Huey Lewis hit a grand slam with 1983's Sports. The third album from Huey Lewis and the News featured the ubiquitous hits "Heart and Soul," "I Want a New Drug," "The Heart of Rock and Roll," "If This is It" and "Walking on a Thin Line." The LP hit No. 1 on the Billboard 200 in June 1984, charted for 160 weeks and has sold more than seven million copies to date. "The Power of Love" single was featured in Back to the Future and was nominated for an Academy Award.

Lewis had been touring for a decade by the time Sports hit, beginning in the early '70s with his San Francisco Bay Area band Clover. Throughout, he gathered  cool fans, friends and collaborators, including Dave Edmunds, Elvis Costello, and Nick Lowe, (Lewis produced Lowe's 1985 version of "I Knew the Bride (When She Used to Rock and Roll):).

By the close of the ‘70s, Clover was over, and  Lewis’ new band was the American Express. However, when their debut album launched on Chrysalis in 1980, the lineup would be named "The News,"  to dodge potential legal issues with the credit card company. The ensuing decade of hits and MTV dominance assured Lewis’ place in cultural history. Of the six Huey Lewis and the News albums released in the ‘80s, two hit Gold sales status and three platinum. And the frontman  would still be playing those hits live on tour if it wasn’t for Meniere’s Disease, which robbed the performer of his hearing seven years ago. (He’s wearing Bluetooth hearing aids "connected to his devices" for our Zoom interview.)

Lewis and the News’ most recent (and potentially final) album, Weather, released in 2020, and was recorded before Lewis’ hearing loss. But don’t count Lewis out; he’s got some tricks up his sleeve that will come to fruition in 2024. For now, looking back on the occasion of Sports’ 40th anniversary, the singer evinces both gratitude and a sometimes slightly wry humor as he recalls the hits, misses and memories of his career to date.

This interview has been edited for brevity and clarity.

From what I read about your self-titled debut in 1980, you were always attuned to what was commercial and on the radio. What does Sports sound like to you now, 40 years later? 

It sounds like a collection of singles to me, which means it's a record of its time. In the early '80s, there was no Internet, no jam bands, and album rock didn't mean anything, either. All that mattered was contemporary hit radio, which was playing 23 songs, basically a playlist. And it was an editing process that we all competed for.

If you wanted to write your own music and sing your own music, and make a living, you had to have a hit single. And if you wanted to hear one of our Huey Lewis and the News hit singles, you also would hear a Garth Brooks song, a Commodores song, or Whitney Houstonsong, or Michael Jackson. Very diverse. We all competed for that one format.

So Sports we produced ourselves because we knew we needed a hit record. We wanted to make those commercial choices ourselves because if we had a hit, we'd have to play it for the rest of our lives. And we didn't want "One Eyed-One-Horned-Flying Purple People Eater" [the 1958 novelty hit by Sheb Wooley] if you know what I mean.

We fought to produce our record ourselves. And fortunately, our small little label Chrysalis was 7,000 miles away and couldn't really control us. We aimed every song — or most of those songs — right at radio. We knew we needed a hit. We didn't know we were gonna have five of them.

Even though I know Sports well, I didn't realize "Heart and Soul" was by [songwriters] Chapman and Chinn. I was a huge fan of the Sweet and all the bands they worked with. How did that song come to you? 

First of all, Chinnichap, Nicky Chinn and Mike Chapman, they're brilliant. Mike Chapman, we actually met with him and flirted with having him produce us, but we really wanted to do our own thing. A publisher sent me the song. It was originally written, I think, for Suzi Quatro. Because, thinking about the [original] lyric, "two o'clock this morning, if he should come a calling / I couldn't dream of turning him away."

But they redid it with Exile, the country band. I didn't know any of this; all I know is my publisher sent me the song. I heard it and went, Wow, that sounds like a hit to me. My philosophy always was, we'll write the eight best songs we can write, and then cover the two best original songs we can find. We basically just copied what we thought was the demo — we now know it was Exile’s record.

It’s not much of a song, there are only three chords, and most of the song is two chords, but it's a brilliant production. We swiped all that, we just copied it. So we're mixing it in LA. I go to the bathroom out of the control room, and go by the other studio. And I hear "Heart and Soul" coming out of the next studio, the same song. And it’s [L.A. band] Bus Boys. The publisher had pitched it to all these people. Needless to say, I wasn't very happy with the publisher.   

