80s Weekender

The gremlins have struck again and I have had to shelve my planned post for today, so here's a little dip into the archives for some 80s (or 80s adjacent) tunes.

I've created hundreds of mixtapes and compilations for this blog, but I only keep the links active for a month or so. Therefore, I've reactivated a selection that share my love of 80s music and especially the 12" remix. 

In total, there 159 songs, 94 artists, 12 mixtapes and selections, Enough to fill the weekend, I think!

A Kick Up The Eighties (Side 1 & Side 2)

Altered Perceptions (Side 1 & Side 2)

Floorshow

Flying In The Face Of Fashion

Just Walk Don't Talk

Kissing The Mix (Side 1 & Side 2)

Musik For Hairspray

Muzik For Hair Gel

Teenage Remix (Side 1 & Side 2)

The Fate Of The Eighties

What My Heart Yearns For Now

You Never Really Saw...

And the A-Z roll call of featured artists, noting if they pop up multiple times, with one runaway winner...

Act
Age Of Chance
Arthur Russell
Associates
Bauhaus
Belouis Some
Billy Idol (x4)
Billy Ocean
Blancmange (x3)
Bronski Beat (x2)
Cardiacs
Chakk
China Crisis (x2)
Clan Of Xymox (x2)
Cocteau Twins (x2)
David Bowie
Depeche Mode (x6)
Divine (x3)
Doctor & The Medics
Echo & The Bunnymen
Erasure
Eurythmics (x2)
Fad Gadget
Faith No More
Feargal Sharkey
Flesh For Lulu
Frankie Goes To Hollywood (x2)
Fun Boy Three
Gary Numan
Gene Loves Jezebel (x2)
Grace Jones
Heaven 17 (x2)
Howard Devoto
Icehouse
Iggy Pop
Information Society
It's Immaterial
Japan (x2)
John Foxx
Julian Cope
Killing Joke
King
Kissing The Pink (x2)
Lloyd Cole & The Commotions (x2)
Lords Of The New Church
Luxuria
M (x2)
Marc Almond (x2)
New Order (x2)
O.M.D. (x2)
Ofra Haza
Pet Shop Boys
Pete Shelley (x3)
Pixies
Prefab Sprout
Propaganda (x2)
Psychic TV (x2) 
R.E.M.
Scarlet Fantastic
Scritti Politti (x2)
Simple Minds
Siouxsie & The Banshees (x3)
Soft Cell (x2)
Sparks (x2)
T. Rex
Talk Talk (x6)
Talking Heads
Tears For Fears (x2)
The Armoury Show
The B-52's (x4)
The Chameleons (x2)
The Communards
The Cult (x3)
The Cure
The Damned (x3)
The Godfathers
The Icicle Works
The Leather Nun (x2)
The March Violets
The Psychedelic Furs (x9)
The Sisters Of Mercy (x2)
The Smiths (x2)
The Stranglers
The Sugarcubes
The The
The Undertones
Thomas Dolby (x4)
Trouble Funk
U2
Vicious Pink (x4)
Visage (x5)
Wang Chung
Westworld
Zeke Manyika

Blimps, Karmann Ghias And Submarines

Happy birthday to Thomas Dolby, born 14th October 1958.

Following last week's dip into Thomas' videography, I realised that apart from another post in 2024 about his song Flying North, I've never done a dedicated Dolby Dubhed selection.

So, to celebrate his 67th year, I've created a 67-minute collection of classics, rarities and remixes spanning 1980 to 1992. 

I'm less familiar with his music in the second half of the 1990s and into the 21st Century and will undoubtedly take a tour at some point, but there's plenty to see here, including the defining hit single featuring the brilliant Dr. Magnus Pike.

The original version of The Devil Is An Englishman featured on the soundtrack album to Ken Russell's 1986 film Gothic. Screamin' Lord Byron is Thomas, plus actor Gabriel Byrne, who played the poet Byron in the film and whose dialogue is featured heavily. Timothy Spall was also in the film (and the song) as Dr. Polidori.

