— Dave Rimmer
They aren't quite the Big Names from the entry of couple weeks' back — only one Rock & Roll Hall of Famer here even though it's probably time Duran Duran got themselves inducted; sorry, that's the last I'll be bringing up the RNRHOF for a while — but there's some pretty stiff competition here, even if only on paper. A suddenly faltering Adam & The Ants (in fact an Adam Ant solo single, as this issue of ver Hits' Bitz section mentions), Soft Cell riding a wave of momentum from "Tainted Love" but quickly becoming hard to sell, ABC hitting their stride with (ho-hum) another brilliant tune, The Associates delivering a bit of a let down following the extraordinary "Party Fears Two", Blondie's first duff track in damn-near forever, Culture Club proving to be not quite ready to take their rightful place in pantheon of UK pop and XTC moving into a permanent spot in ver dumper. Step forward China Crisis!
Polished white-boy funk was all the rage in the UK pop scene of 1982, something I've already become weary of as I've been trudging through singles review pages and YouTube playlists. Fuelled by the energy of punk with the precision of Chic and Motown classics, the likes of Haircut One Hundred and Pigbag had the chops, the flair and, yes, even the soul to eek out some effective tunes that got them featured in Smash Hits and landed them on Top of the Pops and would get them a decent return on the eighties retro package tour circuit today. What they lack is a fresh take that made them more than just another bloody white-boy funk group. Again, step forward China Crisis!
Like its equally outstanding predecessor "African and White", "Scream Down at Me" has those same hallmarks of the British funk-soul boom but with elements of world music and the increasingly influential New Order added to the mix. So while the guitars chug along and the sythns hold it all together, the bass goes out on a superb solo excursion and the drums kick in some brilliant tribal rhythms. All of these disparate elements could have very easily created a giant mess but the whole thing comes together beautifully.
Quite whether the members of China Crisis themselves were happy with the results is another matter. The single promptly went nowhere and has since failed to appear on either a CC studio or compilation album. And their unique brand of indie funk started to get phased out in favour of a more sensitive synth-pop soul that resulted in some Top 20 hits a year later. Stand down China Crisis.
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Also Reviewed This Fortnight
Duran Duran: "Hungry Like the Wolf"
Another one that failed to impress the discerning Dave Rimmer this fortnight ("...this seems curiously lifeless even by their own standards"), "Hungry Like the Wolf" is nevertheless for many where the Duranies get going, particularly in North America where it was their first hit. I seldom listen to them anymore and they don't tend to get the same sort of rotation on retro radio stations and in eighties-obsessed grocery stores as many of their contemporaries so there are some bits I'd forgotten about. Was Lardo LeBon's voice, for one, always so nasally? Did I never notice just how metal that riff (played by a Taylor) is? Did I used to think it was "Hungry Like a Wolf" when I was a boy? (Rightly since animal lust calls for an indefinite article) Lots to quibble with — this is Duran Duran we're talking about — but stupidly impressive pop has its place too.
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