“The first true love in my life is music,” said Carl Weathers. By the early 1970s, the late actor was known as a linebacker for the Oakland Raiders then the BC Lions before retiring from football in 1974 and transitioning into acting. Throughout the ’70s, Weathers appeared on television, starring in Starsky and Hutch, Good Times, Kung Fu, The Six Million Dollar Man, Barnaby Jones, S.W.A.T., and more.
In 1976, Weathers landed one of his most iconic roles as boxer Apollo Creed in Rocky and appeared in the next three films alongside Sylvester Stallone before going opposite Arnold Schwarzenegger in Predator in 1987.
A year later, Weathers took on the starring role of Detroit detective Action Jackson and even sang “What About a Rainbow” during his monologue while hosting Saturday Night Live in 1988.
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Linking music to the screen, Weathers performed The Carpenters‘ 1970 single “We’ve Only Just Begun” as Adam Sandler‘s golf coach Derick “Chubbs” Peterson in the 1996 comedy Happy Gilmore.
During the ’00s through the early 2020s, Weathers was back on television with roles on Psych, ER, The Shield, Arrested Development, and Chicago Fire, among other shows.
Later in his career, Weathers returned to television as the head of the Bounty Hunters Guild, Greef Karga, in the Star Wars television series The Mandalorian, from 2019 through 2023.
Throughout his more than 50-year career, Weathers who died on February 1, 2024, at 76, appeared in more than 75 films and television shows. In the early 1980s, he even revisited his other love, music, and released two singles, which he also co-wrote.
Here’s a look at songs the late actor and singer released during his short-lived music career.
“That’s Love Calling” (1981)
Written by Carl Weathers, Dwight J. Emile, Ray Jackson, and Hadley Murrell
Soul songwriter, Hadley Murrell started performing by the age of 14 in his home state of Arizona before eventually writing and producing artists across genres. Throughout his career, Murrel worked with everyone from James Brown, Little Richard, Peter Cosey, and even Weathers in the early 1980s. Murrell produced two singles Weathers released in 1981, including “That’s Love Calling,” which both also co-wrote.
Revealing Weathers’ funk side, “That’s Love Calling” was released as the B-Side to his other single “You Ought to Be With Me.”
“You Ought to Be with Me” (1981)
Written by Carl Weathers and Dwight J. Emile
Weathers showed another side of himself musically on his other Murrell-produced single, the soul-pressed “You Ought to Be with Me.” The R&B ballad, which Weathers also co-wrote, follows the pleas of a man trying to get someone to return.
You know that I’m not like most men
I may have made all kinds of mistakes
Baby if you just come back
You know I’ll pull out all the stops and take off all the brakes
“You Ought to Be with Me” was also featured in the season two soundtrack for the Netflix sci-fi series Stranger Things in 2016.
Photo: Alberto E. Rodriguez/Getty Images for Disney
