Boston, ‘Don’t Look Back’ – Butch’s Way Back Wednesday

As a music fan there is always something new and great, but there really is something special about the songs you grew up listening to. For me, that was 70′s and 80′s classic rock. If I am in a shi**y mood, I throw in a little Zeppelin or Rush and take a trip back to rolling in my mom’s T-Bird. Now every Wednesday you get to take that trip with me. It’s Way Back Wednesday with Butch, and today’s feature is a song we first heard 35 years ago in 1978… Boston’s, “Don't Look Back.”

"Don't Look Back" is the title track off of the second studio album from Boston, released in 1978. The track is one of the band's biggest hits, reaching #4 in 1978 on the Billboard Hot 100. The album sold over 4 million copies in the first month of its release, and has been certified 7x Platinum by the RIAA in the U.S.

When Don't Look Back was released on LP, 8-track and cassette in 1978, it was originally to be titled Arrival, but Boston members discovered that ABBA had already released an album by that name, so Don't Look Back was chosen instead. The album was listed erroneously as "Arrival" in the cassette inserts of some other CBS releases at the time promoting albums available from the record company and its associated labels.

This album also marked the beginning of the band's legal fight with its record label Epic Records. Tom Scholz has been on record stating that executives at Epic pushed him and the band into releasing the album before they felt it was ready. He said of Don't Look Back that "it was ridiculously short. It needed another song." Their next album, Third Stage, was not released for another eight years, by which time the band and record label had parted ways and were fighting a courtroom battle that Boston ultimately won.

Now take a trip back 35 years with us to 1978...