"Heart and Soul" was nominated for Best Rock Vocal, Group at the 1984 GRAMMYs. What did that mean to you?  

No question; it meant everything to me. Those are our peers. We got nominated for a zillion GRAMMYs, and I think we only won one or two. I mean, Bruce Springsteen beat me out in about nine categories, including "Power of Love," which should have won something, I think.

The "Heart of Rock and Roll" video is so much fun. It was shot in New York City and at Gazzari’s on the Sunset Strip. Where would you guys be without MTV? 

We certainly wouldn't be as popular. But we might be in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. [Laughs.] It kind of hurt our credibility. We were seen as a pop band in America. In Europe. we're a rock and roll band, or a soul band. But I remember it was a necessity for us.

We actually filmed two videos prior to being signed by Chrysalis Records as a way to market ourselves. There was a gal called Kim Dempster and Videowest in San Francisco — this was the advent of videotape and cable and cable TV — she said, "I'll do a video of you guys if you'll let us show it on our Videowest channel at midnight." I said "done!"

I schemed this idea for "Some of my Lies are True" where we’d go to the beach and set up on a sewage pier. Like,what's the strangest place you would have a band set up to play? I liked it on "Shindig" and "Hullabaloo" when James Brown would set up by the swimming pool. Chrysalis saw [the video] and loved it and they signed us.

Now the song "Do You Believe in Love" is on our second album.For that song, the label  got an advertising guy and he designed the set. They're all these pastel colors and they matched our pastel shirts and we all had a lot of makeup on. This is the video where we're all in bed singing to the gal. A week later, we assembled at the record company to see the rough cut. There are 10 people from the record label, 10 people from the video company, 10 of us, and the director and he says, "Now this is not colorized yet, it's gonna look a lot better when it's colorized."  He shuts the lights off, and plays the video.

My heart just sank. It was just so horrible. There's no direction. There was no story, there was no meaning. It wasn't funny, wasn't entertaining, it was just horrible. When it ended, everybody got up and gave us a standing ovation. I remember thinking to myself, clearly, there's no art here.

So we're writing our own songs, we're producing our own records, we're gonna do our own videos from now on. From then on, we wrote all those videos. The idea was to avoid a literal translation of the song and if at all possible, zig when the song zags and just goof off and  have fun.

That's an amazing story. I just flashed back to the Billy Squier "Rock Me Tonite" video.   

There is one other thing about "Heart of Rock and Roll"…  When we were making [Sports]  we were in the Record Plant. Next door was Peter Wolf, working with the producer Ron Nevison on the Jefferson Starship record [Lewis sings ‘We Built This City"] with the [electronic-sounding] machines going. I went, ‘Wow, what is that?’ I befriended Peter Wolf, and  said, ‘can you show me how to do that?’ Because we learned about the Linn Drum machine about 1980; that Roger Linn had a machine that had Jeff Porcaro’s [drum samples] in it.

So he sets the machine up and he sequences the bass and gets it going. So we're going to cut ["I Want a New Drug."]  We start playing to it, and it was just lying there. It  was not working. So we cut the track normally, just organically. We finished the record. We went to New York to mix it. I couldn't get "I Want A New Drug" to groove. I mixed it three or four times with Bob Clearmountain, who's brilliant. We just couldn't get it to where it sounded good to me. I finally got it as best I could. The record was done.

Then Chrysalis sold out to CBS. So we couldn't hand our record in because we didn't know who was going to distribute it; it was all mystery meat at that point. So we just hung on to the record. We hit the road. We had the band and crew and everybody on one bus and we went out and did clubs, the West, Midwest.The last thing we'd ever do is listen to the record because we've been working on it for months and listen to it over and over again. So after about three weeks, one night, on an overnight trip, I say to the guys  "Hey, let's put on the record. Let's see what it sounds like."

We throw the record up, and I go, "Damn, it's not happening." So I cried "problem!" to our manager. We went back into the studio and we recut "Heart of Rock & Roll," "I Want a New Drug," "Walking on a Thin Line," "Bad Is Bad," all to the drum machine. Gives it that little modern, techno thing.

