Barbados

426. 10cc – Dreadlock Holiday (1978)

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The Intro

By the time of their third and final number 1, 10cc weren’t half the band they used to be. Literally. Despite the success of their masterpiece, I’m Not in Love, creative differences had come to a head.

Before

While recording fourth LP How Dare You!, the two separate songwriting partnerships – Kevin Godley and Lol Creme and Eric Stewart and Graham Gouldman – realised they were drifting further apart. Despite this it spawned two hit singes. Art for Art’s Sake reached five in 1975 and I’m Mandy, Fly Me peaked at six.

At the start of sessions for Deceptive Bends (1977), Godley and Creme decided to leave to make an album together. Although Stewart and Gouldman knew the working environment had got more and more difficult, they couldn’t believe Godley and Creme would be willing to walk out on 10cc at the peak of their commercial and creative powers. To make matters worse, Stewart and Creme were married to sisters.

10cc continued as a three-piece with tour back-up drummer Paul Burgess while Godley & Creme released the triple album Consequences, featuring comedian Peter Cook. Stewart and Gouldman likely felt vindicated when that album sank but their own gave them two hit singles – The Things We Do for Love (six) and Good Morning Judge (five). Having said that, Godley & Creme likely didn’t care too much as they were more concerned with doing things their way.

10cc then went on an international tour, bolstered by guitarist Rick Fenn, keyboardist Tony O’Malley and additional drummer Stuart Tosh, formerly of fellow chart-toppers Pilot. The tour was documented on Live and Let Live, released later the same year. O’Malley then left and was replaced by Duncan Mackay and the five-piece set to work on a new album, Bloody Tourists.

Its first single, Dreadlock Holiday, was inspired by a trip to Barbados that Stewart experienced with Moody Blues singer Justin Hayward. Stewart recalled seeing a white man trying to act cool to embarrassing effect, annoying a group of Afro-Caribbeans. This is where the lines ‘Don’t you walk through my words/You’ve got to show some respect’. The chorus, later misunderstood on every cricket highlights package on TV, came about when Gouldman, who was talking to a Jamaican who asked him if he liked cricket, replied ‘No, I love it!’.

The line-up featured Stewart on electric piano, organ, cabaza and vocals, Gouldman on bass, maracas and vocals, Fenn on guitar, backing vocals and organ, Burgess on cowbell, congas, marimba, triangle, agogô and timbales, Tosh on drums, backing vocals and tambourine and Mackay on Yamaha CS-80 synthesiser.

Review

Released in the decade that political correctness forgot, Dreadlock Holiday was a huge hit. But in more enlightened times it proves problematic. Musically, it’s perfectly fine. A good approximation of reggae, well-produced and infectious. But the problem is in the lyrics. Stewart and Gouldman could defend themselves by saying we’re supposed to be laughing at the white man here, thinking that the ‘four faces, one mad’ will leave him alone if he mentions cricket. It’s not good enough really because Jamaicans are certainly not portrayed in a good light either. This gang with ‘dark voices’ are going to rob him, because of course they’re poor criminals, because Jamaica. He manages to escape the gang, only to encounter a dope-dealing woman by the pool. Because Jamaica. Cricket, reggae, crime, drugs, sung in piss-taking cod-Jamaican accents. It’s not that far removed from Typically Tropical’s Barbados.

10cc, or at least Stewart and Gouldman should have known better. It’s a cheap joke and mean-spirited. How can this be the same band that recorded I’m Not in Love? You could argue that perhaps Godley and Creme wouldn’t have allowed something like this through, except they wrote Une Nuit a Paris, a song featuring comedy French accents. No, I think it’s just a case of rich white men not being half as clever as they can be and, well, it was the 70s.

