“Lightning Crashes” by Live

"Lightning Crashes" is the slow-burning centerpiece of Throwing Copper, Live's second album, and it went to American radio in January 1995 as the record's third single. Ed Kowalczyk wrote the words, the music is credited to all four members, and Jerry Harrison produced it with the band, with Gary Kurfirst as executive producer.

It builds like a storm rolling in. Kowalczyk's voice starts out hushed and searching over a slow, patient groove, with Patrick Dahlheimer's bass and Chad Gracey's drums holding back, and then the electric guitars of Kowalczyk and Chad Taylor surge up and the whole thing breaks wide open. Lou Giordano engineered it, and Tom Lord-Alge's mix gives that climb real weight: solemn, spiritual and enormous, rock with its eyes turned upward.

It was never sold as a single in the United States, but radio played it so much that it reached 12 on the Hot 100 Airplay chart, and it ruled the Album Rock Tracks chart for 10 weeks and Modern Rock Tracks for nine. It got to 3 in Canada, too. Billboard has since counted it among the all-time giants of its rock charts: 70th on the Mainstream Rock chart in 2021, and 22nd on Alternative Airplay two years later.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.