I love that you’re such a producer. I know you worked with Mutt Lange with your band Clover. I feel Mutt has some kind of hitmaking brain. Do you have any takeaways from him either as a songwriter or as a producer? 

We actually kind of have completely different philosophies about music. I think music matters like crazy. I think it's important to people, to their lives. Mutt just thinks it’s pop music. See, I have a jazz musician dad. All of his favorite bands — like Jimmie Lunceford and Chick Webb and all those early jazz bands — had one number where they would put funny hats and use the hat for a mute on the trumpet, and it was a kind of a show number, a novelty number.

My old man saw rock and roll as that — all novelty; to him it wasn't real music. So when we cut "Power of Love" I'll never forget. You find out a week ahead of time that a song is gonna be number one next week. I’m talking to my pops, and I say, "Guess what? My record goes number one next week.’ And he goes, "Ah, that’s no good. The best s— is never the most popular."

Oh, ouch.   

But that's where I'm coming from. And Mutt Lange is coming from a whole ‘nother place. All he cares about is popularity. But Mutt is a genius. He works so hard. I like dashing things off and just going with it. I don't mind if there's a mistake or two; didn't bother me.

Jumping ahead, I’m curious about Weird Al and his take on "I Want a New Drug"—"I Want a New Duck."  

I don't know Al at all, but in fact, we did that little thing, the "Hip To Be Square" American Psycho lampoon.. I like his work. He's funny. And you know, he's kind of a serious guy. You know, comedy is serious. It's funny, because when we did that whole thing, the lampoon of American Psycho, we worked on it with the Funny or Die guys for six to eight hours. And they never laughed. No, nothing was funny. I was laughing my ass off.

Did you know the "Huey Lewis appreciation" scene in American Psycho was going to be in the movie? 

Somebody showed me the book. And I read the passage about us. It was amazing. I mean [Bret Easton Ellis] actually clearly had listened to our music a lot. They told us that the movie was gonna come out and they wanted to use "Hip to be Square." I said, "and they're gonna pay us?" I mean, it's an artistic thing, Willem Dafoe’s in it, no problem. So, boom, they paid us.

A week before the release of the film they decide they want to do a soundtrack album. I said, ‘Really? What's that going to look like?’ They said, "Well, 'Hip to be Square,' I think there's a Phil Collins song, and then mostly source music." I said, it isn't good for our fans to have to buy a whole record for one song. So we politely declined.

Now, literally the night before the premiere of the movie, they issued a press release to USA Today, The New York Times, everybody, that said that Huey Lewis had seen the movie and it was so violent that he yanked his tune from the soundtrack.

Oh no! 

It was bulls—, but they were ginning up publicity.’ That pissed me off. So I boycotted the movie and never saw it. To this day. I actually lent the tune to the musical of American Psycho on Broadway! Duncan Sheik wrote all the other music and it's really good. It didn't last that long, but I was really impressed.

Sports’ huge success must have been the "I can buy my first house" record?    

Sports signaled that we're going to have a career where we're actually going to be able to play our own music and have people show up. Until Sports, our focus was to get a hit record, because to exist in the radio was all there was. Such a narrow scope.

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It's a common joke that artists want to be athletes and athletes want to be artists. But how often does the joke actually become a reality?

Becoming a professional athlete is an astronomical feat on its own, so diving back down to earth in hopes of becoming a successful artist is like betting on a fraction—of a fraction—of an already slim chance. Nevertheless, these five athletes hit the lottery twice by making a name for themselves in two dream professions.

Usain Bolt

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The relationship between music and sports reads loud and clear for most. But in case some people need the connection explained in more detail, Usain Bolt does a pretty good job of breaking it down.

"We enjoy music as athletes. It helped hype us up or calm us down depending on the type of genre," the eight-time Olympic gold medalist told GRAMMY.com. "For the artists, it's all about the hype to come to a sporting event to watch athletes perform at a high level. For me I've really been into that from a young age."

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Bolt understands the relationship between artists and athletes so well because he's served as both the world's fastest man and a DJ Khaled-like figure in the reggae, Afrobeats and dancehall spaces. Bolt released his album, Country Yutes, earlier this year, and similar to his track career, he has his eyes set on gold.

