"baby baby (7" heart in motion mix)" || amy grant || 1991

For my inaugural Valentine's Day post, I obviously wanted to pick a love song. For what are probably more than obvious reasons, when we hear the phrase "love song" we end up thinking of romantic love. While understandable, it's not really fair, as there are scads of beautiful love songs in the realm of music that have nothing to do with romance at all.

This Amy Grant tune is one of my all-time favorite love songs because it's so pure. She wrote the song about her daughter Millie, and tells us in the liner notes that her "six-week-old face was my inspiration." Romantic love may be fleeting, but the love that a mother feels looking at her brand new child is one that doesn't fade.

Keeping in fashion with this blog's theme of bringing to light songs that haven't had their chance in the sun, I chose this mix of the song because most people have never heard it. It was stashed on the b-side of the 7-inch single and the cassette single. Most people my age were buying cassette singles instead of vinyl singles at this point, and even then most people never listened to the b-side, so here it is. Amy Grant meets breakbeat. Ha!

I encourage you to take this day of love and use it as an excuse to tell your friends that you love them. While you're at it, call your mother and tell her you love her, since you probably haven't talked to her in a while. Radiate neon waves of love.

So, here goes mine: Mom, Dad, this one's for you. Thanks for all the love you've given me over the years, and here's to plenty more to come.

Love is a beautiful thing, and not one whose many forms are spoken of often enough in today's society. So use the day, and don't just make someone you love smile; make everyone you love smile.

Listen to it here.