Eighties top albums: Black - Wonderful Life


tracklist:

Wonderful Life
Everything's Coming Up Roses
Sometimes For The Asking
Finder
Paradise
I'm Not Afraid
I Just Grew Tired
Blue
Just Making Memories
Sweetest Smile

Colin Vearncombe, Dane Goulding and Greg Leyland make their debut in 1981 as Black with the single "Human Features". A second single, "More Than The Sun, follows, after which the duo reduced group is signed by WEA. Black will be the solo project of Vearncombe, while fellow member Dave Dix will act as his producer from that moment on.

The first single for WEA is called "" Hey Presto", which, partly due to the frequent running on MTV, is well known outside the United Kingdom. However, when a reissue of "More Than The Sun" flops, WEA dumps the group. Vearncombe, plagued by car accidents, confronted with a sick mother, a divorce and living on the streets, writes as a sarcastic reaction "Wonderful Life", released on Ugly Man Records, with an ironic undertone that is picked up by A & M Records.

The reissue a year later means the launch of his international career. Although Vearncombe is presented as a one-hit miracle, this is not entirely correct. Four singles will be released for the debut album of the same name, with "Everything's Coming Up Roses" and "Sweetest Smile" certainly not inferior to "Wonderful Life".

Also nice for the collector of that moment, each single contains songs that are not on the vinyl album. The CD that begins its advance around that time contains some of those songs, but only on the Cherry Red remodeled 2CD version from 2013 adorn all those extras.

It makes this album a top album of the eighties. The smoky-looking vocals of a lightly reverberating sounding baritone dominate the songs on synthesizer, guitar and percussion. A performance that he copied from the Thompson Twins in 1982, after Black provided their support act. His refined jazz pop songs and dramatic vocal episodes place him somewhere between Bryan Ferry and Morrissey.

Vearncombe releases three more albums under the name of Black, after which he debuts in 2005, twelve years after the last Black album under his own name. To pick up the name Black again in 2009 after a second album in 2009. On 26 January 2016, the singer died in Cork, Ireland due to complications of a car accident. Here from "Wonderful Life" the beautiful "Sweetest Smile".


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

An Introduction To Dutch New Wave Vol. 32

Image
And that brings us to Volume 32 of An Introduction To Dutch New Wave. This time 65% of the numbers came from recent purchased vinyl. I will keep telling that Discogs has become a major resource for discovering and hunting vinyl from bands and artists, that sometimes released one single only. But since a couple of weeks I am using a great cross reference site called Nederlandse vinylsingles . The guys behind this site are doing a great job, tracking down all Dutch vinyl singles. Some information on several songs. The Kimono track is spelled wrong. I kept it this way, since the cover of the single shows the same title. It’s one of the groups of which I used the single b-side instead of the a-side. The others are Blackout (b-side of Obscure Disco), G.T. Modell (b-side of Scratch Your Act) and Weekend At Waikiki (b-side of The Valley). Frederic And The Flies was a one off project by producer duo Bolland and Bolland. Not only the group name refers to Adam And The Ants, t...
Read more

A Flock Of Seagulls

Image
Being a fan for many many years I was really surprised the band decided finally, after 25 years, to do an European tour again. I am aware of the fact that it's only Mike Score nowadays who's left of the old line-up. Still I like to see them, because back in 1984 I was unable to visit the famous Noorderligt at Tilburg. On 09-09-09 A Flock Of Seagulls will play the well known Paradiso theatre in Amsterdam. I became an instant fan of the four when I heard I Ran on the radio. But it was Wishing (if I had a photograph of you) which really turned me into AFOS. Through the years I was able to track down most of their vynil releases. And of course the CD's followed as well. I even became a member of the Airborne Division. With the internet things changed and in 1996 I was able to get a CDR copy of most of the b-sides and rare recordings of AFOS ripped from vynil, which I like to share with you. The recordings are from the period 1982 - 1985 when they had the line-up of: Mike Score ...
Read more