What does it sound like?:
I often wonder what went through Mr and Mrs Sulley’s minds when Phil Oakey, with his lop-sided hair and biker boots, sat on their sofa with Philip Adrian Wright and asked if their daughter would give up college and join a virtually unknown pop band. In the event, they said yes and I don’t think they regret it.
Phil Oakey is probably the pop star I admire the most. There was a time, when he faced nothing but adversity. He was staring at bankruptcy, two weeks away from a European tour, lacking any real musical ability with only a slide projectionist for company. He remained steadfast. He kept the faith. He continued to believe in his dream. And, his dream came true.
The Human League started as a duo. In 1977, two computer operators took advantage of the falling price of electronic components and bought a synthesiser. They were Martyn Ware and Ian Craig Marsh. The synthesiser was a Korg 700S. They played Tamla Motown in the style of electronic art rock. They soon made a name for themselves at student parties and could afford a second synthesiser. Before long, they decided they needed a singer. Oakey had the style but, even he, wasn’t sure he could sing.
They signed for a major label (Virgin), released a few singles and a couple of albums that crept into the bottom of the charts, just as Gary Numan stole their thunder and took the synth art rock sound to the very top. Ware and Marsh left to form Heaven 17. Oakey and the visuals projector retained The Human League name. It was at this crossroads that Oakey bumped into Sally Ann Sulley and Joanne Catherill. Put Martin Rushent in the producer’s chair and add a proper musician to the mix (Ian Burden) and everything fell into place almost immediately. 1981 was their peak with four smash hit singles, one of which was a global Christmas number one, and an album of absolute pop perfection, Dare!. They never hit those dizzy heights again, especially album-wise, but they continued to release intoxicating singles right through to today, all with an eye for the bizarre in the mundane, cleverly mixing Motown, Spandau Ballet and Abba using synthesisers.
A Very British Synthesiser Group focusses on the singles, starting with Gary Gilmore’s famous last words, “OK. Ready. Let’s do it.” Being Boiled, The Dignity Of Labour and Empire State Human all have a dynamic crunch that deserved better chart action at the time. By The Sound Of The Crowd and the other singles from Dare! their noise was bass-heavy smooth with shards of Sheffield steel. Fascination vies with Love Action for my favourite, each member allowed a crack at singing lead, it sounds good anywhere; in a club, on the radio, in the car, at a banquet for a queen. Louise is a poignant update of Don’t You Want Me, Human hit number one in the US, Tell Me When gate-crashed Pulp’s top-band-from-Sheffield party in 1995 and the pulsating Night People of 2014 shows all those young eighties synth revivalists how it’s done. The thirty tracks on 2 CDs amount to the best Best Of The Human League have released.
If you are a real fan, you buy a deluxe box with an extra disc and a DVD. Disc three is definitely of interest to collectors and completists, consisting of early takes of various tracks. The music isn’t that different. After all, they glorified in their simple synthesised sound. However, the vocals are just guides and the absence of the backing from Sally Ann and Jo illustrates the sense of joy they bring to the final, polished records. I haven’t seen the DVD but it must be good. All the ‘official’ videos are on there and twenty one performances from a variety of BBC programmes, notably Top Of The Pops. There is a glossy booklet too.
What does it all *mean*?
The value is in the 2CD version, a superb Best Of a superb band. The 4 disc set will please the ardent fan prepared to stump up substantially more cash.
Goes well with…
Eyeliner, peacock shirts and glitter balls.
Release Date:
Might suit people who like…
Throwing shapes.
Tiggerlion says
(Keep Feeling) Fascination
Rigid Digit says
Despite containing possibly the most cringeworthy rhyming couplet ever commuted to record*, I think I need this as I only have Dare on CD, plus a bunch of 7″ singles.
