The Living Years

"The Living Years"
Single by Mike + The Mechanics
from the album Living Years
B-side	"Too Many Friends"
Released	27 December 1988[1]
Recorded	1988
Genre	Soft rock
Length	5:32
Label	Atlantic, WEA
Songwriter(s)	B. A. Robertson, Mike Rutherford
Producer(s)	Christopher Neil, Mike Rutherford
Mike + The Mechanics singles chronology
"Nobody's Perfect" (1988) "The Living Years" (1988) "Seeing Is Believing" (1989)
Official video
"The Living Years" on YouTube

"The Living Years" is a soft rock ballad written by B. A. Robertson and Mike Rutherford, and recorded by Rutherford's British rock band Mike + The Mechanics. It was released in December 1988 in the United Kingdom and in the United States as the second single from their album Living Years. The song was a chart hit around the world, topping the US Billboard Hot 100 on 25 March 1989, the band's only number one and last top ten hit on that chart,^[2] and reaching number-one in Australia, Canada and Ireland and number 2 in the UK. It spent four weeks at number-one on the US Billboard Adult Contemporary chart. Paul Carrack sings lead vocals on the track.

The song addresses a son's regret over unresolved conflict with his now-deceased father. It won the Ivor Novello Award for Best Song Musically and Lyrically in 1989,^[3] and was nominated for four Grammy awards in 1990, including Record and Song of the Year, as well as Best Pop Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocals and Best Video. In 1996, famed composer Burt Bacharach opined that the song was one of the finest lyrics of the last ten years.^[4]

In 2004, "The Living Years" was awarded a 4-Million-Air citation by BMI.^[5]