After spending a good part of the preceding decade proving her acting chops in well-regarded films like Silkwood, Mask, and Moonstruck (for which she won an Academy Award), the legendary Cher came roaring back to the music world in 1987 with a self-titled album and a new sound that was more rock-oriented than what she’d been doing in the ’70s. (No doubt having Jon Bon Jovi and Richie Sambora coproduce the album had something to do with that!) I liked the big single from that album, “I Found Someone.” But I loved the one that came from her follow-up Heart of Stone a year and a half later.
“If I Could Turn Back Time” was well-nigh inescapable during the summer and fall of 1989, peaking at number three on the Billboard Hot 100 and coming in 35th on the year-end chart. If anything, “Time” was even more bombastic and dramatic than “I Found Someone,” and that was just perfect for where I was and what I was feeling around the time of my twentieth birthday. It was one of those songs that comes along at just the right moment and clicks into your life as if someone is programming your own personal soundtrack.
As much as I liked the song, though, I honestly hadn’t thought about it in a very long time. It’s not in rotation on the classic-rock radio stations I follow, and my iTunes hasn’t chosen to shuffle it up in, well, a very long time. Earlier this week, however, I ran across a clip from last month’s Kennedy Center Honors ceremony at which Cher, along with country singer Reba McEntire, composer Philip Glass, and Hamilton creator Lin-Manuel Miranda, were given the prestigious lifetime achievement award. Cher’s friend and fellow ’80s icon Cyndi Lauper performed the song to honor her, and I thought it was pretty awesome. So here it is to help you start your weekend:
And just for fun, here’s the original:
Cher strutting around the decks of the battleship Missouri in a little bit of nothing, with a bunch of sailors and their giant, erect… um… cannons… looming overhead… that was 1989 for you.
Incidentally, this video was hugely controversial at the time; MTV initially banned it, then relented but would only show it after 9 PM. Meanwhile, the US Navy caught quite a lot of flack and hasn’t allowed any music videos to be filmed aboard its ships since. Rock and roll!
