Bangles — Eternal Flame

Released February 11, 1989

"Eternal Flame" is a song by The Bangles, which became a hit single in 1989, peaking at number one in the charts in six countries; including: Australia, the United Kingdom, and the United States. It was written by popular songwriters Billy Steinberg and Tom Kelly and the Bangles' own Susanna Hoffs.

It was a ballad, unlike the rest of the garage-band pop songs on their album Everything. Co-writer Billy Steinberg describes it as "The Beatles meet The Byrds".

The song was inspired by two eternal flames: one for Elvis Presley that Michael Steele saw when the band was at Graceland, and one at a local synagogue in Palm Springs which Steinberg attended as a child.

It spent one week at number one on the Billboard Hot 100, preceded by "The Living Years" by Mike + The Mechanics and followed by "The Look" by Roxette; spent four weeks at number one on the UK singles chart, preceded by "Like a Prayer" by Madonna and followed by "Hand on Your Heart" by Kylie Minogue; and spent seven weeks at the #1 position in the Dutch Top 40. It also topped the U.S. adult contemporary chart for two weeks.

The song was Australia's biggest selling single of '89 and was sent-up on the Australian TV show Fast Forward.

Eternal Flame was featured in an episode of True Blood on HBO and Pushing Daisies on ABC, where it was sung by Kristin Chenoweth.

* The song has been covered in Japanese language in 1997 by Tomoya Nagase, the vocalist of the Japanese idol rock group Tokio, featuring 3T. This song was used as the theme song of the Nippon TV drama "DXD", in which Nagase played the main role. He also wrote the Japanese version lyrics. This version was released as a single in Japan under the name of "Tomoya with 3T".
* The song has been covered in 1999 by the Australian group Human Nature on the Counting Down album.
* The song has been covered in 2000 by Rollergirl on the Now I'm Singin'... And The Party Keeps On Rollin' and released as a single which peaked at #87 in the Swiss Charts
* A cover version has been made in 2005 by the Filipino acoustic duo M.Y.M.P.

The Bangles — Eternal Flame clip can be downloaded for free and without registration.