The Records

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The Records
General information
Genre (s) Powerpop
founding 1978
resolution 1982
Website http://www.willbirch.com/
Founding members
John Wicks
Will Birch
Guitar, vocals
 Huw Gower (until 1980)
Bass , vocals
 Phil Brown
former members
Guitar, vocals
 Jude Cole (1980, 1981)
guitar
 Dave Whelan (1981, 1982)
singing
 Chris Gent (1981, 1982)

The Records was an English rock - pop band from the late 1970s . Most testers song of the band is their US - hit single "Starry Eyes" (1979).

Band history

founding

The Records emerged from the remains of the Kursaal Flyers , a pub rock band with drummer Will Birch. In 1977 John Wicks joined them as a guitarist. Birch and Wicks soon started writing songs together - Wicks as a composer, Birch as a lyricist. Just three months after Wicks joined them, the Kursaal Flyers broke up. Birch and Wicks stayed together, and in 1978 they formed the records with lead guitarist Huw Gower and bassist Phil Brown . Gower had previously played with the " hippie " band Magic Muscle and the punks The Ratbites From Hell (here with John Perry, later guitarist with The Only Ones ); Brown had been bassist for The Janets .

The Beatles , the Kinks and power pop bands of the late 1960s / early 1970s such as Badfinger , Big Star or The Raspberries were the main influences on the sound of the records . Their power pop swam with the wave of success from punk rock and new wave - back to pure rock, away from the bombast of the first half of the 1970s. After a series of live performances, the independent label The Record Company released their debut single "Starry Eyes" in November 1978 .

successes

Stiff Records took The Records under contract, leaving the band their young star Rachel Sweet on the "Be Stiff" tour guide. The concerts each started with a few songs from the records without Rachel. Birch and Wicks also wrote a song for Rachel Sweet ( "Pin a Medal on Mary" from the album "Fool Around" ). During this time, the two composed and wrote the song "Hearts in Her Eyes" for the Searchers , who celebrated an unexpected comeback more than a decade after their last hit.

In 1979 the records received a contract with Virgin Records due to demo recordings that were later released as " Paying for the Summer of Love" . Her debut single "Starry Eyes" has now also been released in the USA, making it her most famous song. All Music Guide calls it an "almost perfect song that defined British power pop in the 70s"; Birch himself calls him on the records website a “brazenly rewritten 'Do Anything You Wanna Do' by Eddie & the Hot Rods ”. The single was in the US a bigger hit than in their home and made it into the Billboard - Charts at # 56 in the UK that could Records her singles (on "Starry Eyes" followed by "Rock and Roll Love Letter" ) the Group Radio, but not in the sales charts.

With the producers Mutt Lange and Tim Friese-Greene they recorded their first long-playing record "Shades in Bed" , which also contained their third single "Teenarama" . In the USA the album was released under the title "The Records" ; it also became a hit here and made it to number 41 on the charts. They went on tour, in the UK as opening act for The Jam ; in the USA for Joe Jackson and for The Cars (in Central Park ), but also played concerts there as headliners with The dB's or The Rubinoos in the opening act.

failure

Gower, who wanted to make harder sound again, left the group in 1980 and joined the band of David Johansen (formerly New York Dolls ). Jude Cole, a 19-year-old American from Moon Martins band The Ravens , replaced him on the album "Crashes" (1980). The album was not a hit; the single "Hearts in Her Eyes" (the song Birch and Wicks originally wrote for the Searchers ) was also unsuccessful. After a US tour, Cole stayed there while Birch, Wicks and Brown returned to England. The three recruited guitarist Dave Whelan and Chris Gent as lead singer. This lineup recorded a third album for Virgin in 1981, "Music on Both Sides" , which was not released until a year later, but went largely unnoticed by critics and buyers.

resolution

After the commercial failure of the third LP and two concerts in London, the band broke up in 1982. Birch continued as a producer (e.g. for Dr. Feelgood) and songwriter (initially mainly at Stiff Records , where he worked with Billy Bremner from Rockpile and Desmond Dekker , and Demon Records ) and later became a music critic / historian (including for the magazine MOJO ) and book author. Wicks kept the naming rights to The Records . In 1991 the original band got together again to contribute the Beach Boys hit "Darlin '" to the tribute album "Smiles, Vibes and Harmonies" in honor of Brian Wilson , and in 1992 they performed one last time live in Kingston upon Thames . Wicks settled in the US and continues to record music - as John Wicks & the Records .

Discography

Albums

  • 1979: Shades in Bed (US version: The Records ; US Charts # 41)
  • 1980: crashes
  • 1982: Music on Both Sides
  • 1987: A Sunny Afternoon in Waterloo (early demo recordings)
  • 1988: Smashes, Crashes and Near Misses (compilation)
  • 1990: Paying for the Summer of Love (early demo recordings)

Singles

  • 1978: Starry Eyes / Paint Her Face (US charts # 56)
  • 1979: Teenarama / Held Up High
  • 1979: Rock and Roll Love Letter / Wives & Mothers of Tomorrow
  • 1980: Hearts in Her Eyes / So Sorry
  • 1981: Imitation Jewelery / Your Own Soundtrack

swell

  1. ↑ "... a near-perfect song that defined British power pop in the '70s." ( Https://www.allmusic.com/artist/mn0000491802 )
  2. ↑ "... a shameless re-write of Eddie and the Hot Rods' Do Anything You Wanna Do." ( http://www.therecords.com/ )  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / www.therecords.com  

literature

  • Will Birch: No Sleep Till Canvey Island - The Great Pub Rock Revolution , Virgin Books, London 2000/2003; ISBN 0-7535-0740-4 .

Web links