The video to Dreadlock Holiday cheapens the song further. To save money (and possibly to avoid confronting any real-life scary Jamaicans), they filmed on the coast of Dorset instead. It looks about as summery as the field of the campsite in Carry On Camping (1969) and not like Jamaica at all. Director Storm Thorgerson (the man behind the cover of The Dark Side of the Moon) clearly encourages the actors to ham it up big time.

After

Dreadlock Holiday was the last proper 10cc hit. In 1979 Stewart was seriously injured in a car crash. A tour was cancelled and the band was put on hold. Originally planned as a 10cc project, Gouldman made the soundtrack to Animalympics (1980) alone. This animated comedy, made to tie in with the Moscow Olympics, has a special place in my heart as I became obsessed with it as a child. The music is great too.

Both Stewart and Gouldman consider this hiatus the beginning of the end for 10cc. Upon Stewart’s return, tastes had shifted and their next album, 1980’s Look Hear? featured contributions from the other band members, with little collaboration between the founding members. For the next LP, Ten Out of 10 (1981), 10cc were officially just Stewart and Gouldman, with the others demoted to session musicians. In a bid to do better in the US, they collaborated with singer-songwriter Andrew Gold and released a separate version in America with his contributions. They asked him to become a fully fledged member but he declined. His contributions made little difference to record sales.

For their ninth album Windows in the Jungle (1983), Stewart and Gouldman wrote together intending to make a concept album, but a desire to also make a hit single got in the way and it was another failure. That was it for 10cc, for a while. In the meantime, Godley and Creme had made several albums together and had two top three singles in 1981 – Under Your Thumb (number three) and Wedding Bells (seven). They also became very good at directing quirky and innovative pop videos for bands including The Police, Ultravox and Duran Duran. In 1985 they made a very memorable promo for their single Cry, featuring faces blending into each other. I remember being totally mesmerised and disturbed by it at the age of six.

After the split, Stewart worked as a producer for Sad Cafe, Paul McCartney and ABBA’s Agnetha Fältskog. Gouldman produced The Ramones and then formed the duo Common Knowledge with Gold, who changed their name to Wax. In 1985 Gouldman tried the Bob Geldof approach and assembled and produced an unusual group of musicians and celebrities dubbed The Crowd. Featuring, among others, Bruce Forsyth, Rolf Harris, Gerry Marsden, the Nolans, John Otway and Motörhead, they covered the Gerry and the Pacemakers 1963 chart-topper You’ll Never Walk Alone in aid of the Bradford City Disaster Fund. It went to number 1 and Marsden became the first person to do so with two versions of the same song.

In 1992 a 10cc reunion album was released. But …Meanwhile was actually a Stewart and Gouldman LP by and large. Godley and Creme were only on board to fulfil contractual obligations and mostly provided backing vocals. It didn’t fare as well as hoped but Stewart and Gouldman toured once more with former members and a few new ones, as captured on another live album, 1993’s Alive.

The next album, Mirror Mirror (1995), saw Stewart and Gouldman working apart in separate countries. Despite the latter’s initial objections an acoustic version of I’m Not in Love was released from it and actually gave them their first singles chart action in 17 years, reaching 29. Stewart left 10cc after the album tour, saying as far as he was concerned 10cc were finished.

Gouldman disagreed and has continued to perform live as 10cc ever since, with the help of Burgess and Fenn, plus Keith Hayman and Iain Hornal at present. Stewart refuses to speak to Gouldman because of his refusal to stop using the name and Creme has also been critical of the move. However, Godley and Gouldman recorded and performed together as GG/06 in 2006 and Godley also performed at the Royal Albert Hall with the band to celebrate the 40th anniversary of their formation in 2012.

The Outro

Despite my criticism of this final number 1, 10cc were one of the smartest acts of the 70s. The material by the original line-up is never dull and at times, in particular I’m Not in Love, brilliant. In a way, it’s amazing four such multi-talented men, all writers and performers, were able to work together for as long as they did.

