Bucks Fizz’s The Land of Make Believe got the group off to a flying start in January 1982. Unfortunately a few months later came their third and final number 1, the interesting but ultimately lacklustre My Camera Never Lies.
Before
Their fifth single was written and produced, as usual, by Andy Hill, but this was their first chart-topping single co-credited to Nichola Martin. She was Hill’s wife and had helped put the group together for their Eurovision entry and first number 1, Making Your Mind Up.
My Camera Never Lies, their second single from the album Are You Ready, was another attempt to give Bucks Fizz more mature material and prove they weren’t just another cheesy pop group. An ABBA for the 80s, perhaps. Lyrically, this song is similar to The Police’s fifth chart-topper, Every Breath You Take – still a year away at this point. The protagonist doesn’t trust his partner and has been following them around with his camera, which has proven to him that ‘there’s nothing worth lying for’ anymore.
Review
We’re off to a promising start with My Camera Never Lies. The intro brings to mind Trevor Horn’s flashy, shiny production, and you can be fooled into thinking this could even potentially outdo The Land of Make Believe. There’s some nice acoustic guitar that even sounds a little like The Smiths, who formed this year. But the big hook never comes. In fact, the most interesting aspect of the song is the backing vocals, where Mike Nolan, Bobby G, Cheryl Baker and Jay Ashton chant the song title repeatedly in a jerky, stop-start way.
There’s some good elements on display here – but they don’t meld together enough to create a memorable song. And as nice as the production sounds, the performances are sorely lacking any meaning. How are we meant to feel sorry for this guy? He’s stalking someone, and doesn’t sound like he gives a fuck anyway. You could forgive him somewhat if his heart sounded broken! I can give or take some of The Police’s material, but Every Breath You Take, which I already considered a classic, does this so much better.
The video doesn’t help either. It’s basically another excuse for Bucks Fizz to swan around in very contemporary, New Romantic-style outfits, interspersed with them recreating scenes from films including The Wizard of Oz and Gone With the Wind – because, cameras, yeah? They missed a trick by not making an ABBA-style video with a bit of relationship drama, G spying on Ashton, who’s run off with Nolan, for example. I chose Ashton over Kennedy for a reason that will soon become apparent…
After
My Camera Never Lies only spent a week at number 1, and Bucks Fizz never bagged the top spot again. Their next single, the mostly a cappella Now Those Days Are Gone, peaked at eight.
Bucks Fizz returned in late-1982 with If You Can’t Stand the Heat, the first fruits of next LP Hand Cut. It couldn’t get higher than 10, and follow-up Run for Your Life finished at 14.
It was perhaps a little early to be releasing a Greatest Hits in 1983, but they did, and although When We Were Young got to 10, London Town scraped in at 34. They disappeared for a while, failing overexposure.
They maybe didn’t go away for long enough. The album I Hear Talk, released in 1984, showcased a more rock sound, but only Talking in Your Sleep performed well, peaking at 15.
On 11 December, Bucks Fizz were returning from a gig in Newcastle when their tour bus collided with a lorry. All four members of the group and members of the crew were injured, but by far the worst was Nolan, who badly hurt his head and fell into a coma for three days. He nearly died, and still suffers from epilepsy, memory loss and poor vision.
Bucks Fizz returned to action the following year, but Aston quit during promotion of their comeback single You and Your Heart So Blue. She sold her story to the press, revealing she and Hill had been having an affair. The rest of the group distanced themselves from her and a replacement, Shelley Preston, was quickly announced.
In 1986 the new-look Bucks Fizz returned triumphantly with a decent song. New Beginning (Mamba Seyra) deserved to do well, and peaked at eight. However, it was their last single to reach the top 40. Preston departed in 1989 after their last studio LP, the ironically titled The Story So Far.
They continued as a trio for a while, but Baker left in 1993 after having started a successful career as a television presenter. Heidi Manton and Amanda Szwarc were picked to return the group to a quartet, but in 1996 Nolan decided to leave, and was replaced by egomaniac and former Dollar star David Van Day.
Things got messy. G and Van Day didn’t get on well at all, so the latter decided to work with Nolan instead and two new members. G got an injunction resulting in the new group reduced to billing themselves as Bucks Fizz starring Mike Nolan and featuring David Van Day. They released an album of re-recordings and were largely slated, even by fans of the group.
In 2001 Nolan couldn’t stand working with Van Day any longer and left. There followed a protracted legal battle over the rights to the name of the group, resulting in an episode of the BBC documentary series Trouble at the Top covering the mess. The whole sorry affair was settled out of court and Van Day briefly toured as the spectacularly named David Van Day’s Bucks Fizz Show, before returning to Dollar.
The Outro
Baker, Nolan and Aston buried the hatchet and became The Fizz in the 10s, working with Mike Stock of Stock Aitken Waterman.
The Info
Written by
Andy Hill & Nichola Martin
Producer
Andy Hill
Weeks at number 1
1 (17-23 April)
Trivia
Deaths
17 April: Peeress Bridget Monckton, 11th Lady Ruthven of Freeland
Meanwhile…
17 April: Canada repatriates its constitution, gaining full political independence from the UK.
21 April: Walsall FC’s bid to become the first Football League club to ground-share ends when officials condemn their plans to sell the Fellows Park stadium and become tenants at Wolverhampton Wanderers’ Molineux.
23 April: The first British serviceman dies in the Falklands War.
If you liked a large helping of cheese with your pop, you were well served in the spring of 1982. Toppling Tight Fit’s The Lion Sleeps Tonight was the second German number 1 of the year – Goombay Dance Band’s Seven Tears. For a brief time, they looked like a Boney M for the 80s.
Before
Goombay Dance Band were an idea from the former child actor and singer Oliver Bendt, who had appeared in stage musicals including Hair, as well as releasing records in his home country. In the 1970s, he lived on the Caribbean island Saint Lucia, where he came up with the Goombay Dance Band, named after a small bay on the island. Bendt dreamt of combining calypso and western pop, much like Boney M.
