Before Journey made it one of the most popular phrases in ’80s rock, “Don’t Stop Believin’” was just a piece of fatherly advice from Jonathan Cain’s dad.
Cain, most known for being the keyboardist and rhythm guitarist in Journey, was a young, struggling musician in Hollywood. His dad was offering encouragement. Then years later, Cain took his words and turned them into Journey‘s signature rock ‘n roll anthem.
“He said, ‘We’ve had a vision all these years,” Cain told NSAI’s Bart Herbison. “He was my prophet. My vision keeper. He said, ‘Son, don’t stop believing.’”
Cain thought the words were beautiful and wrote them in his lyric book. Then he started doodling the phrase over and over again, completely filling the page.
“He talked me down off the ledge,” Cain said. “He told me, ‘If you stick it out in Hollywood, great things are going to happen for you. I’ll send you the money if you stay put.’”
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Cain, now 75 and a member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, was a member of the rock band the Babys at the time. A while later, he took his lyric books to San Francisco, and Journey invited him to join the band. He hadn’t played with the group very often, but his new bandmates wanted him to help write the new album, which became Escape. Cain remembers songs, including “Open Arms” and “Who’s Crying Now,” were pouring out of the players. But they needed one more song. Singer Steve Perry told Cain to go home and see what he had.
“The pressure was on,” Cain said, remembering he went home, sat down at his Wurlitzer, and opened his lyric notebook. “I see it. ‘Don’t Stop Believin,” the title. I said, ‘Steve Perry will sing this. Now, Jon, you’ve got to write some kind of chorus where he can soar. He’s one of them.”
They had two days left of rehearsal. Cain just had two lines and the chords. He started singing it over and over to himself in the melody that became the song. Cain knew founding member George Tickner didn’t enjoy the high notes, but he kept going.
Someone suggested he wrap the chords in a Motown vibe, and then Perry started singing. Then Schon came over and started playing guitar.
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“Next thing I know, I hear this kind of train track thing going on,” Cain said. “It was, ‘What’s Neal doing, man? What are you doing?’”
Schon wrote the song’s B section.
“This was an improv by all,” Cain said. “Steve Smith comes up with this phenomenally cool beat.”
However, they still hadn’t reached a chorus.
“I kept looking at Steve and going, ‘Chorus now?’” Cain said. “And he goes, ‘Oh no, we’re going to milk them, and they’re going to want to play this record. It’s one of those records you want to play over and over again because we’re going to make a song like that. They’re going to have to put it at the beginning and play it until they hear that chorus.”
It took three minutes and 20 seconds to get the chorus—equivalent to 10 years on the radio.
The band lands on the chords. Schon is playing them, but they still hadn’t sung.
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“This was all Steve,” Cain said. “Steve is just so musical. He understood. He was like a real mechanic, understood how all the parts fit. He had more of an innate understanding of what makes a great track than anybody I’ve ever seen.”
Perry starts yodeling and scatting over the music, but the band still had no lyrics. Cain went to Perry’s house the next day to pound them out.
“I always listen to what he’s scatting for clues because he’s a technician,” Cain said, remembering it sounded like Perry said “lonely world.” “I said, ‘What if it’s like Jack and Diane, kind of just a smalltown girl.’”
Schon’s guitar train reminded Cain of “Midnight Train to Georgia.” He wondered what it would be like if it were a midnight train going anywhere.
Sunset Boulevard Inspired “Don’t Stop Believin’”
“Now we’re in the movie,” Cain said, remembering the men kept adding scenes from their lives playing California bars to the lyrics.
“This sounds like Sunset Boulevard where I lived,” Cain recalled. “I explained to him everybody who cruises up and down the boulevard, I mean, the hustlers and the dreamers. They were all looking for something, chasing a dream.”
Cain looks at “Don’t Stop Believin’” a license to dream—which is what his dad gave him when he dropped the phrase on him.
“I think it’s such a strong tune,” he said. “It says it’s okay to dream, and it’s okay to leave and we’ve got the midnight train and it’s going anywhere we want.”
(Photo by Mediapunch/Shutterstock)
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