The Info

Written by

Eric Stewart & Graham Gouldman

Producers

10cc

Weeks at number 1

1 (23-29 September)

Trivia

Births

23 September: Cartoonist Andy Fanton
25 September: Model Jodie Kidd

Meanwhile…

26 September: 23 Ford car plants were close due to strike action.

378. David Essex – Hold Me Close (1975)

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The Intro

Since David Essex’s first number 1, Gonna Make You a Star, he had, with the help of producer Jeff Wayne, remained a top 10 mainstay. His next single Stardust was the theme to the sequel to the film That’ll Be the Day (1973). In Stardust, as before, Essex was the lead, playing wannabe pop star Jim MacLaine. This time his rise and fall took place through the 60s and early-70s. It’s not a bad song, but tries too hard to recapture the lightning-in-a-bottle magic of Rock On. Stardust reached seven in the singles chart, and the film, released in October 1974, did well, but Essex felt it was inferior to That’ll Be the Day.

Before

Next, Essex and Wayne set to work on a concept album of sorts. All the Fun of the Fair was a schizophrenic collection which touched upon Essex’s fascination with fairs as a child. Among the album’s personnel was session guitarist extraordinaire Chris Spedding, who had featured on the number 1 Barbados, and soul group The Real Thing, who would soon go from supporting Essex to having a number 1 in their own right with You to Me Are Everything. First single Rolling Stone went to five.

Ironically, Hold Me Close, which became Essex’s second and last number 1, was almost an afterthought in production. With record label executives waiting in the studio reception to hear the album in full, Essex banged out two vocal takes, and the mix was made in only half an hour.

Review

This information perhaps explains one of the problems with Hold Me Close. Now, Essex was a proper bona fide working-class Londoner, but he definitely played up to stereotypes and laid on the friendly cockney schtick too much at times on this vocal. And that, combined with Wayne’s cheesy production, makes this number 1 seem light years away from the edginess of Rock On. Essex’s transformation to light entertainment star was complete. Which, knowing now that the LP this comes from was all over the place stylistically, is a shame. Mind you, Essex, still popular all these years later, is probably fine with that. He’s very likeable, and despite my criticism, I can’t dislike Hold Me Close too much, it’s good at what it is.

Soon after this, Essex’s chart sales tailed off somewhat, although Oh What a Circus reached three in 1978. But he did take on a role in the original theatre run of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Evita. It was also the year he appeared as the Artilleryman on Wayne’s huge concept double album, Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version of The War of the Worlds, an idea the producer had been working on for years. Now a star in his own right, Wayne went on to be a prolific writer of music for TV, including the TV-AM and Good Morning Britain themes of the 80s. The War of the Worlds has spawned a remake and a theatre show.

After

The 80s started off well for Essex with a lead role in motor-racing film Silver Dream Racer (1980) and a song from it, Silver Dream Racer (Part 1) motoring to number four. In 1982 his seasonal single A Winter’s Tale did very well, reaching two in January. It’s been a festive favourite ever since. Tahiti, in 1983, is his last hit to date, reaching eight. As his music slowed, his theatre and TV roles were increasing, and Tahiti came from the West End show Mutiny!, which he co-wrote and starred in. He was the lead in BBC One’s gentle 1988 sitcom The River, which I enjoyed as a nine-year-old but I dare say it won’t have aged well.

Essex was still releasing albums to mixed degrees of success throughout the 90s, and rounded off the millennium with an OBE in 1999. He played a kind-hearted nomad in an episode of Heartbeat in 2000, a subject close to his heart due to his gypsy roots. He had been Patron of Britain’s National Gypsy Council before moving to the US.

The Outro

In 2005 he was a guest vocalist on dance group St Etienne’s album Tales from the Turnpike House, and was due to join the cast of EastEnders in 2006 but couldn’t fit the time needed into his schedule. He eventually joined the soap in 2011 as Eddie Moon for several months. 2008 was a big year for Essex, with the stage debut of his jukebox musical All the fun of the Fair, based on his back catalogue. It had a West End run two years later. In 2013 he starred in and wrote the score for Traveller, a film in which his real-life son Billy Cook played a half-gypsy searching for his true identity. Now aged 73, Essex still has that boyish smile that charmed so many in the 70s and beyond. Rock on.

