CRC Retro Mix #32

1. Tempted - Waterlillies
2. World in My Eyes (Safar Mix) - Depeche Mode
3. Neighbors (Extended Version) - Camouflage
4. So in Love (Brand New Extended Mix) - Orchestral Manoeuvers In The Dark
5. In Love with Love (Razormaid! Mix) - Debbie Harry
6. Always on My Mind / In My House - Pet Shop Boys
7. You Spin Me Round (Murder Mix) - Dead Or Alive
8. Witchcraft (Extended Mix) - Book Of Love
9. Don't Stop (Razormaid! Mix) - The Mood
10. Anvil (Night Club School) - Visage
11. Let's Go to Bed - The Cure
12. The Beach - New Order
13. Chorus (Fishes in the Sea) (Aggressive Trance Mix by Youth) - Erasure
14. Cry Wolf (Extended Mix) - a-ha
15. Hold It (Extended Mix) - Tin Tin
 
Notes and other random things: I don't know about you, but I've had about enough of the triple digit temperatures. In my part of the world, at least, it's so hot that sweat sweats, stadium vendors are selling "luke warm" dogs and Paris Hilton has changed her catch phrase to "That's cold." And August has just begun! I'm afraid it's going to get a lot worse before it gets better. Thankfully the opposite is true for this podcast.
This week, CRC continues its new wave hangover from the previous episode with great old tracks from The Mood, Visage, The Cure and New Order among the selections. The Mood were from York over in the UK. They formed in 1980 and, like so many other groups, members John Moore, Mark James Fordyce, Steve Carter, John Dalby and Eric James Logan met in a local music store they frequented. This particular establishment was called Track Records. As it was with Fad Gadget, Depeche Mode appeared as The Mood's supporting act for several early live gigs. (Funny how DM eventually surpassed so many of the groups for whom they opened.) The song here, Don't Stop, was released in 1982 and peaked at number 59 on the UK singles chart, but did reach the top spot on the UK dance chart, which had recently been introduced. Between their formation and dissolution in 1984, the band released 5 singles, but none did well enough for their label RCA to support a full album, though a 5-track mini-album was released in the US. A deal with EMI never materialized after the group left RCA and they split up in 1984.    
OMD have appeared several times before on CRC. Though mostly remembered for If You Leave, their bittersweet contribution to the awesome Pretty in Pink soundtrack, Andy McClusky and Paul Humphries strung together an amazing collection of pop hits throughout the 80s. The song here, So in Love, originally appeared on the Crush album, which was released in 1985. The album was the first that producer extraordinaire Stephen Hague (Pet Shop Boys, New Order and others) produced on his own. Though a little nervous, he and the band got along splendidly. The tracks for the album were recorded at Manor Residential studios in Oxford, an isolated locale which led to "long work days and a heroic amount of drinking," according to Stephen. As for the remix that appears here, Andy said that it "... was recorded with some live drums and most of the other instruments were from the Fairlight CMI sequencer, but all put to tape. Therefore, the 12" was made of a series of dub runs of the multi-track onto two track tape, then all spliced together like the good old analogue days." OMD recently released another studio album and have been touring quite liberally over the past year. 
It's not often cover songs show up on this podcast, but in the case of Always on My Mind, I made an exception. Here, the Pet Shop Boys do their thing to Brenda Lee's 1972 country music hit, though Willie Nelson's version from ten years later may be fresher in most minds. Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe released this particular mix of the song in 1988 for their six-song album Introspective. They originally recorded the track for an ITV television special in Britain commemorating the 10-year anniversary of Elvis Presley's death (he covered the song as well). The s(continued)