ALONE: ALONE WITHOUT YOU/KING

King? So what ever happened to King? Here one moment, huge for a minute and then gone. Can you even remember them? Were they purely eurocentric, UK even? No, not King King, the brilliant bekilted blues juggernaut, channeling more Free than seems even possible, if to tinier audiences still, more's the pity, I mean King, rainbow Doc Martens and cockatiel hair, yes?

Alone Without You

So King were actually around for more than a moment, two years and two albums. Centred around charismatic frontman Paul King, on vocals and never more 80s mullet, they burst out of Coventry on the tail end of the Two Tone ska phenomenon that rose out of this gritty midlands landscapes. This was 1984. Wondering if a ska band calling themselves the Reluctant Stereotypes might be too much of, um, a stereotype, filtered from the title of a song by genre breakthrough leaders, the Specials, some serious rebranding was required. Arguably again lifting an idea from the local scene, the concept of Multi Tone was imagined. Again, so far, so meh, but luckily, the songs were there. Or some were. A brief tenure as the Raw Screens faltered and so, like many a band leader before or since, the realisation that a surname could suffice as a band and brand name dropped, both convenient and aspirational. The look and image was allegedly based on the Child Catcher from children's book and film, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, actually not so much a bad idea given the mission statement of the music biz in general: capture the youth and harness their spending power!

Alone Without You was the 4th single, and the first from their second album, so we are ahead of things. So, rewinding a bit, their first album, Steps in Time appeared in 1984 and proved to be a slow burner. The debut single, Love and Pride barely dented the charts in the UK,  number 84 with a squib. Follow-ups Soul on My Boots and Won't You Hold My Hand Now didn't even manage the top 100. Love and Pride came out a second time and, courtesy the active promotion of CBS records, this time found its public. Number 2 this time, translating equivalently across Europe, and even causing a slight splash across the pond, their only chart recognition in the US, with a Billboard 55. On that momentum back out came Won't You Hold My Hand Now, now to a UK 24. In truth these were the only outstanding tracks of the debut, the rest being somewhat lumpen fodder, often with lyrics obtusely impenetrable, backed with glossily produced tunelessness. (What, pray, is I Kissed the Spikey Fridge all about?)  But they looked good and had the zeitgeist.

Love and Pride

With no time to waste, 1985 saw the second album, Bitter Sweet, a somewhat rushed release. Again the singles were the standouts, although becoming a story of diminishing returns. Alone Without You gained a creditable 8 and hopes were high for the next single. The Taste of Your Tears was and still is a terrific song; a classic slow weepy for the dance floor, peaking at 11. There was a 3rd single but I confess to no memory of it whatsoever. And that was just about that. I am not sure they even ever toured. If they did, it maybe accelerated their demise, as they were no more by mid '86, the entire span of the group being less than two years. Maybe they were just a manufactured contrivance for teen stardom, and yet, no teenager myself, or by any means, they rang some sort of bell in my head and I always wanted them to be better than they were, to be more than four good songs and spray painted footwear, however much bouncy bass is in the mix. I don't think that was what even Paul King had sought, perhaps also why their reign was cut short.

The Taste of Your Tears

Paul King tried the de rigeur solo go it alone route, sinking sufficiently deep as to throw in the towel altogether. I don't think I have ever heard his solo album, or hadn't until this piece. MTV, then the big player in music, videos becoming the only way to break an act, and who had, in all probability, had the most to do with King, the bands, success, became the unlikely get out of jail card for King, the singer. This may be where you remember the name, as, de-mulleted and greying elegantly at the edges, he became one of a new breed, the 'veejay', continuity man for the new age, where he spent the next few years, ahead of then taking the same gig for VH1, the MTV for slightly older children.

I Know (from Joy/Paul King)

Crowning glory?