The Goombay Dance Band proved to be an instant success. Their debut single Sun of Jamaica, released in late-1979 went to number 1 in many European countries, even though it didn’t break the top 40 in the UK. It topped the German singles chart for nine weeks and became the title track of their debut album. Their next single, Aloha-Oe, Until We Meet Again, did however make it to 22 here.
Although second album Land of Gold fared nowhere near as well in 1980, two singles, Eldorado and Rain, performed well in Europe, and peaked at 30 and 38 in the UK respectively. Seven Tears was the first single from their third LP Holiday in Paradise.
Review
Hmm, yeah. I recall Seven Tears stinking up the repeats of Top of the Pops on BBC Four years ago. I’m surprised to see it was only number 1 for three weeks, as the video seemed to outstay its welcome, massively. Coming hot on the heels of The Lion Sleeps Tonight really doesn’t help it stand out. That at least has production that still sounds great, and for me personally, is really nostalgic. Seven Tears comes over as a Eurovision runner-up, and is overblown and cheap by comparison to Tight Fit’s chart-topper. I’m more than ready now for more early 80s classics, that are thankfully just around the corner.
I’d put money on part of the reason Seven Tears did so well being their appearance on Top of the Pops, where Bendt did a spot of fire breathing. It could also be because it sounds very similar to Auld Lang Syne.
The video to Seven Tears showcases Bendt’s amazing perm and tacky golden outfit, as he slowly sways for what feels like seven years, interspersed with ‘moving’ shots of waves lapping against the beach.
After
That was pretty much all she wrote for Goombay Dance Band. They never charted again in the UK and had only one more hit in Germany (Christmas at Sea – 22). Non-album singles came and went without impact in the mid-80s. They released an album of remakes in 2009 called 30th Anniversary Collection.
The Outro
Bendt dissolved the Goombay Dance Band and retired soon after his 70th birthday in 2016.
The Info
Written by
Wolff-Ekkehardt Stein, Wolfgang Jass & Ian Cai Mercer
Producer
Jochen Peterson
Weeks at number 1
3 (27 March-16 April)
Trivia
Births
5 April: Actress Hayley Atwell 7 April: Liberty X singer Kelli Young
Deaths
27 March: Writer Ted Lewis 31 March: Footballer Dave Clement 2 April: Anglican clergyman EJH Nash 12 April: Writer Norman Denny/Labour MP Tony Greenwood, Baron Greenwood of Rossendale 13 April: Peer John Drummond, 15th Baron Strange# 15 April: Actor Arthur Lowe (see ‘Meanwhile…‘)
Meanwhile…
2 April: Argentina invades the Falkland Islands, and the Falklands War officially begins.
4 April: The British Falkland Islands government surrenders, which puts the islands in Argentine control.
5 April: A Royal Navy task force sets sail to the Falklands from Portsmouth.
7 April: Britain declares a 200-mile “‘exclusion zone’ around the Falklands.
15 April: Beloved comic actor and Dad’s Army star Arthur Lowe dies suddenly of a stroke, aged 66.
The Lion Sleeps Tonight by manufactured group Tight Fit is a very 1982-sounding number 1. But the song dates back to 1939 and South African singer-songwriter Solomon Linda, who died in poverty.
Before
Linda was a Zulu migrant worker who led the a cappella sextet The Evening Birds, in which he sang soprano. He also worked as a packer at a record pressing plant owned by Eric Gallo. Linda’s group were invited to make music there and at their second session, without prior rehearsal, they recorded Mbube, in which Linda recalls chasing a lion while herding cattle as a child. Performed in four-part harmony, The Evening Birds chant ‘wembube’, while Linda yodels and howls over the top.
Gallo was impressed and rightly saw they had a hit (the first ever made in South Africa) in their hands. But he chose to take advantage of Linda, who couldn’t read and had no understanding of royalties. Linda sold Mbube to Gallo for 10 shillings, and despite it selling 100,000 over the next nine years, the songwriter saw out the rest of his life in poverty, in a house covered in cow manure. One of his son’s died of malnutrition, and Linda collapsed on stage in 1959 of kidney failure. When he died three years later, his family couldn’t afford a tombstone.
In the early, 50s, Gallo had sent a collection of vinyl to Decca Records in the US. Fortunately, ethnomusicologist Alan Lomax worked there at the time and rescued them from being thrown out. He handed them to Pete Seeger, singer in the hit folk group The Weavers. Seeger was fascinated by Mbube, and attempted to transcribe it word for word – but he misheard the chorus as ‘Wimoweh’. Seeger copied Linda’s wail, but to make the track more palatable for early 50s record buyers, bandleader Gordon Jenkins added a brass backing.
Released in 1951 and renamed Wimoweh, the song was credited to Paul Campbell, a pseudonym which meant royalties were shared among The Weavers, their publishers and their manager. It was a big hit, peaking at six, but began slipping down the Billboard when three of the group were accused of being affiliated with the Communist Party during the McCarthy era. Linda didn’t get credited, but Seeger later claimed he objected to this and directed his publisher to send the royalties Linda’s way. His daughters claimed this wasn’t the case.
Fast forward 10 years and doo-wop group The Tokens (Neil Sedaka had previously been a member) decided to create a new version of Wimoweh, which continued to go down a storm at Weavers’ gigs. Desperately in search of a hit for their third single, The Tokens approached songwriters and producers George David Weiss, Hugo Peretti and Luigi Creatore to help them with an overhaul. They kept the chant, took Linda’s final notes from the original to become the main hook, wrote brand new English lyrics and had an interesting appearance from opera singer Anita Darian, who sounds almost like a theremin on her countermelodies.
Although The Tokens weren’t keen on The Lion Sleeps Tonight, which became the B-side to Tina, it became far more popular and became the first African song to reach number 1 in the US. It climbed to 11 in the UK. The Tokens went on to become a production team and were credited on He’s So Fine by The Chiffons. Weiss, Peretti and Creatore were credited on The Stylistics’ 1975 UK number 1 Can’t Give You Anything (But My Love). Linda once again didn’t get a credit.
