Endless Night (Graham Parker song)
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- "Jolie Jolie" (AU)
- "Mercury Poisoning" (DE)
| "Endless Night" | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
![](#/media/File:"Endless_Night"_-_Graham_Parker_and_the_Rumour.jpg) German single sleeve | ||||
| Single by Graham Parker | ||||
| from the album The Up Escalator | ||||
| B-side |
| |||
| Released | September 1980 | |||
| Genre | Rock, new wave | |||
| Label | Stiff (UK & Europe) Arista (USA & Canada) | |||
| Songwriter(s) | Graham Parker | |||
| Producer(s) | Jimmy Iovine, Graham Parker | |||
| Graham Parker singles chronology | ||||
| ||||
"Endless Night" is a song written by rock musician Graham Parker and performed by Graham Parker and the Rumour for their 1980 studio album The Up Escalator. Originally written for the 1980 film Cruising, "Endless Night" features lyrics about aging in rock 'n' roll. The song notably featured backing vocals from musician and Parker fan Bruce Springsteen.
"Endless Night" was released as a single in Germany and Australia. It has since seen praise from critics, who name it a highlight of The Up Escalator.
"Endless Night" was one of two songs originally written by Parker for Squeezing Out Sparks producer Jack Nitzsche to use in the soundtrack for the 1980 movie Cruising, alongside "Devil's Sidewalk". Ultimately, legal issues prevented Nitzsche from using the songs and both songs were instead included on The Up Escalator. Parker said, "I kept playing those songs and I kept thinking they were alright you know. So I'm glad I got them back."[1]
Lyrically, "Endless Night" tackles the effects of aging in the rock music industry. Geoffrey Himes of The Washington Post noted that the song "sums up the dilemma of aging rock-'n'-roll radicals" and grapples "with the problem of how to preserve the passion of rock 'n' roll youth in the face of eroding age and corroding society" in lyrics such as "I had the energy but outgrew it/ The identity but saw through it/ I had the walk but got trampled/ Had the taste; it was sampled/ lf only I could find the switch/ That turns on the endless night."[2][3] Parker later said of aging in rock,
In many ways, as you get older, you lose your edge; meaning those primal drives that acted as a motivator and propellant that were all-consuming to someone between the ages of say, 18 to 24, have all but been burned out by the time one reaches 30, 35, 40, etc. ... In terms of real artistic sharpness, I think it's all downhill by about the age of 30.[4]