Atlantic Starr, “Secret Lovers” | Throwback Vibez 🕶️🎶

On the 16^th edition of Throwback Vibez, we recollect and reflect on “Secret Lovers” by R&B collective, Atlantic Starr. 

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he vibes, the vibes, those Throwback Vibez 🕶️🎶! Throwback Vibez 🕶️🎶 is a column that celebrates awesome songs from the past.  The records that grace Throwback Vibez 🕶️🎶 are older, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that they’re ancient – no fossils 🦴! All genres of music are welcome – we don’t discriminate ‘round here! On the 16^th edition of Throwback Vibez 🕶️🎶, we recollect and reflect on 🎵 “Secret Lovers”, performed by 🎙 Atlantic Starr.

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Theme & Lyrics ✍ 

“We both know that / We should not be together / Cause if we’re found out / It could mess up both our happy homes.” R&B collective 🎙 Atlantic Starr has racked up few hits here and there.  My personal favorite has always been 🎵 “Always”, which topped the Billboard Hot 100.  A close second, perhaps a favorite of many, is 🎵 “Secret Lovers,” which peaked at no. 3 on the Hot 100.  “Secret Lovers” appears on the collective’s 1985 album, 💿 As the Band Turns. The centerpiece of this 80s R&B classic is undoubtedly the chorus:

“Secret lovers, yeah
That’s what we are
Trying so hard to hide the way we feel
Because we both belong to someone else.”

It is that last line of the chorus that complicates things.  Here are two people that feel some type away about one another (physically and emotionally), but they’re already committed to someone else.  What a mighty conundrum! “Can they tell / What’s in our minds / Maybe they’ve had secret loves / All of the time.” So, do their respective lovers know they are adulterers or are they adulterers as well?  Ultimately, it’s a deep, twisted situation but musically, it’s marvelous to the nth degree. 🎼✍ 🎛 Wayne Lewis and 🎼✍ 🎛 David Lewis wrote and produced a surefire classic, one that won’t “mess up happy homes” unlike the scenario mentioned in the song!

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Final Thoughts 💭 

Infidelity never grows old as a theme for pop music.  Atlantic Starr nails it on this R&B gem – unsurprisingly a hit on the pop charts.  Does ‘secret love’ ever work? Ultimately, everything comes out eventually, hence making the realization of that secret love messy AF.

Also appears on 🔽:
🔗 🎧 12 Songs Where Secrets are Revealed

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🎙 Atlantic Starr • 💿 As the Band Turns • 🏷 UMG Recordings, Inc. • 📅 1985
Atlantic Starr, “Secret Lovers”: Throwback Vibez 🕶️🎶 No. 16 [📷: Brent Faulkner, cotton bro,  The Musical Hype, UMG Recordings, Inc.]

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