Loverboy

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For other uses, see Loverboy (disambiguation).
Loverboy
Loverboy Rocks South Florida.jpg
Loverboy at the 2017 Riptide Music Festival
Background information
Origin Calgary, Alberta, Canada
Genres
Rock hard rock[1]
Years active
1979–1988 1989 1991–present
Labels
Columbia CMC International
Associated acts
Streetheart Moxy
Website loverboyband.com
Members
Mike Reno
Paul Dean
Doug Johnson
Matt Frenette
Ken "Spider" Sinnaeve
Past members
Scott Smith
Loverboy is a Canadian rock band formed in 1979 in Calgary, Alberta. Loverboy's hit
singles, particularly "Turn Me Loose" and "Working for the Weekend", have become
arena rock staples and are still heard on many classic rock and classic hits radio
stations across Canada and the United States. The band is based in Vancouver,
British Columbia.

Throughout the 1980s, Loverboy accumulated numerous hit songs in Canada and the
United States, earning four multi-platinum albums and selling millions of records.
After being rejected by many American record labels, they signed with Columbia/CBS
Records Canada and began recording their first album on March 20, 1980. Loverboy's
founding members were lead singer Mike Reno, guitarist Paul Dean, keyboardist Doug
Johnson, bassist Scott Smith, and drummer Matt Frenette.

Contents
1 History
1.1 1979–1983
1.2 1984–1989
1.3 1991–2004; death of Scott Smith
1.4 2005–present
2 Media references
3 Band members
4 Discography
5 See also
6 References
7 External links
History
1979–1983
It has been stated by Reno that their name was chosen due to a dream by Paul Dean.
He had come up with the name after spending the previous night with some of the
bandmates, including Reno and their girlfriends, before going to the movies. The
girlfriends were browsing through fashion magazines, where the guys in the band saw
a Cover Girl advertisement. Cover Girl became Cover Boy, and then became Loverboy
in Dean's dream later that night. After being told by Dean about the dream the next
morning, Reno agreed to try it out and it stuck.[2] The group made its live debut
opening for Kiss at Pacific Coliseum in Vancouver, B.C. on November 19, 1979.

Originally rejected by all the major record labels in the United States, the band
signed with Columbia Records of Canada, and on March 20, 1980, Loverboy went into
the studio with producer Bruce Fairbairn and engineer Bob Rock to record what would
be their self-titled debut album.

Over that summer, the record became a huge hit with eventually over 1,000,000
records sold in Canada alone. The album made its American debut in November 1980,
and would go on to sell over two million copies in the USA alone. The band went on
a touring spree that year putting on over 200 shows with bands such as Cheap Trick,
ZZ Top, Kansas, and Def Leppard. Their debut single, "Turn Me Loose", went on to
hit No. 7 on the Canadian charts and No. 35 on the US Billboard Hot 100 in early
1981. "The Kid Is Hot Tonite" was also a single.

The band's follow-up album, Get Lucky, released in October 1981 when they were
opening for Journey, included the hit tracks "Working for the Weekend","When It's
Over" and "Lucky Ones". It became their best selling album in the U.S., reaching
No. 7 on the Billboard album charts[3] and selling over four million copies.[4] In
the same year Loverboy received six[5] Juno Awards (Canada's highest award for
music) in one year, a record that still stands today.

Loverboy released their third album, Keep It Up, in November 1983. Its first single
"Hot Girls in Love" became their most successful to that date, reaching No.11 on
the U.S. charts. The video for the song as well as for the follow-up single "Queen
of the Broken Hearts" were hugely popular on MTV.

1984–1989
In 1984, Loverboy recorded the United States Team theme for the 1984 Summer
Olympics, "Nothing's Gonna Stop You Now". The song originally appeared on The
Official Music of the 1984 Games but not on any of their albums or compilations to
date. They would often play it on tour mixing it in during the performance of
"Queen of the Broken Hearts".

Also in 1984, Loverboy recorded a song called "Destruction" which appeared on the
1984 soundtrack of a re-edited version of the film Metropolis (1927).[6]

Lovin' Every Minute of It, the band's fourth album, and the first not produced by
Fairbairn (it was produced by Tom Allom, best known for producing Judas Priest
albums several years later) was released in August 1985, with the title single
written by Mutt Lange and "This Could Be the Night" co-written by Journey's
Jonathan Cain becoming their first and second U.S. Billboard top 10 hits
respectively.

In 1986, the band recorded "Heaven in Your Eyes", a song featured in the movie Top
Gun, which peaked at No. 9 on the Billboard charts. However, Doug Johnson refused
to appear in the video as he felt that the film glorified war, which Doug was
highly against.[7]

The release of Wildside, their fifth album, followed in September 1987. While the
band scored a minor hit with "Notorious", co-written by Jon Bon Jovi and Richie
Sambora, the album sold relatively poorly and the band broke up in 1988 due to
tensions between Dean and Reno.

