The La's - There She Goes

Astute readers may look at this post and think, "Isn't this song from the early 1990s?"  And they would be half-right (but let's say wrong for the purpose of this blog).

The story of The La's centers around Lee Mavers, your garden-variety perfectionist/musical genius.  Creatively, Mavers was The La's, although there have been a succession of musicians who worked with him over the years.  The band formed in Liverpool in the mid 1980s, and signed their first recording contract in 1987.

The first version of "There She Goes" was released in 1988, and hit #59 on the UK charts, hence my assertion that this song belongs on the blog.  However, work on their self-titled first album took two additional years, before finally being released in 1990.  The remixed version of the song (from the LP) reappeared on the UK charts (#14) and hit the U.S. charts in 1991 (#49).  With the success of their first album, Mavers was given additional autonomy to record his second album.  This turned out to be a disastrous decision.  Work on the follow up LP started in 1991, but was never completed (the project was apparently abandoned in the mid-1990s).  Sadly, aside from an occasional appearance, Mavers has disappeared from view.

In terms of the song, it is a catchy 60s-influenced pop song with an unusual structure.  The song has no verses -- just a chorus (repeated 4 times) and a bridge.  And yet, the unusual structure only seems to add to the appeal.  There are unconfirmed rumors that "There She Goes" is about heroin use or is an allusion to "There She Goes Again" (Velvet Underground).  Or perhaps it is just a simple, honest love song.  Regardless, it has aged well and is now something of a rock standard.

As befits a song with a complex, interesting history, there are two videos.  And what kind of lame blog would this be if we didn't show our (few) loyal readers both versions?

The first version was shot in 1988:

And the second version came out in 1990:

Cool trivia fact:  the La's version of "There She Goes" has charted 4 separate times in the UK -- in 1988 (#59), 1990 (#14), 1999 (#65), and 2008 (#181).

Billy Burnette - In Just a Heartbeat

The son and nephew of rock and roll performers (Dorsey and Johnny Burnette of the Rock and Roll Trio), Billy has spent his entire life as a musician.  By the time he graduated from high school, he was working full time in both rockabilly and country bands, and released three albums in the 1970s.

"In Just a Heartbeat" was the second single from Burnette's self-titled 1980 LP (in true Peter Gabriel style, it was his third eponymous album).  Neither the single nor the album charted, and we don't believe that the video received much in the way of airplay, as MTV wasn't launched until the following year.

Burnette would go on to have some success in country music, before joining Fleetwood Mac as Lindsey Buckingham's replacement in 1987.  He left the band in 1991 (although he has sporadically worked with them since then) and returned to his country and rockabilly roots.

Cool trivia fact:  Billy Burnette is the cousin of Rocky Burnette (below; the January 23, 2012 post).  Rocky is the son of Johnny while Billy is the son of Dorsey.

Cameo - Word Up

One of the more interesting (and eccentric) bands of the 1980s was the funk group known as Cameo.  The band was formed in the mid-1970s, with front man Larry Blackmon ( a Julliard grad) serving as the focal point.  While they had some success in the 70s and early 80s, it was their 1986 release, Word Up (and the single of the same name) that really launched them into mainstream stardom -- the single peaked at #6 on the Billboard charts, while the album hit #8.

The "Word Up" video does a great job of highlighting the band's strengths -- it's a great funk song accentuated by their flair for the dramatic -- including Blackmon's red codpiece, and a young LeVar Burton (as a police detective trying to arrest the band).

"Word Up" represented the peak for Cameo, and while they released a few subsequent albums, they were not able to recapture the magic.  Larry Blackmon went on to become an A&R executive at Warner Bros.

Cool trivia fact:  "Word Up" samples from ... the theme song from "The Good, the Bad and the Ugly" by Ennio Morricone (yes, really).

"Candy," the underrated second single from the Word Up album was posted on ERV in March, 2015.

The Replacements - I'll Be You

The Replacements were an influential alt-rock band whose popularity never matched their impact.  This is at least partly due to their behavior -- they refused to promote their albums, and their drunken, sloppy live shows are the stuff of legend.  They also did not concern themselves with videos until the end of their career, effectively cutting themselves off from the MTV audience.

