Roxette: "Listen to Your Heart" / Billy Idol: "L.A. Woman"

25 July 1990 (with more "wry" "observations" here)

"Wouldn't buy it, though."

"I met Billy's mum and dad once actually, and it's funny but I never thought of Billy Idol having a mum and dad."

— "Uncle" Phil Collins

Remixes, dance-rock, cover versions, Euro-dance: the likes of grunge, shoegaze, jungle and whatever it was that Hootie & The Blowfish and Spin Doctors played was still ahead of us but the nineties were well underway. But try telling that to Roxette, Billy Idol and, indeed, Phil Collins. To all of them, it was as if 1983 had never ended.

Collins was a good deal older than your average pop star moonlighting as a singles reviewer in Smash Hits, especially by 1990 when the magazine was trending younger. On the other hand, guest critics by this point were on the downswing of their careers. Matt Goss did the singles in the first issue of the new year and was then followed by London Boys, two of the blokes behind Jive Bunny and the members of And Why Not. Not exactly pop's hottest acts. If anything, our Phil was still going strong even if his UK chart placements were starting to peak lower. (As he accurately guesses, not a whole lot of people bought his latest, the Britain-only "That's Just the Way It Is", no doubt because "everybody's bought" his latest blockbuster album ...But Seriously, even though I sure as hell didn't)

The eighties were already starting to fall out of fashion but Collins was having none of it. Roxette's "Listen to Your Heart" is essentially a heavy metal slow song — for the love of god, even the video plays into this with tropes such as a swaying audience and hard rock poses from the band which could've been straight out of a Whitesnake promo — while Billy Idol's cover of "L.A. Woman" is all eighties' lust and eighties' pomp blanketing a seventies' record that needed no frills. It may not have been acknowledged at the time but the trio of Collins, Idol and Roxette might as well have been the new dinosaur acts for a new decade.

Roxette have been enjoying a bit of a critical re-evaluation as of late. They did very well for a little while but they became irrelevant by about 1992 when listeners really started getting the eighties out of their systems. From then until quite recently they were regarded as naff. (Say what you will about a group like Kajagoogoo but at least they were of their time and not clinging to a bygone era) Nostalgia for eighties and nineties acts seemed to forget all about them. Then, singer Marie Fredriksson passed away near the end of 2019 and Generation Xers remembered how much they liked them way back when. It's not inconceivable that the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame will induct them at some point.

The story of how Roxette broke through in the America has practically become a legend. What seldom gets mentioned is how the British stubbornly tried to resist them, to the extent that it mirrors how the US attempted to ignore fellow Swedes ABBA fifteen years earlier. True, "The Look" gave them a Top 10 hit in May of 1989 but follow ups "Dressed for Success" and a first try for "Listen to Your Heart" missed the fun forty altogether. It was only after the syrupy "It Must Have Been Love" returned them to the British charts that their earlier flops got a second chance. Neither of them did anywhere close to the same roaring business they attracted in the US but they both did all right, ensuring that Roxette would be respectable chart regulars in Britain while remaining monsters elsewhere — at least for a little while. Of the two, "Listen to Your Heart" is the sturdier record. As Collins says, it's a bit Bryan Adams (the poor bits) and a bit Heart (the rest) and it had been done a million times before. Very bland, very cliched but I can listen to it from end to end; "Dressed for Success" is just pitiful.

While Roxette still had another year or two of hits to go, Billy Idol was fast becoming forgotten as early as 1990. Where he had once cultivated a diverse cross-section of listeners from pop kids to metallers and from punk holdovers to assorted of castoffs and misfits, Sir Billiam audience had by this point dwindled down to his core following. Middle age suited Collins and Sting but only seemed to make Idol seem even more ridiculous than he already was. Old school punks no longer seemed to have a place at the table (a returning Adam Ant seemed to be an even sadder proposition) when there were sufficient hardcore acts and indie bands for outsiders to embrace.

