The Human League -- Don't You Want Me

 

Folks who have been faithful readers of "Kayo Kyoku Plus" over the past decade (and I thank you again for dropping by) have most likely gleaned that the year 1981 was a big one in terms of music for me since that was when I got into it on both sides of the Pacific. If anything, the initial common denominator for my interest in popular music in both Japan and the West was technopop. Of course, there was Yellow Magic Orchestra in the nation of my heritage along with a number of the singers who embraced all of those synthesizers and sequencers, but in the West, the same thing was happening with computers and music through that genre and New Wave.

On a smaller scale, there has been another trope that's strung itself through our blog, and that is the concept of the gosanke. First used as a historical tribute for the ruling Tokugawa family, the gosanke（御三家...The Big Three） was then taken up by the mass media centuries later to describe three of the most influential people in any particular music genre or business sphere at the very least. Most recently, I brought up the topic when I was writing about the technopop band Hikashu which had been regarded as one of the Techno Gosanke（テクノ御三家）alongside P-Model and The Plastics. You can get a few more examples of gosanke in the first paragraph of that Hikashu article through the link above.

Now, if I were to describe an early 80s New Wave/Synthpop Gosanke for myself, I'd have to say that my personal choice would a trio consisting of Gary Numan, Thomas Dolby and The Human League. As you can see, Thomas Dolby already has representation as a Reminiscings of Youth subject and Numan will be someone that I will cover in the near future. Ah, but this week's ROY will be on The Human League with Philip Oakey.

I couldn't quite believe that Oakey had never been a great fan of "Don't You Want Me", his band's most famous hit from November 1981. Even now, though he's become mellower toward it, he still says that it's overrated. For me, that thrumming bass synth in the song by itself was one of the anthems for the music of my youth! And the music video for the song has always stayed with me over the past 41 years with the two-level depiction of a contemporary film noir being produced while the production staff made up of the band itself was showing signs of tension and their own little drama. The other thing was that Oakey and other band members Susan Ann Sulley and Joanne Catherall looked like Patrick Nagel illustrations come to life.

For someone like who was then in thrall to the bleeps and bloops created by Yellow Magic Orchestra, listening to The Human League was manna from heaven. Having those ice-cold sounds enter my ears was very brisk and fresh, and made for a fascinating contrast with all of those horns and post-disco grooves from bands such as Earth Wind & Fire and Kool & the Gang, although I was as much of a fan of theirs as I was of the synth-based outfits. 

"Don't You Want Me" was very much wanted. It remained at No. 1 on the UK charts for five straight weeks, and then half a year later, it went to No. 1 in the United States for three weeks according to the Wikipedia article on the song. And yep, Canada also embraced "Don't You Want Me" as it hit the top of those charts.  I don't know how it did in Japan, but it was evidently released as a single called "Ai no Nokoribi"（愛の残り火...The Embers of Love） according to the J-Wiki article on the band.

And so, what was up on the Oricon Top 10 for November 1981? I actually put up No. 10 a few days ago in its own article, but here I have Nos. 1, 2 and 5.

1. Masahiko Kondo -- Gingiragin ni Sarigenaku （ギンギラギンにさりげなく）

2. Seiko Matsuda -- Kaze Tachinu （風立ちぬ）

5. The Venus -- Kiss wa Me ni Shite （キッスは目にして）