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"Maneater"
#1 weeks: 2
weeks: 1983-01-01, 1983-01-08
genre: pop / rock, dance-rock, new wave, blue-eyed soul
artist: Daryl Hall and John Oates
album: H2O
writers: Sara Allen, Daryl Hall, John Oates
producers: Daryl Hall, John Oates
label:
lengths: 4:33

"Maneater" is a single recorded by American duo Hall & Oates from their 1982 album HO. It reached number-one on the BillboardHot 100 chart on December 18, 1982. It remained in the top spot for four weeks, more than any of the duo's five other number-one hits. According to John Oates the inspiration for this song was English model and actress Kelly LeBrock.

In an interview with American Songwriter, Daryl Hall states: John had written a prototype of “Maneater”; he was banging it around with Edgar Winter. It was like a reggae song. I said, “Well, the chords are interesting, but I think we should change the groove.” I changed it to that Motown kind of groove. So we did that, and I played it for Sara (Allen) and sang it for her…[Sings] “Oh here she comes/Watch out boy she’ll chew you up/Oh here she comes/She’s a maneater…and a …” I forget what the last line was. She said, “Drop that shit in the end and go, ‘She’s a maneater,’ and stop! And I said, ‘No, you’re crazy, that’s messed up.’” Then I thought about it, and I realized she was right. And it made all the difference in the song.

The Hall & Oates music video opens with a woman walking down a red staircase, and the band playing in a dimly lit studio with shafts of light projecting down on them. The band members step in and out of the light for their lip sync. A young woman in a short party dress is shown in fade-in and fade-out shots, along with a black jaguar, hence the song line "The woman is wild, a she-cat tamed by the purr of a Jaguar." The song refrain is "Whoa, oh here she comes; watch out boy, she'll chew you up; whoa, oh here she comes, she's a maneater".

In 2006, the song and its subject matter were adapted and re-interpreted by Nelly Furtado for her song, also called "Maneater" from her album Loose. The song was sampled once more in 2006 when the Ying Yang Twins (featuring Wyclef and Mr. Collipark) released the song "Dangerous". The Hall & Oates version features a saxophone solo by Charles "Mr. Casual" DeChant. American rapper Hot Karl used the music and chorus of Maneater in a song satirizing the hip hop industry, also called "Maneater". In his intro, Karl alludes to the original song's popularity, telling the audience "I don't want to see any of you really hard guys not singing the words, because I know you know 'em! You don't not know 'Maneater'!" A cover of the song is also used as the theme for the pilot episode of the Adult Swim show Lucy, the Daughter of the Devil. Hall and Oates also appeared on Will and Grace during Grace's wedding to James, singing Maneater as she walked down the aisle.

In 2009, the song appeared on the Ballad Of Gay Tonyepisode of the X-Box 360 exclusive video game, Grand Theft Auto: Episodes From Liberty City, as a part of the Vice City FM radio station.

In November 2008, Hall & Oates initiated legal action against their music publisher (Warner/Chappell Music). An unidentified singer-songwriter was alleged to have used Maneater in a 2006 recording, infringing copyright, and by failing to sue for copyright infringement, Warner Chappell Music were alleged to have breached their contract with Hall and Oates.

The song "We're Live (Danger)" by rapper Royce Da 5'9" (which was featured in the highly acclaimed game Grand Theft Auto III) contains a sample from the Hall & Oates song "Maneater".

The now defunct Chicago band Split Habit covered the song live, and also included it on their 2004 album Put Your Money Where Your Mouth Is.

Las Vegas band The Kickwurmz released two versions of the song circa 1998: Maneater, and Man Eata' Digital Media House Remix.

The original version of the song is heard in the 1999 film Runaway Bride, and appears on the soundtrack. Early in the movie Richard Gere's character Ike Graham describes several mythological 'Maneaters' in a newspaper column, and then cites one human one, Julia Roberts's Maggie Carpenter, who's left multiple men standing at the altar.

Jazz/electronica group The Bird and the Bee covered the song live with John Oates on March 5, 2010 at the El Rey Theater in Los Angeles, California. Their upcoming album Interpreting the Masters Volume 1: A Tribute to Daryl Hall and John Oateswill include a studio recorded cover of "Maneater", featuring backing vocals from Garbage vocalist Shirley Manson, and is to be released March 23, 2010.