20 years later, Ken Gold co-songwriter and producer on The Real Thing’s You to Me Are Everything, decided to capitalise on the craze for medleys. Dutch group Stars On 45 nearly made it to number 1 twice that year with medleys of 60s hits, and Gold fancied a go himself. He assembled a group of male and female session singers, christened them Tight Fit and they made the hit single Back to the 60s, which peaked at four. For their Top of the Pops appearance, a number of actors and singers were used to mime the record. Later that year they scraped in at 33 with Back to the 60s Part 2. It looked like Tight Fit were already over.
However, producer Tim Friese-Greene saw life in the name. He had recently produced Thomas Dolby’s debut album The Golden Age of Wireless and fancied updating The Lion Sleeps Tonight for an 80s audience. Perhaps figuring that Tight Fit was a readymade name that was associated with 60s covers, he took the name but used a different set of musicians. They included Roy Ward, the drummer and percussionist from rock band City Boy, on vocals. Finally, Linda received a songwriting credit, alongside the imaginary Campbell, plus Peretti, Creatore and Weiss.
Review
Yes, Tight Fit’s The Lion Sleeps Tonight is cheesy, but it’s still lots of fun. All the elements of The Tokens’ version are there but updated for a 1982 audience, featuring phased drums, effects on the ‘wimoweh’ chanting and keyboards replacing the operatic melodies of the 1961 version. Ward’s vocal is great – why was this guy relegated to drums with City Boy, and who discovered he could sing well?
This version has aged very well sonically, and hearing it now takes me back to playing it over and over as a young lad. I even confess to pretending I was the self-obsessed Tarzan in the video. However, once you learn about the cultural misappropriation through the years, you can’t help but be left with a bad taste in your mouth and a need to apologise on behalf of white people who can’t see a problem with cultural theft.
The video is cheap and tacky, but fits the mood of the song well, as Tarzan preens lazily among people in bargain-basement lion and gorilla outfits. The cast of the video featured dancer and model Steve Grant, plus singers Denise Gyngell and Julie Harris, who had been assembled by Friese-Greene to be the new Tight Fit for promotional purposes.
After
Tight Fit’s huge success resulted in Friese-Greene deciding to give Grant, Gyngell and Harris a shot at recording the next single. Fantasy Island, which had been an entry for The Millionaires in the Dutch Eurovision Song Contest heats, did very well, climbing to five in May (a very timely release, considering it coincided with the Falklands War – see ‘Meanwhile…‘). However, the appeal of Tight Fit ran out just as they found themselves recording an album and rehearsing to go on tour. The next single, Secret Heart, only got to 41, and Gyngell and Harris subsequently left, complaining over lack of royalties and poor wages. Two new female singers were brought on board, but it was over. A year later, in a bid to pacify Grant, a cover of Stephen Stills’ Love the One You’re With was credited to Steve Grant and Tight Fit. It made no difference to their chart prospects.
Grant, Gyngell and Harris continued to chase fame separately – Grant released singles in his own name, then joined a three-piece group called Splash! (terrible name). Gyngell teamed up with her brothers to become He She Him (awful name). Harris formed Julie and the Jems (shit name), followed by Chopper Harris (so bad it’s actually a pretty funny name).
Gyngell and Harris reformed as Tight Fit in 2008 to tour the UK’s nightclubs, with Grant occasionally joining them before officially rejoining in 2010. They released the album Together in 2016. You don’t need me to tell you it failed to chart, but, to paraphrase the excellent podcast Chart Music, they’ve been on Top of the Pops more times than I have.
As for Friese-Greene, well, he was enlisted by Talk Talk to remix their 1984 album It’s My Life, then became an unofficial member of the band, producing and co-writing their classic trio of albums The Colour of Spring (1986), Spirit of Eden (1988) and Laughing Stock (1991).
The Outro
The Lion Sleeps Tonight continued to be a popular tune, and royalties remained a source of contention. In 1989, a judge ruled that The Tokens’ version should be considered a separate composition to Wimoweh, but that 10 percent of performance royalties should go to Linda’s family. In 1994, the use of The Lion Sleeps Tonight in Disney’s The Lion King made the song even more famous.
In 2000, South African Rolling Stone journalist Rian Malan wrote an essay telling the story of Mbube and explained that despite The Lion Sleeps Tonight earning $15 million in royalties, Linda’s family were still living in poverty. Two years later, the documentary A Lion’s Tail helped keep the background to the song in the public eye.
Finally, there was justice, to a degree. In 2004, with the backing of the South African government and the Gallo Record Company agreeing to pay legal fees, Linda’s family sued Disney for $1.5 million for using the song in The Lion King. The case was settled in 2006, with Abilene Music, who then owned The Lion Sleeps Tonight, agreeing to a lump sum payment, future royalties and a co-composer credit at long last. Not that this was the end of it, as the settlement with Disney ended in 2017 and since then the corporation has used the song for their live action remake of The Lion King in 2019.
The Info
Written by
Hugo Peretti, Luigi Creatore, George Weiss, Solomon Linda & Paul Campbell
Producer
Tim Friese-Greene
Weeks at number 1
3 (6-26 March)
Trivia
Deaths
7 March: Conservative MP John Hare, 1st Viscount Blakenham 8 March: Conservative MP Rab Butler 11 March: Author Edmund Cooper 13 March: Bridge designer William Fairhurst 14 March: Calligrapher Alfred Fairbank 15 March: Poet Edgell Rickword 16 March: Scientist Sir Geoffrey Vickers 18 March: Silent film actress Barbara Tennant 21 March: Actor Harry H Corbett 22 March: Motorcyclist Bob Foster/Actor Harold Goldblatt
Meanwhile…
18 March: Nosy old fuddy duddy Mary Whitehouse’s legal case against the National Theatre’s The Romans in Britain ends after an intervention from the Attorney General.