Dean released a solo album, Hardcore, in May 1989 and a Loverboy greatest-hits
album, Big Ones, was released later that same year, in October, to fulfill
Loverboy's obligation to Columbia Records. The group briefly reunited in late 1989
to tour to promote it, but broke up again at the tour's conclusion.

1991–2004; death of Scott Smith

On October 6, 1991 the band reunited again to join fellow rockers Bryan Adams,
Colin James, Chrissy Steele and Bill Henderson of Chilliwack at a benefit show at
Vancouver's 86 Street Music Hall to raise over $50,000 for Henderson's former
bandmate, Brian MacLeod, who was fighting cancer and undergoing treatment at a
Houston medical clinic. The band reportedly recalled that the concert was the most
fun that they had had in years and decided that they wanted to do it again. They
went on another live touring spree in Canada the following year before launching a
64-concert tour in the United States in 1993.[8]

The band's record label released their second and third compilation albums,
Loverboy Classics and Temperature's Rising, in 1994. Loverboy Classics went Gold by
1998, coinciding with another American tour. Following the releases of Six and
Super Hits in 1997, the band continued touring until November 30, 2000, when
bassist Scott Smith died in a boating accident.[9]

The band went on to release a live album, Live, Loud and Loose, in 2001, which
consisted of refurbished early live concert recordings from the band's intense
touring years from 1982 to 1986. 2001 also brought another round of touring, this
time dedicated to Scott Smith. Ken "Spider" Sinnaeve, a former member of The Guess
Who, Red Rider and Dean and Frenette's pre-Loverboy band Streetheart, joined the
band on bass prior to the tour.

2005–present
Loverboy celebrated 25 years together in 2005 and began to perform in selected
cities to commemorate this milestone. That tour continued with live concerts
scheduled well into August 2006. Also in 2005, Loverboy was one of the featured
bands on the American version of Hit Me, Baby, One More Time. They performed
"Working for the Weekend" and a cover version of "Hero" by Enrique Iglesias on the
show.

In 2006, twenty-five years after its initial release, Get Lucky was remastered and
re-released with several previously unreleased songs, including the original demo
of "Working for the Weekend".[10]

In a video interview from March 2007, Mike Reno confirmed that the band finished
recording a new studio album released in 2007.[11] Titled Just Getting Started, it
was released in October, with a clip of the first single "The One That Got Away"
available on the band's MySpace page. The band continues to tour throughout Canada
and the United States.

The band was inducted into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame during the 2009 Juno
Awards.[12]

On February 21, 2010, the band performed at the 2010 Vancouver Olympics awards
ceremony.

In June 2012, the band announced their album Rock 'n' Roll Revival would be
released by Frontiers Records. The band was on tour with Journey and Pat
Benatar/Neil Giraldo from July 24 to November 16, 2012. They finished up 2012 on
the same tour when Night Ranger took up the reins to replace Benatar.

2013 saw Loverboy tour on and off for at least a few dates during every month,
except for the month of March.

While continuing to tour in 2014, it was announced on the official Loverboy home
page on June 19, 2014 that the band's newest album of all-original material,
Unfinished Business, was expected to be released on July 15, 2014.[13] The first
single was already available for purchase on iTunes and the title of this song was
"Countin' the Nights".[14] The band toured during that summer, including at least
two free shows.[15]

Loverboy appeared at the Rockingham Festival 2017, held at Nottingham Trent

University, UK, between 20 and 22 October 2017.[16] The band headlined on Sunday 22
October 2017.[16][17]

On June 24, 2018 Loverboy headlined Up!Fest 2018, a free music festival held at
Waterfront Park in Wabamun, Alberta, Canada and hosted by Edmonton, Alberta local
radio station Up! 99.3 FM.

Media references

This section contains a list of miscellaneous information. Please relocate any

relevant information into other sections or articles. (December 2016)
In 1995, Elf Power's record Vainly Clutching at Phantom Limbs featured a song named
"Loverboy's Demise" which describes a Loverboy concert.

Several of their songs were featured in the 2001 cult comedy Wet Hot American
Summer, which takes place in August 1981. In 2006, "Turn Me Loose" was featured in
the action movie Crank starring Jason Statham.

An early episode of South Park ("An Elephant Makes Love to a Pig") made multiple
references to a fictional Loverboy song, "Pig and Elephant DNA Just Won't Splice."

In Aqua Teen Hunger Force's episode Revenge of the Mooninites, Err uses the
"Foreigner belt" to "Turn Master Shake Loose" to "Hot Girls in Love" because he's
"Working for the Weekend". When it didn't work, it was revealed that "those are
Loverboy songs, and Loverboy has always sucked." (although Carl said that he saw
them at the Madison Square Garden in 1985 and they "kicked ass".)

