Cosines - Winter A-Go-Go

I know I promised you something ultra-twee yesterday, but I don't like to be predictable. Here instead is a fabulous piece of indie keyboard pop. It's a Yo La Tengo cover, but Alice Hubley (of Arthur and Martha)'s marvellously nasal vocals add considerable weight to what was, in my view, an all too typically vapid YLT original. You can download it for free here.

They Go Boom!! - Everything is Weird

A rare Bring On Bull foray into synthy music. TGB's music actually did have much in common with the type of bands that label was better known for; it was only the instruments they played it on that made them different.

This is actually the least twee song on this 1993 EP. And ironically I also think it's the best.

Soft Cell - Torch

File this one under "songs I never realised were actually as good as they were". This 1982 single was actually Soft Cell's second-biggest hit, something that surprised me to learn because I would have assumed it was "Say Hello Wave Goodbye", which certainly seems to be better remembered. This one's not as instantly memorable as that or for that matter "Tainted Love" but it's really quite nice in its own little way.

Depeche Mode - Dreaming of Me

The first-ever DM single (1981) and one I've always loved. It's sort of a perfect pop tune, synth-pop style. I can't believe there doesn't seem to be a proper video for it.

 

The Assembly - Never Never

The cheesy '80s new wave synth-pop ballad isn't always my thing, but Vince Clarke did it better than most and Feargal Sharkey's voice really is the perfect mix of whiney and vulnerable for this song. A love-or-hate one, probably.

From 1983.

OMD - Souvenir

Another gem from early OMD, the band that always seemed to me to do the best job of contradicting Luddites' claims about synth-pop. You really couldn't credibly argue that electronic music was inherently emotionless in the face of stuff like this.

It was their most successful single ever, which is kind of surprising because I think they had a lot more obvious "hits" than this, but I guess that just shows how much better taste mainstream music listeners had thirty years ago.

It's from their third album, Architecture & Morality, from 1981.

Thomas Dolby - One of Our Submarines

Thomas Dolby has released some horrific material in his time (see: "Hyperactive") but The Golden Age of Wireless would be a guilty pleasure of mine were it not for the fact that I refuse to feel guilty about any of my listening habits. Admittedly some of it is a little too ploink ploink for my tastes, but this particular track would be lovely on any instrument and is no less so just because it's all synthy.

Apparently he wrote it about his uncle, who drowned in a submarine during World War 2.

The Besotted - Mooncrash

Sorry folks, I had some technical problems yesterday. Namely a hard drive that seemed to be trying to commit suicide through an overdose of barbituates or something. I thought it was a bit too delicate to try anything with video files.

Fortunately it seems to have made a recovery this morning so here's what I was going to post yesterday. The Besotted was a side project of Robert Smith's. No, not that Robert Smith, the one from the Golden Dawn. That's the Scottish Golden Dawn, of "George Hamilton's Dead"...eh...fame.

Fortunately the small amount of music he produced was a little more original than his names. This song, which appeared on their 1992 "Kaleidoscope" 7" as well as the brilliant K7 Everlasting Happiness collection, is an odd little piece of synth-twee, which actually sounds pretty horrible to start off with. It grows on you pretty quickly, though. Give it a minute or two.

Depeche Mode - Get the Balance Right!

Non-album single from 1983, always one of my DM faves. The video is rather unfortunate though. Apparently, the director simply assumed that Alan Wilder was the lead singer, and the young lads were too embarrassed to correct him. Bless.

Yazoo - Only You

Classic '80s synthpop. This was Yazoo's first single, and quite an exquisite little number it is, too: sentimental lyrics in a simple melody, sung sweetly over a nicely subdued keyboard arrangement. It's like synthpop twee. What could be wrong with that?

Besides Vince Clarke's hair, that is.

Depeche Mode - See You

One of my absolute favourite early DM songs, from their second album A Broken Frame. They're so young and innocent looking in this video! In perfect keeping with the lyrics, which Martin Gore probably wrote when he was 15 or something.

Bill Nelson - Flaming Desire

Bill Nelson allegedly hates being compared to David Bowie, but his career has spanned the same length and has taken as many twists and turns - though I don't think Bill ever died his hair orange and claimed to be from Mars.

He started off in the prog-rock mould and was famed for his guitar skills, but in the late '70s his music (then with Be-Bop Deluxe) became very keyboard-oriented and by the early '80s it was pretty much synth-pop heaven. And a lot of it really was heavenly, even for someone like me who was only ever mildly into synth-pop.

This was from his 1982 album The Love That Whirls.

Dalek I - Destiny (Dalek I Love You)

Early synthpop, a genre I enjoy in small doses. The Daleks were from Liverpool and sounded like the lovechild of Gary Numan and David Bowie ("Ashes to Ashes" era). This was from their 1980 debut album, Compass kum'pəs.

Blancmange - Don't Tell Me

Here's a fun one from Blancmange's cleverly-titled second album, Mange Tout from 1984. It's totally lightweight synth-pop fluff, but every time I hear it it gets stuck in my head for days. Judging by the video, they didn't take it very seriously either.

Blancmange - Sad Day

Blancmange were a fairly ordinary English synth-pop band of the early 1980s, certainly not one of my favourites, though they did have a number of good tracks on their second album Mange Tout (get it?). Their debut, 1982's Happy Families, was by and large a much blander affair but it did have this one very nice instrumental, a version of which also appeared on the seminal Some Bizarre collection. It's not essential by any means, but I like it.

OMD - Julia's Song

OMD's early music was so beautifully atmospheric, it's really a pity they didn't split up before they started making the bland rubbish that characterised their later works (eg "If You Leave").

This is a particularly lovely track from their 1980 debut album.

A Flock of Seagulls - Wishing

I know what you're thinking. "A Flock of Seagulls? A Flock of Fucking Seagulls? Has Cinnamon Girl lost her mind?" Well, I did warn you you might see things you don't expect here.

All joking aside, AFoS may have had a silly name, appalling hair and an unhealthy obsession with the extraterrestrial, but they also had a few really good pop songs. I had a listen to their Best Of the other day and there was one track that - I kid you not - wouldn't have been out of place on an Another Sunny Day record. If it was guitar- rather than synth-based I mean.

That one actually isn't one of their better songs though, so here's one that is. Seriously, tell me this isn't just a lovely little tune.

B-Movie - Nowhere Girl

Here's one of my favourite synth-pop radio hits from the early '80s, one that will always remind me of the poorly-lit, clove-cigarette-reeking nightclubs I used to sneak into as a teenager. I don't think this is an official video but it does fit the song. Kind of.

Yazoo - Nobody's Diary

This is one of my favourite tracks from the synth-pop era. I've always had a soft spot for Vince Clarke's stuff, and even like some of what he did with Erasure (I said "some") but for me this is a particular standout. Such a lovely, desperately sad song.

That haircut though. Thank the flying spaghetti monster some '80s trends haven't come back!

Fad Gadget - Collapsing New People

More nostalgia. Fad Gadget, aka Frank Tovey, was a bit outside my tastes generally, on account of the heavy electronics in his music. But he wrote a few really good pop songs and I'm always happy to listen to really good pop songs, whatever they're played on.

This is from Gag, his final album under the FG pseudonym. It's a collaboration with (and a tribute to) Einsturzende Neubauten, as the title suggests, but also sums up the whole goth/industrial subculture pretty nicely in one line: "it takes hours of preparation/to get that wasted look". Ah, memories.