"I'm aiming for the top—a GRAMMY," Bolt told The Times UK.

Shaquille O'Neal aka DJ Diesel

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For a second, close your eyes and imagine moshing with Shaquille O'Neal. (There's an Icy Hot joke in there somewhere!)

Most know Shaq as the bruising force that dominated on the court for nearly two decades, then seamlessly transitioned to television once his playing career wrapped. But hidden behind his legendary basketball career and larger-than-life on-air personality is another layer of Shaq that he's been honing for decades.

"I've been doing this since '88," Shaq told SiriusXM at Lollapalooza in 2019. "When I retired in 2011, I needed another adrenaline booster."

Shaq, the four-time NBA champion and mega basketball personality, has north of 20 million followers on Instagram. DJ DIESEL, on the other hand, sits at around 239k Instagram followers and is about as underground as a tank-topped 7-foot EDM DJ can be, but despite the difference in followings, Shaq says the two worlds are linked.

"No matter what you've got going on in life, it's two things that'll stop everything you're thinking about negatively," Shaq explained in 2019. "Sports and music."

More DIESEL: Shaquille O'Neil, A.K.A. DJ Diesel, On Lollapalooza Debut, Loving Bass Music & DJing Since '88

Damian Lillard aka Dame D.O.L.L.A.

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"I think I rap better than Shaq. I've heard Shaq's stuff," Lillard said on an episode of The Joe Budden Podcast in 2019. "I think he was viewed as Shaq, though. People was like, this Shaq. It wasn't like Shaq and Biggie. People weren't looking like this is a real rapper."

Not only did the second and third names on this list successfully transition from court to stage, but they even exchanged surprisingly entertaining diss records at one another in 2019.

"This a different era, you the past and you the past," rapped Lillard in his Shaq diss titled "Reign Reign Go Away". "Said yourself that I'm a Tesla, no longer need diesel gas. Kinda like the Cavs ain't really need Diesel ass."

Evidenced by the nice flip of Shaq's nickname above and the four albums he's released since 2016, Dame D.O.L.L.A. has unlimited bars—much like Damian Lillard has boundless range.

Miles Bridges aka RTB MB

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If Miles Bridges wasn't 6 feet, 7 inches tall, he would genuinely fit in as one of Michigan's many upcoming rap stars.

Unlike Shaquille O'Neal and Damian Lillard—who are megastars in the basketball world—the 23-year-old Charlotte Hornet is as overlooked on the court as he is off the court. Despite falling just short of the 10 players in NBA or WNBA history to record a 50-40-90 shooting season, the masses mostly turn a blind eye to Bridges, and as a result, RTB MB can rap as unfiltered as he wants.

"Put a couple dots on his head like a snap-back," raps RTB MB on "Steph McGrady".

It also doesn't hurt that Bridges' hometown of Flint, Michigan, is about an hour away from one of the hottest areas in rap right now.

"When I was 16, I was tryna make music like Drake," Bridges told The Ringer earlier this year. "My flow has changed tremendously. I started listening to Detroit music when I was 13 or 14. Doughboyz Cashout, Team Eastside, all those guys."

Manny Pacquiao

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As the only eight-division world champion in boxing history, a senator of the Philippines, an actor in multiple films and a professional basketball player for 10 games, Manny Pacquiao is a man of many talents.

While music isn't his most obvious talent—who could say that about a man who's such a monster in the ring?—the four-time welterweight champion does sport impressive music accolades.

From charting on Billboard's Adult Contemporary chart in 2011 to releasing two certified platinum albums in his home country the Philippines, Pacquiao reached heights as an artist that even full-time musicians would applaud.

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On Jan. 28, 1985, 35 years ago, legendary producer Quincy Jones gathered 45 of the biggest artists of the day, including Bob Dylan, Huey Lewis and the News, Stevie Wonder and Cyndi Lauper, at A&M Studios in Los Angeles to record the now-historic charity single, "We Are The World." The goal of this one-time supergroup, USA For Africa, was to raise money for famine relief in Africa; in Ethiopia alone, more than 1 million people had died due to hunger in the prior two years.

