Frankie Goes To Hollywood “The Power of Love” 1984, 12# single, 45 rpm. B-Side “The World is My Oyster.” Today’s pull in honor of Holly Johnson’s birthday, February 9 1960.

“The Power of Love” reached #1 on the UK charts in December ‘84. A very new wave ballad, plenty of keyboards and echoey lyrics/spoken word. The video caused a bit of controversy with its depiction of Christian iconography but was not banned like some of the band’s earlier videos. The B-side, “The World Is My Oyster/Scrapped and Trapped/Holier Than Thou” has a cheekily spoken Christmas message from Holly Johnson, “I would like to give all you punters a lovely Christmas message but I’m too blathered to get it together…Hope you got lots of toys and eat lots of Christmas puds and  Christmas turkey…I hope you choke on the turkey and the puddin’!” It also has some banter by the band members, including Peter Gill reciting a mildly naughty Christmas poem that he penned.

I saw Frankie Goes to Hollywood perform in July 1985 in Irvine, CA. My dad and I traveled to Los Angeles that summer for a family reunion and somehow got us hooked up with really great seats for this concert. FGTH were massively popular in ’85 and at the time were my second-favorite band (behind Duran Duran of course). Being only 13 almost 14 years old at the time, I had very little clue as to the context of most of FGTH’s lyrics and their stage performance. In retrospect I can only imagine my father’s discomfort at taking his teenage daughter to this show.