"Waiting for a Girl Like You" is a 1981 power ballad[2] by the British-American rock band Foreigner released as the second single from the album 4 (1981) and was co-written by Lou Gramm and Mick Jones.

The opening motif was written by Ian McDonald[4] and the distinctive synthesizer theme was performed by the then-little-known Thomas Dolby.

Billboard said that "The melodic arrangement enhances the lyrics while the tasty orchestration and commanding vocal maximizes the love ballad's effectiveness.

[16]In his autobiography, Lou Gramm tells of a beautiful, mysterious woman who appeared in the control room when he was recording his vocal and gave him the inspiration to deliver the stirring take that was better than he has ever sung the song.

Dolby remembers Mutt Lange leaving him to his own devices in the studio one night, "like a kid locked in a toy shop" to develop the intro to the song with six tracks of the multitrack available.

These were sustained single notes in a minor scale, each recorded on a single track of a (separate) 2" multitrack tape; Dolby "played" the faders on the mixing console at Electric Lady Studios (by fading in and out the sustained notes) like a mellotron and bounced down the result onto two tracks.