Recently a friend asked me what my favorite song was about a long lost love. There was one that came to mind - but I was embarrassed to tell him. It was recorded by the Partridge Family, and the woman's name is never given. But it captures the bittersweet sadness of the man she left behind, singing "I know now more than me, she loved the rain."

"Rainmaker" appears on the 1971 album "Sound Magazine," which is considered the best of the group's ten records.

It was one year after the TV show premiered, and the album matches the show's premise with songs about the life of a star. David Cassidy was just 21, but he was already an idol to teenagers across America. The song tries to find a personal story behind the life of fame and glamour.

"She came with the rain," Cassidy sings wistfully, remembering the ribbon in her hair. It's a sad melody with a piano and acoustic guitar, and he starts by saying that "I never even knew her name." It implies that the woman is a groupie, a freedom-loving drifter who won't be tied down. "She just slipped away from me to who knows where."

There's themes of both sadness and freedom, like the song "Ruby Tuesday" (which also describes a free spirit who's unforgettable.) But after a nostalgic verse in a minor key, Cassidy's brassy voice switches to an enthusiastic chorus calling out one last impossible hope - to whoever makes the rain. "Rainmaker, does she have to be free?" The song isn't about the woman, but about the feeling of having lost her. "I guess you know she took the best part of me," Cassidy sings with resigned affection. "Rainmaker, I'll wait endlessly. If there's a way to make her come back to me..."

The chorus delivers a rambly bass and piano, like it's celebrating the woman's freedom. But the song has a complicated structure, returning to its original minor key to deliver the second verse. Each verse has just six short lines, but they deliver the entire story of their relationship.

"Love was only yesterday, and now tomorrow waits in vain
She never promised me she'd stay,
so a stranger to my love she will remain

"And I know more than me she loved the rain."

Learn more about this author, Moe Zilla.
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