While the Replacements seemed to be almost gleefully ignoring the business part of the music business, they also wrote some great music during the 1980s, and became trailblazers for the emerging indie rock scene.  This can be clearly heard in "I'll Be You," the band's only charting single (#51), from 1989's Don't Tell a Soul.  Although frontman Paul Westerberg has stated he views the song as over-produced, it still sounds like a stripped down rock song to me, with pop, rock and punk influences.  In other words, it was ahead of its time and sounded different from what was on the radio at the time.

Unfortunately, by the time Don't Tell a Soul came out, the band was already fraying, and they broke up in the early 1990s.  Westerberg continued to sporadically make music (most notably for the Cameron Crowe movie "Singles"), though it seems like his heart wasn't in it after the Replacements broke up.

Lastly, pay attention to the lyrics; Westerberg is one of the great rock lyricists, in my opinion.

The Waterboys - The Whole of the Moon

Mike Scott's masterpiece began on a snowy New York City street in January 1985, when his girlfriend asked him whether it was hard to write a song.  The song started as a few scribbles on the back of an envelope, and was still unfinished when the recording of the This is the Sea album began in March.

As an ode to artistic expression, the song's lyrics are clearly a tribute to the artists who inspired Scott.  While there has been much speculation about who it is written about, the only comments that Scott has made indicate that  C.S. Lewis was "in there somewhere" and that Prince wasn't (Prince had been rumored to be a source of inspiration, and some sources still cite him).

Amazingly, neither "The Whole of the Moon" single nor the This is the Sea album ever charted in the U.S.  "The Whole of the Moon" did chart twice in the U.K.; once in 1985, upon the original release (#26), and again in 1991 (peaking at #3), after the song won an Ivor Novello Award for Best Song Musically and Lyrically.

After This is the Sea, Scott (who was the main creative force behind the Waterboys), opted to go for a smaller, more folk sound, which continued until the band broke up in 1993.

Cool trivia fact:  The video is directed by Irish director Meiert Avis, who has directed dozens of videos, including a bunch from U2.  The Waterboys posed a little bit of a challenge in that Mike Scott will not lip sync; hence an actual concert was created just for the video.

Jane Wiedlin - Rush Hour

Best known as the rhythm guitarist for the Go-Go's, Jane Wiedlin also released two albums that charted in the 1980s, and has released two more since then.

"Rush Hour" is from her second album, 1988's Fur.  Although the album received mixed reviews, "Rush Hour"  was praised as a good pop song, and would go on to become Wiedlin's biggest solo hit, reaching #9 on the Billboard charts.  Unfortunately, the Fur album did not do as well, peaking at #105.

The original idea for the song came from sitting in traffic in LA.  It occurred to Wiedlin, that "Rush Hour" sounds like it should be fun, but obviously it isn't.  She turned the phrase on its head, and came up with the idea for the song, which she then co-wrote with Peter Rafelson (a professional song writer).

The video is relatively simple, and just shows Wiedlin performing and swimming with the fishies (ok, dolphins, whatever).  Wiedlin is a well-known animal rights activist, which may have had something to do with it.

Rocky Burnette - Tired of Toein' the Line

Rocky Burnette (given name: Jonathan), was the son of early rocker Johnny Burnette.  Johnny wrote "You're Sixteen," later made famous by Ringo Starr, and ran in the same circles as Elvis Presley and Carl Perkins.  He was tragically killed in a boating accident in 1964.

Years later, Rocky joined the family business, and wrote updated rockabilly songs, in the same genre as his dad had in the 1950s and early 1960s.  Rocky is best known for "Tired of Toein' the Line," the 1980 single from the 1979 album Son of Rock'n'Roll.  The song was a huge hit, peaking at #8, while the album hit #53.  Although Rocky never had another big hit, he has remained a working musician, to this day, in fact.

"Tired of Toein' the Line (nice apostrophe) is a catchy song, but it appears that Rocky and his friends completely lost their minds when it came time for the video shoot.  To be fair, early 80s videos were something of an afterthought, as MTV didn't even launch until 1981 (and didn't really gain traction until 1982).  Even so, the chicks in shiny pantsuits energetically pretending to play instruments ... including trombone (yes, really), while Rocky sings with his shirt open, wearing his best Ted Nugent sunglasses ... well, the video scores high on the cheesy / WTF scale.  It might even be so bad that it's good, but you'll have to be the judge of that.

Cool trivia fact:  Rocky would go on to work with Dwight Twilley in the 1990s ... who is also on the blog for a different cheesy video.  Go figure.

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.