The Info

Written by

David Essex

Producer

Jeff Wayne

Weeks at number 1

3 (4-24 October)

Trivia

Births

5 October: Actress Kate Winslet
9 October: Actor Joe McFadden

Deaths

22 October: Historian Arnold J Toynbee

Meanwhile…

9 October: The IRA strike again. An explosion outside Green Park tube station near Piccadilly in London kills one person and injures 20.

13 October: Motorcycle producer Norton Villers in Wolverhampton closes down due to bankruptcy. 

23 October: Another IRA bomb, this time intended for Conservative MP Sir Hugh Fraser, kills oncologist Gordon Hamilton Fairley.

375. Typically Tropical – Barbados (1975)

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The Intro

Here’s a number 1 that is very 1975. Typically Tropical’s Barbados combines two of the decade’s crazes in the UK – the package holiday, and political incorrectness – earning itself the status of a summer smash. Holidays overseas were getting ever cheaper, resulting in songs like Y Viva Espana by Sylvia Vrethammar becoming huge, and controversial sitcom Love Thy Neighbour, about a black couple moving next door to a racist, was an ITV mainstay.

Before

Typically Tropical were two Welsh audio engineers, Jeff Calvert and Max West, who worked at Morgan Studios. Based in Willesden Green, London, Morgan was used by some of the biggest stars of the 70s, including Paul McCartney and Pink Floyd. In 1974 Calvert had returned from a holiday in Jamaica, and felt inspired. He and Hughes penned Barbados in two hours, sitting down with a piano and a guitar before heading to Morgan to put a demo together. On the strength of that demo they signed a three-single deal with Gull Records, and Barbados was to be the first.

Now known as Typically Tropical, they recorded a proper version, and used a fine roll call of session musicians, including guitarists Chris Spedding and Vic Flick, legendary drummer Clem Cattini (been a while since we’ve heard of him) and Blue Mink’s Max West and Roger Coulam on keyboards.

Review

Oh dear. If you’re equipped with the knowledge that the men behind this are two white Welshmen pretending to be black, it makes it pretty hard to stomach. Talk about racial stereotyping… the intro begins with ‘Captain Tobias Willcock welcoming you aboard Coconut Airways Flight 372’… The song is sung from the point of view of a Brixton bus driver who can’t wait to be back on the island, reunited with his girlfriend ‘Mary Jane’. It’s a joke about ganja, get it? You know, because he’s black? Awful.

What can I say in its favour? Well it’s a decent tune, so much so, it went to number 1 again when the Dutch Eurodance outfit Vengaboys reworked it into We’re Going to Ibiza! in 1999. I expect you’re more likely to hear that than Barbados on the radio anymore as it’s more PC, and that’s certainly fair enough. If it wasn’t for the stereotyping, I’d actually prefer Barbados, as I couldn’t stand the Vengaboys at the time.

After

On the strength of reaching number 1, Typically Tropical made the album Barbados Sky. Two singles came from it, Rocket Now and Everybody Plays the Fool but they failed to chart. They also released songs as Captain Zero, Calvert & West and Black Rod between 1975 and 1979, but they sank too. They did however score a hit when they wrote Sarah Brightman’s I Lost My Heart to a Starship Trooper in 1978.

The Info

Written & produced by

Jeffrey Calvert & Max West

Weeks at number 1

1 (9-15 August)

Meanwhile…

14 August: Hampstead entered the UK weather records with the highest 155-min total rainfall at 169mm.

15 August: Olive Smelt, a 46-year-old woman from Halifax, is severely injured in a hammer attack in an alleyway.