1992 song Eastern Bloc is subtitled The Sequal (sic) as it picks up the story of the characters from Thomas' 1982 single (and personal favoruite) Europa And The Pirate Twins.

Dolby fans will take note that the number of omissions from this selection mean that there is plenty more to revisit in a future selection (or two).

For now, here's to you Thomas, hope you have a good one!

1) Hyperactive! (Heavy Breather Subversion) (Remix By Thomas Dolby) (1984)

2) The Ability To Swing (1988)

3) Europa And The Pirate Twins (Extended Version By Thomas Dolby) (1981)

4) Radio Silence (Album Version By Thomas Dolby) (1982)

5) The Devil Is An Englishman (Extended Version By Martin Rushent): Screamin' Lord Byron ft. Timothy Spall (1987)

6) Airhead (Def Ears Mix By Bassy Bob Brockmann) (1988)

7) Pedestrian Walkway (Demo) (1980)

8) Mulu The Rain Forest (1984)

9) Budapest By Blimp (Edit) (1988)

10) She Blinded Me With Science (Single Version ft. Dr. Magnus Pike) (1982)

11) Dissidents (The Search For Truth Part I) (Remix By François Kevorkian & Dominick Maita) (1984)

12) Eastern Bloc (The Sequal - Edited Version By Thomas Dolby) (1992)

13) I Love You Goodbye (Version By Thomas Dolby) (1992)

14) One Of Our Submarines (Extended Version By Thomas Dolby & Tim Friese-Greene) (1982)

1981: Europa And The Pirate Twins EP: 3

1982: She Blinded Me With Science EP: 10, 14

1982: The Golden Age Of Wireless: 4

1984: Dissidents EP: 11

1984: Hyperactive! EP: 1

1984: The Flat Earth: 8

1987: The Devil Is An Englishman EP: 5

1988: Airhead EP: 9

1988: Airhead's Revenge EP: 6

1988: Aliens Ate My Buick!: 2

1992: I Love You Goodbye EP: 12, 13

2009: The Golden Age Of Wireless (Expanded Edition): 7

Blimps, Karmann Ghias And Submarines (1:06:52) (GD) (M)

You Don't Do Heavy Metal In Dobly

Something Thomas Morgan Robertson or, to give him his more commonly accceptable appellation, Thomas Dolby knows only too well.

Songwriter, singer, producer, entrepreneur, teacher and unabashed advocate of the "hair replacement system", I've been a fan since his debut album, The Golden Age Of Wireless in 1982, although I've admittedly followed his 21st Century music releases less closely.

A chance viewing of a 1983 performance of Hyperactive! on BBC 2's The Old Grey Whistle Test prompted me to dig out a few other Dolby classics from the (YT) archives, including a memorable performance of She Blinded Me With Science with Buzz Aldrin (as of August 2025, the oldest living astronaut) at The Smithsonian in 2013.

It's Thomas' birthday next week, so it is highly likely that more of his music will make an appearance then. Mixed in Dolby not Dobly, naturally.

1) Hyperactive (Live @ BBC's Old Grey Whistle Test) (1984)

2) Radio Silence (Official Video) (1982)

3) Europa And The Pirate Twins (Official Video) (1982)

4) Airhead (Official Video) (1988)

5) I Love You Goodbye (Official Video) (1992)

6) The Toad Lickers (Official Video) (2010)

7) She Blinded Me With Science (Live @ 'The Future Is Now' conference, The Smithsonian dt. Buzz Aldrin) (2013)

  

 

 

 

 

 

Muzik For Hair Gel

Day 2 of the Eighties 12" Weekender with a new selection, based on an old idea.

Digging out archive Dubhed selections to include with yesterday's post, I'd planned to include Muzik For Hairspray, a mixtape I'd compiled circa 2000 and posted here in May 2021.

