Toy Soldiers (song)
| "Toy Soldiers" | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 |
||||||||
| Single by Martika | ||||||||
| from the album Martika | ||||||||
| B-side | "Exchange of Hearts" | |||||||
| Released | January 1989 (UK) May 1989 (US) |
|||||||
| Genre | ||||||||
| Length | 4:47 (album version) 4:19 (edit) |
|||||||
| Label | CBS | |||||||
| Writer(s) |
|
|||||||
| Producer(s) | Michael Jay | |||||||
| Martika singles chronology | ||||||||
|
||||||||
|
||||||||
"Toy Soldiers" is a song by American singer-songwriter Martika appearing on her eponymous debut album in 1988, and released as the second single from it in May 1989. It was a number one Billboard hit song for two weeks in the U.S. in the summer of 1989. An edited version of the song is included in the imported version of the album Toy Soldiers: The Best of Martika.
Martika wrote the song about a friend who was battling a cocaine addiction. "I was a little hesitant because I had only written two songs before and they were light songs. I came up to Michael and said I wanted to write about drugs. It was the first time I got the nerve to write about something that was scary for me to talk about, so I did." According to an episode of VH-1's Pop-Up Video, in which "Toy Soldiers" was featured, the friend-in-question eventually conquered the addiction.
The song is performed in the key of C♯ minor with a tempo of 65 beats per minute in 4
4 time. The song follows a chord progression of A–B–A–B–C♯m–B–C♯m–G♯m–C♯m–B.
Martika is the only one who sings throughout the song, although she is joined on the chorus by some of her former castmates from Kids Incorporated, including Renee Sands, Fergie, Rahsaan Patterson, as well as later cast members Jennifer Love Hewitt and Devyn Puett, as backup vocalists.
...
Wikipedia