Songfacts®:

• Bonnie Raitt brings a reggae groove to "Have A Heart," written by the singer-songwriter Bonnie Hayes. In the song, Raitt is dealing with a guy who is just stringing her along. "Have a heart" she tells him, asking him to let her go so she can move on.
  
  The song came from real life: Bonnie Hayes was splitting from her boyfriend of eight years, and he was the inspiration. When she started writing it, the song had a comic tilt, but that changed once she got into it. "When I sat down to write those jokey lyrics, these emotional feelings came out instead," she explained to the San Francisco Chronicle.
• Bonnie Raitt had a sizable following in the '70s when her albums would consistently sell in the hundreds of thousands and she could headline decent-sized venues (in 1974, Bruce Springsteen was one of her opening acts). That changed in the '80s when her record label, Warners, stopped supporting her and radio stations stopped playing her music. Raitt had also developed a drinking problem and her health was suffering.
  
  After Warners dropped her in 1987, she had to tour solo because she couldn't pay a band. This transformed her sound, forcing her to simplify songs and make them more intimate. When she signed with Capitol and made the Nick Of Time album with producer Don Was, they took this approach, making sure every song could stand on its own with just Raitt performing it. The results were spectacular. The album was a huge success, selling a staggering 5 million copies in America and going to #1. It was a stunning comeback for Raitt, who was 39 when she made it and had built up lots of karma by supporting struggling artists and doing good deeds like working to secure health benefits for a generation of blues musicians who were struggling financially.
• The Nick Of Time album was released in March 1989 with her cover of John Hiatt's "Thing Called Love" as the first single. It didn't get much attention, and neither did "Have A Heart" when it was released as the second single. The turnaround came on February 21, 1990, when Raitt won four Grammy Awards, including Album Of The Year (this was the year Milli Vanilli won Best New Artist but had to return it because they didn't sing on their album). Overnight, Raitt's songs got added to playlists, giving her radio support fo the first time in a decade. On April 7, 1990, "Have A Heart" peaked at #49 in the US, over a year after it was first released on the album.
• Bonnie Hayes was hoping Huey Lewis & the News would record this song. Her brother, Chris Hayes, was the group's guitarist at that point.
  
  Bonnie ended up with another song on the Nick Of Time album ("Love Letter") and one on Raitt's next album, Luck Of The Draw ("Slow Ride").
• "Have A Heart" was used in the 1990 movie Heart Condition, starring Denzel Washington and Bob Hoskins. Scenes from the film are used in the music video.
• Rait performed this song and "Thing Called Love" on Saturday Night Live when she was the musical guest for the January 20, 1990 episode. It was her second appearance on the show; her first was in 1978.