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Whoops! There Goes the Neighbourhood

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Allmusic [1]

Whoops! There Goes the Neighbourhood was The Blow Monkeys' 1989 follow-up album to She Was Only A Grocer's Daughter, released two years before.

The album, the fourth issued from the band, represented a further step towards the incorporation of more dancey elements, started with their third 1987 LP, especially with the UK hit "It Doesn't Have to Be That Way", which, getting to Number 5, made that their highest-charting song ever.

The first single was "This Is Your Life", still a pop rock/new wave track, which didn't get higher than Number 70. The next version of the song, its 1989 remix, which turned it into a properly dance tune, fared much better, reaching Number 32 in Great Britain. After the flop of the second single, the politically oriented "It Pays to Belong", written following Dr. Robert's tradition of criticizing England's political reality, which didn't enter the UK Top 75, the album found another smash hit single in "Wait", a Blow Monkeys' song, but in fact credited only to the lead singer, along with soul interpreter Kym Mazelle: the duet actually got to Number 7, making it the second most successful hit single for the band, after the above mentioned "It Doesn't Have to Be This Way", which climbed up to two positions higher, in January 1987.

The album, with its 10 tracks (on the vinyl edition), can be ideally divided into two parts, more or less corresponding to the two sides: the first displays more traditionally pop rock tunes (also embracing the first two tracks of Side 2), approximately lasting 3 to 5 minutes; the second presents instead more new wave-oriented tracks, the timings of which are much longer, 6 to 8 minutes. In perfect accordance with the group's habit of describing their homecountry's social life, most of the lyrics deal with such topics, though there is not a particular unifying theme here, as in the previous disc, which made that a real concept album, against Thatcher's iron politics.

The CD edition also included three bonus tracks, displaying both versions of "This Is Your Life", its B-Side, a rather estranged, almost out-of-tune song called "The Love of Which I Dare Not Speak", and an extended mix of the album track entitled "Squaresville", one of the most powerful tracks on the album, singles excluded, along with "No Woman Is an Island".

Track listing

Words and music: Dr. Robert

  1. "This is Your Life" — 4:37
  2. "Wait" [Robert Howard with Kym Mazelle] — 3:08
  3. "No Woman is an Island" — 4:19
  4. "It Pays to Belong" — 5:35
  5. "Mercy, Pity, Peace and Love" — 3:45
  6. "Squaresville" — 4:22
  7. "Come On Down" — 5:02
  8. "Sweet Talking Rapist at Home" — 7:38
  9. "Bombed into the Stoneage" — 6:01
  10. "Let's Emigrate" — 8:28
  11. "The Love of Which I Dare Not Speak" (CD Only) — 3:59
  12. "This is Your Life" ['88] (CD Only) — 5:11
  13. "Squaresville" [Longer] (CD Only) — 8:02

Singles taken from the album

  • "This is Your Life" (August 1988) (UK Singles Chart no. 70)
  • "It Pays to Belong" (October 1988)
  • "Wait" (January 1989) (UK Singles Chart no. 7)
  • "This is Your Life" [Remix] (March 1989) (UK Singles Chart no. 32)

[2]

Quotations

The booklet, as usual, highlights the various religious inclinations of Dr. Robert, who thanks either Buddha and God, inviting them to "Come on down!" (as in the title of track 7), and, above all, it underlines the political flavour of the work, both featuring a quotation from Wilhelm Reich, which goes like this:

"If the psychic energies of the average mass of people watching a Football game or a musical comedy could be diverted into the Rational channels of a Freedom Movement, They would be invincible."

— Wilhem Reich

and also granting fans and buyers in general, that:

This record is NOT for sale in South Africa!

— The Blow Monkeys in the booklet of their 1988 album Whoops! There Goes the Neighbourhood

Personnel

Musicians

Production

  • Dr Robert: production tracks 1 & 2
  • Stephen Hague: production tracks 4, 6, 12 & 13
  • Leon F Sylvers III for Studio 56 Productions: production tracks 3, 5, 7 & 8
  • Julian Mendelsohn: production tracks 9 & 10
  • The Blow Monkeys & Marius De Vries: production track 11

Staff

  • Alistair Thain: photography
  • Barnaby's Photo Library: additional photography
  • Michael Nash Associates: design

Release details

Country Date Label Format Catalogue
UK 1988 RCA/BMG/Ariola CD PD 71858
MC PK 71858
LP PL 71858

References

  1. ^ Whoops! There Goes the Neighbourhood at AllMusic
  2. ^ [1]
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