All the Rage, the band’s first LP, went to #26 in the US, propelled by their hit single “Tenderness” (#27 US, #95 UK); I loved this song back in ’84. It appeared in two iconic 80’s films: Sixteen Candles and Weird Science, giving it broad exposure though I do remember it getting heavy rotation on MTV. Mick Jones plays guitar on that track. General Public released three other singles from All the Rage: “General Public,” “Never You Done That” and “Hot You’re Cool.”

We saw Dave Wakeling play live most recently this past April at Turner Hall in Milwaukee as part of The (English) Beat (totally revamped of course, I’m pretty Wakeling was the only original member of the band playing). Besides Beat songs, they performed two songs from All The Rage, “Tenderness,” of course, and “Never You Done That.”

The post General Public “All the Rage” appeared first on Vinyl From The Vault.

Singer/guitarist Dave Wakeling said about “Save It For Later,” “I wrote it when I was a teenager. I wrote it before The Beat started. And it was about turning from a teenager to someone in their 20s, and realizing that the effortless promise for your teenage years was not necessarily going to show that life was so simple as you started to grow up. So it was about being lost, about not really knowing your role in the world, trying to find your place in the world. So, you couldn’t find your own way in the world, and you’d have all sorts of people telling you this, that, and the other, and advising you, and it didn’t actually seem like they knew any better. So it was like keep your advice to yourself. Save it – for later.” Also, “The actual hook line itself was just a dirty joke, I just thought it was hilarious that you could get in a song: ‘save it – comma – for later – F-E-double L-A-T-O-R.’ So I thought it’d be really neat to get that in a song and everybody would be singing it. I didn’t know it was going to be a joke that lasted for 30 years.“

The post The Beat (or The English Beat) “Save It For Later” appeared first on Vinyl From The Vault.