Alone Again (Naturally)


"Alone Again " is a song by Irish singer-songwriter Gilbert O'Sullivan. It was released in 1972 at the same time as the album, Back to Front. In total, the single spent six weeks, non-consecutively, at No. 1 on the United States Billboard Hot 100 singles chart. Billboard ranked it as the No. 2 song for 1972. In Casey Kasem's American Top 40 of the 1970s, "Alone Again " ranked as the fifth most-popular song of the decade. "Alone Again " also spent six weeks at No. 1 on the Easy Listening chart. The track reached No. 3 in the UK Singles Chart.

Lyrics

"Alone Again " is an introspective ballad, starting with the singer contemplating suicide after being left at the altar after his bride deserted him, and then telling about the death of his parents. O'Sullivan has said that the song is not autobiographical, as he did not know his father very well, and that his father had mistreated his mother. Also, his mother was still alive when the song was written. O'Sullivan later commented “Neil Diamond covered "Alone Again " and said he couldn’t believe a 21-year-old wrote it, but for me it was just one song I had written”. The song is included on O'Sullivan's The Berry Vest of Gilbert O'Sullivan album on the EMI record label. Big Jim Sullivan plays the guitar break in the original recorded version of the song.

Chart performance

Weekly charts

Year-end charts

All-time charts

Copyright lawsuit

Grand Upright Music, Ltd v. Warner Bros. Records Inc., 780 F. Supp. 182, was a copyright case heard by the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York. The case pitted singer/songwriter Gilbert O'Sullivan against rapper Biz Markie after Biz Markie sampled O'Sullivan's song, "Alone Again ". The court ruled that sampling without permission can qualify as copyright infringement. The judgment changed the hip hop music industry, requiring that any future music sampling be preapproved by the original copyright owners to avoid a lawsuit.

Notable cover versions

Many artists have covered the song. Among the more notable are a version by Nina Simone included as a bonus track on the 1988 digital reissue of her 1982 album Fodder on My Wings and a version by Lazlo Bane's frontman Chad Fischer from the 2009 animated film . Both versions feature substantially rewritten lyrics; Simone's version savagely exhumes her troubled relationship with her late father, whereas Fischer's version explores the unrequited desire of an acorn for the prehistoric squirrel who once chased it.