"Praying for Time" is a song written and performed by British singer and songwriter
George Michael
George Michael (born Georgios Kyriacos Panayiotou; 25 June 1963 – 25 December 2016) was an English singer and songwriter. He is considered one of the most significant cultural icons of the MTV generation and is one of the best-selling music ...
, released on
Epic Records
Epic Records is an American record label owned by Sony Music Entertainment, a subsidiary of Sony Corporation of America, the North American division of Japanese conglomerate Sony. The label was founded predominantly as a jazz and classical mu ...
in the United Kingdom and
Columbia Records in the United States in 1990. It was the first single from his second studio album, ''
Listen Without Prejudice Vol. 1'' (1990), spending one week at number one on the US
''Billboard'' Hot 100, making it Michael's seventh number one in the US and his last solo single to reach the top of the Hot 100. "Praying for Time" also reached number one in Canada for two weeks, becoming Michael's penultimate number-one solo hit there.
Release
The song was Michael's first single in almost two years, entering the
UK Singles Chart in August 1990. A dark and sombre reflection on social ills and injustice, it was hailed by many critics. The single peaked at number six in the UK, but it was his ninth number one on the
''Billboard'' Hot 100 in the US. The song remained in the ''Billboard'' top 40 for ten weeks. It was the first song of political motivation he had released as a single since his earliest days with
Wham!.
The song was the first of five released in the UK from the album ''
Listen Without Prejudice Vol. 1'', although it was the only one of the quintet to make the UK top 10. As of October 2017, the single sold 140,000 copies in UK.
Critical reception
In an retrospective review, Matthew Hocter from Albumism wrote that the song, "which examines the many social injustices faced by so many, questions the listener into the conditioning that society has created and why it can be so hard to be kind to one another." He added, "Timeless and still so relevant in this day and age."
Stephen Thomas Erlewine from
AllMusic picked it as a "highlight" from the album. Upon the release, Bill Coleman from ''
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 ...
'' noted, "Previewing the long-awaited ''
Listen Without Prejudice Vol. 1'' album is a dramatic, socially conscious
ballad
A ballad is a form of verse, often a narrative set to music. Ballads derive from the medieval French ''chanson balladée'' or '' ballade'', which were originally "dance songs". Ballads were particularly characteristic of the popular poetry and ...
, delivered with the kind of unabashed soul and bravado we've come to expect (and love) from Michael. The countdown to No. 1 starts now ..." In an 2008 review, The Daily Vault's Melanie Love said that "Praying for Time" "features Michael singing in a lower range to more formally distance himself from the realm of sunny pop, his tone oddly soothing". She added, "It's the expressiveness of his voice that makes this track such a potent opener, switching seamlessly from scathing to aching to helpless on this rumination on social injustices." Chris Roberts from ''
Melody Maker'' named it Single of the Week, adding that it "marks George entering his loony eccentric British recluse genius phase and displays a staggering excess of ambition."
Pan-European magazine ''
Music & Media
''Music & Media'' was a pan-European magazine for radio, music and entertainment. It was published for the first time in 1984 as ''Eurotipsheet'', but in 1986 it changed name to ''Music & Media''. It was originally based in Amsterdam, but later m ...
'' stated, "A well-crafted, lovely ballad building up to sizeable proportions. The transparent production gives ample space to Michael's passionate vocals." David Giles from ''
Music Week'' described it as a "glorious ballad that ranks alongside "
Careless Whisper
"Careless Whisper" is a song written by George Michael and Andrew Ridgeley. Released on the 1984 Wham! album '' Make It Big'', the single release was credited either to ''Wham! featuring George Michael'' (in North America and several other coun ...
" and "
A Different Corner
"A Different Corner" is a song written and performed by George Michael that was released on Epic Records ( Columbia Records in the US) in 1986 .
Background & Writing
"A Different Corner" was written by Michael while Wham! were at their peak as a ...
" as one of the best things he's ever written." He added, "This has distinct shades of
Lennon circa 1975". Victoria Segal from ''
NME
''New Musical Express'' (''NME'') is a British music, film, gaming, and culture website and brand. Founded as a newspaper in 1952, with the publication being referred to as a 'rock inkie', the NME would become a magazine that ended up as a f ...
'' called it a "splendidly melodramatic breath of apocalypse". A reviewer from ''
People
A person ( : people) is a being that has certain capacities or attributes such as reason, morality, consciousness or self-consciousness, and being a part of a culturally established form of social relations such as kinship, ownership of propert ...
'' magazine commented, "Set to a somber Lennonesque arrangement (unfortunately, that’s
Julian, not John), the song murkily bemoans our troubled, faithless times." The reviewer also complimented Michael's "talents for writing, singing, arranging and producing". James Hunter of ''
Rolling Stone'' described the song as "a distraught look at the world's astounding woundedness. Michael offers the healing passage of time as the only balm for physical and emotional hunger, poverty, hypocrisy and hatred."
Music video
While Michael refused to appear in videos to support the album, an experimental video clip directed by Michael Borofsky was released for "Praying for Time", featuring only the lyrics of the song with a blue and black background that, at the end of the clip, reveals itself to be the image on the cover of the album. Some of the written lyrics featured in the video are slightly animated:
* The lines "The rich declare themselves poor", and "And the wounded skies above" have a shimmering quality, as if written on water.