His — gasp! — fourth Single of the Fortnight (joining Elvis Costello, The Cure and Pet Shop Boys in this once-exclusive group), "L.A. Woman" is nevertheless Idol's weakest record to date. There's much to recommend in the original by The Doors: it's intense, it's them at their grubby blue-rock best, at times it's poppy and catchy, Jim Morrison gives a ballsy but not highfalutin performance and they capture a city they knew all too well. None of that can be found in Idol's rendition however. It opens sounding much more like Kenny Loggins' "Footloose" than anything The Doors would ever have touched and it's only downhill from there. Subtlety goes out the, er, door. Idol's Morrison impersonation is spot on at times (at other points he sounds either like Peter Murphy or someone doing a poor Billy Idol impersonation) but Morrison himself didn't sound like Morrison by the end of his life. 

The only thing that saves "L.A. Woman" is that I buy Idol being enraptured by a gorgeous groupie from Venice Beach in a way that locals wouldn't appreciate. Morrison sang it as if he'd been around these girls his entire life; Idol comes at it from the perspective of a British rock 'n' roller living it up in the California sun for the first time in his life. There's a tradition of New Yorkers arriving in L.A. and despising it while Brits who descend upon the west coast end up living it up on endless groupies and a sea of vodka. Idol always made you believe that he made the most of his rock lifestyle and all its assorted "accoutrements".

~~~~~

Also of some cop

New Kids on the Block: "Tonight"

It seemed like the long and depressing reign of the New Kids was never going to end. Luckily, they were just about to come apart and the a-bit-better-than-I-remember "Tonight" gives clues to their undoing. As everyone knows by now, your best days are clearly behind you if you go into being self-referential ("Taught you 'bout hangin' tough / As long as you've got the right stuff...": did kids who weren't me think that quoting themselves was cool at the time?) and any thoughts that they were representing the future of music had been dashed by them suddenly trying to sound like The Beatles. And then there's the fact that they had put out a single all about how much they loved their fans at precisely the same time that they were being knocked in the press for lip-synching at their concerts. Still, at least Danny, Donnie, Joey, Jon and Jordan weren't living in the past. In fact, you could say that between being a boy band, poorly trying to ape The Beatles, miming to their own recordings and being meta with their lyrics the New Kids were paving the way for the nineties.

Billy Idol: "Hot in the City"

30 December 1987

"Accompanied by a thumping drum beat and a manic accordion, the world's Greatest Living Englishman growls and snarls menacingly, strutting his "stuff" to maximum effect."

— Sue Dando

Part 3: Billiam Woos America

Billiam sat in the Pam Am lounge, sipping on his Jack and coke. No one else cared that he was a world famous pop star but, then again, he had been in the UK for just over a week and hardly anyone in the whole country gave a toss. It hadn't been all that long ago that he began looking forward to trips back home. He'd see some old mates, wander around London like he used to and indulge in some proper British chocolate. But lately he had begun looking forward to being back in New York. He didn't grow up there but it's a city with everything. Plus, no one in his hometown cared about him anymore — either that or they cared too much.

A woman in her late twenties entered the lounge. She sat down, ordered cup of coffee and looked at a newspaper. Billiam looked over at her but she was unaware of him staring at her. She looked professional and these were typically the sort of women he steered clear of. The ladies would throw themselves at him so much that he couldn't recall the last time he approached one...

