WITH a new 'best of' album just out and looking forward to performing at Glasgow's Royal Concert Hall in November, Alison Moyet talked to me openly about the past and present, in our Smooth Drivetime studio.
Click here to listen to Dave chatting with Alison Moyet
WITH a new 'best of' album just out and looking forward to performing at Glasgow's Royal Concert Hall in November, Alison Moyet talked to me openly about the past and present, in our Smooth Drivetime studio.
With hit singles like Only You, Don't Go, Situation and Nobody's Diary all securing a chart place within a few months, why did Yazoo - the electropop duo of Alison and Vince Clarke - decide to call it a day in 1983?
Alison told me: "Well, I think Vince had only recently split up with Depeche Mode and he was still a bit sore about that, he wasn't looking to start a band straight away. He just wanted to prove a point with a song."
Alison also suggested the decision to break up Yazoo was down to Vince, saying: "It was too soon for him to be in another musical relationship, so he knocked it on the head."
However, nearly three decades later, there is clearly no animosity as Alison enthused about touring with Vince again last year.
She said: "We did a tour in England and America and it was fantastic, I had a brilliant time."
Our conversation came round to Alison's memorable part in the 1985 Live Aid concert.
Rumours circulated that she rescued a situation, coming back to the stage to provide emergency vocals on Let It Be when Paul McCartney's microphone failed.
Alison was quick to point out that her stage appearance with the guys was planned, saying: "To have been the only woman to be involved and to be invited, regardless of my sex, to that kind of thing was a great compliment."
Recalling a number two chart place in the mid-80s with the classic ballad That Old Devil Called Love - a mile away from the Alison Moyet we had been used to - she was clearly confident it would be a hit.
Alison said: "I'd done this song live and it went down well and you've got to remember, at the time there was none of that music being played on the radio. It seemed like quite a strange little left field' thing to do.
"Of course, when the record companies realised there was such a market for that style of music, then all of the back catalogues came out."
With sales of more than eight million albums, Howard Jones has been labelled the world's first electronic one-man band.
With a new album, Ordinary Heroes, due to be released in November, Howard popped in to air his new song on Smooth Radio.
So has 1980s icon Howard, now living with his family in an idyllic picture-postcard Somerset village, mellowed just a little bit?
He told me: "I've always had something to say and I make no apology for that. I don't think people should write songs unless they have got something to say."
Talking about his new album title track, he enthused: "Ordinary Heroes is about celebrating ordinary people's courage and determination amid the obstacles of life, and battling through and winning."