19 March: Argentine scrap metal dealers illegally arrive at South Georgia, Falkland Islands – a British overseas colony – and raise the Argentine flag.
25 March: Social Democratic Party co-leader Roy Jenkins wins the Hillhead by-election in Glasgow. At this point, the SDP were leading many opinion polls.
In early 1982, the future looked very bright for The Jam. They were at their commercial peak – Town Called Malice/Precious became a well-deserved instant number 1, and was their third chart-topper. However, by the end of the year, Paul Weller, Bruce Foxton and Rick Buckler had split up.
Before
The Jam’s second number 1 was the excellent (thought not entirely original) Start!, from the 1980 LP Sound Affects. However, despite the follow-up also being more than worthy, That’s Entertainment was perhaps too wistful for mass consumption – it only reached 21 in 1981. Two standalone singles came up next, and although they fared better, Funeral Pyre (their first jointly written 7-inch) and Absolute Beginners both peaked at four.
Work on what was to become their final album started in October 1981. The Gift saw The Jam work with new producer Pete Wilson, who helped point the way forward for Weller, showcasing a smoother, Northern Soul, funk and jazz sound, akin to the next project they worked on together – The Style Council. That didn’t sit well with Foxton and Buckler, however, who could probably see the writing on the wall. As Mods, The Jam were always in thrall to these sounds – but they’d never tried making these types of music themselves.
The title to Town Called Malice came from Nevil Shute’s famous romantic 1950 novel A Town Like Alice – however, there’s no link to the song and book other than the rhyming wordplay of the titles. The real inspiration comes from Weller’s working-class youth in Woking.
Precious was unlike any single The Jam had released up to this point – a psychedelic-funk-based love song, partly derived from Pigbag’s Papa’s Got a Brand New Pigbag.
This was also the first Jam single to move beyond the power-trio line-up, with extra help from producer Pete Wilson on organ, plus Keith Thomas on saxophones, Steve Nichol on trumpet and Russ Henderson on percussion and steel drums.
Reviews
Urgent, poetic and angry, Town Called Malice is Weller’s finest song. It updates his fixations on class, disaffected youth and striving to escape a society that’s left him out in the cold and brings them all strutting onto the dancefloor. And it’s a change in tack from his first number 1, Going Underground. This time, Weller warns his followers not to hide from society if they’re not happy – they need to work together to improve their lives: ”Cause time is short, and life is cruel/But it’s up to us to change this town called Malice’.
I’ve always loved Town Called Malice for its sound, but researching more in-depth here as proved to me how fine a lyricist Weller also is. There’s some great lines about urban decay and Thatcherism’s ‘no such thing as society’ here, including:
‘Rows and rows of disused milk floats, Stand dying in the dairy yard And a hundred lonely housewives Clutch empty milk bottles to their hearts.’
Righteous anger you can dance to. Beautiful. And I love Foxton’s bass breakdown too. All The Jam’s number 1 singles are excellent, but this reigns supreme.
As always with videos by The Jam, you only get a bare bones performance, but it does the job nicely. The Jam perform against a black background, with the occasional dada-style speech bubbles popping up – ‘Anti Complacency League! Baby!’ and ‘If we ain’t getting through to you – you obviously ain’t listening!’.
Weller, as a huge fan of The Beatles, liked to ape their double-A-side single approach. However, while I always enjoy hearing the lesser-known songs such as The Dreams of Children and Precious, I don’t think they really stand toe-to-toe with their ‘real’ A-sides. It’s not like Day Tripper/We Can Work It Out, where both songs deserve top billing. They’re better classed as great songs in which The Jam can test the waters for experiments in their sound. And Precious does fit that bill nicely – I wish I’d heard it sooner. Weller analyses his love over a sprawling funk sound that sounds particularly interesting on the 12″ version. There’s nothing lyrically to match Town Called Malice, though I do like:
‘Lonely as the moors on a winter’s morning Quiet as the sea on a cool, calm night In your tranquil shadow, I’ll try and follow’.
It’s impossible to ignore the resemblance to Papa’s Got a Brand New Pigbag – but that’s no bad thing at all.
There’s no surprises to be found in the video for Precious. Like it’s flip side, it’s simply The Jam and extra musicians performing against a black background.
After
Town Called Malice/Precious shot straight to number 1 and The Jam celebrated by performing both songs on Top of the Pops. While the latter is now somewhat of a curio, the former will most likely fill dancefloors everywhere for evermore.
The Outro
EMI argued that Town Called Malice/Precious kept another classic – The Stranglers’ Golden Brown – from the top spot by having its sales aggregated. It’s a sign of just how strong the singles chart was in 1982 that Golden Brown wasn’t a chart-topper – although the quality control of 1982’s number 1s was about to drop for a while…
The Info
Written by
Paul Weller
Producers
Pete Wilson & The Jam
Weeks at number 1
3 (13 February-5 March)
Trivia
Births
25 February: Footballer Chris Baird 26 February: Gymnast Lisa Mason
Deaths
20 February: Arctic traveller Isobel Wylie Hutchison 21 February: Writer WE Shewell-Cooper 22 February: Suffragist Annie Barnes 23 February: Author Elisabeth Kyle 24 February: Artist Keith Henderson 27 February: Henry Gage, 6th Viscount Gage 2 March: Air chief marshal Sir Donald Hardman 3 March: Ivy Cavendish-Bentinck, Duchess of Portland
Meanwhile…
19 February: The DeLorean car factory in Belfast is put into receivership.
23 February: The Glasgow coal ship St Bedan is bombed and sunk by an IRA unit driving a pilot boat that was hijacked in Lough Foyle, Northern Ireland.
25 February: The European Court of Justice rules that British schools cannot allow corporal punishment against the wishes of parents.