For the latest episode of GRAMMY Rewind, GRAMMY.com revisits the 28th GRAMMY Awards, held in Los Angeles in 1986, when the star-studded, seven-minute track, penned by Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie and produced by Jones, took home Song Of The Year, along with three other big wins.

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"We are so proud to be a part of an industry of people that when the world is in need of helping each other, this music industry of ours responded," Richie said to his peers as he and Jackson accepted the Song Of The Year GRAMMY. "When we called, you responded, and we thank you for that."

A cultural phenomenon and major commercial success, "We Are The World" sold more than 8 million copies in the U.S. and raised more than $75 million for famine relief in Africa. In addition to winning the GRAMMY for Song Of The Year, it also won for Record Of The Year, Best Pop Performance By A Duo Or Group With Vocal and Best Music Video. The visual for the song is a joyful journey back to the big-haired '80s, giving an inside look into the famous studio session.

Watch: GRAMMY Rewind: Watch Kendrick Lamar, U2 & Dave Chappelle Open The 2018 GRAMMYs With A Powerful Performance

The initial idea for "We Are The World" came from singer/activist/actor Harry Belafonte, who was inspired by Band Aid's 1984 charity single, "Do They Know It's Christmas." Both singles inspired 1985's Live Aid, the first benefit concert of its size and caliber, as well as Willie Nelson's long-running Farm Aid shows.

Ultimately, "We Are The World" showed what the influence and unity of the music industry could accomplish when it comes together for a good cause and addresses the important issues of the time.

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Sports and music have been kindred creative spirits for a long time. But we live in a world today where, "basketball players think they can rap, and rappers want to be ballplayers," as GRAMMY-nominated producer and Washington, DC chapter board member 9th Wonder and GRAMMY-nominated rapper Pusha T agree. No doubt, something about the creative and performance elements of both disciplines seems intrinsically connected.

To explore this synergy between the two industries, the Recording Academy Washington, DC Chapter hosted an in-depth conversation on the "Intersection of Sports & Music" at the Kennedy Center's new programming pavilion, The REACH, on March 2, 2020. Panelists for the evening included Pusha T, 9th Wonder, Stephanie Scarpulla, Director for Music and Media Clearances for both the MLB Network and NHL Network and the NBA's Senior Director of Player Development Alexys Feaster as well as broadcaster Elsa M, who served as moderator.

Jeriel Johnson, Executive Director of the Washington D.C. Chapter, opened the proceedings by invoking the legacy of Kobe Bryant and his daughter Gianna, who tragically died on the same day as this year's 62nd GRAMMY Awards. Johnson acknowledged how their tragic passing impacted all in attendance and made the panel "timely and relevant."

He also noted Alicia Keys honored Bryant by playing Beethoven's "Moonlight Sonata" during the NBA star's memorial service. Bryant himself had learned the piece to impress his wife, Vanessa. 

In this spirit, Feaster discussed Kobe's deep ties to music as a catharsis from his significant on-court achievements. "The way athletes connect to music is authentic and often healing," Feaster said. "More than anything, athletes understand just how much discipline and support is required to master one's craft," which, to her, breeds the mutual respect between the two great industries.

Recently, as a part of his brand partnership with Adidas, Pusha T extended that connectivity and respect to another level. Pusha saw a golden opportunity to make a special moment when he was called on to aid the sneaker titan with the launch of Portland Trail Blazers star player Damian Lillard's "Dame 6" edition shoe during the 2020 All-Star Weekend. Inspired by his love for the game, Pusha went to work doing what he does best.

"Allen Iverson is my favorite athlete of all time," he started, citing a commercial AI did with rapper Jadakiss in 2001 where Production tandem The Trackmasters created a beat with basketball-style feel, which inspired Pusha for the "Dame 6" commercial with Lillard. "Pharrell made the beat for my ad, though," he added.

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The ad, which was aired during the Recording Academy event, created a triumphant viral music-meets-sports moment for Adidas during All-Star Weekend.

This kind of sports-meets-music collision is happening more than ever. The MLB Network, for instance, often licenses up to 300 unique pieces of musical content per day, according to the MLB's Stephanie Scarpulla.

