If Howard Jones wasn’t the definitive poster boy for synthpop during the 1980s, he was certainly one of the leaders of the pack, spending many a week in the charts during the course of the decade. We won’t waste our time by listing off every single hit single the man had, but…oh, sorry, perhaps some readers do need a brief refresher course. For those of us who may not have lived through the decade in which Mr. Jones saw his greatest success, we speak of the man responsible for such memorable ditties as “New Song,” “Things Can Only Get Better,” “No One Is To Blame,” and “Everlasting Love.” Indeed, he even managed to maintain his success into the ’90s, scoring a substantial hit in 1992 with “Lift Me Up.”
Although he departed the ranks of Elektra Records not long after the label released his best-of collection in 1993, Jones has continued to release records throughout the years, including Angels and Lovers (1997), People (1998), and Revolution of the Heart (2005); his latest album, Ordinary Heroes, will see release on Nov. 9th, 2009, preceded on Oct. 26th by the single, “Soon You’ll Go.” As part of the pre-release press blitz, Popdose was provided with the opportunity to do an E-mail interview, and it was an offer we could not refuse.
I don’t believe Kajagoogoo has ever come up as a topic in this series before so I don’t know what the reaction will be when I claim these guys are total crap. I truly believe that Kajagoogoo are one of the luckiest bands of the decade. I can’t sit here and even remotely tell you that “Too Shy” despite its stupid lyrics isn’t catchy as hell, but the rest of their debut album White Feathers, including “Hang On Now” is slop. These guys were poised to rise like Duran Duran would soon do (the album was even produced by Nick Rhodes and Colin Thurston who was the Duran Duran producer at the time) but they forgot to actually write some songs. White Feathers is straight by-the-book new-wave, taking very few chances at all. And dumb titles like “Ooh To Be Ah” and “This Car is Fast” cemented their place as poor songwriters in my book. Singer Limahl was fired after this album and the ensuing two records without him (both by Kaja — no “googoo” suffix — in the U.S.) sucked even worse. Good for them that they are still making money off “Too Shy” but damn if that wasn’t just good luck rather than talent.