413 Hello Bananarama* - It Ain't What You Do It's The Way That You Do It

( * Fun  Boy  Three  and .... )

Chart  entered : 13  February  1982

Chart  peak : 4

Number  of  hits : 29

I  can't  claim  to  be  a   great  fan  of  this  lot  but  I  do  get  indignant  on  their  behalf  at  the  ongoing  attempt  to airbrush  them  out  of  pop  history  in  order  to  give maximum  credit  to  a  manufactured  band  of  stage  school  brats  that  came  along  a  decade and  a  half  later. ( I  should  note  in  fairness  that  Mel  B  has  acknowledged  them  as  an  inspiration ).

The  pivotal  figure  in  Bananarama  coming  together  in  1979  was  Sara  Dallin , a  17-year  old fashion  student  from  Bristol . Having  relocated  to  London  she  hooked  up  with  her  childhood  friend  Keren  Woodward  who  had  moved  there  to  take  a  job  with  the  BBC's  Pensions  Department. The  duo  went  out  clubbing  and  were  soon  joined  by  Sara's  new  friend  from  her  course  , the  slightly  older  Siobahn  Fahey  from  Dublin.

The  trio  were  all  music  fans  and  became  known  faces  on  the  post-punk  scene, occasionally  being  invited  on  stage  to  do  backing  vocals  for  the  likes  of   The  Monochrome  Set  and  Department  S. They  caught  the  eye  of  ex-Pistol   Paul  Cook  who  invited  them  to  stay  in  a  flat  above  The  Professionals'  rehearsal  space. It's  not  known  if  he  received  "special  favours "  for  this  although  you  could  hardly  blame  him  for  asking.  Siobahn  befriended  London  DJ  Gary  Crowley  who  arranged  for  them  to  record  a  demo  which  became  their  first  single,  a  cover  of  Black  Blood's  1975  European  hit  "Aie  A  Mwana"  in  August  1981. The  lyric  was  entirely  in  Swahili  which  the  girls  learned  phonetically. It's  a  good  tune  performed  with  stronger  vocals  than  you'd  expect  over  a  disco  beat. It  made  the  "Bubbling  Under"  section  of  singles  just  outside  the  chart  and  got  them  a  small  feature  in  The  Face.

One  person  who  noticed  was  Terry  Hall  of  The  Specials  breakaway  group  Fun  Boy  Three  who  invited  them  to  collaborate  on  this,  the  second  single  for  both  groups. The  song  was  originally  a  jazz  tune  written  and  first  recorded   in  1939.  With  neither  Neville  Staple  nor  Lynval  Golding  being  a  particularly  good  musician, the  fledgling  Fun  Boy  Three's  sound  was  based  on  tribal  percussion  with  some   basic  bass  and  piano  so   the  'Nanas  were  performing  a  useful  musical  function  in  filling  out  the  sound. They  get  a  generous  slice  of  the  record,  singing  the  main  hook  and  the  call  and  response  scatting  in  the  middle  of  the  record  that  goes  on  a  tad  too  long  before  Terry's  little  added  verse.  I  was  quite  disappointed  with  it  after  The  Lunatics  Have  Taken  Over  The  Asylum . I   could  see  why  its  upbeat  tropical  vibe  was  popular  in  the  middle  of  a  dismal  winter  but  at  heart  it's  pretty  vacuous  and  its  thin  sound  means  you  don't  hear  it  on  the  radio  now.      

412 Goodbye Ken Dodd - Hold My Hand

Chart  entered : 26   December  1981

Chart  peak : 44

We  close  our  1981  account  with  a  farewell  to  some  very  Old  Pop. Ken's  chart  career  had  peaked  at  the  height  of  Beatlemania  with  "Tears"  in  1965  becoming  the  third  best  selling  record  of  the  sixties. Two  more  Top  5  hits  followed  in  its  wake. Thereafter  he  was  somewhat  eclipsed  by  the  rather  sexier  Engelbert  Humperdinck  and  the  hits  became  smaller  and  more  sporadic.  His  TV  and  stage  career  as  a  comedian  showed  no  signs  of  slackening  off  and  after  1976  his  visits  to  the  recording  studio  became  less  frequent. I  guess  the  fact  that  royalties  weren't  paid  in  cash  also  made  the  music  business  less  appealing.

This  was  Ken's  first  hit  since  1975  and  was  accompanied  by  a  little  controversy. Since  the  expansion  of  the  charts  to  a  Top 75 , appearances  on  Top  of  the  Pops  had  been  governed  by  a  set  of   production  rules  which  were  transparent, fair  and  protected  the  show  from  the  attentions  of  record  pluggers. Top  of  the  Pops  concentrated  on  the  Top  30  but  where  there  were  spare  slots  they  were  allocated  to new  entries  or  climbers  in  the  31-75  range  in  strict  order, the  only  proviso  being  that  the  acts  must  come  into  the  studio  to  perform.

That  rule  was  clearly  broken  when  Ken  was  given  the  opportunity  to  perform  "Hold My  Hand"  on  the  edition  of  10th  December  1981  because  he  was  nowhere  near  the  chart  at  the  time. By  my  reckoning  Spandau  Ballet  were  the  losers  by  this, missing  the  opportunity  to  perform  Paint  Me  Down  on  the  show.   It' s  easy  to  see  why  it  happened ; Top  of  the  Pops  producer  Michael  Hurll  also   produced  many  of  the  Beeb's  light  entertainment  programmes  and  probably  felt  he  had  to  keep  a  top  talent  like  Doddy  on  side . Nevertheless  it  left  a  nasty  aftertaste  ; just  a  month  later  the  rules  were  rigidly  applied  when  cabaret  electropop  duo  the  Techno  Twins  were  about  to  perform  their  version  of  Can't  Help  Falling  In  Love   but  were  gazumped  by  the  last  minute  arrival  of   Elkie  Brooks   by  helicopter  to  do  Fool  If  You  Think  It's  Over.  It  led  on  to  subsequent  rule-breaking  features  like  Jonathan  King's  US  chart  rundown  until  they  were  eventually  tossed  out  altogether.

"Hold  My  Hand "  was  written  by  Mick  Coleman  who  was  the  Michael  in  Brian  and  Michael  of  Matchstalk  Men  and  Matchstalk  Cats  And  Dogs  fame  and  also  wrote  such  horrors  as  The  Sparrow  and  There's  No  One  Quite Like  Grandma. I  got  to  speak  to  him  briefly  in  the  nineties  when  a  colleague  in  the  part  time  Irish  band  he  was  playing  bass  in  , worked  in  our  office  as  an  IT  guy  and  I  took  a  phone  call  from  him.

It's  well  down  there  with  those  other  hits ,with  a  lyric  about  racial  unity  that  makes  Ebony  and  Ivory  seem  like  Gil  Scott-Heron  and  a  nursery  rhyme  melody  that's  hard  to  shake  out  of  your  head. Ken's  backed  by  another  primary  school  choir  and  they're  needed  as  his  54-year  old  baritone  sounds  decidedly  rusty . Brevity  is  its  only  virtue . Sentimental  Christmas  sales  got  it  to  the  brink  of  the  Top  40   but  no  further.

There  isn't  much  more  of  Ken's  recording  career , just  three  more  singles  "Now  and  Forever", "Little  Words"  ( both  1984 )  and  "When  A  Child  Is  Born" ( 1987 ), none  of  which  I've  heard.

