“You know,
I got my walls,
Sally calls them prison cells.
Sometimes I need protection,
I’ve got the chains,
I got the warning bells.”

About the song:

“Human Touch” is the 1983 single from Rick Springfield, off of his album Living in Oz. The song reached #18 on the Billboard Hot 100, in the U.S. It was also his most successful hit in the U.K., peaking at #23. Charting in the U.K. led to a performance of the song on Top of the Pops.

Because of this being Springfield’s only top 40 single in the UK, he is considered a one-hit wonder in England, despite the fact that “Jessie’s Girl” is his biggest hit worldwide. However, “Jessie’s Girl”only peaked at #43 in 1984 for Springfield, 3 years after its release in the U.K.

My thoughts:

Beyond my over-arching feeling that I adore Rick Springfield, and have, since the very early eighties, I cannot help but mention the inclusion of the year “2016” at the start of the music video (see below). We are given a science fiction kind of story, a space ship filled with frozen humans who wake to “the future”. Our Captain (Rick himself, in one hell of a jacket) asks his computer, Sally, what year is this – and Sally tells him, 2016.

The outfits of the other shipmates look like something borrowed from Pat Benatar’s “Love is a Battlefield”, but with super-sized shoulder pads and I have to wonder, would this crew be disappointed in the 2016 of now? Would they feel inappropriately dressed (except for Rick, I mean really, that jacket is all kinds of yes)? Would they want to be frozen again? How long have they been in those deep-freeze pods anyway? Since 1983?

Other thoughts? I lived for the Living in Oz album, and all things Rick, in 1983. I was nursing quite the crush on him, and still have a bit of one, even today – Ricki and the Flash anyone? Meryl, I was so jealous when you got to make-out with him.

Human Touch (1983) :: Rick Springfield
from the album, Living in Oz