“Take Me Home Tonight” was right on the money. Eddie Money, that is. The rocker whose working-class pop-rock anthems “Two Tickets to Paradise” and “Shakin’” put him on the music map found himself in desperate need of another banger in the mid-’80s to yank him out of a momentary slump.
And then “Take Me Home Tonight” showed up.
According to Songfacts, producers slipped a demo of the song to Money. Written by Mike Leeson and Peter Vale, it interpolated the chorus of The Ronettes’ 1963 classic “Be My Baby,” resulting in songwriting credits for the writers of that earlier hit—Ellie Greenwich, Jeff Barry, and Phil Spector—as well.
After hearing it, Money insisted that the only way the song would really work would be to have the original legend singing on it herself. So he called up the retired Ronnie Spector.
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“I could hear clinking and clanking in the background,” Money, 37 at the time, said in a 2015 interview via Billboard. Spector, then 43, told Money she was doing the dishes, then said, “I’m not really in the business anymore, Eddie.”
After a little coaxing, the ’60s girl group icon re-entered the studio after two decades out of the spotlight and recorded her iconic vocal on the Money song.
Musically, the resulting track blended 1980s arena rock with classic 1960s pop nostalgia. There’s a driving mid-tempo electric guitar sound with some synthesizers supporting, while Money’s gritty yet melodic lead vocals contrast nicely with Spector’s soaring, unmistakable refrain “Just like Ronnie sang, ‘Be my baby.’”
The duet was a smash, with Spector’s contribution bringing immense nostalgia, media attention, and crossover appeal. It peaked at No. 4 on the all-genre Billboard Hot 100, but it went all the way to No. 1 on the Mainstream Rock Tracks tally. The song even saw a resurgence after Money died in 2019, accumulating more than 3 million streams in the U.S. alone.
Spector, who was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame with The Ronettes in 2007, had long been out of the public eye since her early ’60s heyday. However, she continued to record and perform sporadically. But this song changed all that.
“Take Me Home Tonight” not only introduced Spector’s remarkable voice to an entirely new generation, but it also got her on MTV for the first time in music video form, Songfacts reported. The duo’s music video—a moody black-and-white visual featuring Money singing into a microphone and playing the sax, while Spector sings and dances backstage, eventually joining Money on the main stage—received a ton of airtime on the network.
Following the success of the song, Spector released a solo album the following year. Appropriately titled Unfinished Business, the record was praised for its sound. Billboard wrote about it, “Former Ronette’s voice is an American classic, and she puts it to good use on this nice update of the Spector sound.”
As for Money, the comeback hit gave his career a major second wind. He scored a 1987 Grammy nomination for Best Male Rock Vocal Performance, and the single drove his sixth album to platinum certification. The momentum allowed him to score subsequent 1980s hits like “I Wanna Go Back” and “Walk on Water.”
“Take Me Home Tonight” marked a career high for the rock-and-roll singer from Brooklyn, but he did go on to score six additional Top 40 singles through 1992, Billboard reported. Later, he starred in the Rochester, New York, premiere of Two Tickets to Paradise: The Musical, an autobiographical production he wrote and scored.
Now celebrating 40 years in the canon of greatest rock duets ever, “Take Me Home Tonight” has become not just a song that revived a pair of musical careers, but a nostalgic link bridging two generations of rock. And that’s a hook to take to the bank.
Related: 1985 Pop-Rock Hit, Which Closes a Kilmer Cult Classic, Became One of the Greatest ’80s Movie Songs
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