 At  the  end  of  the  decade  Ken  was  arrested  for  tax  evasion. The  evidence  was  overwhelming  with  him  making  frequent trips  to  the  Isle  of  Man  with  suitcases  full  of  cash  earnings, some  of  which  were  found, ready  to  go,  in  his  attic. The  defence  was  basically  "He's  a  great  guy, you  don't  really  want  to  send  him  to  prison  do  you ? "  and  astonishingly  it  worked. In  one  of  the  great  miscarriages  of  justice  he  was  found  not  guilty  though  the  verdict  didn't  save  him  from  a  hefty  tax  bill.

Ken  returned  to  the  boards  and  continued  doing  what  he  does  best  right  up  to  the  present  day  with  occasional  celebratory  appearances  on  TV.

411 Hello Scritti Politti - The "Sweetest Girl"

Chart  entered : 21 November  1981

Chart  peak : 64

Number  of  hits :  14

Though  I  can  enjoy  some  of   his  songs  I  do  think  this  guy  was  seriously  over-rated,  often  by the  same  people  who  knocked  XTC  for  being  too  clever  and  knowing.

I'd  never  heard  of  them  when  this  clocked  in  at  the  bottom  end  of  the  chart.  The  band  was  started  at  Leeds  Polytechnic  in  1976  by  a  fine  art  student  Paul  "Green "  Gartside  ( originally  Strohmeyer )  inspired  by  The  Sex  Pistols. He  recruited  an  old  school  friend Niall  Jinks , who'd  been  his  comrade  in  a   doomed  attempt  to  set  up  a  branch  of  the  Young  Communist  League  in  Wales, to  play  bass, a  fellow  student  who  played  drums  Tom  Morley  and  a  manager  Matthew  Kay  who  could  fill  in  on  keyboards.  During  this  period  they  were  known  as  The  Against.

After  Green  and  Tom  graduated  in  1977  the  band  relocated  to  London  and  moved  into  a  squat. They  changed  their  name  to  Scriiti  Politti  in  a  ( slightly  misspelled )  tribute  to  Italian  Marxist  writer  Antonio  Gramsci  best  known  for  developing  the  theory  of  cultural  hegemony. At  this  time  the  "group"  expanded  to  include  more  people than  just  the  musicians with  assorted  Marxist  squatters  dropping  by  to  discuss  political  theory  particularly  in  relation  to  art  and  culture. They  were  the  product  of  a  febrile  time  when  po-faced  actress Vanessa  Redgrave  could  stand  for  Parliament  for  the  extremist  Workers  Revolutionary  Party  and  cheerfully  reassure  voters  that  their  furniture  wouldn't  be  confiscated.

The  first  musical  product  was  "Skank  Bloc  Bologna"  released  in  October  1978. Simon  Reynolds's   Rip  It  Up  gives  it  more  attention  than  any  other  single  mentioned  in  the  book. The  single  bemoans  the  lack  of  political  awareness  in  a  working  class  girl  while  celebrating  the  fact  that  Communist-influenced  rioting  seemed  to  be  effecting  change  in  the  Italian  city  of  Bologna  and  the  song  is   suffused  with  the  icy  hauteur  of  the  intellectual  left. There 's  a  little  pop  at  The  Clash's  rock  and  roll  romanticism  towards  the  end. The  song  uses  a  loping  reggae  rhythm  cut  through  with  over-loud  abrasive  guitar  and  would  be  a  difficult  listen  but  for  Green's  saving  grace ,  an  underlying  melodic  strength  derived  from  his  love  of  English  folk  rock  and  psychedelia. His  vocal  style  was  derived  from  former  Soft  Machine  drummer  and  fellow  leftie  Robert  Wyatt. The  single  was  released  on  their  own  label  St  Pancras  Records  in  paper  sleeves  with  the  full  production  costs  broken  down  to  encourage  other  new  bands  to  follow  suit  and  cut  out  the  majors. They  went  to  Rough  Trade  for  a  distribution  deal.

John  Peel  picked  up  on  them  straight  away  and  they  did  their  first  session  for  him  in  December  1978. In  1979  they  released  the  EP  "4  A  Sides"  which  ranges  from  the  slinky  left  field  pop  of  "Confidence"  to  the  migraine-inducing  "Bibbly-O-Tek"  which  might  be  saying  something  interesting  about  Wittgenstein's  theories  of  language  but  few  would  think  it  worthwhile  to  try  and  decode  it. In  July  1979  they  did  another  session  for  Peel  then  Rough  Trade  did  a  deal  with  the  BBC  to  release  the  results  as  the  "Work  In  Progress"  EP.  Even  the  adoring  Reynolds  admits   this  sparse, spiky  quartet  of  tracks   is   difficult, quoting  Green  as  saying "That's  a  genuinely  ill  record. As  some  kind  of  index  to  my  state  of  mind  at  the  time, I  find  it  frightening  and  I  can't  understand  it  now  at  all".

Things  got  worse. A  recording  session  had  to  be  aborted  because  nothing  they  did  could  pass  the  overwrought  Green's  quality control.  Things  came  to  a  head  on  24th  January  1980 , the  day  after  Scritti  supported  Gang  of  Four  in  Brighton. Due  to  a  combination  of  stage  fright,  mental  fatigue  and  the  squat  lifestyle  compromising  his  physical  wellbeing, Green  collapsed  with  a  panic  attack  that   literally  paralysed  him. His  parents, reading  about  it  in  the  NME, took  him  back  to  Wales  to  recover. This  brought  the  first  phase  of  Scrtiti's  development  to  a  definite  end.

Convalescing  in  Wales  Green   listened  to  his  sister's  mostly  black  record  collection  and  his  choice  of  philosophers  to  read  veered  towards  French  post-Marxists  like  Jaques  Derrida   and  ideas  of  deconstruction. He  renounced  doctrinaire  Marxism. The  old  Scritti  had  corrected  themselves  into  complete  paralysis; his  new  idea  was  to  become  the  ultimate  subversive  pop  group, deconstructing  all  the old  tropes  as   they  went  along.  He  summoned  his  colleagues  to  Wales  and  secured  their  agreement  after  presenting  them  with  a  lengthy  essay  to  read. When  he  returned  to  London  there  was  to  be  no  return  to  the  squat ; Scritti's  shadow  members   just  evaporated.

At  this  point  in  the  story  I'm  going  to  have  to  tackle  the  question  of  "New  Pop"  as  we're about  to   enter  that  movement's  ( if  such  it  was ) annus  mirabilis.  I  think  the  term  has  some  value  in  describing  a  discernible  shift  towards  accessibility  and  commercial  success  around  the  beginning  of  1982  but  I  don't  regard  it  as  the  apogee  of   British  pop music  like  some  writers  of  these  parts. It's  certainly  not  worth  arguing  whether  The  Nolans  counted  as  "New  Pop"  a point   on  which  Marcello  Carlin  recently  corrected  Bob Stanley  on  Popular.

The  "New  Pop"  era   is  generally  said  to  begin  with  an  article in  the  NME - and  its  champions  are  all  NME-readers  - by  Paul  Morley  at  the  very  end  of  1980  championing  ABC  in  particular  as  a  new  act  directly   aiming  at  pop  stardom  with  an  intelligent  knowing  approach . Morley's  reputation  had  been  made by  spotting  the  potential  of  Joy  Division  very  early  and  he  now  foresaw  that  following Curtis's  death, post-punk  austerity  was  going  to  hit  the  buffers. In  the  autumn  of  1981  it  did  with  a  dismal  first  LP  from  New  Order  and   a   final  Joy  Division  album  Still   which  confirmed  that  we'd  already  heard  their  best  work. In  the  next  few  months, other  doom  and  gloom  purveyors  like  The  Cure  and  Killing Joke  found  their latest  efforts  rejected  ( though  both  would  recover ).

