"Lowdown" is a song originally recorded in 1976 by Boz Scaggs from his album Silk Degrees.

Paich, along with fellow "Lowdown" session musicians bassist David Hungate and drummer Jeff Porcaro, would later go on to form the band Toto.

[7] Public response was very positive and soon Scaggs' record label, Columbia, sent the song to other R&B-oriented radio stations for airplay.

It broke big on Top 40 stations as well, and when it was officially released as a single, it became Scaggs's first major hit, reaching #1 on Cash Box Top 100 and number three on Billboard Pop Singles.

Scaggs is quoted as saying that the success of "Lowdown" was "an accident" and that, even though it was their favorite from Silk Degrees, he and the others involved in the making of the song thought there "wasn't a chance in hell" that it would be released as a single.