~~~~~

I give up! This is now the third time round for Billy Idol on this blog (with at least one more to go!) and I can't bring myself to keep this short story idea going any longer. It began as a laugh, with a piece describing what I might do with the so-called Just Billiam stories (which was, in truth, just an opportunity to avoid having to write something approximating an actual review); I didn't bother composing story for that entry. I would return to the "series" for the next post covering Sir Billiam in which I tried to describe how a very fictionalized facsimile of the star would have gone about living a rock 'n' roll lifestyle. I don't know if I succeeded but it was good fun to write. Still, that's enough of that. It's time I gave Sir Billiam of Idol his "due" with some legit "criticism".

~~~~~

One of the most striking features about Billy Idol was that he often did better the second time around. He had initially been part of the so-called Bromley Contingent, a pack of punk hangers-on who were a vital part of the genre's image. While chums Siouxsie Sioux and Steve Severin would go on to form Siouxsie & The Banshees, the former William Board put together Generation X, a group of little renown beyond their charismatic frontman. Members would come and go before Idol decided to try his luck Stateside. It would be a good move even though it would take time for American audiences to warm to him.

He smartly snapped up Generation X's final single, "Dancing with Myself", and did it again on his own. The record didn't sell but it became a signature number and it would open the door for future hits. The Don't Stop E.P. followed. It featured a cover of the Tommy James & The Shondells hit "Mony Mony" and closed with (imagine that) "Dancing with Myself" and gave the singer his first entry on the American Hot 100. Six years later, live recording of the former gave him a US number one and a British top 10 hit. UK success was slower than in his new homeland. Singles like "Hot in the City" and "Rebel Yell" did no better than "Dancing with Myself" while they and "White Wedding" all did well in the US. It was only with "Eyes Without a Face" that Idol could lay claim to a single that hadn't been a flop — and even then, it was something he wasn't able to capitalise on.

Idol's British salvation wouldn't emerge until the following year and it would be via that most unlikely of mediums: the remix album. As LP types go, remix albums are low priority, reserved mainly for dance acts to collect various 12" mixes as a supplementary release. Hardcore fans scoop them up just as they would a live album or a Christmas record but casual listeners tend to stay away. But they didn't with Vital Idol, which became his first top 10 album. If Neil Tennant had been sufficiently charmed by the Rebel Yell album with its "blend of disco, rock 'n' roll and daft horror-movie imagery" then the public only craved more only dancier, louder and longer. Billy Idol had always been a caricature of a punk but now he was only just starting to embrace it.

This image of Idol as a buffoon didn't travel. He was a bona fide rock star in the US and he played the part to the fullest extent. His appeal crossed genres, with metal heads, pop kids and old school rockers all finding something in his records. American music in the late eighties was getting older and more mainstream and it's to the credit of fans that they made room for someone like Idol to stand in contrast to all the roots rock and MOR.

As 1987 began to wind down, Idol's record label Chrysalis released Idol Songs: 11 of the Best. Yes, it's a chintzy number of tracks for a greatest hits but it wasn't as if his discography was overflowing with golden greats. The live version of "Mony Mony" had just been a hit and his British popularity had never been greater. It was here that "Hot in the City" would get its second shot at chart action. Sue Dando reckons punters were fools to pass up on it the first time round but Sir Billiam was much to close to the punk action from which he was "birthed" to be taken seriously. From the distance of ten years since his pals uttered some naughty language in the company of Bill Grundy, he could be gauged more accurately as a chancer trying to make the most of his modest talents.

The single itself is standard Idol, if less catchy than "Rebel Yell" or "White Wedding". It drips with Americana, something that, again, might not have appealed to Brits in the early eighties but was just what people in the decade's latter half were craving. The Rolling Stones never seemed more English than when they tried to be as American sounding as possible; Idol actually seemed to pull it off better than most of his compatriots. It would be nice if it had more of a dance sound (the 'Exterminator Mix' on Vital Idol is superior to the original single) but '87 was all about getting back to basics so he had that going for him too.

The genius of Billy Idol was his ability to square the circle of people's expectations. Americans took him as a real, blood 'n' guts rocker, the British wanted him to be more of a pantomime act and somehow he managed to be both. And this is something a far more talented individual would never have managed to accomplish. Well done, Sir Billiam!

~~~~~

Also Reviewed This Fortnight

Public Enemy: "Bring the Noise"

Sir Billiam tried to be the punk that is all things to all people but he didn't reckon with the real sound of the streets. And it's just as well since an Idol rap tune would be appallingly bad — possibly even worse than the Public Enemy/Anthrax version of "Bring the Noise". This original version, mercifully, is free of guitars but bursting with Chuck D's raps and a metric ton of samples. At a time when hip hop was bursting with boastfulness, Public Enemy were something different and well ahead of all that 'keeping it real' nonsense that would come along in the next decade. They were never really my thing but that's much more on me than them.

Billy Idol: "Rebel Yell"

11 September 1985

"(well he did more or less invent rock 'n' roll)"

— Steve Bush

Part 2: Billiam Gets Another Chance

"Billiam? Billiam?"

He could sort of make out the gentle voice trying to rouse him but he was conscious enough not to give a toss. Whatever time it was, it was too early to be getting up.

"Billiam," the voice continued. She wasn't about to stop trying so he might as well get up. He knew he could make the task of sending her on her way quick before he could get to more urgent matters.