The tracks are in chronological order (as they should be) meaning the over-played Don’t You Want Me sits in context with the time, rather than opening the album (as I have noted on other League compilations)
*
Before he leaves the camp he stops
He scans the world outside
And where there used to be some shops
Is where the snipers sometimes hide
(The Lebanon)
Sewer Robot says
I’ll see your Lebanon and raise you Night People:
Gather up you skirts and trousers
Put on your best frocks and blouses
Time to go out from your houses
Must we creep round like the mouses?
Tiggerlion says
They were brilliant at bonkers lyrics.
biggles says
Great review Tigger. Stupidly-priced box set pre-ordered “for Christmas”…
Bonkers lyrics?
“Can’t complain. mustn’t grumble.
Help yourself to another piece of apple crumble.”
minibreakfast says
That was ABC.
biggles says
I know, Mini – That Was Then, This Is Now. Sorry – just putting forward a favourite bonkers lyric.
minibreakfast says
It is very bonkers, and always makes me laugh 🙂
Moose the Mooche says
Seconds kind of shocks me… like a child’s view of the event, totally non-political. Stunning.
Black Celebration says
I read in Smash Hits that the echoey footstep beat throughout Seconds is exactly spaced by one second. I remember testing that and I don’t think it does.
The other point of “interest” regarding the song is the phrase “the shot that was heard around the world”. I always assumed that this was something people said specifically about JFK’s shooting – but no! It was about a World Series-winning home run in the 1930s or something.
Freddy Steady says
What!!?? My absolute fave Human League song and it’s about Baseball?
Black Celebration says
Well, the phrase was – originally. The song is still about JFK, so don’t have nightmares.
chiz says
You know, in your ‘Three albums to soundtrack your life’ thread I chose Vienna as the soundtrack to my late teens but that’s because I had completely forgotten about Dare. What a brilliant album that was. Norman Wisdom, Johnny Joey Dee Dee Good times!
Did they really do anything worth listening to after Fascination?
Tiggerlion says
Singles, yes.
The Lebanon
Louise
Human
Heart Like A Wheel
Tell Me When
One Man In My Heart
Night People
Never Let Me Go
For starters.
dai says
The Lebanon? No.
Sewer Robot says
No “Circus Of Death”?
*throws toys out of pram*
Moose the Mooche says
F***ing love that.
Scared the shi’ite out of me when I was 8. Dark Star samples! Yusss.
Jeff says
Fantastic history Tiggs, don’t stop, keep writing! Just make it up if you need to, I can read this sort of stuff all night.
I loved the Human League, and Dare!, and I especially loved Susanne Sulley ar gar! I was living in Leeds when they broke big, and one of my best mates was from Sheffield and his girlfriend->fiancée->wife was too, and she was JUST like Susanne and Joanne.
And thinking about this reminds me about another guy I knew in Leeds in the late 70s; he was from Coventry, and he said that his mates there were in a really good band that was going to be huge. Oh yeah, who’s that then?
“They’re called The Specials AKA”.
Tiggerlion says
You are too kind, Jeff.
Part of the girls magic was their ordinariness. Neither their vocals nor their dancing were polished or professional but girls could easily relate to them and guys could easily fall in love with them. In those days, there was a real vibrancy in the cities north of London, including Scotland. It was all happening.
Moose the Mooche says
There could have been no Bananarama without those girls. Or The Spice Girls.
Special mention for Tell Me When, and Octopus. A great album.
ip33 says
Lovely review.
The League are a very important group in the history of pop and I love groups that can do ‘experimental’ as well.
