Alphaville - Big in Japan

There were a number of continental European bands that had hits during the 1980s, especially in the dance and synth pop segments.  Among them was Alphaville, a German group named after the influential 1965 film by Jean-Luc Godard.

Alphaville came out of the Berlin music scene of the early 1980s -- the members had been part of the Nelson Community, a short-lived art collective.  The band consisted of keyboardists Bernhard Lloyd (real name: Bernhard Gößling) and  Frank Mertens (Frank Sorgatz) along with singer Marian Gold (Hartwig Schierbaum).

The trio released the Forever Young album in 1984, and it would go on to be their biggest LP.  In the U.S. , "Big in Japan" and "Forever Young" both charted, and hit #1 and #2 on the Dance Charts, respectively.  While the Forever Young LP barely broke into the top 200 albums in the U.S. (peaking at #180), it became a top 20 album across much of western Europe.

The backstory for "Big in Japan" is interesting -- unlike the other songs on the album, it had been originally written by Marian Gold in 1979, and the title came from the name of Holly Johnson's band at the time.  (Johnson would go on to form Frankie Goes to Hollywood.)  Gold has stated the the lyrics were inspired by a story of a couple trying to get off heroin.  The idea of going far away seemed to fit this story, so he used the phrase "Big in Japan" as the chorus.

As with many other groups, Alphaville was unable to keep it together, as singer Marian Gold left the band in early 1985.  Alphaville continued on and had some modest success in Europe in the mid 1980s, while Gold's solo career never really gained any traction, leaving "Big in Japan" as their biggest hit.

Cool trivia fact:  the video was directed by Dieter Meier of the band Yello.

Choirboys - Run to Paradise

The Choirboys (not to be confused with the London Quireboys) came out of the vibrant Sydney pub rock scene of the late 1970s and early 1980s.  In 1983, their self-titled first album rose to #26 on the Australian charts, and the band seemed poised to breakout.  Unfortunately, lead singer Mark Gable ruptured his vocal chords while performing, and the band were unable to perform or record for several years.

After several personnel changes (and on a new label), the band finally recorded their follow-up album, Big Bad Noise in 1987.  The album was a massive success in Australia -- "Run to Paradise" topped out at #3, and became the 11th highest selling single of the eighties.  Big Bad Noise peaked at #5 and went double platinum.

Their local success helped them gain some traction in the U.S., where "Run to Paradise" hit #80 on the Billboard charts.  However, their next few albums did not do as well, leaving "Run to Paradise" as their only charting song in the U.S.

Although they did not see huge success in the U.S., the band did carve out a successful career in Australia, with 6 top 40 hits, although none approached the success of "Run to Paradise" and Big Bad Boom.

Cool trivia fact: A remixed version of "Run to Paradise" (by Nick Skitz) hit #16 in 2004 and went platinum in Australia.

The John Hall Band - Crazy

Here at ERV we are not above taking requests, even from (especially from) The Universe.  Tonight, on my way home from work, we were reflecting on which video to post next when this popped up on our local classic rock station.   Hence, we consider it a sign (or a request ... whatever), and as we have said at least once before, when The Universe makes a request, we listen.

You might not know John Hall's name (no, he was not in Hall & Oats) but you know his music.  He was a founder of Orleans, best know for their 1970s top 10 hits "Dance with Me" and "Still the One."  Hall left the band in 1977 (just after their two big hits) in search of a solo career, and as is often the case, it did not turn out that well.  The John Hall Band put out two albums (which did not break the top 100) and two singles, neither of which broke the top 40.

Hall's first solo single "Crazy" (sometimes with the added (Keep on Fallin')) from 1981's All of the Above is a typical early video -- it is just the band playing on a stage.  However, the catchy hook helped it go into heavy rotation for months in the early days of MTV.  We particularly enjoy the three lead vocals, with keyboardist Bob Leinbach challenging The Producers' Wayne Famous as the coolest 80s keyboard player.  The whole look, down to the matching blue glasses and jumpsuit is just ... Crazy, to coin a phrase.  Also, keep an eye out for the six guitar video effect (starting around 2:19).

Even with a solid song and the previously mentioned airplay on MTV, "Crazy" peaked at #42 in 1981, and the All of the Above album  was unable to break through at #158.  When 1983's Search Party LP did not fare much better (#147), EMI-America dropped the band.

During the 1980s Hall became increasingly involved in politics, eventually leading to two terms as a U.S. Representative from New York state.  Hence the Congressman John Hall Band on the video title (below).  Hall lost the 2010 election and has spent the time since with his family and performing at reunion shows with Orleans.

The extremely rare and surprisingly solid video for "You Sure Fooled Me" was posted on ERV in December, 2015, and is worth checking out.

