Rex Smith and Rachel Sweet Version
"Everlasting Love" reached the Top 40 for the third time in the summer of 1981 via a duet version cut by Rex Smith and Rachel Sweet; this version features revised lyrics including an additional verse of uncredited authorship.
The track marked the Columbia debut of Sweet who'd previously recorded two albums for the New Wave oriented Stiff label. According to Sweet upon submitting the tracks intended to comprise her first album for Columbia - all original songs produced by Pete Solly - she was told: "we'd like you to cut some more songs. And we'd like it if they weren't yours." Columbia was hoping that augmenting Sweet's album with outside material produced by Rick Chertoff - then best known for his work with Air Supply - would provide Sweet with a commercial breakout, with "Everlasting Love" in particular being recorded for its perceived hit potential.
In keeping with the trend for duets prevalent in the late 1970s and early 1980s, Sweet was paired on "Everlasting Love" with another Columbia artist who was being produced by Chertoff: Rex Smith, who had reached #10 in 1979 with "You Take My Breath Away": their duet on "Everlasting Love" was featured on both Sweet's And Then He Kissed Me album and the album Everlasting Love by Smith and the single was a two-track B-side featuring Sweet's "Billy and the Gun" and Smith's "Still Thinking of You" respectively taken from each singer's last-named album.
With neither Smith nor Sweet being a strong Top 40 force, their collaboration on "Everlasting Love" would only generate qualified chart impact: the single peaked at #32 on the Billboard Hot 100 in August 1981, affording Sweet her only Top 40 showing and Smith his second and last. The track also appeared on Billboard's Hot Adult Contemporary chart peaking at #31.
This Rex Smith/Rachel Sweet version of "Everlasting Love" was also a mid-chart item in the UK at #35; in Australia the track reached #41 mainly due to its being a local Top Ten hit in Adelaide at #9. In 1982 the Smith/Sweet version of "Everlasting became a Top Ten hit in Switzerland (#9) and Denmark (#4) also reaching #11 in South Africa.
A promotional video was shot for "Everlasting Love" with Smith and Sweet playing a couple getting married. The singers performed "Everlasting Love" live on the Solid Gold episode aired 19 February 1983: Smith was currently co-hosting the show on which Sweet guested to promote her current single "Voodoo".
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