The One-Hit Wonders Who Deserved a Second Hit
8 min read
The Buggles
The tune you know: “Video Killed the Radio Star”
The tune you should know: “The Plastic Age”
It’s humorous to believe that the music that defines not only the onset of the MTV era but the total seem of the ’80s was written and introduced in the 1970s. In 1979, when The Buggles manufactured “Video Killed The Radio Star,” the 1st tunes movie to enjoy when MTV built its debut, the sea alter was nonetheless two years absent. The pair located substantially better good results in their particular person pursuits (singer/bassist Trevor Horn developed practically every single excellent pop music in the ’80s, and keyboardist Geoffrey Downes relished huge industrial achievement as a member of Asia and currently holds down keys for Indeed). But their flash-in-the-pan occupation as a duo established some of the most irresistible synth-pop deep cuts of the decade. “The Plastic Age” has sufficient hooks to fill a Foster the People record and intelligent lyrics these kinds of as “They ship the heart law enforcement to place you underneath cardiac arrests.” https://www.youtube.com/check out?v=c1LhHcPyQ5M Gotye
The track you know: “Somebody You Applied to Know”
The tune you ought to know: “Eyes Large Open”
Ok, enable the “Gotye is any person we applied to know” jokes ensue. The point that prolific and gifted multi-instrumentalist Wally De Becker aka Gotye has yet to adhere to up his breakthrough album Producing Mirrors with any new tunes is a bit of a shock, in particular thinking of the album and tune that built him a star came out in excess of a 10 years back. Creating Mirrors is undoubtedly 1 of the most musically assorted LPs to yield a Billboard No. 1 hit, and for no fewer than 8 consecutive months. A brief scroll even though the album reveals a kind of indie-art-pop playground found only on the playlists of the coolest bartenders or most pretentious hipsters you know. Gotye’s knack for melodic composition provides us to the album’s direct single, “Eyes Huge Open up,” a monitor that, while unveiled in advance of “Somebody That I Utilised to Know” (and probably because of that) scarcely dented the Billboard Scorching 100. Its creator experienced plenty of faith to characteristic it as the other track he done during his May possibly 2012 SNL visual appearance. Until finally Gotye releases a new LP, when that might be, Making Mirrors continues to give to individuals who search beyond the artist’s 1 hit. https://www.youtube.com/observe?v=HxUl6Bo_6pQ Billy Thorpe
The song you know: “Children of the Sun”
The song you should know: “Most Individuals I Know Feel I’m Crazy”
In Australia, Billy Thorpe is a countrywide icon, the Aussie equivalent of Sammy Hagar. But to us, he is recognised only for his 1979 minor rock hit “Children of the Sunlight.” At the height of their fame, Thorpe and his band The Aztecs have been proclaimed “the loudest band in the land,” earning waves with their ridiculously furious hard rock efficiency at the 1974 Sunbury pageant and the stay album that resulted from it. In the course of that demonstrate, Thorpe played an early model of what would turn into his signature track, “Most People I Know Believe I’m Insane,” a song that feels like it should be a staple of drunken bar singing almost everywhere, alongside “Margaritaville” and “Lukenbach, Texas” but with a minimal extra chunk. https://www.youtube.com/view?v=ZQodj0QZo-o The Verve
The track you know: “Bitter Sweet Symphony”
The tune you really should know: “Slide Away”
The Verve’s story is usually concentrated on 1 tune, the masterful “Bitter Sweet Symphony” and the royalty battle that ensued about its sampling of an orchestral edition of a Rolling Stones tune. Audiences (specifically in The usa) are usually oblivious to something else the band made, enable by itself their psych-rock origins. The group’s debut album, A Storm in Heaven, introduced with each other disparate variations drawing from the likes of Dr. John, The Stooges, Cocteau Twins and Can. Producer John Leckie slathers a layer of sonic rainbows that several bands ended up keen to indulge in since Hawkwind.
