Monday 3 July 2017

Record of the Year 1981: Tom Tom Club - Wordy Rappinghood


I first heard my record of the year for 1981 in the most unlikely of places, a school assembly. It was one of the assembly's where a class would do a mini play with a message in it, and they started playing this as we walked in.

I've long forgotten anything else about that assembly, maybe the message was the importance of spelling and grammar or something along those lines. This tune though had a lasting effect, even though I had no idea what it was. I was singing it for some time afterwards, that's how catchy it was.

A few weeks later I heard it again on some channel 4 schools show when I was off sick one day, but still no idea what it was.

Fast forward a decade or so and I purchased Fabriclive 9 by Jacques Lu Cont and it appeared on that mix, I finally found out what it was. As a side note, if you haven't heard that mix then take a listen, it's one of the best mixes you'll ever hear.

The Tom Tom Club were a side project for a couple of members of Talking Heads. This was one of just two top 40 hits for them, the other being their cover of "Under the Boardwalk".

They have another quite famous tune called "Genius of Love" which is at least equally as good, but this never made the top 40 over here.

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