![]() ![]() The single's success drastically altered the band's experience, according to Grey: "Someone picked up an import from England and started playing it on mainstream radio in America, and it just went like wildfire. "I Melt with You" was particularly popular in dance clubs and on MTV, peaking at number 60 on Billboard 's Dance/Disco Top 80 in March 1983. In April 1983, the song peaked at number 7 on the US Billboard Mainstream Rock chart and number 78 on the main Billboard Hot 100. It first began receiving radio airplay as an import single, and bounced from station to station, gaining momentum. The song was mainly a success in the United States, gaining attention over a long incubation period before becoming Modern English's and 4AD's first chart hit. The song was released in the United Kingdom, in May 1982, by label 4AD. While both the album and single versions have circulated on radio, the true stereo mix of the single version has rarely been available since. The latter version was mixed down to mono from its original stereo recording. Eight bars from the instrumental break after the second chorus are cut in the single version, such that only the second rendering of the line "the future's.open wide" (lyrics sung twice on the album version) is present and the guitar riff leading up to this line thus fades in a bit more abruptly, accounting for the time difference between the album and single versions. The more commonly known version of the song is the 3:50 single mix, in which the synthesizer riff is audible during the first chorus, an octave lower than on subsequent choruses, along with contrasting background vocals in the second verse - "You should know better" sung before "Dream of better lives.," etc. The original 4:11 album version features no call-and-response vocals in the second verse, and features a synthesizer break that begins at the second chorus. ![]() He subsequently employed a softer vocal technique on the rest of the album. Producer Hugh Jones encouraged Grey to softly sing the vocal track, as opposed to his natural inclination to shout. Musically, the song came together in the band's rehearsal space in London while recording their second album, After the Snow. In an interview, he described the song as a "love song", but more about the "good and bad in people The last thing we wanted was to write a song where boy meets girl, they go to the cinema and make love, and that's the end of it." The song depicts a couple making love while an atomic bomb is dropped. ![]() There'd be no power-you'd be at home with candles." These conditions and his fears of a nuclear war inspired "I Melt with You". The band's vocalist, Robbie Grey, described England at the time of the song's writing to be a bleak place, due to an ongoing economic downturn: "There was no money. The group signed with 4AD, a British independent record label, in 1980. Modern English formed in 1979 in Colchester, Essex, England. It reached number seven on Billboard 's Mainstream Rock chart in 1983 and a re-release reached number 76 on its Hot 100 chart in 1990 (after reaching number 78 in 1983). It became the band's most successful single, largely in the United States, where it was featured in the film Valley Girl and on MTV. The song, produced by Hugh Jones, was the second single from their 1982 album After the Snow. Anyone who was in high school during the '80s might recall the smell of clove cigarettes after listening to the danceable ""Blister"" while more moody pieces like ""The Lowdown"" and ""Antique Future"" beg for birthing another chapter of This Mortal Coil." I Melt with You" is a song by the British new wave band Modern English. Singer Robbie Grey and keyboardist turned guitar player Steven Walker are the only founding members left, but Hugh Jones, the original producer of ""I Melt With You,"" came back to mix this album - and he's since worked with Simple Minds, Echo & The Bunnymen, That Petrol Emotion and Pale Saints amongst others - so beginning with the very jangly (and very English) ""It's OK,"" Soundtrack harks back to those bygone days when the 4AD label was stylistically consistent. This time around Modern English re-explore ‘80s-flavored new wave in the spirit of ""I Melt With You"" but with witty themes, subtle hooks and thoughtful lyrics. Forward to 2010 and Soundtrack surfaces as their first studio album since 1996's Everything Is Mad. "Ever since 1982's household smash ""I Melt With You,"" Modern English has been locked in one-hit-wonder status.
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