Can We Still Be Friends

Rundgren recorded it in 1977 at Utopia Sound, his house in Lake Hill, New York, playing every instrument and singing every vocal. He told Songfacts it is "about the best possible way to end a relationship", and that it is not about any one person. It has long been taken as a song about his break with Bebe Buell, which he denies. He has said it helps listeners put their own feelings about a situation into words. Bearsville released it as a single in May 1978, backed with Out of Control in the US and Determination in the UK. It reached No. 8 in Australia and No. 37 in Canada, and Record World called it an easy-going ballad.

Live and covers

It is his fourth most-played song, with 601 performances on setlist.fm, the first at the Bottom Line in New York in May 1978 during the Back to the Bars stands. He sang it with Daryl Hall on Live From Daryl's House in 2009, a version later issued on Hall's BeforeAfter, and remade it as a bossa nova on With a Twist... in 1997. Robert Palmer recorded it for Secrets (1979) at Compass Point in Nassau, and Colin Blunstone, Sui Generis and Mandy Moore followed. It is heard in Dumb and Dumber, Vanilla Sky and Nip/Tuck. The upload in the hypersongs web is the official music video, released by Rhino, which runs a few seconds longer than the album track.