1985 Dionne Warwick – Friends

Friends is a Gold-plus album recorded by Dionne Warwick, her seventh for the Arista label. It was recorded during the fall of 1985 and was released that December. The LP was originally issued as number AL 8-8398 in the Arista Catalog. It stands as one of Warwick’s most successful albums.

The album was executive produced by Clive Davis. It peaked at #12 on the Billboard album chart in March 1986. It was nominated for Best Pop Vocal Performance, Female, at the 1987 Grammy Awards, eventually selling 900,000 US copies. The album yielded the single “That’s What Friends Are For”, which became Dionne’s biggest career hit, spending four weeks at #1 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100.

“On My Own”, a song recorded by Patti LaBelle and Michael McDonald, was originally written for Warwick (as the writers are Burt Bacharach and Carole Bayer Sager). She recorded the song to be released on this album. However, it wasn’t included in the final track list. It was later released by the above mentioned singers and it turned out to be a hit. Warwick did sing the song live on several occasions. A second single the song “Whisper in the dark” was released.(source)