It’s hard to convey the impact that Frankie Goes To Hollywood had in 1984. Relax, the Two Tribes video, and most of all this album. In an era of short sharp singles the 13+ minutes of the title song took us to places not visited since about1975. For another wonderfully insightful piece, please welcome Mr Mark Beaumont-Thomas…
This is a celebration of an album released almost exactly 39 years ago, on 29 October 1984: Welcome to the Pleasuredome by Frankie Goes To Hollywood. I claim it as the ultimate ‘80s album, not because it is the best album of the ‘80s, but because within it are encapsulated so many key ‘80s issues and cultural trends. Here are ten of them.
Ultimate ‘80s thing #1: The Producer
The album is more Trevor Horn’s album than it is the group members. Famously, ‘Relax’ was almost entirely put together in the studio, using a variety of session men and then amping that up to incredible levels to create a 13-million-copies seller worldwide. The album is defined by a ‘sound’ that is studio alchemy, a fact that was picked up by labels around the world, resulting in that manufactured sound to so much ‘80s output. But Horn/Frankie did it better than anyone on this album, making it so compelling even now.
Ultimate ‘80s thing #2: The Fairlight CMI
Costing as much as a house in the early ‘80s, not many bands could afford a Fairlight, but the sound effects and textures it could produce took art-rock to a new level. Kate Bush and Peter Gabriel were early users, and Trevor Horn recognized what it could bring to the Frankie sound, on ‘Relax’ and elsewhere across the album. As with point #1, the Fairlight is tech whose time had arrived and used to great effect.
Ultimate ‘80s thing #3: ‘Relax’
This single, included on the album in one of its more conventional mix incarnations, is an ‘80s cultural phenomenon. Released almost a year ahead of the album, in November 1983, it first burst into the charts in January 1984, boosted by a Top of the Pops appearance on 5 Jan, which in terms of impact is up there with Bowie’s ‘Starman’. The nation, me included, goggled at its incredible sight and sound and it catapulted the single from a lowly #35 to the top ten and then to #1 at the end of Jan. By then, Radio 1 DJ had belatedly woken up to the idea that the track might not just be advising people to take it easy and banned it from daytime play and from TOTP. Of course, this did its sales no harm at all, and it remained at #1 for 5 weeks. Re-releases in ’85 and ’93 helped it spend a remarkable 70 weeks in total in the charts.
As well as its commercial success, ‘Relax’ is both an amazing track and a last hurrah for carefree gay sex, with the shadow of AIDS/HIV already beginning to be cast across the US and the UK. It’s no coincidence that the logo for Russell T Davies’ excellent AIDS drama It’s a Sin is in the style of a Frankie t-shirt.
Ultimate ‘80s thing #4: 12-inches
The sheer number of 12-inch versions and remixes of the Welcome… singles is crazy, stretching the form to its limits, a product of the hours Trevor Horn spent in the studio. Every big hit thereafter had its obligatory 12-inch remix, but arguably it was these Frankie incarnations which propelled the artform into the mainstream.
Check out the tongue-in-cheek later 12-inch of ‘Rage Hard’, subtitled ‘Young person’s guide to the 12” mix’, with a commentary on the essential ingredients needed, voiced by Pamela Stephenson. This is included in my Frankie playlist on Spotify.
Ultimate ‘80s thing #5: Slogan T-shirts
The success of Welcome… and the singles was in no small part due to the amazing marketing campaign that was created by Paul Morley and the ZTT label team. Way before social media, it understood the power of influencers, with celebs seen wearing ‘FRANKIE SAY’ t-shirts, with slogans that promoted sex, were anti-war and other social causes (‘ARM THE UNEMPLOYED’ etc). Forty years on, they still feel contemporary.
Ultimate ‘80s thing #6: Threat of nuclear war
In 1984, this threat really did feel imminent, fueled by the BBC drama Threads, broadcast in September 1984, which imagined in unprecedented graphic detail the aftermath of a nuclear bomb falling near my home city of Sheffield. The Protect and Survive booklet was issued by the Government, giving detailed advice on what to do in the event of nuclear war. Phrases from it are added chillingly to various versions of the astonishing ‘Two Tribes’, the next huge hit single from the album. Check out the Annihilation Mix (on the playlist), with its repetition of “If your grandmother or any other member of your family should die while in the shelter, put them outside but remember to tag them first for identification purposes.”
Ultimate ‘80s thing #7: Unemployment
In June 1984, UK unemployment reached a staggering 11.9% and Side 3 of the album, with its sly and affectionate trio of cover versions (‘Ferry Cross the Mersey’, ‘Born to Run’ and ‘Do You Know the Way to San José?’), all dreaming of escape, is rudely interrupted by the voiceover of a Liverpool benefits claimant being put on ‘daily signing’.
Ultimate ‘80s thing #8: Spitting Image
This had launched on UK TV in Feb 1984 and so they couldn’t resist including Chris Barrie voicing Reagan to great effect on ‘Two Tribes’ and Prince Charles, to less good effect, talking about er, orgasms.
Ultimate ‘80s thing #9: Christmas records
To complete their total dominance of 1984 (‘Relax’ in Jan/Feb, ‘Two Tribes’ in June-Aug, the album in Oct/Nov) the last of the big three singles, ‘The Power of Love’, was released for Christmas. As great as the other two, it’s a (to use one of its lyrics) ‘sky-scraping’ power ballad that champions love as the ultimate religious impulse, complete with expensive nativity video. #1 in December, it was held off the Christmas #1 slot by a certain charity Christmas single.
Ultimate ‘80s thing #10: Independent labels
There had already been indie labels, but ZTT, masterminded by Trevor Horn and Paul Morley, took their scope and ambition to a whole new level. The look, the marketing, the hype and the house style were striking and unique and encouraged and emboldened other distinctive labels such as 4AD.
So, Welcome to the Pleasuredome was lightning in a bottle, a one-off whose influence peaked and fell in one tumultuous year. As a result, it is now often curiously overlooked, but it’s now time to dig out that slogan t-shirt and listen again, it’s well worth it.