* The lines "I guess somewhere along the way", "he must have let us out to play", and, at the start of the second verse, "These are the days of the empty hand", unroll themselves on the screen, as if written on a ribbon.
* The single words forming the line "'cause God's stopped keeping score" appear on screen one at a time, in sync with the vocals, on both occurrences of that line.
* In the second chorus, the words "love", "hate" and "hope", respectively at the end of the lines "It's hard to love", "There's so much to hate" and "Hanging on to hope", are all left literally hanging on the screen, fading out a few instants later after the other words in the respective lines have faded out.
* The two occurrences of the line "when there is no hope to speak of", one in each chorus, feature different treatments of the word "hope". In the first chorus, the line appears without the word "hope", which flashes briefly on screen when it is sung; in the second chorus, the word does not appear at all and the line is shown with a gap (i.e. "when there is no ____ to speak of"). Similarly, in the line "This is the year of the guilty man", the word "guilty" flashes on screen only when it is actually sung.
The video quickly became a buzz clip on
MTV
MTV (Originally an initialism of Music Television) is an American cable channel that launched on August 1, 1981. Based in New York City, it serves as the flagship property of the MTV Entertainment Group, part of Paramount Media Networks, a di ...
, and stayed in rotation on most video networks for weeks. Similarly, the commercial single had no cover photo, only words. Some have speculated that the style of the video was influenced by
Prince's similar promo clip for "
Sign o' the Times
''Sign o' the Times'' (often stylized as ''Sign "☮︎" the Times'') is the ninth studio album by American singer, songwriter, producer, and multi-instrumentalist Prince. It was first released on March 30, 1987 as a double album by Paisley Park ...
" released three years previously.
After Michael's temporary move to
Virgin in 1996,
Sony Music
Sony Music Entertainment (SME), also known as simply Sony Music, is an American multinational music company. Being owned by the parent conglomerate Sony Group Corporation, it is part of the Sony Music Group, which is owned by Sony Entertainment ...
re-made the video in a simplified CGI version, with a uniform black/grey background and no animations at all. This is the one most commonly available as of 2017, and as such it was released in the 2017 Deluxe Edition of the ''
Listen Without Prejudice Vol. 1'' album.
An alternate music video for this song has also been released, with Michael actually seen recording and performing the lyrics.
Track listings
* 7-inch: Epic / GEO 1 (UK)
# "Praying for Time" – 4:40
# "
If You Were My Woman" (
live at Wembley Stadium, 11 Jun '88) – 4:05
* also available on MC (Epic / GEO M1), 12" (Epic / GEO T1) and CD (Epic / CD GEO 1)
* CD: Epic / GEO C1 (UK)
# "Praying for Time" – 4:40
# "If You Were My Woman" (live at Wembley Stadium, 11 Jun '88) – 4:05
# "Waiting" (reprise) – 2:27
* limited edition
* Cassette, 7-inch and CD: Columbia 73512 (US)
# "Praying for Time" – 4:40
# "If You Were My Woman" (live at Wembley Stadium, 11 Jun '88) – 4:05
Charts
Weekly charts
Year-end charts
Decade-end charts
Certifications
''American Idol''
The song was performed by
Carrie Underwood
Carrie Marie Underwood (born March 10, 1983) is an American singer. She rose to prominence after winning the fourth season of ''American Idol'' in 2005. Her single " Inside Your Heaven" made her the only country artist to debut atop the ''Bil ...
for the 2008 ''
Idol Gives Back
''Idol Gives Back'' was the name of a charitable campaign that spanned two episodes of ''American Idol'' during its sixth season. A second ''Idol Gives Back'' concert and fundraiser occurred on April 9, 2008, during the seventh season of the s ...
'' mini-marathon on 9 April 2008. In a matter of 24 hours, Underwood's rendition of "Praying for Time" reached number 10 on the
Hot Digital Songs
The Digital Songs or Digital Song Sales chart (previously named Hot Digital Songs) ranks the best-selling digital songs in the United States, as compiled by Nielsen SoundScan and published by ''Billboard'' magazine. Although it originally start ...
chart, with all proceeds being donated to charity. It also peaked at number 27 on the US
''Billboard'' Hot 100 on the week of 26 April 2008. George Michael performed the song during the 2008 ''
American Idol
''American Idol'' is an American singing competition television series created by Simon Fuller, produced by Fremantle North America and 19 Entertainment, and distributed by Fremantle North America. It aired on Fox from June 11, 2002, to Ap ...
'' finale on 21 May 2008.
See also
*
List of European number-one airplay songs of the 1990s
''Music & Media
''Music & Media'' was a pan-European magazine for radio, music and entertainment. It was published for the first time in 1984 as ''Eurotipsheet'', but in 1986 it changed name to ''Music & Media''. It was originally based in Am ...
References
{{Authority control
1989 songs
1990 singles
2008 singles
George Michael songs
Carrie Underwood songs
Billboard Hot 100 number-one singles
Cashbox number-one singles
RPM Top Singles number-one singles
Songs written by George Michael
Song recordings produced by George Michael
Songs about John Lennon
Songs about Martin Luther King Jr.
Epic Records singles
Arista Nashville singles
Pop ballads
1990s ballads