But the 3 CD and Dvd version is £80!!!!! on Amazon
retropath2 says
They were the band that shocked me out of my white boy snarly guitar mode, having effortlessly earlier segued from rocky to punky, with a distrust and dislike of soul and disco. Blondie and Roxy had let me love the beat, but it wasn’t until Dare that I realised guitars didn’t have to be there, let alone 15stone of brawn behind a drum kit. Newly qualified and on the wards and in the theatres of Sidcup I suddenly got it, transported gloriously into this new world. I still know all the words of all the songs on Dare. It still uplifts me. Hysteria too, hell, even the Jam and Lewis helmed one, Crash, that heralded, to me, the slipping of inspiration from their grasp, but still containing the glorious Human and, to my mind, the further-on-than-Louise continuation of Don’t You Want Me, Are You Ever Coming Back, perhaps my favourite song. (Yes, yes, I know the purists consider these the 5th, 6th, 7th whatever, but I went back to the earlier Marsh-Ware stuff: unlistenable tosh. Funny that, as I love their Heaven 17 and B.E.F. output) I sort of lost them after that, as they sliced into 80s tour packages, noting, with no little excitement, that they seem to have risen above that ebb of flotsam and jetsam, and seemed to be making a touring cred again. This album reviewed by Tiggs has a promo tour, I think. Dare I investigate? I think I do.
Tiggerlion says
I’m shocked. You don’t trust Soul Music?
Soul Seekers – Trust Me
retropath2 says
I didn’t until then. Of course I do now, these 36 years later.
Kaisfatdad says
What a very fine band they are. I was browsing the list of UK artists who had had US number ones during the week ( helping a friend with some pub quiz questions) and was surprised to see that Human had topped the American charts. Now I’ve just learnt from this article
https://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2016/aug/03/human-league-10-of-the-best
that it was produced by Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis who were flavour of the month back in the mid 80s.
As a big Rezillos fan, I should also mention that Jo Callis a.k.a. Luke Warm, contributed to the song-writing on Dare and was a member of the League until 1986, playing guitar and keyboards. He later co-wrote Heart like a wheel for them.
Nice work Tigger!
Tiggerlion says
The Jam and Lewis collaboration was a disaster for the band and almost broke them. It was why Callis left. The record company hired a Vogue photographer for the cover. He took hours to set up a shot and was only interested in the girls. When he asked Sally Ann to do a handstand wearing a mini skirt, she wasn’t impressed.
Still. Human is a great track.
Gary says
I thought Heaven 17 were by far the better band. Yeah, Dare was very good – but both Penthouse & Pavement and The Luxury Gap were better. And they had the better name.
So there.
Tiggerlion says
Officially, they split because of musical differences. Oakey wanted to be more Pop. Ware wanted to be more electronic. Marsh sided with his long-term mate. As it is, there isn’t a great deal of difference in sound or style between The Human League and Heaven 17/BEF. I’d say, lyrically, Heaven 17 started off more political but The Human League had their moments. I Am The Law is bravely supportive of the police and is done so by a band from Yorkshire, a place torn apart during the miners strike. Fascist Groove Thang sounds more like The Human League than most Human League records. The truth is they split because they didn’t get on. Part of the deal was that Marsh and Ware would get 1% of the profits from the next album. That next album was Dare!.
I think side one of Penthouse And Pavement is wonderful. Side Two not so much. So there.
Moose the Mooche says
H17 were more interested in black music. From there we get the Tina Turner comeback. Basically Those two wanted to sound like an electronic Earth Wind & Fire and Phil wanted to be an electronic Abba.
The Luxury Gap is a huge, tremendous album, one of the very best of the era. It should have sold like Thriller but…
Black Celebration says
Surely I am the Law is a reference to Judge Dredd from the 2000AD comic. I would suggest that the song is simply about that.
Tiggerlion says
Oh I think, when talking about that song, Phil has been quoted as saying that people may hate the police but, sometimes, you really need them.
Sniffity says
Speaking of which, for a while in the “RoboSlayer” strip, Sam Slade was facing off against The Human League, a protest group who were going around smashing up robots.
“Dare” is also the album (briefly) played at the student party in the 1982 first series of The Young Ones
Rik (putting ‘Dare’ on turntable): Let’s have some music! Who here likes The Human League?!
(The first second of ‘The Things That Dreams Are Made Of’ plays. Instantly a squad of policemen break into the room and smash up the album and the record player with their truncheons.)
Policeman: Stop the noise! There’s been a complaint!
