only by "Ebony and Ivory" at No. 29 on 10 April 1982), but it only peaked at No. 11, making it one of the few songs to enter the chart in the Top 40 but not reach the Top 10. The record was a big success on the European charts, reaching the top 10 in Austria, the Netherlands, Germany, Norway, and Switzerland, and No. 1 in France. This was the group's last top 40 hit on the United Kingdom singles chart.
Music video
The song's video was directed by future 'Highlander' director Russell Mulcahy and conceptualized by Keith Williams.
In the video, a man drives a beat-up convertible through a dust storm to a small town cafe to bring a bouquet to his girlfriend, who is a waitress there. A co-worker hands him a Dear John letter. After having his parked car ticketed for heading the wrong way, he spends a forgettable night at the Pickwick Drive-In movie "Famous Last Words" (reminding viewers about Supertramp's album), seeing himself on the film, watching another couple embrace in the car next to his, and meeting a small child with silver teeth, who points out that his car's left rear wheel is missing.
The next day the man, now on the street outside the cafe without his car, kisses the young girl, leaves the bouquet with her, and with his suitcase boards a bus to downtown Los Angeles. He is greeted by a guitar-playing passenger, then an uninterested cowboy props his long legs onto the seat in front of him, next to a lady putting on lipstick and wearing a white wig that receives a paper airplane thrown by another passenger. Awakened by the driver at the station, the man, now the last passenger still on the bus, finds himself without anything in his pockets, presumably having been robbed, but still with his suitcase. He thumbs down two rednecks in a pickup truck, who find him easy pickings for practical jokes, pitch him onto Hollywood Boulevard, and throw his suitcase onto him.
After a short walk, encountering more rough people, the man suffers a back alley beating in which he is stripped to his underwear and robbed of his suitcase. An elderly lady gives him an orange umbrella just before rain begins to drench the alley. In spite of a sea of black umbrellas, he accidentally runs into his true love, who is under a yellow umbrella, and the two embrace and dance together in the rain. The sea of black umbrellas disappears. This final encounter is what had appeared and now appears at the end of the aforementioned drive-in movie. As the camera pulls back, the couple in the convertible now has two children in the back seat while the song fades out with the children's nursery rhyme "it's raining, it's pouring..."
The five members of Supertramp all appear in the video. At the beginning, John Helliwell is a street musician playing an alto saxophone. Before the first chorus, Dougie Thomson appears as the bus driver (this was the last filmed video where Thomson would appear with his then trademark moustache and beard). Hodgson plays the guitar-playing bus passenger. Lastly, Rick Davies and Bob Siebenberg play the two pickup truck rednecks.
Track listings
7-inch vinyl
Personnel
*Roger Hodgson piano, lead and backing vocals, glockenspiel
*Dougie Thomson bass
*Bob Siebenberg drums
*Rick Davies additional synthesizers, melodica solo
*John Helliwell baritone (middle of song) and tenor saxophones, synthesizers
Charts
{|class="wikitable sortable"
!align="left"|Chart (198283)
!align="center"|Peak
position
|-
|scope="row"|Australia (Kent Music Report)
|align="center"|11
|-
|scope="row"|Austrian Singles Chart
|align="center"|7
|-
|Canada 'RPM' Adult Contemporary
| style="text-align:center;"|1
|-
|scope="row"|Canadian 'RPM' Singles Chart
|align="center"|4
|-
|scope="row"|Dutch GfK Charts
|align="center"|6
|-
|scope="row"|Dutch Top 40
|align="center"|6
|-
|-
|scope="row"|German Singles Chart
|align="center"|3
|-
|scope="row"|Irish Singles Chart
|align="center"|16
|-
|-
|scope="row"|Norwegian Singles Chart
|align="center"|6
|-
|scope="row"|South Africa
|align="center"|6
|-
|scope="row"|Swiss Singles Chart
|align="center"|2
|-
|scope="row"|UK Singles Chart
|align="center"|26
|-
|scope="row"|US 'Billboard' Hot 100
|align="center"|11
|-
|scope="row"|US 'Billboard' Adult Contemporary
|align="center"|5
|-
|scope="row"|US 'Billboard' Mainstream Rock
|align="center"|7
|-
|US 'Cash Box' Top 100
|align="center"|7
|}
Certifications
Notes
References
Category:1982 songs
Category:1982 singles
Category:Supertramp songs
Category:Songs about loneliness
Category:Songs written by Rick Davies
Category:Songs written by Roger Hodgson
Category:Music videos directed by Russell Mulcahy
Category:A&M Records singles
Category:Songs based on children's songs
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