On This Day in 1982, Hall & Oates Were at No. 1 With the Biggest Hit of the Decade To Feature a Saxophone Solo

On this day (December 18) in 1982, Hall & Oates topped the Billboard Hot 100 with “Maneater.” The song spent four consecutive weeks at the top of the chart, making it the final No. 1 of 1982 and the first of 1983. It was also the duo’s longest-running No. 1 hit. Interestingly, the song showcases the duo’s saxophone player, Charles DeChant. As a result, it became the biggest hit of the decade to feature a sax solo.

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On the surface, “Maneater” is seemingly about a woman with expensive tastes who uses men to fund her lifestyle. In short, it sounds like the song is about a gold digger. However, that’s not really the case. Instead, the woman mentioned in the song is a metaphor for the ever-present greed and excess in New York in the 1970s and ’80s. The duo believed that using a woman would make the song more widely relatable.

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Sara Allen Saved This Hall & Oates Classic

Daryl Hall, John Oates, and Sara Allen have songwriting credits on “Maneater.” However, Allen didn’t add anything to the song. Instead, she insisted that something be removed. In doing so, she helped create one of the most memorable choruses of the decade and helped the duo land their biggest hit.

In an interview with American Songwriter, Hall explained how his longtime girlfriend changed the song for the better.

“John had written a prototype of ‘Maneater.’ He was banging it around with Edgar Winter. It was like a reggae song. I said, ‘Well, the chords are interesting, but I think we should change the groove.’ I changed it to that Motown kind of groove,” he recalled.

After changing the song’s groove, Hall played it for Allen. “I played it for Sara and sang it for her, ‘Oh here she comes / Watch out boy she’ll chew you up / Oh here she comes / She’s a maneater and a…’ I foget what the last line was,” Hall said. “She said, ‘Drop that sh*t in the end and go. She’s a maneater,’ and stop!’ And I said, ‘No, you’re crazy, that’s messed up.’”

In the end, he tried playing the song with Allen’s change and realized how much better it sounded. “It made all the difference in the song,” he said of her input.

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