Released today in 1986: Paranoimia

China WOK9

This song, from The Art Of Noise’s album In Visible Silence, concerns paranoid insomnia – hence the portmanteau title. For its appearance as a single, it was re-mixed and the spoken contributions of one Max Headroom were added.

Headroom’s first appearance in Smash Hits came in 1985, following the debut on 6 April that year of his television series for Channel 4, ‘The Max Headroom Show’. Purporting to be computer-generated, Headroom assumed the role of VJ on his show and played music videos which he invariably interrupted with often somewhat disrespectful comments about the artists or their songs or the promotional clips they had filmed to promote their work. Sometimes his chatter would have nothing to do at all with the musical material he was broadcasting, his voice randomly increasing or decreasing in pitch, or becoming scrambled, or skipping like a stuck CD. It seemed that at least once in every edition of his show his speech would end up in a perpetual loop until he snapped himself out of it. Paranoimia made much use of his stuttering vocal delivery and his egotistical nature.

Smash Hits speculated on how Headroom was created: “Is he really a computer-copy of a human brain? Is he a man with make-up? Is he just a puppet tarted up with a bit of computer graphics?” they wondered. The producer of ‘The Max Headroom Show’ told them he was all of those things, but in fact he was portrayed by American actor Matt Frewer after over four hours in the make-up chair before each performance. Only Headroom’s head and shoulders were seen on screen; Frewer’s face and hair were fashioned to appear like moulded plastic, his eyes were often covered by large, dark Ray-Ban Wayfarer sunglasses, and over what could be seen of a stiff white shirt he wore a shiny black suit jacket and tie which appeared to be made of stiff PVC: in reality, he stood in a rigid fibreglass mould. Frewer was raised in Canada and had an indeterminate mid-Atlantic accent that was deemed perfect for an artificial intelligence; once some effects had been added, he sounded not unlike early synthesized voices heard on devices like the popular 80s children’s educational toy Speak And Spell.

Smash Hits tried to establish the official Max Headroom story. His full name, they discovered, was Maximum Headroom 2.3m. This was the last thing that investigative journalist Edison Carter had seen on a sign in a car park before becoming involved in an accident that left him in a coma; a copy of Carter’s mind was uploaded to a computer by shadowy big corporate Network 23 and Headroom took his character from Carter’s memories. No such technology was available at the time of course, and the backgrounds Headroom stood in front of were not CGI: the designs were painted on glass screens. Headroom spoofed the insincere presenting styles rife on television then as it is now. Showing little interest in his audience or in the music industry and its artists, he was as likely to play a clip of a chart hit on ‘The Max Headroom Show’ as he was to play something by a very obscure artist; he often favoured songs by early 80s futurist acts. The show ended on 10 March 1987 after three series, but Headroom turned up in other media thereafter.

NEW SINGLES on sale from Jun. 9
1986
The ART OF NOISE with MAX HEADROOM Paranoimia (China WOK9)
David BOWIE Underground (EMI America EA216)
Peter MURPHY Blue Heart (Beggars Banquet BEG162)

Released today in 1986: Ocean Blue

Neutron NT110

Strings on ABC’s new single are arranged by Anne Dudley (credited correctly on paper-label copies of Ocean Blue, but misspelled ‘Ann’ on the awful injection-moulded version). It’s not her first work with the group: she was brought in to work on their debut album, 1982’s The Lexicon of Love, by producer Trevor Horn, with whom she would continue to collaborate on works by other Smash Hits covers stars such as Malcolm McLaren and Frankie Goes To Hollywood. It was her membership of another Horn project that would bring her the most attention in the mid-80s: the ambient synth group The Art of Noise produced several memorable hits, beginning with the innovatively produced Close (to the Edit) on ZTT (the label Horn founded with band mate Paul Morley). The group’s original line-up would not last long though. An acrimonious split occurred in 1985 when Dudley and two other members left, taking the name The Art of Noise to another label and continuing without Horn and Morley. Their time on China saw them collaborate with an eclectic selection of musicians such as Welsh singer Tom Jones and American guitarist Duane Eddy, record the theme to the 1987 movie Dragnet, and regularly visit the UK Top 40.

While retaining her membership of The Art of Noise, throughout the second half of the 80s she was much in demand as an arranger; her name cropped up regularly in connection with artists as diverse as Liza Minnelli, Paul McCartney and Lloyd Cole and the Commotions. She conducted a full orchestra on Getting Away With It by Electronic, which featured members of Pet Shop Boys, New Order and The Smiths. But it was her work as a writer of film and television scores that would give her the most plaudits. In particular, she wrote, performed and produced material included in the soundtrack to the movie Buster, which at the end of the decade would win a Brit Award for Best Soundtrack/Cast Recording.

She would have another win at the Brits (and the Oscar for Best Original Music Score, Musical or Comedy) for producing, orchestrating and conducting the score to The Full Monty (1997-8). Her writing has also included composing operas and a piece for the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee in 2012. Throughout this period though she remained active in pop music and does so to the present day, with numerous credits as writer, producer or session musician.

NEW SINGLES on sale from Jan. 3
1984
CHINA CRISIS Wishful Thinking (Virgin VS647)
1986
ABC Ocean Blue (Neutron NT110)
1989
Holly JOHNSON Love Train (MCA MCA1306)