"I Know" is the debut solo single by American singer-songwriter

Philip Bailey Philip James Bailey (born May 8, 1951) is an American R&B, soul, gospel and funk singer, songwriter and percussionist, best known as an early member and one of the two lead singers (along with group founder Maurice White) of the band Earth, Wi ...

, released in 1983 by

Columbia Records Columbia Records is an American record label owned by Sony Music, Sony Music Entertainment, a subsidiary of Sony Corporation of America, the North American division of Japanese Conglomerate (company), conglomerate Sony. It was founded on Janua ...

. The song reached No. 10 on the ''

Billboard A billboard (also called a hoarding in the UK and many other parts of the world) is a large outdoor advertising structure (a billing board), typically found in high-traffic areas such as alongside busy roads. Billboards present large advertise ...

Hot Black Singles The Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart ranks the most popular R&B and hip hop songs in the United States and is published weekly by ''Billboard''. Rankings are based on a measure of radio airplay, sales data, and streaming activity. The chart had 100 p ...

chart.

Overview

"I Know" was produced by

George Duke George M. Duke (January 12, 1946 – August 5, 2013) was an American keyboardist, composer, singer-songwriter and record producer. He worked with numerous artists as arranger, music director, writer and co-writer, record producer and as a pr ...

and composed by

Gerard McMahon Gerard Thomas McMahon, also known as Gerard McMann and G Tom Mac, is an English singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and producer who specialises in creating music for films and TV. His gothic rock anthem "Cry Little Sister" was recorded ...

. The single's

B-side The A-side and B-side are the two sides of phonograph records and cassettes; these terms have often been printed on the labels of two-sided music recordings. The A-side usually features a recording that its artist, producer, or record compan ...

is "The Good Guy's Supposed to Get the Girls". Both "I Know" and "The Good Guy's Supposed to Get the Girls" are from Bailey's 1983 album ''

Continuation In computer science, a continuation is an abstract representation of the control state of a computer program. A continuation implements ( reifies) the program control state, i.e. the continuation is a data structure that represents the computati ...

''.

Critical reception

Eleanor Levy of

Record Mirror ''Record Mirror'' was a British weekly music newspaper between 1954 and 1991 for pop fans and record collectors. Launched two years after the ''NME'', it never attained the circulation of its rival. The first UK album chart was published in ''Re ...

scribed "pleasant melody, beautifully performed. No surprises but a lot of class". Paul Willistein of ''

The Morning Call ''The Morning Call'' is a daily newspaper in Allentown, Pennsylvania. Founded in 1883, it is the second longest continuously published newspaper in the Lehigh Valley, after ''The Express-Times''. In 2020, the newspaper permanently closed its Al ...

'' proclaimed that George Duke's "keyboard and synthesizer part turn I Know into the album's best cut".

Personnel

– lead vocals, backing vocals *

– piano coustic synthesizer rophet V*

Nathan East Nathan Harrell East (born December 8, 1955) is an American jazz, R&B, and rock bass player and vocalist. With more than 2,000 recordings, East is one of the most recorded bass players in the history of music. East holds a Bachelor of Arts degr ...

– bass *

James Gadson James Gadson ( James Edward Gadson; born June 17, 1939) is an American drummer and session musician. Beginning his career in the late 1960s, Gadson has since become one of the most-recorded drummers in the history of R&B. He is also a singer and ...

– drums * Paul Jackson Jr. – guitar

References

{{Philip Bailey 1983 songs 1983 debut singles Columbia Records singles Philip Bailey songs Songs written by Gerard McMahon