Pretty certain there was another episode where Alexei Sayle breaks into a couple of bars of “Don’t You Want Me”
Sniffity says
PS The first issue of Smash Hits I bought (not quite being the target demographic) was due to a chucklesome comic strip depicting the history of the band.
As seen here on M. Ellen’s tumblr site…
http://rockstarsstolemylife.tumblr.com/post/96693016785/smash-hits-human-league-cartoon-this-was-a
bricameron says
Travelogue is all I need to say. And that’s just the cover.
Tiggerlion says
I first heard The Human League in 1978. They were doing a sound check in Birmingham’s student union. The whole building shook. They were playing Being Boiled. I went to the gig that night. The live Boiled is way better than any studio version I’ve heard and there are lots of versions to choose from. They all sound weedy in comparison (at least, that’s what my memory tells me). It got to number six in the wake of Dare!’s success.
Black Celebration says
I would like to weigh in with a mention for one of my favourite albums by anyone – the dancey remix album of Dare called Love and Dancing by the League Unlimited Orchestra. There was a small spate of these kind of things at the time and this was the best of its kind.
minibreakfast says
Yes! I think I might even prefer this to Dare. See also Night Dubbing and Wishful Thinking.
Moose the Mooche says
I played Wishful Thinking very loud only a couple of weeks ago. It wuz graet!
minibreakfast says
I found a sleeveless car boot copy for 50p, then last Saturday in the local chazza I found its companion A Secret Wish (this time complete with sleeve) for two quid. Wahey!
Freddy Steady says
A Secret Wish! Non more 80’s but still, still, utterly fantastic.
My iPod threw up Infected today…that was fab too.
Moose the Mooche says
Thirty years old this month. Tremendous.
Freddy Steady says
30 years! 30 flippin years. I’ll have to give the whole album a go. Bit of its time I should imagine but what a time!
Moose the Mooche says
Once you get past the title track you’ll be surprised how well it’s weathered. Mind you, I’ve barely stopped listening to it in that time so I’m probably the wrong guy to ask.
Freddy Steady says
Right, I’m off to take the mutt for a walk so will give it a go.
Freddy Steady says
@moose-the-mooche
You know what, it’s still excellent. Bit heavy on the anti USA rhetoric mebbe but still. That was probably the first time I’ve listened to it all the way through since 1990. Off to do the same with A Secret Wish.
Moose the Mooche says
“From Mombasa to Miami, Beirut to Bangladesh, I’ve been around the park with the dog, and standing on the wing of a jet”
Yes, the anti-USA rhetoric is a bit much from someone who was being hugely bankrolled by Epic/CBS….
The film is great too. He was charging around South America totally fried on acid, vodka and MDMA. No wonder his hair fell out.
Tiggerlion says
Oh. I assumed Night Dubbing was a Grace Jones remix but you mean Imagination, don’t you? Which makes me think you are talking about Wishful Thinking by China Crisis.
Moose the Mooche says
No, it’s Feargal Sharkey In Dub.
“You little thief…. B’DOOOM A-DOOOM-DOOOM”
Black Celebration says
It was on here and only very recently that I learned that the Undertones refer to the Human League in My Perfect Cousin. I think I must have interpreted Feargal’s accent differently.
Tiggerlion says
Rhyming ‘synthesiser’ with ‘advise her’ is genius.
minibreakfast says
Propaganda, tigs. A remix of A Secret Wish.
Tiggerlion says
I know, I know. Don’t rub it in. I’m still mourning for a dub Nightclubbing. The dub Hurricane is just brilliant.
minibreakfast says
I’m getting impatient for her supposedly upcoming “African-themed” album. Hurry up Jones! Stop messin’ about!
Freddy Steady says
@moose-the-mooche
Just finished A Secret Wish all the way through for the first time in many a year. A quite different beast from Infected in as much as its not political as far as I can see. But it’s much more poppy (?) and has tune after tune after tune.
I have some very very specific memories of the album. Listening to P Machinery with a mate who went on to have moderate success in a band and being blown away by the power of music.
