There are albums that capture a band finding its sound.
Then there are albums that catch artists actively trying to escape one. ๐๐ถ
Hall & Oatesโ 1976 album Bigger Than Both of Us falls firmly into the second camp.
By the time Daryl Hall and John Oates entered this period of their career, the duo had already started tasting proper commercial success thanks to โSara Smileโ. Plenty of artists would have looked at that breakthrough, rubbed their hands together and said, โRight lads, more of that then.โ
Hall & Oates?
Nah, mun.
They got restless. ๐ฅ
Instead of simply cloning what had worked, they pushed deeper into soul, pop, rock, blues and increasingly adventurous songwriting. The result was an album that sounded like two musicians refusing to be shoved into one tidy little box.
And hidden amongst all that musical wandering was a song called โRich Girl.โ
That one did rather well.
๐ค Hall & Oates Were Never Just One Thing
One of the easiest mistakes to make when looking back at Hall & Oates is to remember only the massive glossy hits of the late โ70s and early โ80s.
You know the ones.
โManeater.โ
โYou Make My Dreams.โ
โPrivate Eyes.โ
โI Canโt Go for That (No Can Do).โ
Absolute weapons. ๐ถ๐ฅ
But Hall & Oatesโ musical roots were far messier and much more interesting than the polished pop machine people sometimes remember.
Across their early career, the pair bounced between folk, singer-songwriter material, Philadelphia soul, R&B, rock, experimental sounds and straight-up pop.
They werenโt walking into the studio with one rigid blueprint.
They were poking everything with a stick to see what made a noise.
That spirit is all over Bigger Than Both of Us.
๐ฟ The Album Where Everything Was Still Up for Grabs
Released in 1976, Bigger Than Both of Us arrived at an important point in the duoโs career.
Hall & Oates had already scored serious attention with โSara Smileโ, which had become their first major American hit.
Suddenly there was pressure.
Not necessarily from the band themselves, but from the industry.
When youโve had a breakthrough single, record labels tend to develop a mysterious medical condition known as:
โCan you do exactly that again?โ
Hall & Oates clearly werenโt interested.
Instead, Bigger Than Both of Us became a playground.
There are slick moments.
There are soulful moments.
There are tougher rock flavours.
There are songs that stretch themselves far beyond tidy radio-friendly structures.
It feels like a duo still working out exactly where they belonged.
And perhaps more importantly, realising they didnโt actually have to belong anywhere.
๐บ โBack Together Againโ Brings the Soul
One of the albumโs standout moments is โBack Together Again.โ
Written and sung by John Oates, the track leans heavily into the duoโs R&B and soul influences.
There are horns.
There is groove.
There is that unmistakable Philadelphia flavour running through the thing.
Itโs the sort of song that reminds you Hall & Oates werenโt just pop writers.
These were musicians steeped in soul music.
That foundation would become crucial later when they started combining R&B rhythms with rock production and increasingly modern pop arrangements.
In many ways, you can already hear pieces of the future being assembled.
They just hadnโt finished reading the instructions yet. ๐
๐ธ โRoom to Breatheโ Turns Up the Guitars
Then youโve got โRoom to Breathe.โ
And suddenly things get considerably dirtier.
The track carries a bluesier, tougher rock edge compared with some of the duoโs more polished material.
It is another perfect example of just how unwilling Hall & Oates were to remain in one musical lane.
Soul song?
Yep.
Pop tune?
Yep.
Blues-rock?
Chuck that in as well.
Why not?
There is a restless energy underneath the whole album, almost as though every song is asking:
โWhat else can we get away with?โ
๐ค โDo What You Want, Be What You Areโ Says It All
Few titles sum up the Hall & Oates philosophy of this era quite as perfectly as:
โDo What You Want, Be What You Are.โ
You could practically stick that on the studio door.
The song is soulful, atmospheric and considerably more introspective than the giant pop singles that would later make Hall & Oates household names.
But its title feels almost like a mission statement.