I was barely six months into the blog, Muzik For Hairspray was my 29th post and I had no expectation at the time that five years and over 1,500 posts later, I may want to re-post the selection...so I deleted it.

In recreating the original mixtape (again), I was inspired to create a companion set, inspiringly titled Muzik For Hair Gel.

The idea was simple enough: use exactly the same artists and sequence of the Muzik For Hairspray mixtape*, just different songs, and ideally ones that I hadn't used on a previous 12"/80s compilation. And it was that last bit that took the most time!

That said, I'm pretty happy with the end result. After the controversy of 1979's Pop Musik on the previous comp, today's song by M (aka Robin Scott) was genuinely released in the 1980s...just. 

Official Secrets was only released on 7" in the UK and many other countries, though the Spanish put the full length album version on theirs, and Mexico went one step further by putting it on a promo 12". Tick!

I've used the dub remix of Love Calling by Sir William of Idol in a previous Best of Billy selection, so I stuck with the album version. As with Mexico, it was Australia to the rescue this time, releasing this version on a promo 12" single. Double tick!

This is the fourth appearance on this blog of Boom! There She Was (Sonic Property Mix) by Scritti Politti. However, whilst the previous three selections all featured an edit included on the UK 12", this time it's the unexpurgated 9-minute version direct from the U.S.A. 

Divine makes a welcome reappearance, again teaming up with Bobby Orlando for Love Reaction. But what 1983 12" single could possibly have inspired their own dancefloor smash?

* With one exception.

Having recorded this selection first, I then revisited Muzik For Hairspray, only to discover too late that I've accidentally missed off the last song on Side 1 when I originally posted the tracklist. So, apologies to Belouis Some for missing out on Muzik For Hair Gel. Them's the showbiz breaks, I guess!

This weekend's selections are dedicated to Mike, his mates and anyone else making their way to the Milton Keynes Bowl for today's Forever Now festival, featuring several of today's artists and some unbelievably great headliners to boot. Have a fab day!

And a very happy birthday to Green Gartside, who is 70 today!

Side One

1) Official Secrets (Album Version By Robin Scott): M ft. Brigit Vinchon (1980)

2) Love Calling (Album Version By Keith Forsey): Billy Idol (1982)

3) Cccan't You See... (8:15 To Nowhere Mix By Tony Mansfield): Vicious Pink (1984)

4) Love Reaction (12" Version By Bobby Orlando): Divine (1983)

5) Junk (Remixed By Harvey Goldberg): Bronski Beat (1984)

6) Dissidents (The Search For Truth Part II) (Remix By François Kevorkian & Dominick Maita): Thomas Dolby (1984)

7) Where The Heart Is (12" Version By Mike Thorne & Harvey Goldberg): Soft Cell (1982)

Side Two

1) Boom! There She Was (Sonic Property Mix By Steve Thompson & Michael Barbiero) (Full Length): Scritti Politti ft. Roger Troutman (1988)

2) Channel Z (Rock Mix By Don Was & Michael Hutchinson): The B-52's (1989)

3) On Your Own (New York Mix By Steve Thompson & Michael Barbiero): Pete Shelley (1986)

4) Let's All Make A Bomb (New Version By B.E.F. & Greg Walsh): Heaven 17 (1983)

5) Shock (The Shep Pettibone Mix): The Psychedelic Furs (1987)

6) It's Called A Heart (Extended) (Remix By Depeche Mode & Daniel Miller): Depeche Mode (1985)

7) Without You (12" Mix By Tim Friese-Greene): Talk Talk (1984)

Side One (45:52) (GD) (M)

Side Two (46:19) (GD) (M)

You can find Muzik For Hairspray here

And, for your further 12/80s listening pleasure:

Flying In The Face Of Fashion (2022)

Just Walk Don't Talk (2022)

Fun To Think (2023)

No Games (2024)

Party Down, Rock The House (2024)

When I'm By Myself...

Side 1 of a cassette compilation, recorded May 1992.