"Morning," he gurgled, slowly sitting up. Tracey (he just remembered her name!) was getting dressed. She looked lovely in the morning light. He liked waking up to a girl that made him not regret the night before.

"I gotta go baby," she said sweetly, "I gotta be at work in a bit."

"Well, can I get you some breakfast?" Billiam responded feebly. He loved making offers he knew he wouldn't have to fulfill.

"Thanks, sweetie, but I'll get something on the way. Don't get up. I'll let myself out. Call me." She kissed him on the forehead and walked out of the bedroom.

"Right ho," he replied. He wasn't sure if he got her number but it didn't matter since he wasn't going to call her anyway.

~~~~~

Billiam never seemed to make a good first impression, especially with the ladies he was really after. A rock star of some note, he was bound to attract attention but he never seemed to want anyone willing to throw themselves at him. He always preferred the girls who paid him no mind. Girls who seemed above it all. Girls who always seemed to have someplace better to be, meeting far better people. Girls for whom rock 'n' roll glamour meant nothing. (Of course, Billiam also knew that this was just an act: why would they choose to be in the vicinity of fame if they weren't attracted to it?) He respected their supposed aloofness and it made him miss being young in London and having to chase down every opportunity no matter how much of a longshot it was.

Tracey claimed she had been dragged out by co-workers and did the usual "have I seen you someplace before?" routine when she got chatting with Billiam the night before. This was a variation on the same story he always heard: pushy friends or colleagues twisted their arms to go out, they never typically went to nightclubs and they didn't think about trying to meet guys. They never seemed impressed to be in his presence, didn't appear drawn to him in any way and only seemed to be talking to him as if to pass the time in a place they felt uncomfortable.

These girls may not have been taken by him at first but they would slowly come round. Billiam was charming and sweet and always made them feel like they were the only girls that mattered. It just took a little time but they never let him down. They just wanted more, more, more.

~~~~~

He didn't awaken until the early afternoon and only then because the phone was ringing. It  was Glenn, his manager, calling from London.

"It's another flop, mate," Glenn began without a greeting. Billiam didn't reply. "I'm sorry."

"'S aw-right, mate," Billiam responded nonchalantly.

"The record label isn't happy. I'm worried they might drop you."

The conversation continued for a bit with Glenn doing all the talking and Billiam giving token replies. He told his manager that he didn't care and that he'd made America his home and he didn't care what the English thought anymore. He was pretty sure he'd convinced Glenn but hadn't quite been able to convince himself. He knew there was something a bit strange about those British groups who hit big in the States but weren't able to cut it back home. He always chalked it up to Americans taking him seriously while being treated like a joke in his homeland but it still gnawed at him.

Putting down the phone, he got himself ready to head out. A tour was coming up and he had to get started on rehearsals. And he was looking to hit the clubs later.

~~~~~

He invited his touring band out after a productive rehearsal and they readily agreed. Jobbing musicians always knew that one of the perks of backing a popular solo artist was the chance of meeting women. Billiam led the fivesome into the club and they began scoping the joint but the singer made a bee line for the bar. Women would come to him, they figured.

It didn't seem like Billiam was looking around but he knew where everyone was. The women he had no interest in were the easiest to spot: they tended to stick closest to him. Beyond them, he had to check out the groups of friends enjoying their drinks and laughing. There was always one he had his eye on.

He first noticed Layla standing with a group who had given up looking for a table. She didn't seem to mind even as others in her pack kept searching for a place to sit down. Billiam tried not to stare, only glancing in her direction in short spurts. He would have to wait a bit to make his move and decided to get a round in for his bandmates. They weren't having too much luck but as soon as Billiam joined them they began attracting attention.

"I thought you were already with a girl," Larry the affable drummer commented.

"Nah," Billiam dismissed, "there's lots of time for that." Few knew how to play the long game as well as he did.

"Got anyone in mind?" inquired Rick the rhythm guitarist.

"Dunno," said Billiam as he looked around the room, trying his best to seem as noncommittal as possible. He wanted to make sure his chums were spoken for before he made his move.

He eventually approached Layla. She didn't appear surprised that he'd chosen her.

"'Ello. I'm Billiam."

"Yeah, I know. It's nice to meet you."

Billiam was impressed. She wasn't pretending not to know him like the girls he typically chatted up — but neither was she fawning all over him like the girls he didn't want. They spoke for a while and she agreed to have a drink with him. Their conversation continued for over an hour: she asked him about living in America compared to England, where he liked to go on holiday, hobbies and keeping his apartment tidy; he asked her about her job, family, books she's been reading and how she handled the pressures of being an independent woman in the eighties. This was going well and it was just about time to ask her if she wanted to get going.

"Listen, it's been great meeting you but I have to get going," Layla said suddenly. Billiam was surprised but he didn't panic. Girls often pulled out the old 'I gotta go' line but it never worked on him.

"You don't 'ave time for one mo' drink?"

"I'm sorry, my friends are waiting for me. But maybe we'll see each other again." Billiam still wasn't completely worried. As she stood up to go, he gave her a smoldering, 'come hither' look, the kind he had perfected over years of magazine shoots, the kind you could only pull off if it was perfectly natural, anyone who tried to hard wound up looking ridiculous.

"Take care," she smiled, not the least bit moved by his sex appeal. Billiam didn't move as she turned away. That night the members of his backing band all went home with women they met at the club but Billiam headed home by himself. Joey, his doorman, was stunned: he couldn't recall a time when he witnessed Billiam returning home all by himself.

