1996 . It was a cold and rainy Monday as I entered HMV. The timing was just right, the new singles were on display. And there it was that morning: I took the single off the shelf. I looked at the back cover and this is what it said: Written by Barry Stone. Produced by Belvedere Kane & Julian Gingell. Instantly, my interest was piqued. Both Stone and Gingell had worked at PWL in varying musical…
So, it’s been almost a year since Steve Wright in the Afternoon came to an end. This popular Radio 2 show had been on air for nearly 24 years, and Steve Wright himself has been a constant presence on UK radio for nearly twice as long. I thought it was worth me looking back on this end of an era one year on from that event, and also one year on from my own blog post at the time celebrating Steve &…
Stephen O'Brien ponders on his own formative friendships as he watches the members of a-ha deal with their own in their new film, True North. A new album from legendary Norwegian pop band a-ha is always an event in my book – but even more so when that new album is accompanied by a film. So it was that my girlfriend and I went to Showcase Cinemas in Liverpool on Thursday 15 September 2022 to watch…
Stephen O’Brien tries to come to terms with the end of the greatest radio show of all time, Radio 2’s Steve Wright in the Afternoon On a Friday afternoon in March 2022, my girlfriend and I were driving along the Llyn Peninsula in Wales, on the way to a well-deserved weekend away. As is customary when we go on holiday in the UK, we were being kept company by Steve Wright in the Afternoon aka The…
On a recent episode of his excellent Electronically Yours podcast, Heaven 17’s Martyn Ware singled out Let Me Go as the best Heaven 17 track, and after revisiting it based on that proposition, I wholeheartedly agree. The lead single from Heaven 17’s second album The Luxury Gap, Let Me Go stalled at #41 and was eclipsed by the massive success of follow-up Temptation. There’s no question that…
It is the end of September 2018 as I write this, and I am here to tell you about the album of the year. Still Life is the debut album from Swedish songwriter and producer Peter Kvint. Kvint has had a long career behind the scenes, working with acts like Andreas Johnson, Britney Spears and Morten Harket. Having enjoyed Kvint's work on Harket's contributions to a-ha's last studio album Cast In Steel…
There are many contenders for The Best Kim Wilde Tracks You've Never Heard - and I'm going to cover a number of them in a new series of blogs - but I'm going to start with my favourite. Kim Wilde had enjoyed a successful 1980s, starting out with catchy and lyrically intriguing hits crafted by her father, the famous rock and roll singer and songwriter Marty Wilde, and her brother, talented…
January 2016 has been an unrelentingly sad month, with the loss of many talented, creative people. Lemmy, Alan Rickman, Colin Vearncombe and of course, David Bowie have all passed, leaving a huge legacy. And now today, we have lost Sir Terry Wogan, undoubtedly one of the greatest broadcasters the UK and Ireland has ever seen. If anything, I feel Sir Terry's loss more keenly than those others…
Before Christmas, I'd been listening a lot to Black's 1987 debut album Wonderful Life . It'd been a while since I'd dug it out, and it took only a few tracks for me to ask myself why I'd left it quite so long. An astounding long-player, it took me back to my life at the time of its original release but, as with such things, the events of my life since then have also allowed me to find new…
I'm probably one of the last bloggers to pay tribute to the late, great David Bowie in the week he died, and many many bloggers have expressed their sadness at his passing in far more eloquent and elegant ways than I could ever hope to. Whilst perhaps not a Bowie fanatic per se , I am a big fan and ardent admirer, and was lucky enough to see the man himself play live at the Liverpool Royal Court…
1986 was an interesting year for Stock Aitken Waterman. The writing and production team had only been together for two years, but had already achieved significant success with their early work for acts such as Divine, Hazell Dean, Dead Or Alive and Princess. 1986 would see the team experiment with a number of different styles and genres, before finding a niche in the dance-pop style that would…
Everyone knows Stock Aitken Waterman (SAW) as hit-making writers and producers, but as many fans know, there are a number of singles in their back catalogue which were not big hits. Some of these lower-charting tracks are among the most interesting and admired tracks Mike, Matt and Pete were involved in, and as such, deserved better recognition and success than they achieved. One example of this…