 

A bit of an oddity in my collection, this one, as it was never recorded by me or for me, but by my brother's then-fiancée. Both the relationship and the cassette were subsequently discarded and, if memory serves, I rescued this and a few other tapes that my brother had binned and intended for landfill.

I think I was curious about this collection in particular because it contains lots of singer/songwriter heavyweights that I recognised by name but was largely ignorant of. So, it was a good opportunity to dip my toe into the waters.

I'd like to say that this was my springboard into the worlds of Bob Dylan, Joni Mitchell and Jackson Browne. It wasn't, but it opened my eyes and ears and eventually I started dipping into Bob, Joni and Jackson's respective back catalogues. Although I've yet to own a Sting album and I'm in no particular rush to do so.

 

The collection opens with 80s Dylan, but it's okay, it's one of the good ones. I'm not familiar enough with Joni Mitchell's vast body of work to know if there are similarly certain periods and/or album that should come with their own "enter at your own risk" warning, but Hejira presents no such threat.

On paper, The Cure's debut B-side seems the errant choice, nestled between Sting and Sinéad, but it fits right in and still hits the same sweet spot as it did when I first heard on the double play greatest hits cassette, Standing On A Beach: The Singles (And Unavailable B-Sides), in 1986.

 

My Special Child was a standalone single by Sinéad O'Connor, peaking at #42 in the UK in June 1991. I was still travelling around Australia at the time, which probably explains why I had no recollection of the song. It's an okay song, though with that voice, Sinéad's 'okay' is still way above many other artist's 'excellent'.

The original compilation featured the album version of Airwaves by Thomas Dolby from his 1982 debut, The Golden Age Of Wireless. I've swapped it out here for the earlier demo version, which appeared on the 1980 cassette From Brussels With Love, on the now-legendary label Les Disques Du Crépuscule. I love this pared down, less tech-y version, which sits better with the warmer, organic sounds infusing this collection.

I know The Beautiful South were big back in the day, and had lots of hit records. Even so, I still don't think Paul Heaton gets the level of recognition and appreciation he should, as one of the finest singers and songwriters to emerge in the 1980s. I don't listen to his music as often as I should. Hearing a song like Let Love Speak Up Itself makes me question why.

I heard Cowboy Junkies' cover of Powderfinger before I heard the song as written and recorded by Neil Young. it followed the achingly slow template of the Trinity Sessions album and remains the definitive version for me. 

 

The same month that my brother's girlfriend put I'd Rather Go Blind by Chicken Shack, I also acquired the song via Vox magazine's cover mounted cassette freebie, Radio Daze (The John Peel Sessions). The fact that the opening song was 10.15 Saturday Night makes me think that she included both songs from the very same compilation. 

 

I'd Rather Go Blind is another example where I was deeply immersed in the cover long before I heard the original version, in this case Etta James in 1967. The song has been covered many, many times since by the likes of Rod Stewart, Ruby Turner, Janet Kay, Paul Weller, Beyoncé and Dua Lipa. Chicken Shack's version is hard to beat, not least for the sublime vocals by Christine Perfect aka the much-missed Christine McVie.

The Road by Jackson Browne is a bit of an oddity. Taken from his 1977 album Running On Empty, according to Iffypedia, "the entire album was recorded on tour, either live on stage, or in locations associated with touring, such as backstage, on tour buses, or in hotel rooms".

The song itself is a prime example. The first half was recorded in room 301 of the Cross Keys Inn in Columbia, Maryland on 27th August 1977. The second half switches to a live recording at the Garden State Arts Center in Holmdel, New Jersey on 7th September 1977. The latter pretty much sounds like an entirely different song to the sparse acoustic section that preceded it.

Rounding off the collection is The Manish Boys featuring one David Jones who, like Christine Perfect, changed their name and enjoyed slightly more success as... David Bowie. The session guitar player also went on to greater things, a young whippersnapper by the name of Jimmy Page.