Donโt chase trends.
Donโt repeat yourself.
Donโt become whatever somebody else thinks Hall & Oates should sound like.
Do what you want.
Be what you are.
Tidy philosophy, that. ๐ค
๐ โFallingโ Shows Their Ambitious Side
Then comes โFalling.โ
Clocking in at around six minutes, it isnโt exactly built like a conventional smash-hit single.
And thatโs precisely why itโs interesting.
The song develops through multiple sections and shows the duo stretching their songwriting ambitions.
This is Hall & Oates experimenting with structure rather than simply chasing an immediate hook.
Again, it reinforces the feeling that Bigger Than Both of Us was not created by two blokes desperately trying to crack a commercial formula.
Ironically, of course, they were about to stumble onto one of the biggest songs of their career.
๐ฐ Then โRich Girlโ Happened
And here comes the monster.
โRich Girl.โ
Short.
Sharp.
Ridiculously catchy.
Built around one of those choruses that takes roughly three seconds to permanently lodge itself inside your skull.
The song became Hall & Oatesโ first No. 1 hit in the United States.
And suddenly the pair who had spent much of Bigger Than Both of Us wandering happily around the musical wilderness had a gigantic pop smash on their hands.
Funny how that works, isnโt it?
You spend an album avoiding formulasโฆ
โฆand accidentally write a massive hit anyway. ๐๐ฅ
โRich Girlโ proved that Hall & Oates could make something immediately accessible without completely abandoning their soul background.
That balance would eventually become one of their greatest strengths.
๐ถ The Restlessness Was the Secret Ingredient
The important thing about Bigger Than Both of Us isnโt simply that it contained a No. 1 single.
Itโs what surrounded that hit.
Hall & Oates were still searching.
Still experimenting.
Still figuring out how soul, rock and pop could exist inside the same musical universe.
John Oates has reflected on this period as one where the duo were still trying to discover themselves musically.
And that makes sense when you listen back now.
There isnโt one rigid sound dominating the record.
There are ideas everywhere.
Some point backwards towards their roots.
Others point directly towards what Hall & Oates would become.
๐ The Road to the Massive โ80s Sound
Hall & Oatesโ commercial peak didnโt arrive fully formed in 1976.
It developed gradually.
Throughout the remainder of the decade, the duo kept refining the combination of influences that had always been there.
Soul.
Rock.
Pop.
R&B.
Then, as the musical landscape changed around them, elements of New Wave and increasingly modern studio production started creeping into the mix.
By the early โ80s, everything clicked.
Albums including Voices, Private Eyes and H2O turned Hall & Oates into one of the biggest musical acts on the planet.
But the roots of that success can be heard years earlier.
Including right here.
๐ค The Riff Report Verdict
Bigger Than Both of Us is fascinating because it captures Hall & Oates halfway through becoming Hall & Oates.
Theyโd already found success.
They just hadnโt settled.
And thank goodness for that.
Rather than hammering the same musical nail until the record label was happy, Daryl Hall and John Oates continued experimenting.
Soul one minute.
Rock the next.
Pop melodies everywhere.
Longer arrangements when they fancied them.
And sitting right in the middle of the chaos was โRich Girl,โ waiting to become their first US chart-topper.
Thatโs the beautiful contradiction of the album.
Hall & Oates were trying not to become predictableโฆ
โฆand in the process discovered just how powerful their songwriting could be.
Basically, Bigger Than Both of Us wasnโt the sound of Hall & Oates reaching the finish line.
It was the sound of them realising there wasnโt one. ๐น๐ฅ๐ค
And sometimes, butt, thatโs where the best records come from.
๐ธ What do you reckon?
Is Bigger Than Both of Us an underrated chapter in the Hall & Oates story?
Or are you heading straight for the huge โ80s classics?
Stick your favourite Hall & Oates track on loud and let the debate begin.
Proudly Welsh. Proudly Loud. Zero Apologies. ๐ค๐ด๐ฅ