3 March: Queen Elizabeth II opens the Barbican Centre in London.
I still find it weird to know that Kraftwerk, one of the greatest, most influential groups of all time, had a UK number 1 single. Even weirder that it’s primarily due to The Model, a song that had been released five years before it topped the chart. Then again, should it really be a shock that it had taken the rest of the world half a decade to catch up to sounding anywhere near as good as Kraftwerk?
Before
You don’t need me to tell you that the West German experimental scene of the late 60s and early 70s was thriving, exciting and diverse. So it’s really annoying that everyone was lazily lumped together by the British press as ‘krautrock’, and that the name has stuck. Nonetheless, Kraftwerk, Neu!, Can and more had a shared desire to move on from the desolation of post-war Germany and push the boundaries of music.
Among the many great young artists were Ralf Hütter and Florian Schneider-Esleben, who met as students at the Academy of Arts in Remscheid in 1968. in Düsseldorf. The duo became part of Organisation zur Verwirklichung gemeinsamer Musikkonzepte – also known as simply Organisation. They recorded one album of experimental music, Tone Float, in 1970, which only saw release in the UK. At the time, Hutter contributed only Hammond organ, with Schenider-Esleben primarily on flute and percussion.
Shortly after Organisation disbanded, Schneider-Esleben became interested in synthesisers. He and Hütter were inspired at an exhibition by surrealist duo Gilbert & George, and adopted the image of two deadpan artists dressed in suits that has remained indelibly Kraftwerk ever since.
The early line-ups of Kraftwerk – the German for powerplant – were a work in progress, with the only constant throughout being Schneider-Esleben. Even Hütter briefly left to complete university. Konrad ‘Conny’ Plank, who had been behind the mixing desk on Tone Float, was their producer.
Kraftwerk would have you believe their debut album was Autobahn in 1974. Schneider later dismissed their first three albums as ‘archaeology’. They’re not commercially available, and no material has been performed from them since 1975. However, while they may vary in quality, and it’s a nice idea to imagine Kraftwerk arrived fully formed in the mid-70s, it’s a real shame they have been airbrushed out of history. Their eponymous debut, released in 1970 and starts with the propulsive highlight Ruckzuck. One track, Von Himmel Hoch, featured future Neu! drummer Klaus Dinger.
Kraftwerk 2 came two years later and featured only Hütter and Schneider-Esleben. While not as interesting as its predecessor, it does open with the lovely Klingklang, which gave the duo the name of their future studio.
Their third, Ralf & Florian (1973), is the best of the forgotten trilogy. It saw the duo move closer to their trademark sound, including their first use of vocoder, but with elements of psychedelia still at play, and Tanzmusik is very lovely. I genuinely think that the LP’s cover, which shows Hütter as an awkward geek next to a very suave and totally on-point Schneider-Eseleben, is the reason these albums have disappeared. Although Hütter hinted in 2009 that these albums could see the light of day eventually, we’re still waiting.
In 1974, Hütter and Schneider (at this point dropping his second surname) went shopping for synths which would transform their sound and fortunes, including a Minimoog and a Farfisa organ. They also picked up two new members – Klaus Roeder on violin and Wolfgang Flür on percussion. Their associate, the painter Emil Schult, who helped on the artwork to Ralf & Florian, became more heavily involved, helping to create a more formulaic look for the new quartet, and even contributing lyrics to the title track of their ‘first’ album.
All 22 minutes of Autobahn, Kraftwerk’s hymn to the joy of simply driving on German roads,remain a total charming delight and if you’re going to rewrite history, what a way to begin chapter one. Amazingly, it’s still brilliant in its radio edit of three minutes, which peaked at 11 in the UK in 1975. It just goes to show that a great hook will capture the imagination of record buyers, even if it is part of an electronic symphony that symbolises a giant leap forward in pop. Also worth mentioning from the accompanying album is the gorgeous Kometenmelodie 2.
Kraftwerk toured Autobahn in the UK, US and Canada, and heads were turned by four unassuming men in suits creating magical, futuristic pop music. Hütter and Schneider sang and played synths, while Flür was joined by newest member Karl Bartos on home-made electronic percussion. The classic line-up was complete.
With Kling Klang now a fully operational studio, more electronic gadgets to hand, and Hütter and Schneider producing, Kraftwerk set to work on the icy cool follow-up, Radio-Activity (Radio-Aktivität in their homeland). A concept album that played on the twin themes of the title, Kraftwerk paid tribute to radio waves on the sweet Airwaves and sang about nuclear power on Radioactivity, co-written with Schult. The peaks aren’t as high as its predecessor, but Radio-Activity is more cohesive. Kraftwerk toured once more and David Bowie declared himself a fan, even inviting them to support him on tour, but they declined.
In 1977 came Kraftwerk’s best album yet. The title track to Trans-Europe Express was an epic sequel-of-sorts to Autobahn, this time focusing on rail travel. It namechecked their new biggest fan, Bowie, and helped invent hip-hop when sampled on Afrika Bambaataa and the Soul Sonic Force’s 1982 hit Planet Rock. And the opening track Europe Endless is a gorgeous hymn to the continent. They also started to explore the concept of disparity between humanity and image with Hall of Mirrors and Showroom Dummies – with the latter reaching 25 in the UK singles charts.
The Man-Machine, which followed in 1978, wasn’t quite as good, but definitely summed up their concept better than anything else within this decade. Robots and the title track further refined their danceable rhythms and the idea that they were conjured up by people who were seemingly more mechanical than humanoid. Neon Lights is up there with Europe Endless as one of their sweetest songs. And The Model was, as it turned out, catchy and importantly, short enough, to be an actual catchy pop record.
Kraftwerk spent much of the next three years working on modifications to their studio, to enable them to effectively take it out on tour. Computer World is Kraftwerk’s masterpiece and well worth the longest wait yet between LPs. It was also their most timely, arriving just as the home computer revolution began and digital technology entered the mainstream. Concise and flawless, Computer World is one of the greatest albums of all time. The fun, bouncy Pocket Calculator was released as a single, but somehow only reached 39. It was perhaps just too esoteric for the mainstream at the time. This was followed by the moving melody Computer Love, which only performed slightly better, peaking at 36.
