Steve Ellis, Love Affair Singer Behind 'Everlasting Love,' Dies at 76

Steve Ellis, the British singer whose voice carried Love Affair’s “Everlasting Love” to No. 1 in the U.K. in 1968, has died at 76. A message on his social media said he “peacefully left the world on the evening of October 30, 2026, in the presence of his loved ones,” after “complications from a chronic illness,” as reported by Rolling Stone and The Guardian.

No specific cause of death has been made public.

The song that made him

“Everlasting Love” was written by Buzz Cason and Mac Gayden and first recorded by American soul singer Robert Knight, whose version reached No. 13 on the Billboard Hot 100, Rolling Stone noted. Love Affair’s cover, released in December 1967, went bigger in Britain. By February 1968 it was No. 1 on the U.K. singles chart, knocking the Beatles’ “Hello, Goodbye” off the top, and it stayed there for two weeks, according to The Guardian.

Ellis was a teenager at the time. In a 2015 interview quoted by Rolling Stone, he recalled arriving at the session to find a 40-piece orchestra and top session players instead of his bandmates: “Two takes, done. That was it.”

The Guardian reported that the band’s version remains the most popular recording of the song on streaming services and a staple at weddings, even though other covers, including Carl Carlton’s 1974 version, did better in the U.S.

Love Affair’s run of hits

Born in Edgware, northwest London, in 1950, Ellis formed his first band, Soul Survivors, at 15, inspired by Black American soul and R&B acts such as James Brown, The Guardian said. The group became Love Affair in the mid-1960s.

After “Everlasting Love,” Love Affair had three more U.K. Top 10 hits: “Rainbow Valley,” “A Day Without Love” and “Bringing on Back the Good Times.”

Ellis later said he left as the band drifted toward progressive rock. “I’d always been a soul-boy,” he said, as quoted by The Guardian. Rolling Stone dates his exit to 1970.

Life after Love Affair

Ellis went on to lead the band Ellis, whose debut album was produced by The Who’s Roger Daltrey, and later sang with Widowmaker. By the early 1980s he had stepped away from music and was working on the docks in southern England, until a forklift accident badly injured his feet and led to years of operations and therapy, Rolling Stone reported.

He returned to recording with the album “Best of Days,” featuring Daltrey and Paul Weller. The Guardian dates that album to 2008, while Rolling Stone gives 2015. Weller became a regular collaborator, co-producing 2018’s “Boom! Bang! Twang!” Ellis’s most recent album, “Baby Faced Assassin,” came out in September 2026 with three songs created with Weller, according to The Guardian.

Ellis had a complicated relationship with his signature song and refused to play it live for a while, but he came to embrace it. “It used to be a bit of a curse and I thought, ‘You know what. I’m lucky, really,’” he said, as quoted by Rolling Stone. “To have a record of that magnitude at 17 years old. It’s served me very well.”

Tributes

Weller was among those paying tribute, writing on Instagram: “God bless ya Stevie safe travels everlasting love for sure,” The Guardian reported.

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