Kim Carnes - Voyeur

Although Kim Carnes has been featured on ERV twice before (for "More Love" and "Bette Davis Eyes"), those songs were both covers.  As Carnes is a prolific songwriter, we thought that it would be appropriate to highlight a song that she wrote (co-wrote in this case), which leads us to "Voyeur."

Carnes co-wrote "Voyeur" with her husband Dave Ellingson and songwriter Duane Hitchings.  The song was the lead single off the 1982 album of the same name, the follow up to the massively successful Mistaken Identity.  As ERV readers know, the music industry can be a capricious place, and although Voyeur was a well-constructed new wave/pop album, it fell flat with the listening public.

It's not that Carnes had a terrible career -- she generated 5 top 100 LPs and 7 top 40 singles before moving to Nashville with her husband and repositioning herself as a songwriter.  But it is a shame that she didn't stay at the top of the charts for longer.  Her unique voice and solid songs, which bridged the gap between new wave, pop, jazz, and folk would have made her an interesting pop star.

"Voyeur" is a strong video of a really decent song.  As was alluded to, the song only reached #29 on the charts, while the album stalled at #49.  Carnes would continue to release solo albums through the early 1990s and continues to sporadically perform to the present day.

Cool trivia fact:  Carnes only had one top 40 album in her career -- 1981's Mistaken Identity, a #1 LP.