28 Years Ago Today, We Said Goodbye to The Jersey Boy Who Changed Country Music

Country music is commonly associated with the southern United States. However, one of the genre’s most influential figures of the 1970s and 1980s hailed from the East Coast. Raised in New Jersey, Eddie Rabbitt helped develop the crossover sound that came to dominate the 1980s with songs like “I Love a Rainy Night”, one of his 26 country chart-toppers. On this day (May 7) in 1998, Rabbitt died from lung cancer in Nashville.

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At just 56 years old, his death came as a shock to many—including his own agent, who “had no idea Eddie was terminal.”

Diagnosed in March 1997, the three-time Grammy nominee had been quietly undergoing radiation treatments and surgery to remove part of one lung. At the request of Rabbitt’s family, no media outlets reported on his passing. Word didn’t begin to spread until after his burial at Nashville’s Calvary Cemetery a day later.

Eddie Rabbitt Got His Start Writing Songs For Elvis Presley, Ronnie Milsap

Edward Thomas Rabbitt was born on November 27, 1941, to Irish immigrants in New York City. He grew up nearby in East Orange, New Jersey, watching his father put his fiddle and accordion skills to use in New York City dance halls.

Rabbitt himself was a competent guitarist by age 12. Four years later, he dropped out of school and worked a variety of jobs while also performing at a local club.

In 1968, Eddie Rabbitt moved to Nashville with $1,000 to his name in pursuit of a songwriting career. His first success came in 1969 with Elvis Presley’s “Kentucky Rain”. And after Ronnie Milsap took his composition “Pure Love” to No. 1 in 1974, Elektra Records offered Rabbitt a recording contract.

Rabbitt scored his first No. 1 hit as a singer-songwriter with 1976’s “Drinkin’ My Baby (Off My Mind).” A flurry of crossover hits followed, including 1979’s “Suspicions” and the Hot 100 chart-topper “I Love a Rainy Night” (1980).

[RELATED: 3 Country Duets From the 80s That Are Not at All Romantic]

Although Rabbitt became Nashville’s poster child for crossover success, he never intentionally courted that title.

“I don’t think about writing categories,” he said in a 1990 interview. “I write what I like to write, and to me it’s all country because that’s the first thing I ever learned to play on the guitar and noodle on the piano. So even though it may not sound country to anybody else, it’s country to me.”

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