Van Halen - (Oh) Pretty Woman

In honor of the boys (mostly; we miss Michael Anthony) getting the band back together, we'd like to present Van Halen's first real video.  While Warner Bros. did release videos for earlier songs, they used concert footage for the videos.  (As an aside, it seems that most hard rock bands frowned on doing 'real' videos in the late 1970s and early 1980s.)

At any rate, by 1982 Van Halen were one of the biggest rock acts in the world, but they had also been touring and recording more or less constantly since 1977.  Supposedly, the band wanted to do Diver Down as quickly as possible in order to go on some well deserved vacations.  As a result, the album clocks in at 31 minutes and includes 5 covers.  The result is surprisingly good, highlighting the strength of VH's original lineup

"(Oh) Pretty Woman" is, of course, a cover of a 1964 Roy Orbison song that had spent three weeks at #1.  However, by the early 1980s, Orbison was mostly forgotten; he often credited the Van Halen cover with restarting his career.  The Van Halen version peaked at #12, while Diver Down rose to the #3 spot on the album charts.

In typical semi-self destructive Van Halen style, the video was banned on MTV due to its sexual content (the folks at MTV were apparently not amused by midgets fondling tied-up transvestites).  We remember seeing the video on USA's Night Flight, but it was not widely viewed (= rare!).

Cool trivia facts:  Van Halen's frontman, David Lee Roth directed the video, and claims that he wrote the "Intruder" synthesizer intro to fill enough time for the video.  (Yes, "Intruder" also appears on Diver Down, as the band needed every second that they could find).

In the interest of completeness, here is the Roy Orbison original.  We chose a 1964 Top of the Pops video, as it is the most like a 'real' music video.

Note that David Lee Roth's "Going' Crazy!" video (with the full intro) was posted on ERV in January 2015.

Baltimora - Tarzan Boy

A classic one hit wonder, Baltimora came onto the music scene in 1985 with the catchy dance song "Tarzan Boy."  The band was a strange Northern Irish - Italian collaboration, with an Italian producer and writer (Maurizio Bassi) and a Northern Irish lead singer (Jimmy McShane).

Bassi and McShane apparently met in Ireland in 1984, where McShane worked as an EMT.  The two quickly formed a band, with McShane as the frontman, due to his flamboyant style.  There seems to be some dispute over who actually sung the lead vocals on Tarzan Boy, with several sources claiming that Bassi did the honors.

At any rate, the song became a huge success, hitting #13 in the U.S. (although it did even better in most of Europe).  Unfortunately, the other songs from the Living in the Background album did not do as well, and a second album (1987's Survivor in Love) did not chart at all.  Baltimora disbanded soon afterwards, and neither Bassi nor McShane had much success with their future musical projects.  McShane died of AIDS in 1995.  He was 37.

Cool trivia fact:  A remix of Tarzan Boy charted, and nearly broke the top 40 in 1993 (it peaked at #51), after the song was used in a Cool Mint Listerine commercial.  Here is your special bonus, from your friends at ERV:

The Romantics - One in a Million

The Romantics (named because the band formed on Valentine's Day 1977) were a Detroit-based power pop band with clear British Invasion influences.  Although they are best known for their 1980 hit "What I Like About You," it was not their biggest hit.  Instead, 1983's "Talking in Your Sleep" from the In Heat album takes that honor, as it reached #3 on the Billboard charts.

The third single from In Heat is "One in a Million," a solid song with a wonderfully campy video.  Set it some strange alternate 1950's sexy universe, the video does highlight the Romantics sense of style.  Although somewhat hard to describe, we would characterize the band's style as 1950s meets Road Warrior, with extra leather thrown in, to boot.

As is all too common a refrain on this blog, the band was unable to hold it together after In Heat, and drummer Jimmy Marinos left prior to 1985's Rhythm Romance.  While the band continued to work, they did not release another album until the web-released 61/49 in 2003.

Cool trivia fact:  Clem Burke (of Blondie fame) was The Romantics official drummer for most of the 1990s.

Rick Springfield - I've Done Everything for You

After working as a musician and actor for years, Rick Springfield finally got his big break in 1981, with the Working Class Dog album.  The album peaked at #7, driven by "Jessie's Girl," a #1 hit with a corresponding video that showed the emerging power of a young MTV.

However, it is the second (charting) single that is more interesting (to me, at least).  "I've Done Everything for You" was another top 10 hit for Springfield, but is actually a cover of a Sammy Hagar song.  The song was originally released on Hagar's 1978 live album, All Night Long, and apparently Hagar had been performing it since 1977.  A Sammy Hagar studio version was released in 1982 (on the Rematch album), in order to attempt to generate momentum in the aftermath of "I've Done Everything" becoming a big hit.

