"Your Daddy Don't Know (What Your Mama's Gonna Do Tonight)" is a song by the Canadian rock band

Toronto Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the most populous city in Canada and the fourth most populous city in North America. The city is the ancho ...

, from their 1982 album '' Get It on Credit''. The song was written by Geoffrey Iwamoto and Michael Roth, and was the only song on the album not written or cowritten by any member of the band.Scott Benarde, "Women rock steady and win recognition". ''

South Florida Sun Sentinel The ''Sun Sentinel'' (also known as the ''South Florida Sun Sentinel'', known until 2008 as the ''Sun-Sentinel'', and stylized on its masthead as ''SunSentinel'') is the main daily newspaper of Fort Lauderdale, Florida, as well as surrounding Br ...

'', August 20, 1982. Iwamoto and Roth were a songwriting duo whose other noteworthy song, "My Heart Is Still Young", was recorded by

Jennifer Rush Jennifer Rush (born Heidi Stern; September 28, 1960) is an American pop and rock singer. She achieved success during the mid-1980s with several singles and studio albums including the million-selling single " The Power of Love", which she co-w ...

and Paris Black. The song has been interpreted as being about a

stripper A stripper or exotic dancer is a person whose occupation involves performing striptease in a public adult entertainment venue such as a strip club. At times, a stripper may be hired to perform at a bachelor party or other private event. M ...

or a woman about to cheat on her husband, although the band's keyboardist Scott Kreyer claimed in interviews to not know what the song was actually about.

Impact

The band's biggest chart hit, it peaked at #5 in the ''

RPM Revolutions per minute (abbreviated rpm, RPM, rev/min, r/min, or with the notation min−1) is a unit of rotational speed or rotational frequency for rotating machines. Standards ISO 80000-3:2019 defines a unit of rotation as the dimensionl ...

'' charts in Canada, and at #77 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 ...

'' charts in the United States. In 1983, it was used as the soundtrack to a

Labatt Blue Labatt Brewing Company Limited (french: La Brasserie Labatt Limitée) is a Belgian-owned brewery headquartered in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Founded in 1847, Labatt is the largest brewer in Canada. In 1995, it was purchased by Belgian brewer Int ...

beer commercial. Despite its popular success, the song has received mixed reception from critics; Evan Cater of ''

AllMusic AllMusic (previously known as All Music Guide and AMG) is an American online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on musicians and bands. Initiated in 1991, the databas ...

'' refers to the album as a "debacle" and does not single "Your Daddy Don't Know" out as an exception to his otherwise negative assessment of the album's quality, while Greg Burliuk of the ''

Kingston Whig-Standard ''The Kingston Whig-Standard'' is a newspaper in Kingston, Ontario, Canada. It is published five days a week, from Tuesday to Saturday. It publishes a mix of community, national and international news and is currently owned by Postmedia. It has ...

'' named it as a highlight of the album and later wrote that the lack of a single of equivalent strength was one of the biggest problems with the band's followup album '' Girls' Night Out''. When the song began receiving radio airplay in the United States, Scott Benarde of the ''

'' called it "far from the best the album offers", and opined that it "really sounds like a rip-off of a couple of

Rick Springfield Richard Lewis Springthorpe (born 23 August 1949), known professionally as Rick Springfield, is an Australian-American musician and actor. He was a member of the pop rock group Zoot from 1969 to 1971, then started his solo career with his debut ...

tunes". The song was nominated for two

Juno Awards The Juno Awards, more popularly known as the JUNOS, are awards presented annually to Canadian musical artists and bands to acknowledge their artistic and technical achievements in all aspects of music. New members of the Canadian Music Hall of ...

at the

Juno Awards of 1983 The Juno Awards of 1983, representing Canadian music industry achievements of the previous year, were awarded on 5 April 1983 in Toronto at a ceremony hosted by Burton Cummings and Alan Thicke at the Harbour Castle Hilton in the Metropolitan Bal ...

, for Bestselling Single of the Year and Songwriter of the Year.

Legacy

In 1984, it was included in the band's ''

Greatest Hits A greatest hits album or best-of album is a type of compilation album that collects popular and commercially successful songs by a particular artist or band. While greatest hits albums are typically supported by the artist, they can also be crea ...

'' compilation. The song was included in the 2001 edition of '' Oh What a Feeling: A Vital Collection of Canadian Music'', a multi-disc compilation of Canadian pop and rock hits released to mark the 30th anniversary of the Juno Awards. In 2002, the song was recorded by

the New Pornographers The New Pornographers are a Canadian indie rock band, formed in 1997 in Vancouver. Presented as a musical collective of singer-songwriters and musicians from multiple projects, the band has released eight studio albums to critical acclaim for th ...

, with

Neko Case Neko Richelle Case (; born September 8, 1970) is an American singer-songwriter and member of the Canadian indie rock group the New Pornographers. Case has a powerful, untrained contralto voice, which has been described by contemporaries and cri ...

on lead vocals, for the film soundtrack '' Fubar: The Album'', which featured contemporary Canadian bands recording covers of 1980s Canadian rock hits. In 2022, the song was used as a lip sync number in an episode of '' Canada's Drag Race: Canada vs. the World''.Kevin O'Keeffe
"‘Canada’s Drag Race: Canada vs The World’ Episode 4 recap: Stand-up gals"
''

Xtra! ''Xtra Magazine'' (formerly ''DailyXtra'' and ''Xtra!'') is an LGBTQ-focused digital publication and former print newspaper published by Pink Triangle Press in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The publication is a continuation of the company's former pr ...

'', December 10, 2022.

References

{{reflist 1982 songs 1982 singles Canadian rock songs