 There   were  two  main  strands  to  "New  Pop". One  was  writers  like  Morley  giving  good  reviews  to  previously  despised  acts  like  Dollar  and  Bucks Fizz  even  where  their  music  hadn't  appreciably  changed. Tony Wilson, outside  the  tent, described  this  as  "Raiders of  the  Lost  Ark Syndrome"  whereby  anything  that  was  well  done  was  valid  no  matter  how  vacuous.  The  other  was  the  seemingly  simultaneous  conversion  of  previous   icons  of   the  alternative  to  the  idea  of  making  chart-friendly  music. Scritti  Politti  fall  into  this  category  but  were  by  no  means  alone.

"The "Sweetest  Girl" "  was  the  first  product  of  the  new  approach. It  was  first  released  on  the  NME's  C81  compilation  in  March  1981  but  not  as  a  single  until  November  by  which  time Niall  had  quit  the  group, unable  to  stomach  his  friend's  dictatorial  behaviour. It  utilises  a  rhythm  from  the  soft  variant  of  reggae  known  as  "lover's  rock" , largely  played  on  an  oddly  squelchy  synthesiser. Green  sings  in  what  was  to  become  a  trademark, slightly  needling  high  register  which  raised  the  question  of  whether  it  was  being  doctored  in  the  studio. My  mate  always  reckoned  they  didn't  play  live  because  he  couldn't  reproduce  that  fey vocal  sound  on stage.  Green's  idol  Robert  Wyatt  plays  the  jazzy  piano  that  fills  all  the  musical  gaps  on  the  track  and  his  return  to  recording  his own  material  ( on  Rough  Trade ) after  a  six  year  hiatus  was  largely  through  this  patronage.

The  song  is  split  between  Green  hymning  the  language  of  love, hence  the  inverted  commas , and  then  gradually  unveiling  his  subversive  intent  -  "The  weakest  link  in  every  chain  I  always  want  to  find  it".  I  didn't  like  it  at  first  but  gradually  got  to  appreciate  it. As  it  didn't  break  out  of  night  time  radio  play  it  was  only  a  minor  hit  for  Scritti  Politti  but  unfortunately  attracted  a  dreadful  cover  by  the  declining  Madness  four  years  later  which  did  break  into  the  Top  40.
 

410 Goodbye Boney M - We Kill The World ( Don't Kill The World )

Chart  entered : 21  November  1981

Chart  peak  : 39

After  epic  success  in  the  late  seventies  with  two  million  sellers  in  1978, the  new  decade  saw  a  rapid  decline  in  the  fortunes  of  Bobby  and  the  girls  with  their  latter  singles  struggling  to  make  the  Top  40.

They  signed  off  in  style   with  this  six-minute  anti-pollution  epic  which  throws  in  everything  but  the  kitchen  sink  and  is  a  lot  more  fun  than  Michael  Jackson's  Earth  Song. It  starts  out with  explosions  then  an  ominous  piano  figure  before  Bobby  Farrell  , finally  allowed  to  do  the  spoken  parts  himself  , starts  intoning  about  atomic  mushrooms ( I  think  perhaps  Trevor  Horn  was  listening ) . Marcia  Barrett  then  takes  over  for  a  fairly  standard  Eurodisco  tune  with  lyrics  that  come  across  like  a  ten  year  old  attempting  to  rewrite  Big  Yellow  Taxi  - "New  factory  towers  tall, farmhouse  had  to  fall". Then  after  three  and  a  half  minutes ,pp without  warning  the  song  turns  into  a  nursery  rhyme  led  by  school  boy  Brian  Paul  with  The  Boneys  eventually  joining  in  as  it  tries  to  turn  into  Abba's  I  Have  A  Dream. Throw  in  a  Dave  Gilmour-esque  guitar  solo  towards  the  end  and  you  have  the  whole  package. It's  terrible  but  gloriously  so. Radio One  ignored  it   except  in  the  chart  rundowns  so  it  quickly  disappeared  here  but  it  was  a  number  one  in  Spain  and  South  Africa.

By  the  time  the  single  was  released  Bobby  had  actually  left  the  group  after  a  number  of  arguments  with  Farian  and  was  replaced  by  the  rather  more  talented  Reggie  Tsiboe. He  first  appeared  on  their  next  single  in  1982, a  dreadful  version  of  The  Seekers'  classic  The  Carnival  Is  Over  which  is  cheesily  over-produced  and  loses  all  the  pathos  in  the  original . It  did  nothing  here  and  only  moderately  well  in  Switzerland  and  Germany , adding  to the  impression  that  the  group  was  past  its  prime.

The  next  single  ( in  the  UK )  was  "Jambo -Hakuna  Matata" ( a  Swahili  phrase  meaning  "no  worries " )  which  is  basically "Hooray  It's  A  Holi-Holiday"  set  to  modern  electrodance  beats. It's  entirely  vacuous  and  only  reached  number  48  in  the  German  charts  leading  to  the  scrapping  of  their  intended  album  that  year.

Farian  now  suggested  that  Reggie  do  a  solo  single  and  recorded  a  quick  fire  cover  of  Tony  Esposito's  Italian  hit  "Kalimba  da  Luna" with some  session  singers. The  girls  objected  and  at  the  eleventh  hour  it  became  a  Boney  M  single, the  only  one  with  a  male  lead  vocal. It's  a  likeable  enough  Eurodisco  number  which  restored  them  to  the  German  Top  20  although   neither  version  made  any  impact  in  the  UK.

Bobby  in  the  meantime  had  put  out  a  couple  of  solo  singles . The  self-written  German-language  "Polizei"  sounds  like  Falco  doing  a  reggae  number  and  is  interminable. It  didn't  sell  well  and  two  years  later  Bobby  and  Farian  patched  up  their  differences  and  put  out  another cover  of  an  Italian  hit  Baby's  Gang's  "Happy  Song" . It  was  variously  credited   ( in  the  UK  it  was  "Bobby  Farrell  &  the  School  Rebel  featuring  Boney  M" )  but  only  Bobby  ( with  a  brief  rap )  and  Tsiboe  actually  featured on  the  recording. The  backing  track  sounds  identical  to  You  Spin  Me  Round  ( Like  A  Record ).It  was  their  last  visit  to  the German  top  10.

After  another  hopeless  solo  single  "King  of  Dancin"  on  which  he  growls  out  some  approximation  of  a  rap  Bobby  agreed  to  rejoin  the  group  for  their  final  album  "Eye  Dance "  in  1985. The  only  single  that  appears  to  have  been  released  in the  UK  was  "Young  Free  And  Single " ( nothing  to  do  with  the  Sunfire  hit  a  couple  of  years  earlier  )  a  novelty  single  that  sets  a  number  of  Boney  M  trademarks  to  a  Hi-NRG  backing  track  and  throws  in  a  Peter  Gunn  surf  guitar  riff.  The  single  limped to  49  in  the  German charts  and  the  album  bombed. After  a  TV  special  to  mark  their  tenth  anniversary  the  group was  officially  disbanded.