And driving along the M4 in the dark on the way from South Wales to Norfolk. I was in the RAF at the time and had just passed an HGV driving test which enabled me to be posted to the Falklands for 4 months…lovely! I remember blasting the album out (cassette of course, CDs were still too expensive) …Power Force Motion Drive!
Moose the Mooche says
I think deep in the credits there might be some people who are on both of these records – JJ Jeczalik or somebody like that. I’m pretty sure they used some of the same studios too.
Matt Johnson was using electronica to make a sort of rock record with Infected (whereas Prop were at ZTT who were determinedly “anti-rockist”, to use a phrase of the time), or at least a record with rock sensibilities – although the brass on side two (and Slow Train to Dawn in particular) betray a love of soul music that you don’t especially hear on any of his other records.
Tiggerlion says
One of @pencilsqueezer‘s favourites! With its nods to Barry White’s Love Unlimited Orchestra it went top three in the UK.
Moose the Mooche says
Would it be bad form say the words HARD TIMES in a preposterously deep voice?
chiz says
Only if I can reply HARD TIMES! in a surprisingly high voice
Tiggerlion says
Isn’t that HAA-AA-AAA-AAAA-AAAAARD TIMES!!?
chiz says
I love the way that on Love Action, when Phil sings “I’ve had some hard times in the past” the girls sing “HARD TIMES!” It’s like one side of the disc invading the other
Black Celebration says
@chiz – yes yes yes. That’s just given me goosebumps.
minibreakfast says
I’ve a soft spot for the debut Reproduction, which of course I discovered via the medium of car boot vinly: http://carbootvinyldiaries.blogspot.co.uk/2016/07/teenage-wildlife.html
Their cover of the Righteous Brothers’ hit is rather captivating:
https://youtu.be/DtuMG02FoP4
Kaisfatdad says
Thanks BC! It’s on Spotify: will give it a listen.
Which makes me think: are there any good HL mash ups?
There was one on YT with EW & F but I wasn’t too impressed.
Tiggerlion says
Richard X (Liberty X) had a hit with Being Nobody
https://youtu.be/JcRyL-rYfgs
Black Type says
I saw them in the winter of 1981 on the Dare tour. The show was memorable but not in a good way – the hardware kept failing mid-song, so much of the time saw Phil dashing hither and thither trying to fix it.
Moose the Mooche says
“Is there an electrical engineer in the house?”
ernietothecentreoftheearth says
I saw them in the same tour, there weren’t any equipment failures, but it wasn’t a whole lot better. In fairness, Stafford Bingley Hall was never going to do them any favours.
Colin H says
I always had a soft spot for the League. aside from a lot of great tunes (‘Open Your Heart’ is my fave) I like underdogs, and somehow the HL always seemed liked – and even more so in retrospect – like total underdogs: like something that just shouldn’t work on paper but somehow managed, through their daft, gormless, guilelessness, to be brilliant – much greater than the sum of their parts. I have a feeling they probably don’t know how they did it themselves (if they did they’d probably still be creating music that touches people now, years after their – relatively long – ‘moment’), and trying to analyse it to bottle it just wouldn’t work. They were a perfect balance of guilelessness and sophistication, poppiness and artiness, good tunes and bad haircuts, gormlessness and apparent profundity.
Kaisfatdad says
Wonderfully put, Colin.
The whole business of them working with Jam and Lewis and that preposterous photographer was surprising to me. And so not them. They are a very English band and being groomed by a big US record company was just wrong.
The Good Doctor says
I didn’t realise they were pushed into working with Jam & Lewis and that it wasn’t a good experience – to be fair though in 1986 I can’t see where else they could have gone – it was either these or Stock Aitken & Waterman.