However, Kraftwerk’s record label, EMI, had gotten wind that The Model, which was the B-side to Computer World, was getting more attention than the A-side. Against the group’s wishes, the single was re-released as a double-A-side, with a video created for The Model, and for one shining week, Kraftwerk were on top of the pop world.
Reviews
The Model, originally Das Model in their homeland, was written primarily by Schult. The artist was dating a model at the time, and Hütter and Bartos knew he had something, but they reworked the guitar-driven tune to fit their sound better.
From Radio-Activity onwards, Kraftwerk had chosen to release German and English language versions of their albums simultaneously. This of course led to occasional differences in lyrics when translated, but The Model and Das Model are mostly the same – bar for a striking utterance of ‘Korrekt!’ in the latter. This came about due to an in-joke in which the group invited a waiter they knew from a nightclub they frequented in Düsseldorf. Very funny for them, I’m sure, but it does jar somewhat and I’m glad it’s not in the UK version. The Model, is a typically Kraftwerkian icy cool observation of a beautiful woman, at once both sexy and not at all. The tune is a hell of an earworm, and totally at home among the best electronic pop of the early 80s. But it’s easier to appreciate than enjoy. It may sound silly to accuse a Kraftwerk song of lacking heart, but at their best, Kraftwerk actually made some great soulful records – and you only need to flip this record to hear one.
Although I assume the video to The Model was put together without Kraftwerk’s permission, it’s pretty good. Simple but effective, it’s primarily old footage of models, interspersed with the group performing inside their neon-lit studio/live setup. The only negative is the dated, early 80s technique of ‘animating’ them to create an annoying needlessly jerky effect.
Computer Love is the beating heart of Kraftwerk, and in an ideal world, deserves to be recognised as a number 1 in its own right. But lets just be grateful that this extremely prescient song exists in the first place. Released as Computerliebe in West Germany, Computer Love predicts modern dating as a lonely man forlornly stares at a screen while looking for romance. I’ve been there, done that, and believe me, this song captures such melancholy very well.
A lot of that is down to the plaintive melody, which came from neither Hütter or Schneider. Caps for this can be doffed squarely at the unsung hero Bartos, who had also helped work The Model into shape. Schult was again responsible for some of the lyrics – I applaud whoever came up with ‘I need a data-date, a data-date’ and assume it was him. The full seven minutes of Computer Love is pretty emotional – the rhythm grows more propulsive in the latter half. Is this to mirror the desperation of the protagonist? However, it inevitably loses some of this effect when chopped in half for a single release. Nonetheless… it’s just really rather beautiful.
Coldplay certainly felt so – they lifted the melody on their 2005 single Talk. After asking Kraftwerk’s lawyers for permission, they eventually received a letter in the post, which contained a handwritten reply that simply said ‘Yes’.
After
Kraftwerk took their Kling Klang studio on the road for their ‘Computer World’ tour, using replica mannequins to perform The Robots to audiences. They then began to work on their next album, provisionally called Technicolour. In 1983 they released the fantastic single Tour De France – a sign of Hütter’s growing love for cycling following the rigours of the previous tour. He tried to persuade the rest of the group to record a concept album based around cycling, but they refused – perhaps in part due to the fact he was involved in a cycling accident during recording that left him in a coma for a while. The single climbed to 22 and was featured in a brilliant scene from the film Breakin’ (known over here as Breakdance).
Kraftwerk found themselves becoming victims of their own success. After years of pioneering electronic music, some of those they inspired began to catch up with them, thanks in part to the advance in technology and growing cheapness of the instruments needed to create similar sounds. Although Flür had performed on the accompanying tour, his percussion was not included on Computer World, and he preferred to spend his time on the road with his girlfriend than out cycling with Hütter.
Over time, Technicolour developed into Techno Pop, then Electric Café, before finally being released in 1986. Although much maligned, the opening trio of Boing Boom Tschak/Techno Pop/Musique Non-Stop is up there with some of their most fun work. But there’s no hiding the fact it descends almost into pastiche in the second half. Flür is missing from the LP’s credits. Neither Musique Non-Stop or The Telephone Call charted in the UK.
After years away, Kraftwerk returned to live performances with gigs in Italy in 1990. Flür had been replaced by Fritz Hilpert, and Bartos left soon after, with his slot filled by Fernando Abrantes. In 1991 came The Mix. Originally conceived as a best-of, the album served as an update of key tracks, bringing them more in-line with their live shows. For many dance music fans who discovered Kraftwerk at the time, it’s one of their favourite albums. The updated The Robots climbed to 20 in the UK. Abrantes departed before long and was replaced by Henning Schmitz.
In 1999, Kraftwerk were commissioned to create a jingle for the Hannover Expo 2000 world’s fair in Germany. The result was developed into Expo 2000, which reached 27 in the singles chart on these shores.
Hütter finally got his wish in 2003 when Tour De France Soundtracks was released. Unsurprisingly, he was credited with most of the music, with Schneider’s name absent. Maxime Schmitt received co-writing credit on the lion’s share of the album. It was better than you’d expect an album that had been awaited for years, but was a little one-note – inevitably, I guess. It spawned their last charting single to date – Aerodynamik, which peaked at 33 in 2004.
Kraftwerk’s ‘Minimum-Maximum’ tour began in 2003, and saw decreasing physical input from the ‘band’ members. All four stood in front of laptops, which, of course was inevitable for Kraftwerk, the synthesis of man-machine now complete. An accompanying live album was released in 2005.
Schneider left Kraftwerk in 2008, leaving Hütter as the sole surviving member. His ever-decreasing role was taken by Stefan Pfaffe – a ‘video technician’.
2009 saw the release of Kraftwerk’s controversial The Catalogue, in which Hütter had taken a similar approach to Star Wars creator George Lucas, changing the artwork to the albums from 1974 onwards and effectively telling the world that Kraftwerk began with Autobahn. You have to wonder if this approach had helped Schneider decide to leave. They also began touring a 3-D show featuring impressive backdrops to their shows.