Today's 80s UK Christmas Singles post is "Jason And His Amazing Stock Aitken Waterman Christmas Single!" Jason Donovan - When You Come Back To Me Former star of Australian TV soap opera Neighbours , Jason Donovan had made quite an impact on the music scene in 1989, which is in no small part due to the continued success of the writing and production team of Mike Stock, Matt Aitken and Pete…
Today's 80s UK Christmas Singles post is a Rea-lly seasonal 1988 diatribe at the state of the roads in late December... Chris Rea - Driving Home For Christmas Chris Rea's second attempt at a 1980s Christmas hit single was rather more successful than the previous year's Joys of Christmas , even though it was not a new song. Rea states that the idea for Driving Home For Christmas came to him many…
Today's 80s UK Christmas Singles post is a "Not Really a Christmas song but..." entry, taking us back to 1987 when Pet Shop Boys and Nat King Cole ganged up against Rick Astley... Rick Astley - When I Fall In Love With a rich deep voice totally at odds with his youthful appearance, Rick Astley had exploded on to the music scene in 1987 with his smash hit debut solo single Never Gonna Give You Up .…
Max Headroom - Merry Christmas Santa Claus (You're A Lovely Guy) Billed as the World's first computer generated TV host, Max Headroom was actually actor Matt Frewer behind complex prosthetic make-up and digitally-manipulated speech patterns. Debuting in 1985 in TV movie Max Headroom: 20 Minutes Into The Future, the character went to host a Channel 4 music programme, and later featured in his own…
Thank God it's extract number 5 from 80s UK Christmas Singles, and today it's Queen! Queen - Thank God It's Christmas Rock band Queen are acknowledged as one of the world's biggest music acts, with the golden era of their career spanning over two decades. Best known for their 1975 classic Bohemian Rhapsody , the band would actually gain a whole new lease of life thanks to their blistering…
Today's 80s UK Christmas Single extract is a beautiful piece of melancholy from 1983... The Pretenders - 2000 Miles Led by charismatic frontwoman Chrissie Hynde, rock band The Pretenders have enjoyed critical and commercial success through their career, most notably with singles such as Brass In Pocket and Don't Get Me Wrong . 1983 saw the release of this Christmas song, although to call it such…
Today we cover the UK's first hip-hop record -- which, amazingly, was a Christmas song... Dizzy Heights - Christmas Rapping Former member of hip-hop act The Krew, Dizzy Heights combined the Yuletide season and rap to break new ground with Christmas Rapping, which is widely acknowledged as the first UK hip-hop single. Initially credited to to Dizzy H, this is a very accessible rap…
Today's extract is the strange case of Pink Floyd's Dave Gilmour and his Christmas novelty record... Holly and the Ivys - Christmas on 45 One would not associate the frontmen of Pink Floyd and The Dream Academy with a Yuletide take on Stars on 45, but that's precisely what David Gilmour and Nick Laird-Clowes did with Christmas on 45 , recorded under the moniker of Holly And The Ivys. Laird-Clowes…
Here's the first extract from my 80s UK Christmas Singles book -- and I'm starting off with a popular classic: Jona Lewie - Stop The Cavalry Offbeat artist Lewie started out in the 1970s as part of Terry Dactyl and the Dinosaurs, a novelty act best known for their Seaside Shuffle hit. He later ended up at the legendary Stiff Records, which released his best known singles—You'll Always Find Me In…
My new book 80s UK Christmas Singles has just come out on Kindle. Covering 81 pop singles released for the Christmas charts between 1980 and 1989, the book covers big hits, obscure curios and some downright bizarre releases. Artists covered include: Kate Bush, Jona Lewie, Barron Knights, Darts, Jim Davidson, The Damned, St Winifred's School Choir, Chris Squire and Alan White, Holly & The Ivys, The…
This is a recurring feature which will look at obscure 80s records which I find interesting, even if no-one else will! And I'm kicking off with a bizarre, synth-laden belter: "Am I Normal?" by David. Which, when you hear it, will inspire the following response: "No, quite the opposite!". Because this is a really offbeat record. There were fears in the 1980s that we would reach a point where…
You may have heard radio DJs over the years make a particular and remarkable statement when interviewing a musician or pop group. What happens is that a DJ will play an artist's new single and, as a prelude to the interview, will tell the artist that their record "sounds great on the radio". Notice the statement isn't "Your record sounds great", but that it sounds great on the radio. There is a…
Getting ready for work the other morning, I was snapped out of my normal hypnagogic stupor when Radio 2's Chris Evans played "Drinking In LA" by Bran Van 3000. If I was some kind of barely-literate halfwit, I'd have just tweeted "CHOOON! LOL BSVMP" or something like that but this record - and the memories it conjures up - deserves a better tribute than 140 characters of acronyms. This unusual and…