Paul Oxley's Unit

Paul Oxley's Unit

Paul Oxley's Unit was a popular rock band in Finland in the 1980s. The band's vocalist and songwriter was a man from Manchester, England, named Malcolm Campbell, whose stage name became Paul Oxley. Playing the keyboards was Brian Hammond, although he wasn't playing in the first single produced by the group. The other members of the band were Swedish-speaking Finns Ulf Enberg (guitar), Kjell Ekholm (bass) and Janne Romberg (drums).

Initially, the band was called Paul Oxley's Radio, and it was under this name that they released their first single, "Another Heartbreak/The Judge and the Jury," which had a reasonable amount of airtime on Finnish radio stations in 1980. But the real first taste of success came with summer gigs of 1981 and their debut album "Living in the Western World", released in autumn of the same year. The album's melodic and energetic pop was so popular with Finnish youth that more than 60,000 copies were sold, pushing it over the platinum marker and by today's standards, into double platinum. The album reached No. 1 in the charts and stayed there for 17 weeks. The biggest hits from the album, and possibly the most internationally recognized, were "Spanish Bars", "Terry's Inside" and the album's namesake song, "Living in the Western World."

The summer 1982 tour, Paul Oxley's Unit - Live in the Western World Tour, was a success and in the autumn of that year, the group released a new album titled "Both Sides of the Equator". The album reached gold record status with over 35,000 copies sold.

By early 1983, the band had changed its name to "Unit 6" and released another LP, "After the Party." The band then broke up, and the British members moved back to the United Kingdom.

In 1987, record label CBS (now Sony Music) released a compilation album of the band's songs, "The Paul Oxley's Unit Collection". By now, all of the band's eight records have been released in CD-format with more than 100,000 records sold. "Terry's Inside" and "Spanish Bars" are both included in Finland's top 100 songs of all time.

In 1995, Oxley returned for a holiday trip in Finland to meet his old friends, and the band was briefly put together (without Hammond) for a one-time gig. The concert, however, turned out to be quite popular and the members of the band thought about a bigger comeback. In 1996 they released a new album, "The Magic", with replacement drummer Niklas Björkqvist and replacement keyboardist, Johan Lyander before a spring 1997 tour.

Kjell Ekholm is now FST's (Finlands Svenska Television) entertainment manager. From 1992-2001, Paul Oxley made music in the United Kingdom with a Devon-based group called New World Orchestra. He also made a solo album, "Eden Wakes," which came out in 2008.

Paul Oxley is still an active songwriter and now works with top writers and producers in Scandinavia. As well as writing hits for several Finnish artists, he has recently had cuts with international platinum selling artists including a No. 1, platinum selling single in Japan with the band Kat Tun. Oxley has had four entries in the Eurovision song contest and co-wrote the song, "Cider Hill", which came second place in the 2010 Finnish final. He also co-wrote the Jessica Wolff song 'Better' the 2012 Finnish entry. He works from his studio in Helsinki.

Members

Original line-up:

• Paul Oxley (lead singer)
• Brian Hammond (keyboards)
• Ulf Enberg (guitar)
• Kjell Ekholm (bass)
• Janne Romberg (drums)

The Magic line-up:

• Niklas Björkqvist (drums)
• Johan Lyander (keyboards)

Discography

Singles

• Another Heartbreak (1980: 1st)
• The Judge and the Jury
• Living in the Western World
• Spanish Bars
• Terry's Inside
• The Beat of Your Heart
• Tears Among the Flowers
• Camera Camera
• After the Party

Albums

• Living in the Western World (1981, platinum)
• Both Sides of the Equator (1982, gold)
• After the Party (1983, gold)
• The Paul Oxley's Unit Collection (1987)
• The Magic (1996)
• Spanish Bars – The Very Best of Paul Oxley's Unit (2001)
• Collections (2007)
• Living in the Western World (30 year anniversary album/DVD) (2011)

External links

• [1]
• [2]