As my husband and I drove to Renton on Sunday, he was getting very bored with the music available in our CD/MP3 collection and switched over to the radio. Getting very quickly bored with the all-Beatles morning show on his regular station, he began channel surfing. Just as we were pulling into Fry’s, he flipped to The End and I reached out and stopped his hand, my eyes wide. I couldn’t speak for a few moments.
It was Heaven, by the Eurogliders. (YouTube linky for the curious, or for those who just love that Aussie 80s synth-y goodness)
For years they were simply a memory, a band and song I’d believed only my father and I cared about anymore. I knew the words by heart, and I haven’t heard that song in well over 20 years. Naturally, this prompted me to go searching for it, and judging by the YouTube link, obviously they are not completely forgotten. Now I need to get my hands on a decent copy of it - any copy my dad or I owned has long since disintegrated into shiny, cassette-tape dust many, many moons ago.
Tell me about your old favourites that have re-surfaced when you very least expected it! What song has caught you completely off guard while channel surfing, only to have you realise you had never truly expected to hear that song on the radio ever again?
I don’t know if i’d call it an old favourite, but I guess I did love the song when I was about 8… but today a coworker, for reasons he refused to tell me, started singing “Step by Step” by the New Kids on the Block!
What makes this even funnier is that said coworker is a 6-foot-tall, muscular, shaved-headed black guy. It just messed with my head!
About a year ago, I heard the song Red Skies at Night for the first time in a long time. I remembered how much I really liked that song back in the day, but never gave much thought about the artist. I looked it up and discovered it’s The Fixx.
Then I realized The Fixx were behind many 80s tunes I really enjoyed but never gave much thought to the artist:
Red Skies at Night
Secret Separation
Saved by Zero
One Thing Leads to Another
Are We Ourselves?
Deeper and Deeper
Stand or Fall
Sunshine in the Shade
I couldn’t help but wonder why The Fixx never really became a household name. I never realized I really love this band. Since then, I’ve seen them in concert twice in NorCal and wouldn’t mind seeing them again. I just saw them a few weeks ago in San Francisco with The Alarm and Psychedelic Furs. It was a great show, and I think The Fixx, who played the middle set, stole the show.
Otherwise, I have recently re-discovered 80s Aussie synth goodness of Icehouse and their two bigger singles, Crazy and Electric Blue. GREAT STUFF!
I was in Canada when Larry (now known as Lawrence) Gowan first rose to popularity. His album “Strange Animal” was all over the air and people bought it hand over fist. It’s chock full of stellar musicianship, and has Tony Levin playing bass. Fast forward twenty years, and he’s singing lead for Styx. In concert, they play Gowan’s biggest song, “A Criminal Mind.” I heard that song by Styx last week and realized that I never bought Gowan’s album when it was new. So I had to order it. It should be here on Friday. Maybe I’ll dig out my videotape with the MuchMusic Spotlight of all his videos and watch that, too.
I love love LOVE this song, but never knew anything about the band. It’s, IMO, one of the all-time great pop songs. I’d never seen any video and had no idea what the band looked like, so thanks for the link. I didn’t even know they were from Australia.
Wow. Sudden flashback to when the Eurogliders were performing on the MTV New Years Eve Rock ‘n’ Roll Ball (1983?). One of the cameramen was lying on his back, right in front of the lead singer, trying to get a shot up her cut-off t-shirt. He succeeded.
Pretty damned eye-opening for a sheltered sixth grader.
Ah, the memories.
Couple of months isn’t too far gone to bump my own thread, is it?
Yesterday at work, I was discussing surface prep for a paint job with a contractor when I was caught off guard by the song on the radio.
“Holy cow,” I sputtered. “It’s** Nik Kershaw**!” Sure enough, it was Wouldn’t It Be Good. Thankfully, the contractor knew the song, too, and was just as surprised to hear it. Though he pointed out that I must have only been about yay high:
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when it first came out. Yes, I was. But I was fan then, anyway, as much as a five or six year old can be. 
Once again, me and my pops, big Nik Kershaw fans for years - didn’t think anyone else ever gave him a second thought. But somewhere, somehow, someone programming a radio station playlist still thinks of our Nik.
Cheesy video goodness!
But… wasn’t The Riddle even cheesily* better*? Man, I’d like to hear that on the radio again. 