4 Soft Rock Songs From the 70s That Will Make You Feel Like a Hopeless Romantic Again

There’s something about the genre of soft rock music that just automatically gets us in our feels. There are plenty of heartbreak anthems out there for when you need them, but here are four soft rock songs from the 70s that make falling in love sound like not such a terrible idea.

“Fooled Around And Fell In Love” by Elvin Bishop

Ironically, even though Bishop released this song, he’s not the one singing vocals on “Fooled Around And Fell In Love”. Mickey Thomas, who sang background vocals in Bishop’s band, took the lead on this one. Later on, Thomas would sing vocals for the band Starship, an 80s rock group that scored big with the hit “We Built This City”.

“Dance With Me” by Orleans

This romantic little soft rock hit by Orleans was written by then songwriting couple John Hall and Johanna Hall. The song came about when Hall was jamming out on the guitar. His wife became struck with inspiration from the other room.

“I started playing it on acoustic guitar and developed it, just jamming by myself in the living room,” Hall told Songfacts. “The whole song — the verses, the bridge, the ending — was all complete coming out of my acoustic guitar. Johanna yelled from the other room, ‘That sounds like ‘Dance With Me’.’ And I went, ‘Can’t we come up with something a little bit more unusual than that?’ And she said, ‘I don’t know, it really sounds like ‘Dance With Me’.’”

“Lovely Day” by Bill Withers

Everyone can recognize this soulful little tune. If you don’t know him from this song, you definitely know Bill Withers’ work from songs like “Ain’t No Sunshine”. With “Lovely Day”, Withers embraces his more optimistic, romantic side.

“Brandy (You’re A Fine Girl)” by Looking Glass

There’s a theory attached to this song that it was inspired by a spinster named Mary Ellis. However, in an interview with The Tennessean, band guitarist Elliot Lurie confirmed that this was not the case. Rather, the name “Brandy” was inspired by a high school girlfriend of his.

“The name was derived from a high school girlfriend I had whose name was Randy with an ‘R,’” he shared. “Usually when I write—I still do it the same way I did back then—I strum some guitar and kind of sing along with the first things that come to mind. Her name came up. Then, I started writing the rest of the song, and it was about a barmaid. I thought Randy was an unusual name for a girl, so it could go either way. The song was about a barmaid, so I changed it to Brandy.”

Photo by Fin Costello/Redferns