In an episode of Drew Carey's Green Screen Show, Brad Sherwood remarks to a

character called 'Hover-boy', "I loved your album Get Lucky!"

In the 15th episode of season 5 on 30 Rock, "It's Never too Late for Now," Scott
Adsit's character Pete Hornberger tells Frank Rossitano he was in the band Loverboy
for 3 months before leaving the band for a college scholarship in "TV Budgeting."
The episode includes a brief clip in which Adsit has been digitally inserted into
the music video for the song.

In the 9th episode of 5th season of Scrubs, Todd imitates Mike Reno's performance
of "Working for the Weekend" while attending the air-band 'Cool Cats' audition in
the beginning of the episode.

In 2012, a humorous commercial for Mr. Lube oil change shops featured the song
"Turn Me Loose"

In 2016, the band appeared in a commercial for National Car Rental featuring the
song "Lovin' Every Minute of It."[18]

Band members
Current members

Mike Reno – lead vocals (1979–1988, 1989, 1991–present)

Paul Dean – guitar, backing vocals (1979–1988, 1989, 1991–present)
Doug Johnson – keyboards, backing vocals (1979–1988, 1989, 1991–present)
Matt Frenette – drums (1979–1988, 1989, 1991–present)
Ken "Spider" Sinnaeve – bass, backing vocals (2001–present)
Former members

Scott Smith – bass, backing vocals (1979–1988, 1989, 1991–2000; died 2000)
Timeline

Discography
Main article: Loverboy discography
Studio albums
Loverboy (1980)
Get Lucky (1981)
Keep It Up (1983)
Lovin' Every Minute of It (1985)
Wildside (1987)
Six (1997)
Just Getting Started (2007)
Rock 'n' Roll Revival (2012)
Unfinished Business (2014)
See also
Loverboy portal
icon Music of Canada portal

Book: Loverboy
Canadian rock
Music of Canada
Canadian Music Hall of Fame
References
Deming, Mark. "Loverboy". Allmusic. Rovi Corporation. Retrieved June 6, 2013.
"Loverboy's Mike Reno is still 'Lovin' Every Minute Of It'". Goldminemag.com.
2012-12-23. Retrieved 2014-08-22.
Adam White & Fred Bronson (1988). The Billboard Book of Hits. Billboard Books.
ISBN 0-8230-8285-7.
"RIAA statistics for Loverboy". Riaa.com. Archived from the original on September
2, 2008. Retrieved August 10, 2011.
[1][dead link]
"Loverboy info at". Discogs.com. Retrieved August 10, 2011.
"On The Wildside-Loverboy (Canadian Musician, December 1987)". Web.295.ca.
Retrieved August 10, 2011.
[2][dead link]
Loverboy Member Presumed Dead Archived October 31, 2005, at the Wayback Machine.
"purchase info for "Get Lucky" remaster". Amazon.com. Retrieved August 10, 2011.
"Mike Reno interview from CAFKA, Mar. 2007". Youtube.com. Retrieved August 10,
2011.
"Self-proclaimed 'mainstream' Nickelback reigns at Junos". CBC Arts, Mar 29, 2009
"Loverboy - Official Loverboy Website". Loverboyband.com. Retrieved 2014-08-22.
"iTunes - Music - Unfinished Business by Loverboy". Itunes.apple.com. 2014-07-15.
Retrieved 2014-08-22.
"Loverboy - Concert Tour Dates - Official Loverboy Website". Loverboyband.com.
Retrieved 2014-08-22.
"Rockingham 2017 lineup". Rockingham. Rockingham 2017. Retrieved 2017-04-07. Cite
error: Invalid <ref> tag; name "Rockingham 2017" defined multiple times with
different content (see the help page).
"Loverboy Setlist". setlist.fm.
National Car Rental (2016-09-08), National Car Rental: Lovin' Every Minute of It,
retrieved 2016-10-25
External links
The official Loverboy website
CanConRox entry
Interview with Paul Dean
Canadian Pop Music Encyclopedia
Chart archives at CHUM radio
2007 interview with Mike Reno on CAFKA.TV
Canadian Recording Industry Association database
vte
Loverboy
vte
Juno Award for Album of the Year (1980–1999)
Authority control Edit this at Wikidata
WorldCat Identities BNF: cb13904697z (data) ISNI: 0000 0001 1508 0566 MusicBrainz:
c11ba128-03b1-404d-ae88-452524b7ecc3 VIAF: 153527220
Categories: 1979 establishments in Alberta1988 disestablishments in Canada1991
establishments in AlbertaCanadian hard rock musical groupsJuno Award for Album of
the Year winnersJuno Award for Single of the Year winnersMusical groups established
in 1979Musical groups disestablished in 1988Musical groups reestablished in
1991Musical groups from CalgaryMusical quintetsJuno Award for Group of the Year
winners