Today's headline photo, nicked from t'internet, is a contemporary photo (April 1992) of the Redcliffe flyover and the George Railway Hotel near Temple Meads station in Bristol. The flyover was a narrow, single-track curved bridge opened as a temporary measure in 1968...which ended up staying there until 1998. As a kid sitting in the back seat of my parents' car, a journey into the city centre via the flyover was the equivalent of a free rollercoaster. Without seat belts. Fearless times, eh?

1) Man In The Long Black Coat: Bob Dylan (1989)  

2) Mad About You: Sting (1991) 

3) 10:15 Saturday Night (Single Version): The Cure (1978)

4) My Special Child: Sinéad O'Connor (1991)

5) Airwaves (Demo): Thomas Dolby (1980)

6) Let Love Speak Up Itself (Album Version): The Beautiful South (1990)

7) Powderfinger (Cover of Neil Young): Cowboy Junkies (1990)

8) Coyote: Joni Mitchell (1976)

9) I'd Rather Go Blind (Cover of Etta James): Chicken Shack (1969)

10) The Road (Cover of Danny O'Keefe): Jackson Browne (1977)

11) I Pity The Fool (Cover of Bobby 'Blue' Bland): The Manish Boys (1965)

1965: I Pity The Fool EP: 11

1969: I'd Rather Go Blind EP: 9

1976: Hejira: 8

1977: Running On Empty: 10

1978: Killing An Arab EP: 3

1980: From Brussels With Love (Les Disques Du Crépuscule): 5

1989: Oh Mercy: 1

1990: Choke: 6 

1990: The Caution Horses: 7

1991: My Special Child EP: 4

1991: The Soul Cages: 2

Side 1 (46:56) (KF) (Mega)

Decade II: 1982

Side 1 of a cassette compilation, recorded sometime in March 1990, lost sometime in the next two decades, reimagined and recreated 11th August 2024.

 

And the hits just keep on coming...

 

If you were here for last weekend's opening brace of 80s-themed mixtapes, you'll know that of the five cassettes I recorded in 1990, only three remain. 

 

The two lost volumes covered 1982 to 1985 and I've had a go at recreating the track listing and cover art (kind of) from scratch. Some songs I vaguely recall being on the original mixtapes, others I've no idea, but I've excluded any songs that I couldn't have owned or borrowed in spring 1990. Lots had to be left out, inevitably, but I think the end results are faithful reproductions that sit well with their contemporary cassettes.

 

1982 was another fantastic year for pop and I realise how lucky I was to grow up surrounded by all this diverse and exciting music troubling the Top 40. Synths were fully embedded in the mainstream by now but with all sorts of influences and flavours stirred in. 

 

Looking back, there's a marked shift towards heavy marketing and promo by this point: videos, double pack 7" and 12" picture discs with free posters, saturation on kids' TV shows, and so on. If a single wasn't a hit, it would be re-mixed, re-recorded and re-re-re-released until, damn it, it became a hit.

Kiss Me is a prime example of this. Stephen Duffy originally formed the band Tin Tin with a couple of guys from Fashion, a Dexys Midnight Runner and producer Bob Lamb. Kiss Me was their debut single in November 1982 and flopped. The single was remixed and released in the USA by François Kevorkian in 1983 and became a minor club hit. 

 

Taking notice, Duffy's label released the remix in the UK in 1984 and it scraped to #78. Undeterred, Kiss Me was remixed yet again, this time by J.J. Jeczalik (Art Of Noise) and Nicholas Froome, and given one last shot in early 1985. Fourth time lucky, as Stephen 'Tin Tin' Duffy reached the dizzy heights of #4 and enjoyed several other hits afterwards.

I've cheated a little here and gone for François Kevorkian's remix from 1983, partly because I didn't own the original Tin Tin single back in the day and partly because it's a much better version than the 1982 original.

I've also plumped for the 12" remix of Talk Talk's eponymous single to open proceedings. An early purchase from Plastic Wax Records in Bristol, back when it was in Old Market, opposite the Trinity. As with most Talk Talk extended mixes, there are fewer vocals than the single/album version and lots of none-more-80s bridges, bells and whistles.