While Rematch was not a big hit, Sammy Hagar's career did take off in 1981, perhaps partly due to the Springfield cover.  Of course, Rick Springfield would go on to have tremendous success in the 1980s, with 4 consecutive top 20 records.

As an aside, we think Springfield does a fine job on the cover, which sounds more polished than the original.

Note that the Sammy Hagar version is louder (!) so you might want to turn down the volume a bit ...

Cool trivia fact:  Rick Springfield played a sex and drug addicted version of himself on the cable TV show Californication, which gets ERV's highest recommendation.

Springfield's odd but fun sci-fi video for "Human Touch" was featured on ERV's All Hallows Even celebration in 2022.

Dwight Twilley - Girls

Mixing rockabilly, country and British Invasion pop, Tulsa-born Dwight Twilley does not fit neatly into one music segment.  Combine this with nearly unbelievable bad luck throughout his career (including plane crashes, bribery scandals, and O.J. Simpson) and his lack of real success is understandable.

In spite of these issues, Twilley had two top 40 hits -- 1975's "I'm on Fire" (as the Dwight Twilley Band) and 1984's "Girls," from Twilley's solo album called Jungle.  Coincidentally, both singles peaked at #17 on the charts.

The "Girls" video is a Porkies tribute, and there even is an R-rated version with nudity (FYI, the version here is PGish).  The video shoot was co-funded by The Playboy Channel, and featured Bunnies.  We believe that at the time Playboy was looking to create R-rated videos for its own music video show.  As an aside, we originally saw this video on the old USA Network show Nightflight, a truly great TV show that mixed videos, interviews, concert footage and indy films.

The video is great, cheesy fun, complete with male and female shower scenes, and features the coolest full uniform football player pretending to play guitar solo scene ever.  (Yes, really).

Cool trivia fact:  Tom Petty sings backup vocals on "Girls" -- he and Twilley were on the same label and became friends in the late 1970s.

INXS - Don't Change

It is easy to downplay INXS; they sounded like a new wave bar band, and were not the most innovative or creative group of their time.  What INXS did, however, was churn out a ton of really good rock songs; they had ten top 40 hits in the U.S. and have sold more than 30 million units worldwide, mostly in the 80s and early 90s.

"Don't Change" was the last song on 1982's Shabooh Shoobah and the second single from the album (after "The One Thing.")  It reached #80 on the U.S. charts, so it was not a big hit at the time, but is widely regarded as on of the band's best songs.  Sound-wise, "Don't Change" comes off almost as a rocked up version of Roxy Music, with big, atmospheric keyboards and a great chorus.

Of course, the band followed up Shabooh Soobah with four consecutive platinum albums, including 1987's Kick (which sold 6 million units in the U.S. alone.)  The nineties were tougher on INXS, and the original lineup ended with the tragic death of lead singer Michael Hutchence in 1997.  We suppose that the stories of virtually all rock bands are tragic in the end.  Still, it is cool to go back in time, so to speak, and see them as a young Australian band doing a simple video of a great song.

Note:  The INXS/Jimmy Barnes song "Good Times" was posted on ERV in September 2013. 

Cinderella - Shake Me

While Cinderella's image was hair-metal, their sound was more bluesy, hard rock.  "Shake Me" fits right in with this, and is a spiritual successor to "You Shook Me" (covered by Led Zeppelin) or "You Shook Me All Night Long" (AC/DC).  Now that we think of it, there should be more hard rock songs using the verb 'to shake' -- we propose the ultimate song could just be called "Shake" or "Shaken" or "Shaky."

Moving right along, "Shake Me" was the first song from Cinderella's first album, 1986's Night Songs.  The video does feature another fine example of a supernatural guitar -- it falls from the poster and then magically teleports the attractive young woman right on to the stage at the local Cinderella concert.  Though this is not as impressive as laser beams (or ill-tempered bass, for that matter), it still is pretty cool.  And no, apparently not all Les Pauls can magically teleport young women.

"Shake Me" did not chart, but Night Songs hit #3 on the charts in early 1987, spawned two other singles that did chart, and sold three million units.  The band went on to sell more than twenty million units in the 80s and early 90s, before the shift to grunge (and problems with lead singer Tom Keifer's vocal chords) ended the bands' run of platinum records.

Cool trivia fact:  Cinderella was discovered by Jon Bon Jovi, who saw them in 1985 at the old Empire Rock Club in Philly. He told his A&R rep about them and soon after they were signed to Mercury/Polygram.

Cinderella's "Gypsy Road" was posted on ERV in June, 2015.