Tom Tom Club
The music you know: “Genius of Love”
The song you should really know: “Sunshine and Ecstasy”
This one pretty much feels like cheating, as Tom Tom Club was initially the pure funk outlet for Speaking Heads spouse-and-wife rhythm area gamers Chris Frantz and Tina Weymouth. Their self-titled debut LP yielded “Genius of Really like,” a single of the most irresistible and ubiquitous funk music ever produced. While the band’s subsequent get the job done took a backseat to Talking Heads’ ballooning achievement and succumbed to its have unashamed ridiculousness, it stays a hidden gem of that ’80s/’90s borderline of funk bleeding into freestyle. “Sunshine and Ecstasy,” from 1991, exemplifies this, comprehensive with deep-voiced interjections and Frantz’s rapping. Ridiculous or not, it is hard not to dance to it at minimum a tiny. https://www.youtube.com/view?v=eNTdHhBO2_o New Radicals
The song you know: “You Get What You Give”
The track you should really know: “Someday We’ll Know”
Couple pop tunes, of any 10 years, are as good as “You Get What You Give.” Who knows how it occurs, but New Radicals frontman Gregg Alexander appears to be to have some grasp on genius songwriting. In some techniques, their early reputation could possibly have been a curse in spite of the good quality and consistency of New Radicals’ only LP Possibly You have Been Brainwashed, the band in no way identified pop success once more. The band’s comply with-up solitary “Someday We’ll Know” is a microcosm of what helps make New Radicals a creative pressure, hushed but sharp in its observation. Not to point out, it was later on covered by America, of all bands (certainly, “Horse With No Name” The united states). After New Radicals disbanded, Alexander co-wrote “The Recreation of Appreciate,” recorded by Santana with Michelle Branch, and “Lost Stars,” sung by Adam Levine for the soundtrack of the musical romance film Get started All over again. Not terrible. https://www.youtube.com/look at?v=bDmA8qQKhMY Blind Melon
The music you know: “No Rain”
The track you must know: “Galaxie”
Of all the drug casualties of the ’90s, couple of are as missed as the loss of Blind Melon frontman Shannon Hoon. While the pure bliss of “No Rain” has grow to be lodged in the brains of Gen X as an prompt resource of serotonin, Blind Melon never quite in good shape in with their grungier Seattle contemporaries, as the band was regularly in musical flux, discovering shades of psychedelia and roots rock that ended up lightyears from the angst and volume of the flannel-clad flag-bearers of the scene, Nirvana and Pearl Jam. The band’s next album, Soup, was an extension of this musical exploration, and its opening track is about as head-spinning as any band of the ’90s on a major label was inclined to get. The horns give way to guitars, the guitars give way to barroom sway. It can be a shame the band hardly ever got the recognition (or time) they deserved. https://www.youtube.com/check out?v=ktZoUHcP0wI A Flock of Seagulls
The music you know: “I Ran (So Much Absent)”
The tune you need to know: “Space Age Adore Song”
Of course, Mike Score’s laughable haircut and the ubiquity of “I Ran (So Significantly Absent)” have stored A Flock of Seagulls from remaining nearly anything other than an ’80s punchline for nearly 40 decades now, but it is the band’s self-titled album’s other jewel of a solitary that shines amongst all the jokes. “Space Age Like Song” may perhaps be the perfect distillation of each individual musical element that A Flock of Seagulls was likely for: a article-punk/synth-pop that in hindsight is cheerful more than enough to give The Cure’s “Just Like Heaven” a run for its funds and stands tall along with “Take On Me,” “Just Can not Get Enough” and approximately any other ’80s synth-pop vintage conceivable. If only millennials did not assume of Chandler Bing when wanting up A Flock of Seagulls, we’d have an simpler time spreading the word. Rickie Lee Jones
The track you know: “Chuck E’s in Adore”
The tune you should really know: “Pirates (So Extended Lonely Avenue)”
Rickie Lee Jones located a excellent market among the slick California jazz-rockers and singer-songwriters of the late ’70s: the type of tunes that expected a tiny army and an extra of tolerance to spare — not so a lot “yacht rock” as “Griffith Park rock.” Jones’ breakthrough one “Chuck E’s in Love” is just one of the most energetic and hummable tunes to emerge from a decade that produced really a bit of hummable new music, but she under no circumstances uncovered that form of pop good results all over again, despite getting lauded by critics and her friends alike. Her self-titled debut album and its adhere to-up, Pirates, are sleek and verbose affairs, evoking Joni Mitchell’s meditative songsmithing and Stevie Nicks’ warmth by means of Jones’ distinctly beatnik persona. The albums are crammed largely with piano travelogues and jazzy dirges, but the title keep track of to her sophomore LP is the closest Jones at any time came to revisiting the “Chuck E’s in Love” fashion. It is a music so breezy and tied up in its deviant people it could move for Steely Dan. Los Bravos
The track you know: “Black is Black”
The tune you ought to know: “Bring a Little Lovin’”
“Black is Black” could as well be a Beatles song. It is a hook and riff that just about anyone from Paul McCartney to Tony Iommi ought to envy and curse since they failed to produce it by themselves. Though the band behind it, Madrid’s Los Bravos, were not a portion of the British invasion, their Spanish roots led to a decidedly more R&B acquire on the pop fad sweeping the globe. The band’s good results finished when “Black is Black” and its shockingly superior dad or mum album fell off the charts, but Quentin Tarantino’s limitless crate-digging paid out off for both equally him and Los Bravos when he involved “Bring a Very little Lovin” on the soundtrack to his enjoy letter to the pre-Manson ’60s in After Upon a Time in Hollywood.
