11 Reasons To Love Trevor Horn
During the creative process of making music you have various individuals who make a large and important contribution to the finished product including singers, musicians, songwriters, mixers and producers. Some well-known producers such as George Martin. Mark Ronson, Paul Epworth have built up extensive discographies and helped launch the careers and carve the sound of several artists including The Beatles and Amy Winehouse to name a few.
Of course you cannot really state that the work of Ronson is better or worse than say Martin’s because both of them have different musical ‘ears’ for different performers. One singer, musician and producer who has actually been described as ‘The Man Who Invented the Eighties’ and contributed to some of the world’s biggest albums and singles is Durham-born Trevor Horn.
Horn currently tours the world with The Trevor Horn Band which includes Lol Crème of 10CC fame, Yes/Asia keyboardist Geoff Downes as well as professional session musicians and glittering special guests. To coincide with The Trevor Horn Band’s appearance at 80s Rewind Festival South in Henley on Thames on Saturday 20th August 2016 we felt like now was a good time to run down (in no particular order) a list of reasons to love Trevor Horn and his contribution to popular music. Here we go…
T.A.T.U – ‘All The Things She Said’
T.A.T.U were a female duo from Russia that was made up of Julia Volkova and Lena Katina. The groups debut single ‘All The Things She Said’ was the group’s debut single and was both co-written and produced by Horn for release in August 2002 to support their debut album ‘200 km/h in the Wrong Lane’ which was released in October of the same year.
The vocal harmonies are subtle and crisp alongside the spacey electronic keyboards and uptempo drums whilst the songs chorus is simple to repeat thus making it a perfect radio hit under four minutes.
Did you know that All The Things She Said” reached number twenty on the US Billboard Hot 100, the first Russian act to accomplish this.
The Buggles – ‘Video Killed The Radio Star’
Let’s be honest, I couldn’t write an article about Trevor Horn without including this hit for The Buggles could I? In many ways, it was this particular track that really put Horn’s talents on the musical map as it were when they released this pop classic in 1979. ‘Video Killed The Radio Star’ became incredibly significant in pop music history though when it became became the first video broadcast by MTV when it launched in the US in August 1981.
It seemed quite fitting that a song about a popular radio host who had struggled in the transition to the world of music television was aired on one of the most successful music video channels of all-time. However, the entire ‘Age of Plastic’ album dealt with the pros and cons of modern technology and was incredibly futuristic at the time of its 1970s release. Over the years, the song has been covered by several artists across various genres including The Feeling, Ben Folds Five, Erasure and even Alvin and The Chipmunks for a 2007 video game release!
Did you know that the music video for ‘Video Killed The Radio Star’ was filmed over one day in South London, United Kingdom and had a budget of $50,000.
Grace Jones – ‘Slave To The Rhythm’
I remember when I saw the Trevor Horn Band perform this track to a packed crowd at Cornbury Music Festival in July 2015 and they completely surprised the crowd with very special guest SEAL who sang this song with such passion and energy just like Grace Jones did on the original release.
The track was written by Horn, Bruce Woolley, Simon Darlow and Stephen Lipson and when it was released in Autumn 1985 it was a commercially successful pop song around the world especially in the UK, US and Germany. One notable live performance of the track was by Jones at Queen Elizabeth II’s 2012 Diamond Jubilee Concert as she decided to hula-hoop for the duration of the song!
Did you know that the track was originally supposed to be a follow-up to ‘Relax’ by Frankie Goes To Hollywood and was covered by Dame Shirley Bassey in 1996.
The Art of Noise – ‘Close (To The Edit)’
When the ZTT (Zang Tumb Tuum) label commenced in 1983 this outfit came to the fore. Keyboard adventuress Anne Dudley had worked with Horn on the Lexicon of Love sessions for ABC and with engineer Gary Langan and J J Jeczalik made use of a new kind of sampling keyboard called the Fairlight.
As a side venture to working on a Yes album ( 90125) these pioneers were experiments with samples and textures. Paul Morley, a self-styled iconic writer became involved for the occasional lyric and business promotion. The New York hiphop scene was influence and market at the same time. The group eschewed traditional photo sessions and wore masks.
A six-track EP ‘Into Battle With The Art Of Noise’ was released and filled the dancefloors of clubs where novelty-seekers thronged. Drum and coke, anyone ?Tracks included BeatBox.
The full album Who’s Afraid Of The Art Of Noise spawned a single Close (To The Edit) which Fairlighted a car engine to a hiphop beat. This crash-bang material mixed with mellower pieces delighted the arty types in big cities
In the Summer of 1975 egos clashed and the group went over to Chrysalis, but with an established reputation by now for the arty and radical. Duane Eddy becomes involved but that’s another story…
T.A.T.U. -‘Not Gonna Get Us’
Two knowingly sexy Russian females became internationally famous/notorious under the musical helming of Horn. The big, dry 80’s beat sound that was the ZTT trademark as much as Phil Spectors heavy-handed boom, boom, boom – crash tempo seemed to suit the tastes of the time. Some scoffed at the OTT production values and overt messages of the music but as Howlin’ Wolf once artfully observed ‘the little girls understand’…
The big hit single was All The things She Said’. However ‘Not Gonna Get Us’ exemplified the rebellious nature of the duo and had better pacing and impact.