I was tempted to drop in the 12" mix of Party Fears Two by Associates but it pops up quite frequently in my 80s mixtapes so I've stuck with the single version here instead. Hearing this for the first time on Top Of The Pops was an attention-grabbing moment and began a lifelong love of Billy MacKenzie. What a voice.

Making their debut here along with Talk Talk are Tears For Fears, Blancmange and Scritti Politti, who will all (probably) reappear in later volumes. Others, like Yazoo, ABC and Monsoon make one-time appearances in this series.

Squeeze wrapped up an incredible run of singles with Annie Get Your Gun, recorded to promote their essential compilation, 45s And Under. 

And should any 1982 collection be without Pete Wylie's epic The Story Of The Blues? No Wah!, sorry, no way!

 

No prizes for guessing the year in tomorrow's post...

1) Talk Talk (Extended Mix Long Version): Talk Talk

2) Don't Go (Album Version): Yazoo

3) Party Fears Two (Single Version): Associates

4) Living On The Ceiling (Single Remix): Blancmange

5) The Story Of The Blues Part One (Single Version): Wah!

6) Mad World (Album Version): Tears For Fears

7) Kiss Me (U.S. Remix) (7" Version): Tin Tin

8) Poison Arrow (Single Version): ABC

9) Windpower (Single Version): Thomas Dolby

10) Ever So Lonely (Single Version): Monsoon

11) Asylums In Jerusalem (Album Version): Scritti Politti

12) Annie Get Your Gun (Single Version): Squeeze

14th March 1982: The Lexicon Of Love (#6): 8

21st March 1982: Sulk (#9): 3

25th April 1982: Talk Talk EP (#52): 1

2nd May 1982: Ever So Lonely EP (#12): 10

25th July 1982: Upstairs At Eric's (#3): 2

8th August 1982: Songs To Remember (#43): 11

5th September 1982: The Golden Age Of Wireless (#31): 9

24th October 1982: Singles: 45's And Under (#43): 12

31st October 1982: The Hurting (#3): 6

??? November 1982: Kiss Me EP (# n/a): 7

21st November 1982: Happy Families (#7): 4

16th January 1983: The Story Of The Blues EP (#3): 5 *

Side One (45:46) (GD) (M)

* The Story Of The Blues first charted on 19th December 1982

Staring Right Into The Light

Flying North by Thomas Dolby popped up on my playlist this week, a standout from his debut album The Golden Age Of Wireless. 

 

On the original album release in May 1982, Flying North was the opening song with a much different track listing from subsequent re-releases. The vinyl version I bought a few years later was the 1983 issue which placed She Blinded Me With Science at the start, added One Of Our Submarines to Side 2 at the expense of another song and relegated Flying North to Track 4 on Side 1.

Flying North was also released as a B-side to breakthrough single Windpower the same year, peaking at #31 in the UK in September 1982. As such, it enjoyed a 'High Altitude Extended Play' version on the 12" single and a Razormaid remix in the US.

 

It's always been one of my favourite Thomas Dolby songs, with crisp production from Thomas with Tim Friese-Greene that sounds very much of the 1980s but was also a cut above many of its contemporaries.

 

I've discovered a 2006 live performance, with studio intro to the song from Thomas, which provides a fascinating context to the lyrical origin. And the performance is great, too. It's #4 of 6-part podcast, Sole Inhabitant, and I'll go back to watch the rest this weekend.

