After Danny Gokey shouted his way through Terence Trent D’Arby’s “Dance Little Sister” the other night on American Idol (rightfully earning the wrath of the dialing/texting public, who pushed Kris Allen through the finale), I figured it was worth taking today to undo some of the damage done to D’Arby’s legacy.

“Dance Little Sister” was the fourth single taken from D’Arby’s 1987 debut, Introducing The Hardline According To Terence Trent D’Arby, reaching #30. D’Arby had courted controversy right out of the gate with his declaration that the album was more important than The Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper. A bold, biased assessment, but second single “Wishing Well” did reach #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 back in May of 1988, and for a moment, there was something good going on:

Twenty years after the release of The Hardline, three tunes from the album were heard in Judd Apatow’s 2007 film Knocked Up—“Wishing Well,” “If You Let Me Say” (#68) and “Sign Your Name” (#4). Subsequent releases post-Hardline weren’t as strong (and certainly not very frequent), and the public pretty much forgot about him. As for what D’Arby’s up to these days, he changed his name to Sananda Maitreya in 2001, and has been self-releasing material since.

Purchase Terence Trent D’Arby – “Wishing Well” via iTunes, Amazon MP3.