How Michael Bolton’s Songwriting Breakthrough Eventually Became His First Charttopper as an Artist in 1983

He eventually strutted his stuff as one of the biggest pop stars on the planet. But Michael Bolton first had to make his mark as a songwriter for hire. Only then could he start to make progress of his own on the recording front.

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As it turned out, his first big songwriting score would eventually become one of his biggest solo hits. But first, Laura Branigan took “How Am I Supposed To Live Without You?” to the chart stratosphere in 1983.

Bolton’s Big Break

Michael Bolton started knocking around the music industry in the mid-70s, looking for his big break. He recorded a pair of solo albums in short succession under his given name, Michael Bolotin. On top of that, there was a stint as lead singer in the hard rock band Blackjack.

All those efforts hadn’t amounted to much by the early 80s. It was at that point that Bolton started writing songs that he thought others might record. Working with co-writer Doug James, he penned the ballad “How Am I Supposed To Live Without You?” in 1982.

At one point, it looked like the Australian duo Air Supply was going to record the song. But record exec Clive Davis wanted Bolton and James to change a portion of the lyrics. To their credit, they refused the offer. That decision paid off the following year when a different pop star took a liking to the pair’s original demo and recorded it without any alterations.

Hey, Laura

The Canadian songstress Laura Branigan exploded on the US pop scene with the 1982 No. 2 single “Gloria”. A year later, she recorded her take on “How Am I Supposed To Live Without You?” It reached No. 12 on the pop charts and soared to the top of the adult contemporary survey.

As Bolton’s songwriting success started to blossom after “How Am I Supposed To Live Without You?” paved the way, he turned to the possibility of reviving his recording career. Realizing that fans were gravitating to the slow stuff he was writing, he reinvented himself as a ballad singer in the late 80s.

Having hit the Top 20 with three singles in the late 80s, Bolton released his own version of “How Am I Supposed To Live Without You?” on the 1989 album Soul Provider. Fittingly, the song that gave him his first songwriting break also became his first ever No. 1 pop hit as an artist.

Behind the Lyrics of “How Am I Supposed To Live Without You?”

In “How Am I Supposed To Live Without You?”, a narrator confronts the one they love upon the news that the object of their affections is moving on with someone new. “I had to come and get it straight from you,” they explain.

The narrator isn’t trying to sway them into changing their mind. They just want this other person to know how devastated they are. “I don’t wanna know the price I’m gonna pay for dreamin’,” they lament. “Even now, it’s more than I can take.” Their final question can’t be answered in any satisfactory fashion: “And how am I supposed to carry on/When all that I’ve been living for is gone?”

Which version do you prefer? Branigan’s take is more restrained and somehow sadder for it. Bolton belts his blues to the heavens. “How Am I Supposed To Live Without You?” put Michael Bolton on the right path as a songwriter and, later, solidified his stardom as an artist.

(Photo by Gary Gershoff/Getty Images)