~~~~~

The tour went well and Billiam hadn't lost a step, neither as a performer nor with the ladies. There were women available to him every evening in every city they visited and he usually took them up on their hospitality — it would be rude not to.

His records were also doing well. He now had Top 10 hits in the US, Canada, Australia and New Zealand and he was finally beginning to make inroads back in Britain. Critics who had always been hostile were beginning to warm up to him too. Still, he couldn't shake the feeling that he was a joke back home. It would show them if one of those singles they spurned could make a comeback and prove them all wrong.

Getting back to New York after several months on the road, Billiam was unsure about going to the nightclubs and discotheques. The English pub round the corner suited him for the moment but he was also happy just to lie low at home with mates coming round for small gatherings. There were still plenty of women to choose from and he didn't have to revisit his failure from his previous night out.

"Why aren'cha comin' out anymore, man?" asked his buddy Lance, a restaurateur Billiam had known since first moving to New York four years earlier.

"I been on tour so long and I'm still knackered. It's nice t' be at 'ome, mate," he shrugged his shoulders. "I jus' wanna party 'ere!"

The phone rang. Billiam didn't feel like answering it and didn't want to take the call so he asked his chum Dave to take a message.

"It's your manager," Dave shouted. "He says your single is in the Top 10 in England."

Billiam didn't shoot and scream but everyone could tell he was excited. His mood perked up even though he assured everyone that he didn't care beyond the royalties he'd be getting.

"Come on," commanded Lance, "we gotta go out and celebrate!" Billiam still wasn't in much of a mood but he agreed. He didn't want to spoil everyone's fun.

~~~~~

"Good morning." Billiam awoke to a soft voice. He turned and looked at Layla.

"Morning."

"I had a great time last night."

"Yeah, me too."

"I'm so glad I bumped into you again. I wasn't sure if I would ever see you after our last encounter."

"Oh really?" Billiam asked, pretending not to know what she was on about.

"Yeah, I didn't want you to think of me as a cheesy rock groupie chick."

"Oh, come on love, I'd never think that. You're special."

She offered to make him breakfast but they ended up doing bacon and eggs together. He was going to be sorry to see her go.

Layla kissed him and went to leave.

"Call me."

"Right ho," he replied. He didn't get her number but it didn't matter since he wasn't going to call her anyway.

~~~~~

Also of some cop

Freddie Mercury: "Living on My Own"

Part 6: Billiam in the Shadows

Billiam loves rock 'n' roll but he looks down upon a lot of older stars, especially if they stand in the way of his old school punk values. British stars in New York often form cliques but he won't just hang out with anyone, especially if they're older and are coming out of prog or hippie music or pomp rock. Then he meets Tanya, a vivacious girl who kind of digs him but who also seems to favour those hoary old rock geezers that he doesn't care for. She's hoping Billiam might be able to introduce her to one or two legends but he doesn't want them to steal his thunder. Then he remembers an old Queen who just happens to be in town. Can he get a rock god to lend a hand?