It's  quite  hard  to  track  what  happened  over  the  next  few  years. Bobby  retreated  to  Amsterdam  and  his  wife  discovered  that  Farian  had  not  trademarked  the  Boney  M  name  everywhere  so  that  Bobby  could  still  use  it  in  certain  countries. Bobby  invited  the  others  to  record  a  new  album  in  Belgium. Liz  Mitchell  and  Maizie  Williams  accepted, Marcia  who  had  long  harboured  solo  ambitions,  declined.  However  Bobby  did  not  show  up  for  rehearsals  and  the  project  went  ahead  as  a  solo  album  for  Liz  called  "No  One  Will  Force  You"  though  she  found  it  difficult  to  get  it  released. At  the  same  time  Liz  and  Maizie  recruited  two  new  singers  for  a  tour  as  Boney  M. Bobby  released  a  solo  single  "Hoppa  Hoppa"  an  utterly  vacuous  piece  of  Euro-bombast.

In  1988 Simon  Napier-Bell  did  some  remixing  of  the  Boney  M  catalogue  with  Farian's  blessing  and  the  classic  line  up  was  persuaded  to  reunite  to  promote  it. The  album  only  made  the charts  in  Sweden   but  the  single  "Megamix"  made  number  one  in  France  ( number  52 in  the  UK ).  It  was  enough  for  Liz  to  get  deals  to  release  her  album  in  certain  territories  and  she  left  the  group  in  1989  to  pursue  her  solo  career. The  single  "Mandela"  a  well-intentioned  but  bland  bit  of  synth-pop  with  melodic  similarities  to  Fernando  was  released  in  Spain  and  Holland  to  little  effect  and  "Ninos  De  La  Playa"  a  pale  imitation  of  her  old  group  was  released  in  Denmark.

In  the  meantime  the  remaining  trio  and  Liz's  replacement  went  to  the  UK  to  record  a  new  single  "Everyone  Wants  To  Dance  Like  Josephine  Baker "  as  Boney  M  with  Barry  Blue. With  Marcia  doing  the  lead  vocal  it's  a  decent  attempt  at  marrying  a  classic  Boney   M  historical  song  to  a  Hi-NRG  backing  track. However  Farian  was  incensed  at  their  temerity   in   recording  something  without  him  , went  to  court  and   got  the  single  pulled.  The  group  dissolved  once  more.

Further,  he  persuaded  Liz    to  front  a  new  Boney  M  line  up  featuring  Tsiboe  with  the  offer  of  a   new  single  "Stories"  which  came  out  under  the  name  Boney  M  featuring  Liz  Mitchell. It  sounds  suspiciously  like  a  Milli  Vanilli  outtake  tarted  up  with  orgasmic  moans. It  was  a  moderate  hit  in  Switzerland  at  the  beginning  of  1990  but  ignored  everywhere  else. A   dance  version  of   the  old  James  Taylor / Carly  Simon  hit  "Mocking  Bird"  the  following  year  didn't  do  any  better.

Marcia  went  to  Munich  to  record  but  was  diagnosed  with  ovarian  cancer  which  put  her  out  of  action  for  most  of  the  next  decade. Bobby returned  to  Amsterdam  and  formed  his  own  version  of  the  group  to  work  where  he  owned  the  trademark. He  released  his  own  version  of  the  Josephine  Baker  song  in  1991  , his  last  recording  for  over  a  decade.

The  following  year  another  "Megamix"  did  well  reaching  the  Top  10  in  the  UK  which  propelled  a  compilation  into  the  album  charts. Farian  continued  to back  Liz's  version  of  the  group  and  tested  the  water  in  1994  with  a  new  single  "Papa  Chico"  a passable  pop  reggae  tune  which  failed  to  chart  anywhere.  Around  this  time  Maizie  Williams  popped  up  again  with  her  own  version  of  the  group.

In  1999  Marcia  re-emerged  with  a  new  LP  "Survival"  It's  a  modern  dance  album  , pretty  generic  in  parts  but  it  has  its  moments  particularly  " Hello  Friends"  where  she  quotes  all  the  hits  and  namechecks  her  old  bandmates. Unfortunately  no  one  was  very  interested  in  new  material  from  the  ex-members  and  it  got  minimal  attention.  Liz  too  put  out  another  album  "Share  The  World"  that  year.

In  the  noughties  Bobby  was  content  to  churn  out  half  a  dozen  CDs  of  re-recordings  of  Boney  M  material  with  his  ever-changing  line  up  while  constantly  touring. Liz  divided  her  time  between  touring  and  putting  out  Christian  albums  though  she  too  revisited  the  old  songs  in  2005, her  last  recordings  to  date.  Maizie  also  got  into  the  Christian  scene  with  her  only  solo  LP  "Call  Upon  Jesus " in  2006. Marcia started  adding  "of  Boney  M"  to  her  name  in  2003  when  she  recorded  an  anti-Iraq  war  EP  that  raised  a  princely  $295  for  charity. She  released  another  LP  "Come  Into  My  Life "  in  2005  including  covers  of  Hey  Joe  and  Albatross   for   which  she  received  permission  from  Peter  Green  to  add  lyrics.  She  then  started  touring  as  Boney  M  featuring  Marcia  Barrett.  A  third  album , which  would  include  some  work  with Eddy  Grant, was  put  back  as  Marcia  battled  another  bout  of  cancer  and  has  yet  to  see  the  light  of  day. 

Marcia  did  join  Liz  and   Farian  at  the  London  and  Berlin  premieres  of  the  Daddy  Cool  musical   which  ran  in  2006-07 . In  2009  Maizie  won  a  court  case  against  Farian  over  royalties. The  following  year  promoters  mulling  over  which  Boney  M  to  book  had  one  less  option  when  Bobby  died  in  a  St  Petersburg  hotel  room  while  on  tour  in  Russia.  The  three  girls  were  reunited  at  his  funeral; I  don't  think  Farian  was  there.








 

409 Hello Edwyn Collins* - L.O.V.E Love

(* as  part  of  Orange  Juice )

Chart  entered  : 7  November  1981

Chart  peak : 65

Number  of  hits :  15  ( 9  with  Orange  Juice, 6  solo )

If  nothing  else  this  must  be  a  contender  for  the  worst  sleeve  we've  had; it's  hard  to  believe  an  intelligent  fellow  like  Edwyn  saw  this  and  thought  "Yeah, that  looks  good !"

This  was  also  I  think  the  first  hit  cover  of  a  chart  hit  from  my  own  pop  lifetime.

Edwyn  was  born  in  Edinburgh  in  1959  and  joined  his  first  band , a  hard  rock  outfit  Onyx  at 15  until  they  decided  a  banjo ukulele  player  didn't  fit  their  sound. A  few  years  later  he  was  a  student  at  Bearsden  Academy  and  responded  to  an  ad  placed  by  a  bedroom  outfit  The  Nu-Sonics . He  took  along  a  college  friend  David  McClymont . With  original  Nu-Sonics  members  James  Kirk  and  Steven  Daly they  played  the  Glasgow  punk  scene  until  September  1979  when  they  changed  their  name  to  Orange  Juice.  Edwyn  had  a  wide  range  of  musical  influences , the  Buzzcocks, the  Byrds, Velvet  Underground, Chic , Motown  for  starters  , so  the  band  sounded  pretty  fresh  if  you'll  excuse  the  pun.

