Games People Play (Joe South song)
"Games People Play" is a song written, composed, and performed by American singer-songwriter Joe South, released in August 1968.[1] It entered the Billboard Hot 100 in January 1969 and won the 1970 Grammy Awards for both Best Contemporary Song and the Song of the Year.[2]
For other uses of the same title, see Games People Play (disambiguation)."Games People Play"
"Mirror of Your Mind"
August 1968
3:34
Joe South
Joe South
Release[edit]
"Games People Play" is a protest song whose lyrics speak against various forms of hatred, hypocrisy, inhumanity, intolerance, and irresponsibility, in both interpersonal and social interactions between people. Billboard favorably reviewed the song some three months after its release and eight weeks before it finally reached the Hot 100.[3]
The song was released on South's debut album Introspect and as a single, reaching No. 12 on the Hot 100.[4] It was also a No. 6 hit in the UK in 1969, No. 4 in Ireland, and won the Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Song and the Grammy Award for Song of the Year.[2]
The distinctive guitar in the opening is played on a Danelectro electric sitar,[5] which can be seen in a video recorded to support South's album Introspect. Concurrent with South's version of the song on the pop chart, Freddy Weller, guitarist for Paul Revere and the Raiders, released a country version of the song in 1969 as his debut single; this rendition spent two weeks at No. 2 on the Country Chart.[6]