The 1984 Soundtrack Footloose

The album that knocked off Thriller

The Footloose soundtrack, released by Columbia Records in January 1984 ahead of the film, hit number one on the Billboard 200 on April 21, 1984 — displacing Michael Jackson's Thriller, which had occupied or dominated the top of the chart for most of the prior year. It would sell roughly nine million copies in the United States and seventeen million worldwide. (wikipedia, americansongwriter)

"The soundtrack album hit No. 1 on the Billboard album charts, it deposed Michael Jackson's Thriller and eventually sold more than 17 million albums." — Dean Pitchford bio, deanpitchford.com

Pitchford as soundtrack architect

The unusual fact about the Footloose soundtrack is that one person — Dean Pitchford (in Footloose) — wrote the lyrics for every song. He had written the screenplay first, knew where the songs needed to go in the picture, and brought in nine different composers and performing artists to write the music with him.

The collaborators included Kenny Loggins, Tom Snow, Eric Carmen, Jim Steinman, Sammy Hagar, Mike Reno of Loverboy, Ann Wilson of Heart, Bonnie Tyler, John Cougar Mellencamp, Karla Bonoff, and Michael Gore (Pitchford's Fame collaborator).

The title song was written in a hotel room

Pitchford and Kenny Loggins wrote "Footloose" in a Lake Tahoe hotel room while Loggins was on tour. Loggins had broken some ribs falling off a stage and was on painkillers; the two of them roughed out the chorus and the first verse before Loggins flew to Asia for tour dates. Pitchford wrote most of the rest of the lyric while Loggins was gone, and they finished it together at Loggins's house in Los Angeles.

"Pitchford recalled that Loggins recently had broken some ribs when he fell off a stage during a show, and had been taking painkillers at the time. The two got together in Pitchford's hotel room and were able to bang out most of the song." — Songfacts, Songfacts (Loggins interview)

The single hit number one on the Billboard Hot 100 on March 31, 1984, and stayed there for three weeks. It was Loggins's only number-one pop hit. In 2017, the recording was inducted into the National Recording Registry of the Library of Congress for its cultural significance. (loc)

The track list

Track	Performer	Co-writer	Chart
"Footloose"	Kenny Loggins	Pitchford / Loggins	#1 Hot 100
"Let's Hear It for the Boy"	Deniece Williams	Pitchford / Snow	#1 Hot 100
"Almost Paradise"	Mike Reno & Ann Wilson	Pitchford / Snow	#7 Hot 100
"Holding Out for a Hero"	Bonnie Tyler	Pitchford / Steinman	#34 Hot 100 (US); #2 UK
"Dancing in the Sheets"	Shalamar	Pitchford / Snow	#17 Hot 100
"I'm Free (Heaven Helps the Man)"	Kenny Loggins	Pitchford / Loggins	#22 Hot 100
"Somebody's Eyes"	Karla Bonoff	Pitchford / Snow	—
"The Girl Gets Around"	Sammy Hagar	Pitchford / Hagar	—
"Never"	Moving Pictures	Pitchford / Carmen	#81 Hot 100

Six of the nine songs charted in the Hot 100. Three reached the Top 10. Two went to number one. The album generated more chart placements than most studios manage across an entire year of releases.

The score and the diegetic music

Notably, the soundtrack album is not a film score — it's the pop songs. Miles Goodman composed the instrumental score, much of which is built from variations on the song melodies. The diegetic music in the film — what plays at the drive-in, in the warehouse, on Ren's cassette tapes — is a mix of the soundtrack pop and period-appropriate placeholders. The soundtrack album never really tried to be a complete listening experience for the movie; it was designed to be radio.

The songs return without the film

The 1998 Broadway musical kept the original songs and added new ones by Pitchford and Tom Snow. The 2011 remake re-recorded several of the originals (Blake Shelton's cover of "Footloose"; Hunter Hayes's cover of "Holding Out for a Hero") and used the rest as period reference. "Holding Out for a Hero" has had its own afterlife — it appeared in Shrek 2 (2004) and has been covered repeatedly. "Footloose" itself has become a wedding-reception standard.