The pair had fun with the media over their sexuality, aided by faces and even hair that could have adorned 17th Century artwork of angels. Sensual female voices are often set against horn sections & /or sweeping string arrangements but the icy keys and clattering percussion used by horns by Horn does give a different slant on temptation set to songs. And these panting, eager anti-cherubs Julia and Lina were indeed themselves a contrast to the diffident and disdain-fuelled longeur of Grace Jones
Frankie Goes To Hollywood – ‘Two Tribes’
It is for some and certainly me easier to admire Horn’s work with and production of the Scouse wasters and Holly Johnson than to like it. There are endless versions and remixes of this cut but the aim is common – a sledgehammer pulsing beat and dancefloor dominance. The band played up their sleaziness, eschewing musical chops and varied arrangements for rough trade cred and cod-revolutionary stance. Trevor took care of business using urgent heavy beats and mathematical polyrhythmic layering to smash home the message…which was ? well I guess you could call this a protest song on the futility of war. But that hardly registered one suspects with the flailing club dance fanatics. Horn made the group look like social warriors par excellence and for a while succeeded. To outsiders, the club scene seemed even less alluring. Our loss maybe but the dominance of machine beats ain’t everyone’s cup of Yorkshire.
ABC – Poison Arrow
This is one of the singles from ABC’s iconic album ‘Lexicon Of Love’ which was released in 1982. The musical partnership came about after his work with pop duo Dollar which saw Horn produce four hit singles that helped relaunch them.
‘Lexicon Of Love’ was one of the albums that encapsulated the eighties and helped propel New Romanticism to new heights alongside the work of Spandau Ballet and Duran Duran to name a few. In addition, ABC were from a working class city of Sheffield, United Kingdom at a time when the are was gaining quite an exciting nightlife environment.
The really key and significant thing about Horn’s work with ABC was that he assembled an expert creative team which consisted of keyboard-player, arranger and orchestrator Anne Dudley, engineer Gary Langan and Fairlight operator J J Jeczalik and they in turn would go onto form Art Of Noise.
Alongside ‘Look Of Love’, ‘Poison Arrow’ is still a clear live favourite for fans of ABC with the electronic sounds and lush saxophone as Martin Fry sings those biting lyrics of a relationship gone wrong. It is catchy and emotionally charged at the same time.
The Korgis – Don’t Look Back
The Korgis released their debut album 1979 and were born out of the a Bristol-based outfit Stackridge. The album was incredibly well-received by the music industry and radio DJs such as Tony Blackburn were crusaders of the band and played ‘If I Had You’ so much that it got into the top-twenty chart!
However, it was at this point that The Korgis took the incredibly risky move of not engaging in live performances and instead adopted the attitude of ‘only being a studio band’. The problem with that approach is that it a) doesn’t help maintaining a loyal fanbase and b) it means that you don’t have the outlet of live gigs to help shift more music e.g. cassettes, Vinyl and CDs. Interestingly, The Buggles had this exact same attitude and were still incredibly successful despite not touring.
Fast forward to 1982 and The Korgis’ James Warren contacted Trevor Horn to help record ‘Don’t Look Back’ which featured Anne Dudley on keyboards and Mel Collins on tenor sax. The song wasn’t as successful as the band had hoped but it is still one of their well know songs.
SEAL – Crazy
In the film ‘Casablanca’ there re tons of memorable quotes but one in particular makes me think of SEAL and Trevor Horn: “I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship”. That is because both of them first met in 1990 when SEAL struck a deal with ZTT and they are still working together now as Horn produced SEAL’s 2015 album ‘7’. Born in Paddington in London, SEAL’s voice is incredibly soulful and his stage presence memorable so when he released single ‘Crazy’ is was the perfect blend of techno, soul and rock.
Pet Shop Boys – I’m With Stupid
The Pet Shop Boys had previously worked with Trevor Horn in 1988 ‘Left To My Own Devices’ with Trevor commenting that The Pet Shop Boys were “Che Guevara and Debussy to a disco beat”. So it seemed fitting that the team reunite for 2006’s ‘I’m With Stupid’.
The single was effectively political satire as it mocked the ‘special relationship’ between President George W. Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair and the music video featured comedy duo Matt Lucas and David Walliams. The use of electronic drum is programmed to a tee but suits this act perfectly.
SEAL – Kiss From A Rose
This song is proof that if you have a beautifully written song that is used in a popular television series or blockbuster film then you have a very good chance of it being a hit. Taken from the album ‘Seal II’, the song was actually written by Seal in 1987 who was actually “embarrassed by it” and he ended up throwing the tape into the corner of a room.
Despite this, Seal actually gave the tape to Horn during the recording sessions in 1994 and then over time it generated eight million record sales and helped make Seal a household name. The thing is, the song soon dropped out of the charts shortly after its release so how did it become such a worldwide success?
One day, Seal received a phone call from respected film director Joel Schumacher who asked him if he could use the song during a love scene in the 1995 film ‘Batman Forever’. Although the song was used in the end credits and not the scene, it soon became a hit and topped the U.S. Billboard Hot 100. It also went to number four on the UK Singles Chart.
The song won several wards including three Grammys (Record of the Year, Song of the Year, and Best Male Pop Vocal Performance) and is performed in live shows by both Seal and The Trevor Horn Band to this day.
(Please note that this is just an opinion piece and not in any specific order or countdown)
By Glenn Sargeant and Pete Sargeant
