Another big disappointment for me was this band, Boy Meets Girl, whose major hit we probably all know, that being “Waiting for a star to fall”, but the album it came from, their second, “Reel life”, had only one or two other decent tracks. This is possibly weirder when you consider that the two members of Boy Meets Girl --- husband and wife team George Merrill and Shannon Rubicam --- also wrote two big hit singles for the late Whitney Houston, so it's not as if they couldn't write a followup. In fact they did, and it wasn't too bad, but somehow “Bring down the moon” didn't capture the imagination of record buyers in the same way that “Waiting for a star to fall” did.
Reel life --- Boy Meets Girl --- 1988 (RCA)
You've got to give them their due: every single track on this album is written by Merrill and Rubicam, except for one, on which Merrill flies solo, but by the same token there's then nowhere to hide, as you can't hypothesise that writers brought in to contribute are responsible for the other tracks not gaining the popularity of the hit single. It is, in the end, all on the duo.
But it gets going well enough, with the already-mentioned followup to their hit single...
Then there's that single. I have to say, it's a great pop tune, not surprised it was a big hit. Just a shame the next one didn't make it to single status, as I really think it could have been another success for them, and without question my favourite on the album...
... and this is it! It's called “Stormy love”. How was this not released as a single??
It has everything: cool guitar intro, great hooks and melodies, excellent chorus...
... unfortunately it then degenerates into somewhat of a sub-pop/dance album with tracks like “Stay forever”
“If you run”
and “Restless dreamer”.
There is some hope though, in the shape of “One sweet dream”
and the closer, “Someone's got to send out love”, though it's far too short. A decent end to a disappointing album.
It's not that the rest of the tracks are terrible: most of them are adequate, with a few quite good. It's just that none of them measure up to the promise of the opening three, and as I say, when you have an album with self-penned songs, and when both those songwriters are already established via one of the biggest recording artistes of the time, it's both sad and frustrating to see that the album which will go down in music history as their most famous is so hit-and-miss, when it could have been a triumph.
Merrill and Rubicam divorced in 2001, but remained a writing duo. Their last album was released in 2004 however, and pretty much sunk without a trace. There's been no news of them since.