100 Records That Shook The World, #10

You Spin Me Round (Like A Record)

Dead Or Alive

Dead or Alive was a British dance-pop group which found fame thanks to the antics of androgynous frontman Pete Burns. Formed in Liverpool in 1980 after Pete's stints with The Mystery Girls and Nightmares In Wax, they debuted with the Ian Broudie-produced Doors soundalike "I'm Falling." "Number Eleven" followed, but just as the group was gaining momentum, they were swept aside by the emergence of the New Romantic movement, with Burns subsequently charging that fellow androgyne Boy George of Culture Club had merely stolen his outrageous image.

Burns reworked the Dead or Alive lineup including future Mission U.K. guitarist Wayne Hussey and bassist Mike Percy. Over the course of the next couple of years the group evolved into a true dance band and ultimately landed with major-label Epic. A series of singles appeared during 1983, including "Misty Circles" and "What I Want"; Hussey left for The Sisters Of Mercy, and the lineup comprising Burns, Percy, keyboardist Tim Lever, and drummer Steve Coy scored their first major hit, a 1984 cover of KC & the Sunshine Band's classic stomper "That's the Way (I Like It)" which made the British Top 30.

Sophisticated Boom Boom was the group's full-length debut and it fared well with audiences, but it was  in early 1985 with the Hi-NRG smash "You Spin Me Round (Like a Record)," the first number one hit for the production team of Stock, Aitken & Waterman. The succeeding LP, Youthquake, was also a smash, yielding further hits in the form of the singles "Lover Come Back to Me," "In Too Deep," and "My Heart Goes Bang."

The success was never repeated, although "You Spin Me Round" has been re-released several times and made the charts on each occasion, especially during Pete Burns' infamous stint on Celebrity Big Brother.

Enjoy.




P.S. You've all probably heard about Pete Burns' ongoing cosmetic surgery. Here's what he looks like now...