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Erasure: Hits (2-disc edition)
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Hard as it is to imagine now, perhaps, after more than a full decade of
ABBA's cultural rehabilitation, but in the early summer of 1992 an admiration for
the Swedish quartet was still a guilty secret nobody dared talked about.
Erasure's Abba-esque E.P., enjoying the 5th of its 6 weeks at #1 on the chart of
12 years ago, helped to change all that. To their credit, Andy Bell and Vince
Clarke had been covering the Super Troupers' songs as far back as 1986, when
Gimme Gimme Gimme (A Man After Midnight) was a staple of their live set; a
time when ABBA was still a dirty word in certain musical circles and several
years had passed since the band had last enjoyed a decent-sized hit, their
last few releases all peaking in the low-20s and mid-30s of the UK listings.
Abba-esque brought together four Erasure interpretations; Take A Chance On
Me was generally afforded the greatest exposure and unofficial top-billing,
with S.O.S, Lay All Your Love On Me and Voulez-Vous completing the line-up. It
was the first #1 of Erasure's career, and to date remains their only UK
chart-topper. The biggest winners of the E.P.'s runaway success were, fittingly,
ABBA themselves; shortly afterwards Polydor issued a 19-song compilation
entitled Gold: Greatest Hits, and the world started to acknowledge their place in
pop history once again. For that, the likes of Mamma Mia: The Musical was but a
small price to pay.
Cover versions also took 3 of the other 4 places in the top 5. Mariah
Carey's grammatically-flawed take on The Jackson Five classic I'll Be There was at
#2, having shot up from its debut position of #11. Recorded for her
MTV-Unplugged special, it thus eschewed the slick MOR tendencies of her early studio
releases. Trey Lorenz was an uncredited male vocalist on the track. Heartbeat,
first charted posthumously by Buddy Holly in 1960, had returned to the Top
40 some 32 years later courtesy of actor Nick Berry, star of ITV's rural drama
of the same name. The single had peaked at #2 and was now in decline,
dropping to #4. Meanwhile, at #5 was a more interesting remake; Utah Saints'
Something Good took a vocal sample from the 1985 #20 hit Cloudbusting by Kate Bush
and built a trance anthem around it.
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