At  the  end  of  the decade  he  decided  to  set  up  an  independent  label  Postcard  with  his  mate   former  punk  singer  Alan  Horne  and  thereby  define  the  "indie"  sound  for  the  next  decade ( people  of  my  age  wince  at  the  very  idea  that,  say,  Coldplay  could  ever  be  described  as  "indie" ).  Not  surprisingly  Orange  Juice  were  the  first  band  to  put  out  a  single  on  the  label, "Falling  and  Laughing"  in  February  1980.  It's  fair  to  say  that  the  band's  ambitions  outstripped  their  abilities  at  this  point  and  the  single  is  fairly  rough  around  the  edges  with  the  drums  too  loud  and  the  timing  suspect. Nevertheless  it  has  a  certain  charm  as  Edwyn  sings  of  unrequited  love  over  the  guitar  jangle  in  his  mannered  style  and  one  has  to  remember  this  is  three  years  before  The  Smiths.

It  was  followed in  August  1980  by  the  more  muscular  "Blue  Boy"  apparently  written  as  a  tribute  to  Pete  Shelley, its  querulous hero  finding  consolation in  the  songs  of  the  Buzzcocks  frontman. It's  notable  for  a  killer  chorus  and  two  heroically  out  of  tune  guitar  solos.

The  third  single  that  November  was  "Simply  Thrilled  Honey"  combining  one  of  Edwyn's  most  arch  lyrics - "Ye  Gods ! I'm  simply  thrilled  honey"  - with  a  distinctly  Joy  Division  influence  in  the  arrangement. Future  member  Malcolm  Ross  was  involved  in  producing  the  single  and  the  band's  increasing  musical  proficiency  is  obvious. By  now  the  music  press  was  going  apeshit  for  each  release  by  OJ  and  their  label  mates  Josef  K  and  The  Go-Betweens  hailing  them  as  "perfect  pop". This  wasn't  particularly  welcomed  by  the  group  who  were  acutely  conscious  that  they  weren't  selling  any  records  outside  the  NME-reading  student  audience. As  Steven  Daly  later  put  it  "we were  aware  that  you  couldn't  be  pop  unless  you  were  actually  popular".

Orange  Juice's  last  single , the  disco-flavoured  "Poor  Old  Soul"  was  released  in  March  1981. The  lyric  is  a  playful   dig  at  Horne  though  it  hints at  Edwyn's  increasing  exasperation  at  his  partner's  erratic  behaviour . I  think  it's  the  weakest  of  the  four  Postcard  singles  but  its  interesting  in  raising  the  question  of  the  provenance  of  New  Order's  Temptation.  Another  single  James  Kirk's  song  "Wan  Light"  was  planned  for  release  in  the  summer  but  was  cancelled  when  Horne  realised  Edwyn  was  talking  to  the  majors.  As  soon  as  Orange  Juice  signed  for  Polydor  in  the  autumn, the  label  was  shut  down.

Doing  a  cover  of  Al  Green's  last  ( at  the  time ) hit   in  1975 ( number  24 ) was  the  idea  of  their  new  producer  Adam   Kidron . Daly  claims  he  opposed  the  idea "I  didn't  even  think  it  was  one  of  Al  Green's  good  records  and  I  certainly  didn't  think  we  could  add  anything".  I  tend  to  agree  with  him; I  only  really  remembered  that  the  song  had  been  in  the  same  chart  as  Sweet's  Fox  On  The  Run  and   was  uninteresting.  It  just  meanders  along  at  the  same  pace  with  no  real  chorus . Orange  Juice  do  add  something  besides  an  updated  production, a  badly  off  key  lead  vocal  which  makes  the  record  seem  longer  than  it  actually  it  is . Edwyn  is  more  defensive  about  the  record - Green  himself  apparently  liked  it - but  even  he  concedes  it's  out  of  tune.  I  think  that  without  the  goodwill  accumulated  through  the  Postcard  singles  this  wouldn't  have  charted  at  all.

408 Hello ABC - Tears Are Not Enough

Chart  entered : 31  October  1981

Chart  peak : 19

Number  of  hits : 18

Here  come  another  band  from  Sheffield  who  became  prisoners  of  their  own  success.

ABC  evolved  out  of  Vice  Versa  , a  synth  trio  formed  in  1979  including  Mark  White and  Stephen  Singleton. They  set  up  their  own  record  label  Neutron  to  distribute  their  music. They  were  purveyors  of  a  particularly  dour  and  minimalist  synth  music  somewhere  left  of  John  Foxx  and  early  Human  League  with  Mark  providing  the  dehumanised  vocals  intoning  their  future  shock  lyrics. In  January  1980  they  put  out  a  four  track  EP  "Music  4"  which  got  Single  of  the  Week  in  the  NME.  This  led  to  an  interview  by  English  graduate  Martin  Fry  for  his  fanzine  Modern  Drugs  ; as  the  other  guy  in  the  trio  had  just  left  he  was  invited  to  join  as  a  keyboard  player. Martin's  arrival  did  not  greatly  change  the  sound  as  their  cassette-LP  "8  Aspects  Of"  and  Dutch  single  "Stilyagi"  later  in  the  year  prove.

While  jamming  in  Holland  the  guys  discovered  that  Martin  had  a  pretty  good  singing  voice  , opening  up  new  possibilities  for  the  band. Mark  happily  gave  up  lead  vocal  duties  and  suggested  they  ditch  the  synths. He  switched  to  guitar  and  Steve  to  saxophone.  The  name  of  the  band  was  changed  to  ABC  after  the  last  Vice  Versa  gig  at  Futurama  in  September  1980 and  they  started  playing  pop  with  a  distinct  funk  and  soul  element  in  deliberate  contrast  to  their  previous  oeuvre. They  needed  a rhythm  section  and  so  recruited  drummer  David  Robinson  and  bassist  Mark  Lickley.

It  took  them  a  full  year  to  get  a  single  out  but  they  were  well  repaid  with an  instant  hit. Lavishly  packaged  with  a  rather  Fry-centric  essay  on  the  back  of  the  sleeve  which  would  have   long  been  held  against  them  if  they  hadn't  been  successful , "Tears Are  Not  Enough"  sounds  rather  lumpy  by  comparison  with  what  was  to  come  and  was  reportedly  quite  difficult  to  record. David's  drumming  is  leaden  to  say  the  least  and  he  was  immediately  replaced  after  promotional  duties  had  been  fulfilled  and  producer  Steve  Brown  was  also  jettisoned  in  favour  of  a  certain  Mr  Horn . Still  the  song  was  strong  enough  to  cut  through  the  murk   with  Martin's  Bowie-esque  vocal   delivering  a  kiss-off  to  his  lover  while   demonstrating  his  taste  for  pop  irony  with  the  deliberate  references  to  Ken  Dodd's  MOR  mega-hit  of  yore. Some  of  Vice  Versa's  minimalism  is   detectable  in  Mark's  one  note  rhythm  guitar  and  the still -surprising    raw  percussion  break   (  which   was  softened  up  with  a  synth-line  when  they  re-recorded  it  on  The  Lexicon  Of  Love  ) .

I  thought  I  was  going  to  hate  it  having  read  all  Fry's  bravado  about  the  group  but  found  myself  thinking  actually  this is  quite  good.

407 Goodbye The Dooleys - And I Wish

Chart  entered :  10  October  1981

Chart  peak : 52

This  is  another  one  I  missed  at  the  time  as  The  Dooleys  make  their  barely-noticed  exit  from  this  story.

