"Make A Move On Me" by Olivia Newton-John

Hey Dialophiles!

I'm coming to realize that 1982 is, hands down, my favorite year of music in the 1980s. I'm always thinking of tunes from that very year to eventually spotlight on the Radio Dial. Back then, I had really immersed myself in the top 40 sounds... on car rides with my folks, on my portable AM/FM radio/cassette deck in my room, and spinning hits via vinyl on my Emerson record player. One of the forgotten former hits from that year is getting the spotlight tonight, Olivia Newton John's "Make A Move On Me".

The follow up single to her smash hit "Physical", which held at US #1 for an amazing ten weeks, "Make A Move" is a bouncy, fun filled pop song all about a woman's recognition that a certain guy fancies her... and she's perfectly okay with that... so long as he hurries up. In fact, she encourages the fella to "spare her all the charms, and take her in his arms"! Ah yes, a confident woman!

Peaking at US #5 in April of '82, Olivia's lighthearted synth-heavy track would not seem out of place as musical accompaniment to a cheerleading routine. Yet, while the iconic (and indeed overplayed, even 30 years later) "Physical" remains a part of our pop culture consciousness, "Make a Move" slipped into radio obscurity, even a year or so after it's original release.  

So here's to Aussie Olivia Newton-John... former country songstress, "Pink Lady", and Xanadu muse, for creating one of the greatest unfairly forgotten top 10 hits of 1982, or the entire decade. 

  

"I'm the one you want... that's all I have to be...

So come on baby... make a move on me."

"Life in Dark Water" by Al Stewart

Good morning, dialophiles! We’ll begin the week today by listening to a selection from Scottish singer Al Stewart’s 1978 “Time Passages” LP, the enigmatic “Life in Dark Water”.

A truly haunting track concerning a rather unusual topic for a rock song, a solo mariner aboard a submarine lamenting his isolation. Is he lost? Is he insane? Is he a ghost, doomed to navigate the lower ocean depths with no further human contact? Could be any or all of these, or none of them…

Listen for the syncopated sonar “pings” throughout the track, especially in the final several seconds of the song… as metallic and cold as that sound is, the context of the song lend them an especially forlorn and wistful feel. Tim Renwick’s amazing guitar work gracefully reinforces a spooky and otherworldly quality.

Additionally, the final verse makes reference to a famous maritime mystery, the Marie Celeste, a merchant ship found in seaworthy condition, but completely abandoned in open water in 1872, with no explanation or evidence of what happened to the crew.

Time Passages, a follow up to Stewart’s 1976 signature album “Year of the Cat”, features lush production work by the iconic Alan Parsons, producer of The Beatles’ “Abbey Road”,  Pink Floyd’s “Dark Side of the Moon”, and of course, his own material under the moniker The Alan Parsons Project.

I discovered this song in the early 2000s, after picking up the Time Passages LP from a local used book & record store. Upon the first listen, I became fascinated with Dark Water’s unusual subject matter, spectral instrumentation, and uncovering the story behind the lonely submarine crewman. Give it a listen… immerse yourself in the music, let the lyrics lodge in your mind, and arrive at your own conclusion…

“No sound comes from the sea above me… No messages crackle through the radio leads. They’ll never know, never no never, how strange life in dark water can be.”

TWO FER TUESDAY: Patty Smyth

Hello Dialophiles! The Radio Dial is getting it in under the wire with the latest TWO FER TUESDAY!!!! (Reminds me of cramming for a test back in high school several hours before class… ) Tonight the spotlight lands on singer Patty Smyth, as we listen to a track she laid down as lead vocalist of Scandal, and wrap up with a solo track from her second LP.

“Only the Young” 1984 

How did Patty and her band Scandal come to record a song so closely associated with 80s icons Journey? Well, the story here is that Journey wrote and recorded the song in ‘83 for their Frontiers LP, but decided to shelve the track. The song was then offered to Scandal, who included their version on the 1984 “The Warrior” LP, which contained Scandal’s signature tune (“Shooting at the walls of heartache, BANG BANG… I am the Warrior!”). One year later, Journey dusted off their recording and released it as a single from the Vision Quest soundtrack, taking it to US #9 on the Hot 100 in the process. 

As Scandal’s version was never released as a single, the Radio Dial proudly features it here for your listening enjoyment. Compare the two versions... Scandal's version is rather an interesting deviation from the normally heard Journey recording. 

“They’re seein’ through the promises… and all the lies they dare to tell. Is it heaven or hell? They know very well…”

 

“No Mistakes” 1992

Next up is the second single from Patty’s self-titled 1992 solo LP, which produced the monster Don Henley duet “Sometimes Love Just Ain’t Enough”.  That entire album had more of an adult contemporary lean than her 80s rock recordings with Scandal, and as such, “No Mistakes” features a relaxed, soft rock vibe and mature lyrics that only come from years of lost loves and internal reflection…

This is one of those “lost hits”… I heard it frequently on the radio twenty years ago (has it really been that long?), but not a peep out of it since then. 

“There are no mistakes now baby… we did the best we could. It takes what it takes and sometimes, It takes much more time than it should.”

In 2005, Patty and her Scandal bandmates reunited for a small well received tour of East Coast cities, but so far, no new tunage from Smyth or Scandal has materialized save for a 2011 digital download of Silent Night.  But wherever Patty and company currently are, the Radio Dial will always tune them in. Somebody’s gotta shoot at those walls of heartache, after all!