Billy Idol: "Eyes Without a Face"

7 June 1984

"Although he doesn't have a great voice and the words are utter drivel, somehow he sounds affectingly sincere."

— Neil Tennant

So, we've come to a key SOTF, one I had not relished writing about. Not because I dislike the "artist" in question — even though I am by no means a fan — but because he doesn't inspire much in me and, crucially, I am going to have to deal with him again. And again. And again. Where other groups and singers I have covered or will cover on multiple occasions have given me confidence that there's enough material there for several entries, I feel at a loss for words when it comes to Billy Idol. Prior to getting this blog going — as a matter of fact, before I'd even cooked up the idea for this blog — I compiled a list of SOTF and, apart from the odd omission of a prominent act here and there, the biggest surprise I had was discovering just how much the Hits critics liked them some Billy.

Four entries on Billy Idol will be coming your way in the months and years ahead, approximately four more than I would have anticipated. Had there been just the one, I would have shovelled out some nonsense about being a punk who could never move on and, thus, made the biggest move possible by relocating from London to New York, where his naff commitment to such a passe genre and lifestyle would mark him out as "authentic", admired by Americans for never selling out. A second single and I would have been reduced to one of those annoyingly contrary pieces about how he "actually was the biggest sell out of all by remaining tied to his punk roots" or some other supposedly clever bit of analysis. A third would have had me begging the Smash Hits staff to stop torturing me. But it's four and — assuming I don't pack it in by the time we get to July, 2022 — I have to spread the very little I have to say about the former William Broad out as lightly as possible.

All this Idol did give me one idea that I toyed with over the last few days which I promptly abandoned this morning. Instead of critique, how about I compose a series of short stories based very loosely around his life and songs. It would allow me the freedom to take such a ridiculous pop star and put him into some ridiculous situations. Here is a brief synopsis for each of the Just Billiam stories:

Part 1: Billiam Proves Them Wrong
A charming English good-for-nothing has been described by audiences and critics as "naff" once too often and he decides to show 'em by writing and recording a song that expresses his feelings, though he quickly comes to realise that he has no idea how to go about doing so. Then he meets Maxine who he quickly falls for but she's turned off by his shallowness. Can he prove her wrong too?

Part 2: Billiam Gets Another Chance
Billiam's songs never quite hit the mark right away but they all find a way of eventually catching on. Meanwhile, Billiam's love life is similarly beset by disastrous first encounters that he winds up turning around into wild, passionate affairs. Then he meets Layla who seems immune to all of his tricks and is reluctant to give him that second chance he thrives on. Can he turn yet another flop into a huge hit?

Part 3: Billiam Woos America
Americans love Billiam. They're buying his records en masse, clamouring to see him in concert and wallpapering their bedrooms with posters of him. Then he meets Deborah who has recently emigrated to the US from Britain and is very much like the pop music fans of their shared homeland: very reluctant to take to him, unable to take him seriously and only able to handle him in very small doses. Can he woo her like he did an entire nation?

Part 4: Billiam Begins to Falter
Billiam is aware that the world around him is changing and so, too, is the music scene. He is starting to drift creatively and so he decides to record a cover version of a beloved song from his youth to get his juices flowing. Then he meets Nancy, a real LA woman if there ever was one and a veteran rock groupie who is now trying to settle down. Can he make his mark on a pair of classics before it's too late?

So, that's what you would have had in store but perhaps they're best left here, an idea set aside so that I may try to be a proper critic. But not today: probably next week and the week after and so on and maybe even next April when we're due to come encounter him again. I promise to get my critical chops going. Either that or I'll churn out the short story Billiam Gets Another Chance.

~~~~~

Also Reviewed This Fortnight

Frankie Goes to Hollywood: "Two Tribes"

Part 5: Billiam Say Relax
A new sensation has hit the charts but they're far removed from the punk ethos that drives Billiam and he is unimpressed with these lads flaunting themselves. Then he meets Joanne who has had her life changed by this groundbreaking quintet. She is convinced they are the next wave of political and sexual liberation and their ecstatic disco pop isn't so far off from Billiam's beloved punk rock. Can he develop an appreciation for this radical outfit so that he might score?