The  band  hit  their  peak  shortly  after  youngest  sister  Helen  Dooley  joined  on  keyboards  when  the  shrill  synth-pop  of  "Wanted"   ( still  worth  a  listen  ) got  to  number  3  in  the  summer  of  1979.  The  follow-up  "The  Chosen  Few"  made  the  Top  10  but  thereafter  their  decline  was  very  swift. The  two  singles  immediately  preceding  this  one  hadn't  charted  so  I  expect  they  had  an  inkling  their  days  were  numbered.

"And  I  Wish  "  was  written  by  Barry  Blue  and  Robin  Smith  who  also  produced  and  arranged  respectively. It's  very  much   later  period  Abba-lite  with  the  vocodored  repetition  of   the  title  used  to  build  up  a  rhythm  in  the  same  way  as  Take  A  Chance  On  Me   and  the  whole  song  sounds  like  an  out-take  from  Voulez-Vous. The  production  is  a  bit  cheap    and  the  girls'  voices  sound  thin  and  uncomfortable  with  the  key. With  a  bit  more  work  it  might  have  squeezed  them  back  into  the  Top  40.

The  group  had  never  sold  many  albums; middle  of  the  road  pop  acts  never  did  in  the  seventies  and  eighties  and  the  parent  album  "Secrets"  didn't  chart. It  wasn't  helped  by  GTO  being  taken  over  by  Epic  at  the  time.

The  group  started  to  fragment  even  before  the  second  single  was  released. Ann  Dooley  and  bassist  Bob  Walsh   had  got  married  and  decided  to  emigrate  to  South  Africa. Helen  decided  to  go  with  them ; I'm  not  sure  if  that's  ever  really  been  explained.  The  trio  formed  a   band  called  Shiraz  over  there  to  play  wedding  gigs  and  write  musicals  for  the  local  theatre  and  are  still  going.

 Fortunately  Kathy  Dooley  was  the  main  vocalist  on  "The  Dancer"  so  the  departures  did  not  seriously  impede  them  from  promoting  it.  It's  the  sort  of  light  disco  pop  that  The  Nolans  were  still  having  hits  with  but  it  failed  to  do  the  business  for  them. Vicki  Roe  , a  former  Irish  Miss  Universe  was  brought  in  to  replace  Ann . Their  musical  director  John Taggart filled  in  if  extra  keyboard  parts  were  required.

They  re-emerged  in  July  1982  with  "Will  You  Or  Won't  You" , another  Abba-soundalike  song  written  by  producer  Mike  Myers. It  got  them  onto  Seaside  Special  but  it  wasn't  a  hit. Epic  had  kept  them  on  after  the  takeover  but  now  they  parted  company.

The  band  found  a  new  home  on  RnR  Records  and  released  "Flavour  of  the  Month " a  Bugatti  Musker  song  that  sounds  like  recent  records  by  Bucks  Fizz, Toto  Coelo   and  Toni  Basil  have  been  placed  in  the  blender  to  produce  an  identikit  Europop  number  . It  came  initially  as  a  double  pack  single  and  all  four  tracks  were  on  their  next  album  "In  Car  Stereo"  which   the  record  company  decided  was  only  worth  releasing  in  Japan  where  they  retained  some  support.

The  following  year  Mike  Myers  persuaded  them  to  record  his  song  "New  Beginning "  under  the  assumed  name  of  Force  8. I  haven't  heard  that  version  but  it  was  a  much-praised  hit  for  Bucks  Fizz  a  couple  of  years  later. That  was  the  end  of  the  band  as  a  recording  act  as  they  split  into  two  factions. John  Dooley, Frank  Dooley  and  Al  Bogan  quit  and  after  a  short  interval  set  themselves  up  as  The  New  Dooleys  while  Kathy  and  Jim  Dooley  soldiered  on   with  replacements.

By  the  early  nineties  both  groups  had  packed  it  in, exhausted  from  constant  touring  and  nothing  more  was  heard  of  them  as  a  musical  concern  until  a  one-off  reunion  gig  in  South  Africa  in  2006,  followed  by  a  CD  from  the  three  Dooley  brothers  a  year  later. I  haven't  heard  it.

They  all   went  on  to  run  The  Mobility  Bureau  supplying  scooters  for  disabled  people. Kathy  got  married  to  The  Bill- actor  Andrew  Mackintosh   and  has  appeared  in  pantomime  with  him. He  too  is  involved  in  the  charity . Jim   was  in  the  news  in  2012  when  his  nine  year  campaign  to  organise  a  memorial  to  Bomber  Command  ended  in  success   and  then  again  earlier  this  year  concerning  a  tax  dispute.

406 Goodbye Marc Bolan / T Rex - You Scare Me To Death

Chart  entered : 19  September  1981

Chart  peak : 51

If  memory  serves  this  is  the  first  posthumous  goodbye  since  Otis  Redding.

A  lot  had  happened  to  T Rex  since  they  first  appeared  as  Tyrannosaurus  Rex. Steve  Peregrin  Took  was  sacked  after  the  first  three  hits  in  1969  for  excessive  drug  use  and  challenging  Marc  Bolan's  dominance  of  the  songwriting. He  was  replaced  by   the  less  talented  but  more  compliant   Mickey  Finn. In  1970  they  shortened  the  name  to  T.  Rex , went  electric   and  soon  became  leaders  of  the  glam  rock  scene  with  Marc  the  biggest  teen  idol  since  The  Beatles  with  four  number  ones in  the  early  seventies. Bassist  Steve  Currie  and  drummer  Bill  Legend  were  recruited  to  the  band.

T.Rex's  fame  was  just  on  the  turn  as  I  became  interested  in  pop  at  the end  of  1972  and  consequently  his  was  the  first  decline  I  witnessed. The  album  "Tanx"  released  at  the  beginning  of  1973  failed  to  repeat  the  success  of  its  immediate  predecessors ; excluding  the  number  3  ht  "Twentieth  Century  Boy"  probably  didn't  help. Bill  quit  at  the  end  of  the  year  and  "Truck  On"  became  the  first  single  of  the  electric  era  to  fall  short  of  the  Top  10. He  would  in  fact  never  return  to  it. His  next  album  "Zinc  Alloy  and  the  Hidden  Riders  of  Tomorrow" , made  with  an  extra  guitarist  Jack  Green  now  in  the  line-up,  confirmed  his  commercial  decline  and  both  Mickey  and  producer  Tony  Visconti  quit  the  T.Rex  project  in  its  wake. The  music  press  was  now  hostile  to  him  but  his  fans  didn't  completely  desert  him  ; both  "New  York  City " ( 1975 )  and  "I  Love  To  Boogie" ( 1976 )   made  the  Top  20.

His  last  album  "Dandy  in  the  Underworld "  in  March  1977  finally  got  the music  press  back  on  side  and  The  Damned  agreed  to  be  his  support  act  on  the  tour. Then  Muriel  Young  offered  him  the  hosting  job  on  her  latest  pop  show  "Marc"  which  allowed  him  to  rub  shoulders  with  The  Jam, Boomtown  Rats  and  Generation  X. It's  often  claimed  he  was  on  the  cusp  of  a  renaissance  though  it  should  be  noted  the  last  single  of  his  lifetime  "The  Soul  of  My  Suit"  only  scraped  to  number  42.

