11 October 1998
Surprisingly, given how her big-budget power ballads were on ’80s and ’90s radio more often than the traffic news, this is only Diane Warren’s second Irish number one single. The first was ‘Nothing’s Gonna Stop Us Now’, from a movie about a shop-floor dummy who comes to life. This one is also from a movie, Armageddon, about the outer-space encounter of two slightly craggier inanimate objects, namely an asteroid and Bruce Willis. It also stars Liv Tyler, and perhaps she overheard the producers wondering who they’d get to sing the theme song, then put in a good word for her old man.
I can’t say I care enough about Aerosmith, a try-hard American version of the Rolling Stones that aren’t the Black Crowes, to comment on how un-Aerosmith this record probably is. Orchestras, synths, echoing snare hits, all the bombast of a Diane Warren hit multiplied by the excess of a Michael Bay movie: that’s what ‘I Don’t Want To Miss A Thing’ is. Papa Tyler gurns and squeals his way through some almighty maudlin and syrupy lyrics: “Then I kiss your eyes / And thank God we’re together” is where my stomach usually fails me. You can forget about the likeable charm of ‘Nothing’s Gonna Stop Us Now’: the obnoxious, Bay-ist ‘I Don’t Want To Miss A Thing’ will have you rooting for the Earth-bound asteroid.
