Tears For Fears - Shout

With news this week that Tears For Fears are going to be back in action this year, celebrating the 30th anniversary of the release of their first album, I thought I'd feature this single that shot the band into superstardom around the world. Released in November 1984 and got to number 4 in January 1985 and hit the top spot in America the same year. It was off the classic album Songs From The Big Chair and Shout was a change of sound as the band sound was going more towards a synth pop, rock, stadium band sound. The song was basically about protesting rather than keeping quiet, but to think about what you are protesting about rather than just going ahead and just have no idea why you are protesting, also the single lasted over 5 minutes but was still played heavily on the radio. A classic single for classic times, I think it is from one of the last great years for UK pop music!

John Foxx - Underpass

This was the debut single from John Foxx, who originally had been the lead singer with Ultravox. Ultravox were formed from Tiger Lilly in 1976 and signed to Island records where they released 3 albums. They had a good following but no success in the charts, after the third album Systems Of Romance, Foxx left the band to go solo, Midge Ure would later join the band and take them in a different direction.

In 1980 John released this first single, Underpass on his own label through Virgin called Metal Beat. The single only reached number 31 in the UK charts but it summed up the early electronic songs of the early eighties, cold, stark, drama laden but still a classic track. It also came off his first album, Metamatic which reached number 18 in the charts and influenced many of the up and coming electronic bands, Gary Numan was a fan too!

He had several more hits in the early eighties before dissapearing for a few years before making a return to recording in the 1990's and he is still recording and touring today!