 

Metal bird dip wing of fire

 Whose airlanes comb dark Earth

 The poles are tethers we were born in

 On the brink of a whole new deal

 On the floor of a Pan Am bar

 I'm staring right into the light

 And I'm drawn in like a moth

 And I'm flying north again

 

Here come the men in suits

 Papers waving in the runway glare

 Lincoln streaming in the chilly air of the morning

 At the end of a double day

 At the back of an airport lounge

 I'm staring down into the cold

 And I'm worn out like a cloth

 And I'm flying north again tonight

 

 Down with the landing gear

 Up goes the useless prayer

 The poles are tethers we were born in

 Now I'm back in the London night

 On a bench in a launderette

 I'm staring right into my face

 And I'm drawn out like a plot

 And I'm flying north again tonight

We Don't Really Need A Crowd To Have A Party

Another 45-minute selection of eclectic Eighties 12" mixes to shuffle in the weekend. 

I was an avid consumer of remixes as a newly minted record collector in my teens, spending a disproportionate amount of my hard-earned Saturday and holiday job money on 12" singles. My tastes were broadening from the outset: I had no problem parting with cash for Hi NRG, Pop, Goth, Electro, Rock, Indie or D.I.S.C.O., often within the same shopping trip.

For all that, I can say confidently that I didn't own a single one of today's selections until the advent of the internet, eBay, nostalgia-driven 3CD 12"/80s collections and as importantly, if not more so, music blogs.

Suddenly, things that had passed me by or were just out of reach were more readily available. Pre-Brexit and/or the sky-rocketing of shipping fees, I'd acquire tons of music from sellers in Europe and the USA. Without music blogs, would I ever have heard of Shona Laing? Or been able to deep dive into Joseph Watt and Art Maharg's Razormaid archive? Probably not.

Some of this selection may be familiar, it may trigger some fuzzy, happy memories or it may be music that you've never heard before today. If it's none of the above but it gets you shuffling and shimmying around the kitchen, then that's good enough for me!

 

1) Dancing In Berlin (Extended Version - Dance Remix By Giorgio Moroder & Richie Zito): Berlin (1984)

2) Flying North (Razormaid Remix): Thomas Dolby (1988)

3) So Bright So Strong (The Kissing Side) (Remix By Phil Harding & Paul 'Wix' Wickens): Nitzer Ebb (1985)

4) Big Fun (Juan's Magic Remix By Juan Atkins): Inner City (1988)

5) Work It Out (Acid Dub): Steve 'Silk' Hurley ft. M. Doc aka Marc Williams (1989)  

6) Beat Boy (Dance Dub): Visage (1984)

7) Soviet Snow (Meltdown Dub) (Remix By Justin Strauss & Murray Elias): Shona Laing (1987)

8) Our Darkness (Remix By Anne Clark & David Harrow): Anne Clark (1984)

We Don't Really Need A Crowd To Have A Party (46:22) (KF) (Mega)

Pioneer

Celebrating Ryuichi Sakamoto 坂本龍, 17th January 1952 to 28th March 2023.

 

I was born in 1970 so it's little surprise that my entry point to Sakamoto's music wasn't Yellow Magic Orchestra but Japan, although I wasn't particularly aware of it at the time, and the follow up singles Bamboo Houses/Bamboo Music and Forbidden Colours with David Sylvian.

 

My brother had a giant poster of Japan on his bedroom wall, featuring honorary band member Masami Tsuchiya and I appreciated the beautiful synchronicity of a band called Japan having a Japanese musician in their line up. It was probably from reading my brother's copies of Smash Hits (delivered every week by the paper boy) that I read that Ryuichi Sakamoto had performed with Japan on their Sons Of Pioneers tour in 1982.

 

That seemed the natural starting point for this selection, which I've wrestled with since news on Sunday of Sakamoto's inevitable and heartbreaking passing, following a long battle with cancer. One of my favourite Japan songs, Taking Islands In Africa, from 1980's Gentlemen Take Polaroids, is credited to Sakamoto and David Sylvian and features Ryuichi on keyboards. In researching this post, I came across a fascinating post by David J Nibloe on his Vista blog which reveals some of the deeper story behind the Sakamoto's meeting with Japan and the recording of the song.

