Song #618: "Shake You Down" by Gregory Abbott

Date: Jan 17, 1987
Weeks: 1

This could be the most generic soft song ever.  It's just so gentle and inoffensive and bland. The music is thin, and yet I can hear a harmonica, a guitar, a drum, and plenty of background vocals. But they all get used so sparingly that there's barely anything there.

When the music is this thin, it falls to the singer showing off his talent to save the song. But Gregory Abbott's voice isn't very compelling. It's high-pitched and nasal, especially during the bridge when he has a talky part. The song wants so badly to be sexy, but Abbott can't carry it.

Not that any other singer could pull it off with lyrics like these. First of all, "Shake you down?" Is that sexy slang? I always thought that was what loan sharks did to people who didn't pay. According to Songfacts:

"Shake You Down" is a phrase Abbott came up with that he thought expressed the way a man feels when he sees an attractive woman - "Girl, I want to shake you down." He tried the phrase out on a female friend and when she responded positively, it became the title for a song he was working on.

So it doesn't mean anything, except in the songwriter's head, and he didn't bother to explain it to the rest of us. Thanks, Gregory Abbott.

I've spent way too much time now trying to hammer the rest of the lyrics into some semblance of sense. With lyrics like "I've been watching you from so far across the floor" and "I can't stop thinking of the things we do," the song seems unclear about whether it's a pickup song or a long-term relationship song. My best interpretation is that the relationship he's in is going through a rough patch, and he thinks that they can solve all their problems in the bedroom. And he indicates that she agrees. And now I think I've spent more time thinking about these lyrics than anyone else ever has.

My verdict: Don't like it. The funny thing is I remember that this song was all over the radio at the time, but it never comes up when people are being nostalgic about the 80s. It seems like a song that is best left forgotten.