Please Don't Go (KC and the Sunshine Band song)


"Please Don't Go" is a song recorded and released in 1979 on the KC and the Sunshine Band album Do You Wanna Go Party. Originally written in the key of D flat, the song was the band's first love ballad. In the song, the subject pleads for a second chance. Shortly after the song's one-week run at number one, the group broke up and Harry Wayne Casey went solo. The song was a number-one hit on the Australian ARIA Charts, their sixth and final number-one hit in Canada on the RPM national chart as well as their fifth and final number-one hit on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 charts, and the first number-one hit of the 1980s. "Please Don't Go" was actually part of a double-sided single, with the flip slide "I Betcha Didn't Know That" being released to R&B stations and hitting number 25 on the R&B chart.

Original version

Chart history

The song was the first No. 1 hit of the 1980s on the Billboard Hot 100.
The song was also an international chart hit, reaching No. 1 in Australia and Canada and charting in Belgium, Germany, Ireland, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway and the UK.

Weekly charts

Year-end charts

All-time charts

Double You version

Track listings

; CD maxi
  1. "Please Don't Go" – 3:18
  2. "Please Don't Go" – 6:14
  3. "Please Don't Go" – 3:31
  4. "Please Don't Go" – 3:18
; 7" single
  1. "Please Don't Go" – 3:18
  2. "Please Don't Go" – 3:18
; 7" single – France
  1. "Please Don't Go" – 3:18
  2. "Please Don't Go" – 3:31
; 12" maxi – Germany, Italy, Spain, U.S.
  1. "Please Don't Go" – 6:14
  2. "Please Don't Go" – 3:18
  3. "Please Don't Go" – 3:31
  4. "Please Don't Go" – 3:18
; 12" maxi – France
  1. "Please Don't Go" – 6:14
  2. "Please Don't Go" – 3:31
; CD maxi / 12" maxi – Remixes
  1. "Please Don't Go" – 5:20
  2. "Organ Dream" – 2:15
  3. "Please Don't Go" – 4:55
  4. "Please Don't Go" – 1:45
; CD maxi / 12" maxi – Techno remixes
  1. "Please Don't Go" – 6:00
  2. "Please Don't Go" – 5:00
  3. "Please Don't Go" – 4:55

    Charts

Weekly charts

Year-end charts

Certifications

KWS version

A sound-alike cover of Double You's arrangement was released as the debut single by the British group KWS and hit number one on the UK Singles Chart for five weeks in May 1992 and reached number six on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 in October that year. In Germany, the song reached No. 7 but disappeared out of the German Singles Chart the following week due to legal issues with Double You, who covered the song before. Due to this fall, "Please Don't Go" is the song with the highest position that dropped out of the country's Singles Chart the following week.
It was recorded and released after record company Network Records failed to secure UK distribution rights for the Double You version. KWS band member Chris King heard the Double You version in a club in early 1992, and, bringing together the other KWS members to form the band, decided to cover it "like The Love Affair covered Robert Knight's 'Everlasting Love' or David Parton covered Stevie Wonder's 'Isn't She Lovely'." The similarity between the versions resulted in Network paying compensation to Roberto Zanetti, Double You's producer, following three years of legal action.
The KWS version was dedicated in honour of Nottingham Forest defender Des Walker, who was on the verge of signing for Italian team Sampdoria. It was also a double A-side with "Game Boy"; King recalled: "We wanted something new and Game Boy was my son's favourite games console at the time. There were various mixes on the 12-inch single with silly names like "Afternoon of the Rhino", which had been the title of a northern soul single by Mike Post."

Release

The single was picked up as a news story by a local Nottingham TV station. BBC Radio 1 soon made it "Record of the Week" and it climbed from number 30 in the UK Singles Chart to number 9 and then in its third week to number 1, which is when the group first performed it on Top of the Pops. They performed it five times on the show, one week upsetting Elton John by using Dressing Room 1, relegating John to Dressing Room 2. Across the song's five-week reign at the top of the UK Singles Chart, it kept SL2's "On a Ragga Tip", Guns N' Roses' "Knockin' on Heaven's Door", Shut Up & Dance's "Raving I'm Raving" and Kris Kross' "Jump" stalled at number 2. It was ultimately certified Gold by the British Phonographic Industry.
The same week "Please Don't Go" was withdrawn in Germany, and only seven days after the song reached the 500,000 sales mark in the UK, the Nottinghamshire County Council honoured KWS with a civic reception. Council chairman Gordon Young commented: "All the good work they are doing is helping to put Nottingham in a good light. We like to put on receptions for people that have achieved something. We are proud of what they have done and will wish them well for the future."

Critical reception

Joseph McCombs of AllMusic was mixed in his assessment of the KWS cover, writing that: "The bright vocals, synth bleeps, and predictable house groove that drove 'Please Don't Go' to the top of the charts wear thin quickly." Larry Flick from Billboard described the song as a "House-induced cover" and noted further that the beats "are hard enough to fill dancefloors, but are brightened by radio-friendly vocals and slick synths." In 2017, BuzzFeed listed the song at number 52 in their list of "The 101 Greatest Dance Songs Of the '90s". "It's hard to muster much love for 'Please Don’t Go' – a barely adequate trot through a good song," Tom Ewing of Freaky Trigger wrote in his 3/10 review of the cover; "It's a good example, though, of one of the nineties least-regarded, most revival-immune style, the generic dance cover version. 'Please Don’t Go' isn't quite as deathly as the king of the dance cover version, Undercover's formica take on 'Baker Street', but it’s never memorable. That this nullity got five weeks at the top says more about the immobile singles chart than any double-digit run." Ewing considers "Game Boy", the other song in the double A-side release, to be as close as the UK Singles Chart came to a hardcore number one, but nonetheless concedes that: "As 'ardkore goes, it's poor, a collection of five years of weary dance tropes in search of even one good hook – Beltram-style hoover noises, house piano, cut-up vocal samples, a dubby bassline, none of them sticking around long enough to make an impact."

Track listings

; CD Maxi
  1. "Please Don't Go" – 3:40
  2. "Please Don't Go" – 6:09
  3. "Game Boy" – 3:23
  4. "Kollision" – 4:12

    Charts

Weekly charts

Year-end charts

Basshunter version

In 2008, it was remade into a eurodance tune by dance-techno musician Basshunter.
It was released as a single in Sweden, where it reached number 6.
The song was originally planned to be released in the UK as the second single from Now You're Gone – The Album on June 23, 2008. However, the release was cancelled due to technical difficulties and "All I Ever Wanted" took its place on July 7. It had much more success than originally thought as the single reached number 2 in the UK charts.
However, despite rumours that this would be the third UK single, "Angel in the Night" was released instead and was premiered on BBC Radio 1 on 22 August 2008, during Scott Mills's "Friday Floor Fillers".
The Guardian described the single as europop.

Track listing

  1. "Please Don't Go" – 2:58
  2. "Please Don't Go" – 5:00
  3. "Please Don't Go" – 4:39
  4. "Please Don't Go" – 5:37

    Charts

Other cover versions