I've skipped the aforementioned Sakamoto/Sylvian collaborations as they both appeared on my recent David Sylvian selection (which I've made available again via a link below), but the two worked together many many times over the subsequent years and decades. I've picked Midnight Sun, arguably a lesser known, bluesy track from Sylvian's 1999 album Dead Bees On A Cake, featuring Ryuichi Sakamoto and Marc Ribot. 

 

The main, instrumental theme from Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence, in it's vocal version better known as Forbidden Colours, also makes an appearance alongside The Last Emperor. I was incredibly moved by both films when I first watched them, not just for the striking visual narrative but also Ryuichi Sakamoto's soundtrack which is a character and voice in it's own right. I've barely dipped into his film composition work outside of these two but it's incredible to think that Sakamoto was creating something on the scale and power of The Last Emperor in 1987 whilst also releasing the poppier Risky with Iggy Pop. 

 

Ryuichi Sakamoto's capacity to ignore boundaries, to blend genres and create new ones, has been a constant source of fascination even if I've only intermittently followed his career. I draw parallels with John Cale, who to me has similarly pursued a desire to explore new paths, different ways of (musical) expression and artists to collaborate with.

So this selection ended up not being a straightforward Ryuichi Sakamoto selection at all, including not just his work with Yellow Magic Orchestra and as a solo artist but also his remixes, co-writes and appearances on other people's songs. This is how I discovered his wider body of work and it felt appropriate to try to capture that feeling across a mere 80 minutes. The original 'shortlist' was over two and a half hours, so some tough choices along the way.

 

Some of these songs will be familiar, though not necessarily in the versions presented here, there are frequent changes from upbeat to downtempo, quiet to loud, vocal to instrumental, pop to something harder to define.   

 

Having started with the band that first introduced me to Ryuichi Sakamoto, it seemed somehow fitting to close with a remix that he produced for his daughter Miu. Hard to believe that this alone is now 25 years old. Harder still to believe that Sakamoto-san has gone, but his vast musical legacy leaves much to discover and re-discover in the years to come.

 

Rest well, 坂本龍

 

1) Taking Islands In Africa (Album Version By John Punter): Japan (1980)

2) Fatalism (Ryuichi Sakamoto & Yukihiro Takahashi Remix): Massive Attack ft. Guy Garvey & Martina Topley-Bird (2010)

3) Rocket Factory: Sheena & The Rokkets ft. Yellow Magic Orchestra (1979)

4) Firecracker (Special DJ Copy): Yellow Magic Orchestra (1978)

5) Risky (Extended Mix By Julian Mendelsohn): Ryuichi Sakamoto ft. Iggy Pop (1987)

6) eena ferroix (Ryuichi Sakamoto Mix): CoH (2014)

7) The Last Emperor - Theme Variation 1: Ryuichi Sakamoto (1987)

8) Midnight Sun: David Sylvian ft. Ryuichi Sakamoto & Marc Ribot (1999)

9) Love & Hate (Message Mix - Single Edit): Ryuichi Sakamoto ft. Holly Johnson (1994)

10) Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence: Ryuichi Sakamoto (1983)

11) Behind The Mask (Remixed By Mark Gamble): YMO Versus The Human League (1993)

12) 0318: Fennesz + Sakamoto (2011)

13) Completion: Willits & Sakamoto (2012)

14) Drip Dry Eyes (Album Version): Sandii ft. Yellow Magic Orchestra (1980)

15) Field Work (Long Tokyo Mix): Ryuichi Sakamoto ft. Thomas Dolby (1985)

16) solari (Jóhann Jóhannsson Rework): Ryuichi Sakamoto (2017)

17) Awakening (Endo Mix By Ryuichi Sakamoto): Miu Sakamoto (1998)

Pioneer (1:21:28) (KF) (Mega)

If, like me, this leaves you wanting to hear more Ryuichi Sakamoto then you may be happy to know that I've re-posted a few of my previous Dubhed selections where he makes an appearance. 

 

David Sylvian: Nostalgia Burns (February 2023)

Mick Karn: KarnAge (January 2023)

Various: Big In Japan (March 2022)