The AIDS crisis was just around the corner, and Section 28 would be in place by the end of the decade. Sadly, as we know all to well, this didn’t herald a sea-change in British attitudes towards homosexuality. ‘Relax’ was just the latest update on the theme. Even before Elvis wiggled those hips, pop and sex have been inextricably linked. But… pop music has never just been about the music. If you’re of a negative disposition, you could argue that all this represents the worst of the 1980s, a triumph of image and promotion over substance. One ad saw keyboardist Paul Rutherford dressed a sailor, alongside the phrase “All the nice boys love sea men.” The record sleeve, above, which Mike Read took such exception too, features a man and a woman in a little bit of leather and not much else. Two of the members were out and proud, and the song’s promo played on this with gay abandon. You can kind of see why – even today the video raises an eyebrow – but at the same time would this record have been as huge if they’d just played it without blinking? Maybe not.īut the band new what they were doing. For the five weeks that it was #1, ‘Top of the Pops’ showed nothing but a picture of the band. Radio 1 DJ Mike Read even pulled it off (the record, that is…!) live on air, in apparent disgust. Two weeks before ‘Relax’ made top spot, the BBC had banned it from being played before 9pm. It’s gloriously tasteless, clearly designed to get a reaction. Meanwhile, a Roman emperor unleashes a torrent of piss from the balcony (putting the ‘number one’ in number one single…) on the biggest Come! of the song, complete with a super-soaker sound effect. The video sees singer Holly Johnson entering a gay bar in his sensible work suit, and after three minutes of face-spitting, banana-licking, tiger-fighting, and cage-wrestling, he ends up straddling a writhing mass of bodies… and that’s just the edited version. Question is, did anyone ever think ‘Relax’ was about anything else? The band half-heartedly claimed it was about ‘motivation’ when the song was first released, but by the time the album came out bassist Mark O’Toole confessed it “really was about shagging.”Īnd not just any old shagging. Everyone knows what this one’s about… Relax, Don’t do it, When you wanna suck it to it… (there’s some debate about those lyrics, but the band have apparently confirmed them) When you wanna… Come! For reasons of public decency, I will be spelling it as ‘come’ throughout, when we all know it should be… Anyway. It’s all out there, slapping you about the face… Which brings us on to the lyrics. Producer Trevor Horn – last heard on another synth-pop classic ‘Video Killed the Radio Star’ – took complete control of what was a jingly demo, and created a monster.Ī monster that demands to be played loud. Apparently, singer Holly Johnson was the only band member to feature on the recording. These are played like guitars, and could flatten a skyscraper. I’ve been a bit down on synthesisers at times in this blog, but these are great. An ominous intro floats in – I’ve always wondered what is being sung here (it’s M-i-ine, Give it to me one time now…) – before giving way to some grinding synths. In fact, that first bit – ‘Relax’s catchiness – is the one aspect of this song that possibly gets overlooked. It’s catchy, it’s memorable, it’s a real cultural moment… and it pissed off all the right people. Far from it: this is almost the perfect number one. Relax, by Frankie Goes to Hollywood (their 1st of three #1s)ĥ weeks, from 22nd January – 26th February 1984
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