Kraftwerk continued to tour, presenting a run of shows at the Museum of Modern Art in New York in 2012 in which they performed each album from The Catalogue box-set per night. Pfaffe had been replaced by Falk Grieffenhagen.
In 2017 I finally got to see Kraftwerk live at Sheffield City Hall. The 3-D element was somewhat ruined in the second half due to a curtain malfunction, in which one poor guy was forced to hold the huge curtain half-open for the rest of the set. He got the biggest cheer of the night when Hütter thanked him. The 3D The Catalogue box set was an excellent document of this tour, and with the audience noise removed, was effectively a reworked version of their entire official back catalogue.
In 2020, Schneider died of cancer, and despite Kraftwerk’s faceless self-image, the music world recognised the huge contribution he had made. The group was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2021. Hilpert was replaced in 2023 by Georg Bongartz, another video technician. Kraftwerk continue to tour the world.
The Outro
What will happen to Kraftwerk when Hütter either retires or dies? It’s very likely that the group will still function as a touring entity to me. After all, the only existing founder member has ensured people can pay to see and enjoy their music and impressive stage show, no matter who is pressing the buttons. There will most likely be a neverending chain of four ‘musicians’ – that is, after all, what you think of when you think of Kraftwerk. Perhaps they will be represented by holograms. Despite occasional teases, it’s unlikely there will be a new album.
What is beyond a doubt is Kraftwerk’s place in music. They are the most important group since The Beatles. Often imitated, never bettered, their ability to push boundaries, with an ear to a catchy tune, using a very German sense of fun, was incredible. We are lucky to have had them in our lifetimes.
The Info
Written by
Ralf Hütter, Karl Bartos & Emil Schult
Producers
Ralf Hütter& Florian Schneider
Weeks at number 1
1 (6-12 February)
Trivia
Births
11 February: Actress Natalie Dormer
Deaths
6 February: Painter Ben Nicholson 8 February: Sir Cedric Morris, 9th Baronet
Meanwhile…
6 February: Queen Elizabeth II commemorates her Pearl Jubilee.
1981 had been a banner year for Shakin’ Stevens, with two number 1 cover versions of rock’n’roll classics This Ole House and Green Door. Shaky was back a year later and he topped the charts for the third time with a song of his own – the jaunty, Cajun-flavoured Oh Julie.
Before
The album Shaky had made Stevens one of the most popular singers of the previous year. With two number 1s under his belt, Epic Records milked the LP for one more hit. However, his cover of the vintage ballad It’s Raining proved it was time to make more music, when it peaked at 10.
Recording on the follow-up began at the end of a whirlwind year. Give Me Your Heart Tonight. As it wasn’t released until October 1982, it’s most likely that the album was still being worked on when Oh Julie was released, but Epic were understandably hoping to try and keep Stevens very much in the public eye.
Oh Julie was penned by Stevens and arranged by his guitarist Mickey Gee, who had previously worked with Tom Jones (when he was known as Tommy Scott), Joe Cocker and Dave Edmunds. He had also played in Shaky’s old backing band, The Sunsets.
It’s also worth talking about – on a song that there isn’t really much worth saying – Steven’s guitarist and producer, Stuart Colman, who played a large part in the singer’s success. In 1976, Colman organised a march to the BBC, complaining about the lack of rock’n’roll on Radio 1. Despite the fact the station, as always, was supposed to be playing chart music, Colman was awarded his own show, and that is why Epic gave him the fateful call to ask him to produce Stevens.
Also in the line-up for Oh Julie was the accordionist Geraint Thomas, who had recorded the album Geraint Thomas & the Dominators, produced by Andy Fairweather Low, in 1979. Thomas’s input adds some much needed colour to Stevens’ least-remembered chart-topper, giving it that authentic rockabilly feel.
Review
Before Shaky fans shake their fists at me, let me say, fair play to Stevens for Oh Julie. It’s a decent stab at songwriting, and a rather brave attempt to move away from only recording classic material. Anyone would have potentially come up short against rock’n’roll standards in that situation. But it’s middling at best – and Shaky doesn’t cover himself with glory by admitting later that he only called it Oh Julie because it rhymes with ‘truly’.
Actually… I’ve just scanned the lyrics. Bloody hell Shaky, I’ve changed my mind. They’re beyond lazy. Let’s face it, Colman deserves credit here for having polished a bit of a turd. There’s no excuse for this when you compare it to some of the amazing number 1s yet to come in 1982.
What is worth mentioning, however, is the unhinged video. Stevens can always be relied on for amusingly camp videos, and this is no exception.
Shaky is out in the cold, singing by a lamppost while an accordionist (Thomas himself?) plays on. Suddenly, our hero spies the sexy, glamorous Julie, who gives a sly look and goes inside, leaving her door open (ahem). Taking this as a red rag to a bull, Shaky goes in, and we then see that there’s CCTV cameras watching him. He starts singing to photos of Julie on the wall, which start coming to life, and then we see Julie sat in a control room casually watching him busting his moves. All totally normal. Once he’s had enough, Stevens just fucks off and Thomas carries on playing. Mental.
After
Although Give Me Your Heart Tonight was a top 10 album and spawned several hits, 1981-82 were the peak years for Stevens. However, there was one last number 1 to come – but that has to wait until we get to the 1985 Christmas number 1, Merry Christmas Everyone.
The Outro
There’s not a lot to say here, so I’m just going to use the chance to post once again the fantastic sight of a pre-fame Jim Moir before he became known as Vic Reeves, dancing in the video to his 1987 number five hit What Do You Want to Make Those Eyes at Me For? which had been the final number 1 of the 50s for Emile Ford and The Checkmates.