On  16th  September  1977  it  all  became  academic  when  Marc  was  killed  in  a  car  accident  as  his  girlfriend  Gloria  Jones  drove  into  a  fence  and  then  a  tree. She  was  injured  but  survived  ; he  was  killed  instantly. As  the  news  broke  his  home  was  looted. His  passing  was  marked  with  a  big  funeral   but  always  somewhat  overshadowed  by  the  death  of  Elvis  Presley  the  previous  month.

In  October  1980  Steve  Took  passed  away,  officially  as  a  result  of  inhaling  a  cocktail  cherry  (  I  remember  a  guy  at  school  mis-attributing  this  cause  to  Led  Zeppelin's  John  Bonham  who'd  died  the   previous  month)  though  it's  widely  assumed  drugs  were  involved. He  had  spent  the  past  decade  generally  floating  around  the  underground  scene , a  regular  festival  presence  as  a  solo  performer  and  a  starter  of  various  bands  such  as  Shagrat  and  Inner  City  Unit  . He  can  be  heard  on  a  number  of  recordings   by  these  outfits   which  were  only  released  after  his  death.

It  wasn't  really  until  the  new  decade  when  kids  who'd  seen  Marc  on  Top  of  the  Pops  began  making  records  that  his  reputation  began  to  revive  with  covers  of  his  songs  by  Siouxsie  and  the  Banshees, Bauhaus  and  rockabilly  chancers  The  Polecats.   In  May  1981  his  Fan  Club  acquired  the  rights  to  release  an  EP  "Return  of  the  Electric  Warrior"  comprising  two new  songs  he'd  performed  on  Marc  and  an  outtake  from  the  late  sixties.  It  reached  number  50.  Just  a  month  earlier  Steve  Currie  too  had  perished  in  a  car  crash  in  Portugal. He  had  been  working  as  a  session  musician  , often  in  tandem  with  Chris  Spedding ,  since  Marc's  death.

Encouraged  by  the  EP's  performance,  Marc's  ex-manager  Simon-Napier-Bell  got   session  musicians  to  flesh  out  some  demos  from  the  sixties  he  had  in  his  possession  and  squeezed  out  another  Bolan  LP  "You  Scare  Me  To  Death"  on  Cherry  Red  Records. This  title  track  was  originally  meant  as  a  jingle  for  Amplex  breath  freshener  tablets  and  therefore  the  hookline  goes  "You  scare  me  to  death  with  your  horrible  breath". To  say  that  it's  a  marriage  of  1966  pop  whimsy  and  1980s  New  Wave  guitar  pop   it's  skilfully  done. You  can't  see  the  join  but  nothing  can  hide  the  fact  that  the  song  itself  is  just  a  piece  of  doggerel.  Napier-Bell  put  a  self-justifying  essay  on  the  back  of  the  sleeve  to  make  it  worse. Despite  it  getting  to  the  cusp  of  the  Top  40,  Radio  One  completely  ignored  so  I  hadn't  heard  it  until  now.

  The  album   reached  number  88  in  the  charts. Another  single  the  nursery  rhyme-like  "Cat  Black"  was  released  in  November  but  didn't  chart.

The  following  year  the  Fan  Club   run  by  John  and  Shan  Bramley   set  up  a  designated  label  Marc  on  Wax  to  release  Bolton  material. They  had  access  to  more  recent  material  and  released  the  outtake  "Mellow  Love"  from  April  77  in  February  1982. It's  a  pleasant  enough  slice   of  Francophile  pop  with  some  nice  bass  work  but  the  release  clashed  with  a  tenth  anniversary  reissue  of  "Telegram  Sam"    which  reached  number  69. 1982  then  saw  an  absolute  blizzard  of  re-releases  on  four  different  labels  ; the  Bramleys  had  to  sit  back  until  the  end  of  the  year  when  they  released  "Christmas  Bop"  a  trifle recorded  for  the  fan  club  back  in  1975  which  filches  heavily  from  Under  The  Boardwalk  ( which  is  perhaps  why  it  wasn't  previously  released ).

By  the  following  year  they  had  scraped  together  enough  material  for  a  "final"  album  "Dance  In  The  Midnight"  The  first  side  is  pleasant  enough  but  the  second  is  dire with  a pointless  cover  of  "Stand  By  Me"  , a  weak  early   version  of "Solid  Gold  Easy  Action"  and  a  couple  of  unlistenable  jams  to  round  it  off.   It  reached  number  83.

Thereafter  with  no  more  "new"  material  available  Marc  on  Wax  began  remixing  the  hits  to  howls  of  protests  from  the  fans. Tony  Visconti  was  initially  involved  but  pulled  out  acrimoniously. It  was  all  pretty  tawdry. A  medley  "Megarex"  reached  number  72 in  May  1985  and  a  pilloried  remix  of  "Get  It  On"  reached  54  two  years  later.

In  1991,  when  Marc  on  Wax  still  owned  the  rights, "20th  Century  Boy"  was  chosen  by  Levi's  as  the  soundtrack  for  their  next  ad  featuring  Brad  Pitt. My  then-colleague  and  friend  Graham,  who's  about  six  years  older  than  me,  anticipated  that  it  would  follow  The  Clash  to  number  one  and  made  the  horrible  error  of  telling  the  young  clerks  on  his  section, one  of  whom  he  had  a  hopeless  crush  on, that  they  were  about  to  hear  something  special  at  number  one. I  know  the  sentiment  - like  when  I  read  "classic  tune "  in  You  Tube  comments  on  some  completely  unmelodic  rave  or  hip  hop  track  or  Tom  Ewing  and  his  buddies  slavering  over  The  Spice  Girls  on  Popular  - but   even  back  then  I  realised   that  he  was  only  going  to  be  disappointed  by  their  response.  None  of   his  young  cohorts  thought  much  of  the  record  and  in  any  case  it  peaked  at  number  13. That  was  Marc's  last  appearance  on  the  chart  apart  from  as  a  credited  sample  on  Bus  Stop's  "Get  It  On", a  number  59  hit  in  2000.

No  one  was  in  any  great  hurry  to  sign  up  or  employ  Mickey  after  he  left  the  band. He  did  a  little  session  work  for  The  Blow  Monkeys  led  by  huge  T.Rex  fan  Dr  Robert  but  you  suspect  that  was  more  for  the  association  rather  than  Mickey's  musical  abilities. He  sometimes  appeared on  stage  with  a  band  called  Checkpoint  Charlie. In  1991  he  joined  an  R&  B outfit  WD  40  but  soon  had  to  pull  out  for  health  reasons. In  1997  T  Rex's  tour  old  tour  manager  Mick  Gray  invited  him  and  Jack  to  a  50th  Birthday  Concert  for Marc  which  inspired  them  to  form  Mickey  Finn's  T.Rex  with  Paul  Fenton  who'd  played  on  at  least  one  of  the  albums  as  a  session  drummer. Jack  left  in  1999  and  was  replaced  by  former  Smokie  man  Alan  Silson. There  was  never  an  intention  to  record new  material  but  they  released  a  live  CD  in  2002. After  returning  from  a  tour  of  Japan  Mickey  died  of  liver  and  kidney  failure  in  January  2003.  Fenton  has  continued  the  band  still  bearing  Mickey's  name  to  this  day.