Radio -->Television: Video Killed the Radio Star

[purchase]

On a basic level, “Video Killed the Radio Star” harkens back to a time when the emergence of television supplanted radio as the primary source of information and entertainment. On a general level, it can be interpreted as a reflection on new technology replacing the old. In the cultural history of the 20th Century, because it was the first video ever played on MTV, the song has come to represent the emergence of the music video and the marginalization of radio.

I’d argue, though, that while music videos and MTV probably didn’t help radio, it wasn’t the only thing that caused the decline of the medium. Even MTV stopped playing videos years ago, I think that two different forces more powerful than video combined to render radio less vital. (Note—these opinions are about rock radio—I would not even presume to opine about the state of urban, Latin, country or other genres).

First, as I alluded to in my prior piece, I think that radio’s success commercially resulted in consolidation of ownership and a homogenization of content. Independent owners, willing to take risks and hire edgy DJs and program directors, were replaced by media behemoths that sanded off the rough edges and used market research to cater to the masses. There has always been a balance in radio programming between leading the listeners and following them—in other words, trying to determine the right mix of music that you think the audience will or should like and the music you know they already like. I think that the balance on commercial radio has shifted way toward playing the known, and avoiding risk. The spirit of adventurous radio still lives on in the occasional independent station and on college/noncommercial stations. Unfortunately, these stations tend to have small listenerships, can swing too far toward the strange and unknown, and often have difficult to listen to student DJs (which I can say, having been one).

The second force is, of course, the new technologies, mostly digital music, and the Internet and satellite “radio,” that allow listeners to create their own playlists, stream music from around the world, download music easily and find stations that narrowcast in limited genres. This allows each individual listener to decide, on a moment to moment basis, the balance between the known and unknown, and how much the listener wants to rely on their own taste, and how much to leave to someone else’s decision. And videos have become a way to circumvent the tight playlists of commercial radio and the small listenership of noncommercial/independent radio by getting the product directly to the consumer.  Videos, however, remove some of the mystery, because they create a codified, unitary version of a song's meaning.  The ability of every individual listener to imagine a personal vision is gone.  I have no memory anymore of what I thought the first time I heard Peter Gabriel's "Sledgehammer" on the radio--now, all I can think of is claymation.

There is nothing inherently wrong with this—it is just reality. It isn’t as easy as when I was a kid, when there was a choice of a few radio stations, you pretty much knew that one station played top 40, another played album rock, and another was “free form.” Or you put on a record. And I lived in the media capital of the world, so I can only imagine that radio was even less varied elsewhere. Now, if you like popular hits, you can find a way to listen to them. If you want to only listen to obscure indie rock, you can do that. And if you want to mix things up, you can do that, too. But all of this choice requires more work than I think most people are willing to do, and can simply be overwhelming. Maybe not to most people who read obscure music blogs, but most regular people.  I wrote this earlier this week, and here's an op-ed from today's New York Times that discusses some of the same issues.

Although I would expect that most people reading this were in fact aware that the Buggles’ “Video Killed the Radio Star” was the first video on MTV, I am willing to bet that a significantly smaller percentage of you knew that it was not the first version of the song released. The song was written by Trevor Horn, Geoff Downes and Bruce Woolley, all members of the Buggles, and it was a demo of the song that helped get the band signed. Apparently, it took the trio about an hour to write. While recording the album, Woolley left amicably, formed The Camera Club and released his somewhat less “produced” version of the song on the album English Garden. Here it is:

Shortly thereafter, the remaining Buggles released their version, which became the huge hit and a cultural icon. And to show there were no hard feelings, Woolley appears in the video. Downes and Horn started to work on another album, but instead joined Yes, in what was at the time a true head scratcher. The second Buggles album was later released, to less acclaim, and Downes joined Asia and has been part of other bands. Horn has mostly made his name as a producer. The Camera Club’s second album went unreleased, and Woolley has become better known as a songwriter, often for movies. One of the other members of that band was Thomas Dolby, who must also have recognized the interplay between TV and radio. His debut album was called The Golden Age of Wireless, and the first track was another early MTV staple, “She Blinded Me With Science.” The second track? “Radio Silence.”