Given that the Bangles' "Walk Like an Egyptian" had been ranked by Billboard as the number one single of 1987 and that the group had reached number two on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1986 with "Manic Monday" and in 1987 with "Hazy Shade of Winter", the number-five Hot 100 peak of the lead single from their album Everything, "In Your Room", was a comparative disappointment with its parent album Everything—whose original Billboard 200 peak was number 33—being considered a flop.Los Angeles Times March 24, 1989 "Morning Report" by Dennis Hunt p.VI-2 The January 1989 release of "Eternal Flame" as the new Bangles' single was heralded in the Chicago Tribune with the song described as an "old-fashioned killer ballad that is just about as far as one could get from the psychedelic sound of the group's recent Top 5 hit 'In Your Room'."The Chicago Tribune January 27, 1989 "Chart Watching" p.7-I "Eternal Flame" debuted at number 56 on the Hot 100 issue dated February 4, 1989, when "In Your Room" was ranked at number 45, and rose to number one after ten weeks, making the Bangles the third all-female group to top the Hot 100 multiple times, after the Shirelles and the Supremes.Detroit Free Press April 2, 1989 "Two Hit Bands Tinker With Winning Formulas: the Bangles want it their way" by Gary Graff p.6H In addition "Eternal Flame" set a record for the song's co-writers: Billy Steinberg and Tom Kelly, as the first songwriting team to score a number-one Hot 100 hit five years in a row.Lafayette Journal & Courier April 14, 1989 "Tunes Top Off Lists: former native pens #1's on Pop charts"by Byron Purvis p.F1 "Eternal Flame" also afforded the Bangles a two-week tenure at number one on the Adult Contemporary chart.