After  his  brief  stay  in  T. Rex  Jack  joined  The  Pretty  Things  for  a  couple  of  albums   and  Rainbow  for  a  couple  of   minutes  ( I'm  exaggerating  slightly but  not  much ) before  launching  a  solo  career  with  four  albums  between  1980   and  1986. The  couple  of  singles  I've  heard  "This  Is  Japan"  and  "Murder "  suggest  Chris  Rea- like  indeterminate  rock  without  the  voice  to  make  it  interesting.  He  now  lives  on  the  Isle  of  Wight  where  he  teaches  guitar  and  has  a  small  film  production  company.

Bill  Legend  , the  only  surviving  member  from  the  band's  peak  period  went  back  to  session  drumming  after  Marc's  death. He missed  the  50th  anniversary  concert  through  personal  issues  and  in  recent  years  has  been  playing  in  Christian  bands. Last  year  at  the  age  of  70  he  decided  to  form  Bill  Legend's  T  Rex  and  has  played  gigs  in  Europe  under  that  name.

405 Hello Lionel Richie* ( solo ) - Endless Love

(* Diana  Ross and ....)

Chart  entered : 12  September  1981

Chart  peak : 7

Number  of  hits :  28

Some  eight  or  nine  years  ago  a  friend  in  my  walking  group  asked  me  in  all  seriousness  if  I  was  interested  in  going  to  see  Lionel  perform. I  thought  "My  God, what  signals  have  I  been  giving  out  ?"

The  phenomenal  success  of  Three  Times  A  Lady , a  transatlantic  number  one  in  1978  had  made  its  composer  and  singer  the  undisputed  main  man  in  The  Commodores,  dictating  the  direction  of  future  singles  and  writing  a  number  one  for  Kenny  Rogers  with  Lady  in  1980.  

Lionel  was  then  asked  to  write  a  theme  song  for  the  film  Endless  Love   ( which  is  pretty  dire -see  my  review  here. )  Ross  was  persuaded  to sing  on  it  despite  having  already  signed  the  deal  to  leave  Motown  for  RCA. Despite  Lionel  writing  and  producing  the  song  she  gets  first  billing  of  course . It  is  of  course  his  record, an  utterly  typical  slow  piano  ballad  over  which  he  smoothly  layers  his  chocolate  box  lyrics, the  only  real  difference  from  Three  Times  A  Lady   or  Still  being  the  extra  layer  of  honey  Miss  Ross  brings  to  the  proceedings.

It  was  top  of  the  US  charts  for  nine  weeks,  became  Ross's  biggest  selling  single  and  her  last  chart  topper. It  was  nominated  for  an  Oscar, the  only  thing  in  the  film  that  was. It  prompted  Lionel  to  leave  The  Commodores  and  strike  out  as  a  solo  artist.  It  almost  made  number  one  again  in  1994  as  a  duet  for  Luther  Vandross  and  Mariah  Carey   and  Lionel  himself  re-recorded  it  with  Shania  Twain  in  2011 though  to  less  commercial  effect.

Lionel  is  a  nice  bloke  and  does  what  he  does  well  but  this  sort  of  thing  will  hopefully  never  be  appealing  to  me.

404 Hello U2 - Fire

Chart  entered : 8  August  1981

Chart  peak : 35

Number  of  hits : 44

We're  entering  the  modern  world  here  with  the  arrival  of  a  band  who  boast  the  same  line  up  they've  always  had  and  are  still  by  and  large  at  the  top  of  their  game   ( although  it  looks  like  their  relationship  with  the  singles  chart   is  coming  to  an  end ) . I  don't  think  you  can  really  say  that  about  Rush  or  Depeche  Mode  now  and  I  don't  regard  The  Rolling  Stones  as  a  genuine  band  any  more.

U2's  genesis  is  pretty  well  known. In  1976, 14-year  old  Larry  Mullen  put  a  notice  up  looking  for  musicians  to  form  a  band  at  Mount Temple  Comprehensive  School  in  Dublin. Six  people  responded  including  David  Evans, Adam  Clayton  and  Paul  Hewson. Initially  accommodating  everyone  in  a  seven  piece  line-up  called  Feedback,  it  soon  whittled  down  to  5  the  odd  one  out  being  David's  brother  Dik  as  an  extra  guitarist.  In  March  1977  they  renamed  themselves  The  Hype. The  following  year  Dik  Evans  ceremonially  left  the  group  at  a  gig  in  Howth  to  go  to  college; he  walked  off stage  halfway  through  and  the   group  announced  they  were  now  U2.

Shortly  afterwards  U2  won  a  talent  contest  in  Limerick  organised  by  CBS  Ireland  and  got  to  make  a  studio  demo . They  also  acquired  a  manager  Paul  McGuinness  at  this  time. By  September  1979  they  were  ready  to  release  their  first  record  - in  Ireland  only - an  EP  imaginatively  titled  "Three". Two  of  the  tracks  were  "Out  of  Control"  and  "Stories  For  Boys"  which  were  subsequently included  on  "Boy"  which  I  reviewed  here. The  other  , "Boy/Girl" is  a  punky  song  with  awful  lyrics  partially  redeemed  by  some  of  Edge's  pyrotechnics. The  EP  made  a  showing  on  the  Irish  chart  to  give  them  some  encouragement.
In  December  1979  they  played  their  first   gig  in   London  where  they  were  recording  their  next  single  "Another  Day"  ( again  in  Ireland  only ). An  uncomplicated  optimistic  song  , with  the  guitar  work  suggesting  some  acquaintance  with  The  Jam's  recent  Setting  Sons  , it  does   sound  rather  unfinished  with  Bono  wailing  in  the  absence  of  any  real  chorus.

Nevertheless  it  was  enough  to  clinch  a  deal  with  Island  Records. The  band's  choice  of  producer  for  their  first  international   single  was  Martin  Hannett   and  they  called  on  him  while  he  was  producing  Love  Will  Tear  Us  Apart  for  Joy  Division  in  March  1980, the  only  encounter  between  the  two  bands . "Eleven  O Clock  Tick  Tock "  was  released  five  days  after  Ian  Curtis's  death  in  May  1980.  It's  my  favourite  of  all  their  singles, a  marvellous  evocation  of  the  awe  of   children   at  primary  school, something  already  lost  even  to  a   young  band  who  haven't  released  an  album  yet. The  balance  between  the  quiet  bits  with  the  unknown  choirboy  trilling  "Sad  sad  song"  and  Edge  running  through his  latest  set  of  riffs  is  exactly  right. Hannett's   influence  is  most  obvious in  the  fractured  drum  sound.

The  next  two  singles  "A  Day  Without  Me"  and  "I  Will  Follow"  were  both  taken from  "Boy"  which  reached  52  and  hung  around  the  lower  reaches  of  the  album  charts  despite  none  of  these  early  singles  charting.

To  make  sure  this  one  did  Island  initially  released  it  as  a  double  pack  with   versions  of  "Eleven  O  Clock  Tick  Tock/The  Ocean"  and  "Cry/The  Electric  Co"  recorded  at  a  gig  in  Boston, Massachusetts  in  March  1981  on  the  second  disc. "Fire"  was  the  lead  single  for  their  difficult  second  album  "October" . It's  not  an  obvious  choice  with  a  spiky , not  very  tuneful  chorus  punctuated  by  Edge's  guitar  suddenly  jumping  in  volume. The  lyrics  are  pretty  vague,  suggesting  only   a  churning  confusion  and  the  whole  song  seems  like  a  rather  blustery  re-tread  of  the  better  stuff  on  "Boy" . Still  it  got  them  off  the  mark.