For her part, sync-licensing specialist Scarpulla related to just how many special moments in sports require musical soundtracking. She outlined the intensity of her music-moment-making schedule balancing both the MLB and NHL Networks, starting with the opening day of Major League Baseball's season, which roughly coincides with the close of the National Hockey League's year. From there, MLB's All-Star Game falls a scant ten weeks or so later. Plus, the NHL's offseason is when the network will roll out an entirely new slate of documentary programming. 

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Scarpulla, who has been in her job for 12 years after seven years working as a music licensing executive in the music industry, says she, "Listens to anything and everything, from everywhere" to inspire the choices for the networks, which air almost 20,000 hours a year. Initially, her choices leaned in the direction of "bro rock," which she felt matched went well with baseball and hockey. Now, the genre search has expanded to include hip-hop and up-and-surging Korean pop music, too.

Both 9th Wonder and Feaster spoke to the unique and enduring relationship that the National Basketball Association has with hip-hop music and culture. Of all the relationships between sports and music highlighted, basketball and rap seem to be the most consistently intertwined, and the sports world has started to recognize its athletes' musical interests and abilities.

Featster's favorite recent anecdote related to this crossover is how rising Sacramento Kings star Marvin Bagley III - who is also a gifted emcee - has access to a full recording studio in the Golden 1 Center, the team's home arena. This is one of the many ways both industries are seeing growth together in each other's home courts.

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"My job is to help artists and musicians become their best versions of themselves," Feaster added.

In fact, Bagley's passion for hip-hop was likely inspired by Feaster's fellow panelist, 9th Wonder. The Jamla Records head and veteran hip-hop producer is also a professor of African and African-American Studies at Duke University, where Bagley attended school (and 9th Wonder's classes) for two years until 2018.

In his opening remarks, Wonder tied the sustaining connection between hip-hop and music to the genre's mid-1970s roots, and how hip-hop started in the Bronx at the same time that the legendary Rucker street basketball tournament started in Harlem. From there, he noted that Nike's 1984 creation of the Air Jordan sneaker (and rappers cosigning both Jordan and his signature footwear) allowed for hip-hop to infiltrate the NBA ever since.

"The genre has taken over the culture," 9th Wonder says, admitting that even as the league grows more international in its appeal, it's still hip-hop that reigns supreme as an influence.

With hip-hop now five decades old, Wonder is impressed at the depth and scope of influence players find in not just modern rap, but of the appeal of the classics, too.

"When [Bagley's Sacramento Kings teammate] Jabari Parker attended Duke, we bonded over how much he loved A Tribe Called Quest, who were popular when I was his age." He continues. "And when I had Zion Williamson in my classes, we often spoke of how much he loved and was inspired by Jay-Z." 

Through her work with the NBA and with Athletes For Obama, Feaster said she frequently discusses with players how difficult it is to feel like they "have the world's issues on their shoulders," an issue that uses both sports and music as its outlet.

By creating the best paths to sustain the development of mentally enriched and uniquely creative people, no matter which outlet they choose, we build a future where music and sports inspire people to be their best selves, and, ultimately, the culture and industry behind both worlds will also flourish.

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Music and sports fans will have a lot to cheer about at this year's NCAA March Madness season. Taylor Swift, Halsey and Tayla Parx are confirmed to headline the Capital One JamFest, marking the event's first-ever all-female lineup, according to the NCAA.

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As if that wasn't already enough awesome news, Capital One JamFest, a one-day mini-fest taking place Sunday, April 5, is a free concert. But, event organizers are requiring advance registration for tickets for all fans looking to attend. The general public registration for free tickets opens Thursday, March 5, at 9 a.m. ET and will be available while supplies last.

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Capital One JamFest is the closing event of the 2020 NCAA March Madness Music Festival, a free three-day music series running from April 3-5 at Centennial Olympic Park in Atlanta, Ga. Both events lead up to the big NCAA National Championship game on Monday, April 6. Other events during the festival weekender include an AT&T Block Party on Friday, April 3, and a Coca-Cola event on Saturday, April 4. 

Previous Capital One JamFest headliners include GRAMMY winners Bruce Springsteen, Aerosmith, Dave Matthews Band, Sting and 13-time GRAMMY nominee Katy Perry, among many others. 

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