Making Love Out of Nothing At All (1983) – Air Supply

The Bristish / Australian rock duo Air Supply had huge success in 1980’s mostly by their ballad releases. Many times, I would get the music of Air Supply and Chicago confused. Somehow their songs made it all the way over here to Colombia including today’s song Making Love Out of Nothing At All. When I heard the rendition of Making Love Out of Nothing At All sung here, they sang it but with Spanish words. So, when sung in English this is how the pronunciation sounds in Spanish:

Out of nothing at all
Making love 

They sing:

Hay un moco en el arroz
Comelo

This translates as:

There is mucus in the rice
Eat it

I suppose this song didn’t deserve this treatment, but these interpretive translations are made all the time with Western music here:

So, when John Travolta and Olivia Newton John sing:

You’re the one that I want
Ooh Ooh Ooh

They sing:

Yo no voy a lavar
no, no, no

This translates as:

I’m not going to wash
No, No, No

I don’t think these translations will win me many Air Supply fans. Any-hows onwards and upwards!
Making Love Out of Nothing At All is a power ballad, like a power ranger, but in song. It was composed by Jim Steinman and released on their 1983 compilation album Greatest Hits. It reached number 2 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 for three weeks (behind “Total Eclipse of the Heart” by Bonnie Tyler, giving Steinman a consecutive peak of two songs).

I like the following verse:

[Verse 5]
I can make the runner stumble
I can make the final block
And I can make every tackle at the sound of the whistle
I can make all the stadiums rock
I can make tonight forever
Or I can make it disappear by the dawn
And I can make you every promise that has ever been made
And I can make all your demons be gone

The following is from Wikipedia:

Steinman offered Making Love Out of Nothing At All, along with Total Eclipse of the Heart, to Meat Loaf for his Midnight at the Lost and Found album; however, Meat Loaf’s record company refused to pay Steinman for the material so Meat Loaf ended up writing compositions for the album himself. 
By 1983, Air Supply had changed much of its classic musician line-up, both in the recording studio and on tour. But Steinman, known for his lavish, rock-opera-ish type productions, used Bruce Springsteen’s E-Street Band members Roy Bittan on keyboards and Max Weinberg on drums, to musically underscore the recording with like energies.

Rick Derringer, who was previously the guitarist for the McCoys and Johnny Winter, provided the electric guitar solo that made the sound of Making Love Out of Nothing at All stand so drastically apart from most other Air Supply songs. In an interview, Hitchcock and Russell confirmed Hitchcock did his vocals in one take. When Steinman asked “What do we do next?” Russell replied “We go home“.

References:
1. Making Love Out of Nothing at All – Wikipedia