"The Stroke" is a song written and recorded by American rock artist

Billy Squier William Haislip Squier (, born May 12, 1950) is an American rock musician and singer who had a string of arena rock and crossover hits in the early 1980s. His best-known songs include "The Stroke", "Lonely Is the Night", "My Kinda Lover", "In t ...

. It was released in 1981 as the debut single from his 3× Platinum album '' Don't Say No''. This was Squier's first single to chart, reaching No. 17 on the US ''Billboard'' Hot 100. It was a bigger hit on rock radio, reaching No. 3 on the

Top Tracks Classic Vinyl is a Sirius XM Radio channel focusing on classic rock music mostly from the late-1960s to the mid-1970s, with the channel's name meant to indicate that it consists of music that first appeared on vinyl records. This encompasses musi ...

chart. It also reached the

UK Singles Chart The UK Singles Chart (currently titled Official Singles Chart, with the upper section more commonly known as the Official UK Top 40) is compiled by the Official Charts Company (OCC), on behalf of the British record industry, listing the top-s ...

, rising to No. 52. It was named the 59th best hard rock song of all time by VH1.

Charts

Weekly charts

Year-end charts

In popular culture

*In 1995, the song was used in the movie ''

Billy Madison ''Billy Madison'' is a 1995 American comedy film directed by Tamra Davis. It stars Adam Sandler in the title role, Bradley Whitford, Bridgette Wilson, Norm Macdonald, Darren McGavin, Mark Beltzman, and Larry Hankin. The film was written by Sandler ...

'' *In 2007, the song was used in the movie ''

Blades of Glory ''Blades of Glory'' is a 2007 American sports comedy film directed by Will Speck and Josh Gordon, written by Jeff Cox, Craig Cox, John Altschuler and Dave Krinsky, and starring Will Ferrell and Jon Heder with Will Arnett, Amy Poehler, William Fich ...

'' *In 2022, Quebec Internet star Joel Martel used a modified version of the song during a binge watch of a series called "Pignon sur rue", that aired on his Twitch channel. He played the song when one of his followers, Francois Guyon AKA L'homme du futur, showed up every night *The song was sampled in the song " Berzerk" by

Eminem Marshall Bruce Mathers III (born October 17, 1972), known professionally as Eminem (; often stylized as EMINƎM), is an American rapper and record producer. He is credited with popularizing hip hop in middle America and is critically acclai ...

on his 2013 album ''

The Marshall Mathers LP 2 ''The Marshall Mathers LP 2'' is the eighth studio album by American rapper Eminem. It was released on November 5, 2013 by Aftermath Entertainment, Shady Records, and Interscope Records. The album is Eminem's last to have the involvement of inde ...

''. *In 2007, it was used in an episode of the

Adult Swim Adult Swim (AS; stylized as

dult swim Dult is a village in Batala in Gurdaspur district of Punjab State, India. It is located from sub district headquarter, from district headquarter and from Sri Hargobindpur. The village is administrated by Sarpanch an elected representati ...

and often abbreviated as s is an American adult-oriented night-time cable television Television channel, channel that shares channel space with the basic cable network Cartoon Network and is programme ...

series ''

Lucy, the Daughter of the Devil ''Lucy, the Daughter of the Devil'' is an American adult computer-animated television series that aired on Cartoon Network's late-night programming block Adult Swim. It was created and directed by Loren Bouchard (who later made the Fox show ' ...

''. *The song was the inspiration for the 1989 rap artist

Maestro Fresh-Wes Wesley "Wes" Williams (born March 31, 1968) is a Canadian rapper, record producer, actor, and author. He is known professionally by his stage names Maestro Fresh Wes (formerly Maestro Fresh-Wes) or Maestro as a musician, and is credited by his ...

hit

Let Your Backbone Slide "Let Your Backbone Slide" is the debut single by Maestro Fresh-Wes, released in 1989 from his first album, '' Symphony in Effect''. In Canada, over 50,000 copies of the single were sold, making Maestro the first Canadian rapper to have a gold singl ...

References

External links

Lyrics of this song
{{DEFAULTSORT:Stroke, The 1981 debut singles 1981 songs Billy Squier songs Capitol Records singles Funk rock songs Song recordings produced by Reinhold Mack Songs written by Billy Squier