I think this is still a cracking tune though:
deckards says
In 1979 The League were under pressure from Virgin due to a large advance and little impact on the charts, to come up with something more commercial. They agreed on the understanding anything released would be under a pseudonym. The only thing released was I Don’t Depend On You and the group call themselves The Men. It features Katie Kissoon on backing vocals and sounds like it could have been lifted straight from Dare even though it was 2 years before Catherine and Susan joined the group. The b side was a instrumental remix of the song called cruel.
https://youtu.be/2RzjlpkQFtg
Colin H says
Catherine?
deckards says
Meant Joanne, don’t know where Catherine came from.
Tiggerlion says
Easy to understand when the surname is Catherill.
Colin H says
Was that the message when her mum sent Phil a sicknote?
Moose the Mooche says
Martyn Ware’s moustache was always an anomaly wasn’t it? It looked like he was wearing it for someone else, or was seriously ahead of the game with Movember.
Locust says
“Hey Martyn, hold my moustache for me, will ya? I’m going for a wee.”
Moose the Mooche says
“It’s the last time I buy those cheap Christmas crackers!”
Dave Ross says
Yes, “Don’t You Want Me” was their peak but this was the performance that got them recognised among me and my peers. Everything said on this thread distilled into 3 minutes on a Thursday night. How do bands do it now without TOTP. Incidentally I adored the Jam and Lewis stuff, “Human” is beyond beautiful….
Tiggerlion says
Oakey was annoyed with the record company for releasing Don’t You Want Me as a single. He saw it as mere album filler! Sometimes, those suits know what they are on about.
Moose the Mooche says
See also Satisfaction.
retropath2 says
“How do bands do it now without TOTP?” I constantly ask this question, (including on my as yet unvisited Bastille review, eclipsed by either Cohen, L or the poverty of interest therein), wondering if there would be a better trickle through effect of popular music if it were still there, Yes it got sad in the dance music numberoneforasecond years, but surely there is more variety now?
Dave Ross says
You should start that thread Retro “How Do Bands Do It Without TOTP?” I did read your Bastille review, it was excellent. The trouble I know the guys voice is very identifiable but find it quite grating so I haven’t got beyond the hit., didn’t quite know what to comment.
Argot says
Wow. I remember that.
Took me right back to a time and a place.
fentonsteve says
I bunked off school to buy Dare on the morning of release. It was double-P.E. which gave me just long enough to jog to my pal Gary’s house and play it in full before we had to run back in after our “long cross-country run”.
I’m still not going to pay £80 for the third CD, though.
Tiggerlion says
A pedant writes…For £80, you get the DVD and booklet as well. The first 2 CDs will cost you £13, so the difference is £67.
Mind you, I’ve just noticed the title has ‘synthesizer’ spelt the American way! That’s ironic for a Very British Synthesizer Group!
Moose the Mooche says
In my memory it was usually with a z in those days – partly because I suppose as an instrument it’s an American invention. I would think of a synthesiser as a rather specific job title in a lab or summat.
fentonsteve says
I have a greatest hits DVD from about 10 years ago, so I’ve seen most of the content. £67 for a CD of demos is bonkers. I bet the download tracks are “album only”.
Tiggerlion says
I see your point.
Sewer Robot says
Here: double cd €10.50, triple €17 (only downloadable as complete albums). Conclusion: the box must be f*ckin’ awesome!
metal mickey says
Late to the thread (again), so most of what I would have contributed has been covered, except my pet opinion that “Dare” is actually closer to the pre-split albums “Reproduction” and “Travelogue” than is usually acknowledged… the same pop-culture lyrical concerns, a daft cover version (“Get Carter”), and The Things That Dreams Are Made Of, Darkness, I Am The Law and Seconds could (shinier production aside) easily have come off those earlier records…
Tiggerlion says
I have a confession to make. In an effort to improve a perfect album, I replaced I Am The Law with Hard Times. The sequence of Hard Times/Seconds/Love Action didn’t work, so I tried Seconds/Hard Times/Love Action. The problem is that Hard Times is almost a dub variation of Love Action. In the event, I had to admit defeat and simply acknowledge Oakey, Wright and Rushent as geniuses and put I Am The Law back where it belonged.