The Info
Written by
Shakin’ Stevens
Producer
Stuart Colman
Weeks at number 1
1 (30 January-5 February)
Trivia
Births
31 January: Footballer Allan McGregor
Deaths
30 January: Actor Stanley Holloway 1 February: Conservative MP Sir John Foster 4 February: Scottish blues-rock frontman Alex Harvey 5 February: Folklorist Peter Opie/Welsh novelist Ronald Welch
Meanwhile…
5 February: The collapse of Laker Airways leads to 6,000 passengers stranded.
Bucks Fizz may be considered a bit of a joke, but they deserve better than that. Not only did they win the Eurovision Song Contest with the sugary sweet Making Your Mind Up, but they went on to have a further two number 1s, and The Land of Make Believe is an excellent pop song with more to it than the fairytale imagery and super-catchy chorus.
Before
Although Bucks Fizz had originally been intended as merely a vehicle for songwriter Andy Hill’s Making Your Mind Up, he and his girlfriend, music publisher Nichola Martin, were determined for the group to sustain that success. Together with RCA Records executive Bill Kimber, they decided to change tack, update the cheesy rock’n’roll sound of their debut, and make the whole project more polished. And it paid off when follow-up single Piece of the Action climbed to 12. That may not sound too impressive, but bear in mind that at the time this was the highest chart placing ever achieved by a Eurovision-winning act with their follow-up single. It became the first track on their eponymous debut LP, which also contained their next single, One of Those Nights. However, this track only reached 20, so alarm bells may have begun to ring. Had the well run dry already?
With this perhaps in mind, Hill sought help from fellow songwriter Pete Sinfield. He had been a founding member and lyricist for King Crimson, before writing words for Emerson, Lake & Palmer. He also wrote the lyrics for Lake’s classic I Believe in Father Christmas. Sinfield moved to Ibiza to live as a tax exile, and by the time he returned to London in 1980, progressive rock was largely extinct.
Sinfield was introduced to Hill and they set to work on Bucks Fizz’s fourth single. Though it may seem a simple task for the man who wrote the words to prog classic LP In the Court of the Crimson King, Sinfield said in a 2002 interview: ‘It is 10 times more difficult to write a three-minute hit song, with a veneer of integrity, than it is to write anything for King Crimson or ELP.’
During the recording, Mike Nolan told Hill he thought the song was a dud, and could even sink the group for good, but the producer told him that Bobby G and Cheryl Baker had already recorded their parts, and what’s more, they loved it. Nolan later admitted he had been totally wrong.
Review
Whether Hill’s fairytale tune came first or not, Sinfield nonetheless wrote lyrics that shone a light on the darkness behind so many fairytales, and that queasy, eerie feeling they can conjure. Though the first verse seems traditional enough:
‘Stars in your eyes, little one Where do you go to dream To a place, we all know The land of make believe’
It’s followed up with this distinctly darker couplet: ‘Shadows tapping at your window/Ghostly voices whisper: “Will you come and play?”‘ and a genuinely creepy
This lyric, and ‘Something nasty in your garden’s waiting/Patiently, till it can have your heart’, take on a whole new meaning when you consider that Sinfield later revealed The Land of Make Believe was in fact an attack on Margaret Thatcher’s Conservative government – something that’s focussed on brilliantly in episode one of director Adam Curtis’s recent BBC documentary Shifty.
Most eerie of all is the ending – usually not played on the radio. It’s a nursery rhyme, read by then-11-year-old Abby Kimber, who was the daughter of the RCA Records executive mentioned earlier:
‘I’ve got a friend who comes to tea And no-one else can see but me He came today but had to go To visit you? Ya never know’
This gains added weirdness when you consider that young Kimber would a year later star in Minipops, the ill-advised TV show in which young children performed pop songs. The series was cancelled after one series due to complaints over having children dressed up as adults performing songs with sexual lyrics. Conspiracy theorists would have a field day with this song – anti-Thatcher, who was mates with Jimmy Savile… what did Sinfield know?!
The hidden depth to The Land of Make Believe adds lots of appeal – but even if that depth wasn’t there, it’s a great pop song. The chorus is incredibly catchy and the early 80s electro production is leagues above Making Your Mind Up – fair play to Hill and co for not resting on their laurels. And as a young child at the time, I can tell you that this ticked all the boxes when it came to parties and discos.
With sights set on the Christmas market, the video to The Land of Make Believe has lots of pantomime imagery, glitter and sparklers. And for a change it’s Baker, not Jay Aston, that is the video’s sex symbol – which is ironic as it was Aston that chose the outfits.
After
The Land of Make Believe was released in November in time for the Christmas market, but stalled at five during the festive chart itself. However, when Don’t You Want Me finally ran out of steam, Bucks Fizz finally scored their second number 1. The Human League’s Phil Oakey was among many critics, fans and fellow pop stars that were full of praise for the first new chart-topper of 1982. It would be a hell of a year for chart music.
The Outro
A year later, The Land of Make Believe was recorded by future Eurovision winner Celine Dion, whose first UK number 1, Think Twice, was written by Hill and Sinfield.
The Land of Make Believe was covered by pop group allSTARS* in 2002. It reached nine in the singles chart.
The Info
Written by
Andy Hill & Pete Sinfield
Producer
Andy Hill
Weeks at number 1
2 (16-29th January)
Trivia
Births
16 January: Ordinary Boys singer Preston 19 January: Ice hockey player Shaun Wallis 21 January: Rugby union player Nick Duncombe
Deaths
21 January: Actress Penelope Dudley-Ward 27 January: RMS Titanic survivor Frank John William Goldsmith
Meanwhile…
18 January: ‘A Complaint of Rape’ – the third episode of BBC One fly-on-the-wall documentary series Police, shows police treating a female complainant dismissively, which led to changes in police treatment of rape allegations.
21 January: Miners vote against strike action and accept the offer of a 9.3% pay rise from the National Coal Board.
26 January: Unemployment is recorded at over 3 million for the first time since the 1930s.However, the 11.5% of the workforce currently unemployed is approximately half of the record percentage which was reached half a century ago.
