"Lay Down Your Arms" is a pop rock

Pop rock

Pop rock is a music genre which mixes a catchy pop style and light lyrics in its guitar-based rock songs. There are varying definitions of the term, ranging from a slower and mellower form of rock music to a subgenre of pop music...

 song which Charlotte Caffey

Charlotte Caffey

Charlotte Irene Caffey is an American rock and roll guitarist and songwriter, best known for her work in the Go-Go's in the 1980s, including writing "We Got the Beat."...

, Ralph Schuckett and Ellen Shipley

Ellen Shipley

Ellen Shipley, born 24 March 1949 in New York, is a US musician and songwriter.-Biography:Shipley is best known for work with Rick Nowels. Together they've written for Kim Wilde and worked on the Belinda Carlisle albums Belinda, Heaven on Earth, Runaway Horses, and Live Your Life Be Free...

 wrote and composed, and which Shipley produced, for The Graces

The Graces (band)

The Graces were a US band in the late 1980s and early 1990s featuring Charlotte Caffey, Meredith Brooks, and Gia Ciambotti. Formed in 1988, they released their debut album Perfect View on A&M Records in 1989. Their first single "Lay Down Your Arms" hit #56 on the Billboard Hot 100 but the album...

's first album Perfect View (1989). Caffey was the lead vocalist on the song, and it was released as the band's debut single. It charted at #56 in the Billboard charts.

Belinda Carlisle Version

The song was interpreted

Cover version

In popular music, a cover version or cover song, or simply cover, is a new performance or recording of a contemporary or previously recorded, commercially released song or popular song...

 by American singer Belinda Carlisle

Belinda Carlisle

Belinda Jo Carlisle is an American singer who gained worldwide fame as the lead vocalist of the Go-Go's, one of the most successful all-female bands and the first such group whose members wrote their own songs and played their own instruments...

, who, like her friend Caffey, was an alumna of "The Go-Go's

The Go-Go's

The Go-Go’s are an all-female American rock band formed in 1978. They made history as the first all-female band that both wrote their own songs and played their own instruments to top the Billboard album charts....

." It was the second song Carlisle released from her fifth studio album, Real

Real (Belinda Carlisle album)

Real is the fifth studio album by American singer Belinda Carlisle, first released on September 29, 1993. The album has a genre of mainly pop songs written by Charlotte Caffey, Thomas Caffey, Ralph Schuckett and half co-written by Carlisle...

, which she released in 1993. Carlisle's version, which Mr. Schuckett produced, was the more successful of the two versions, charting at number 27 on the UK Singles Chart

UK Singles Chart

The UK Singles Chart is compiled by The Official Charts Company on behalf of the British record-industry. The full chart contains the top selling 200 singles in the United Kingdom based upon combined record sales and download numbers, though some media outlets only list the Top 40 or the Top 75 ...

. The CD single

CD single

A CD single is a music single in the form of a standard size Compact Disc, not to be confused with the 3-inch CD single, which uses a smaller form factor. The format was introduced in the mid-1980s, but did not gain its place in the market until the early 1990s...

included three additional tracks, "Tell Me," "Wrap My Arms," and "Here Comes My Baby"; the last two were 8-track demonstration recordings.

Track listing

• 4 track CD single

1. "Lay Down Your Arms"
2. "Tell Me"
3. "Wrap My Arms Around You" (8-track demo)
4. "Here Comes My Baby" (8-track demo)

Charts

Chart (1993)	Peak position
UK Singles Chart	27