Simply Red 'Holding Back The Years'

Chart Peak: 2 [51 in 1985]

YouTube

Originally made No. 51 in November 1985 but it took until June 1986 before 'Holding Back The Years' finally made No. 2 for 2 weeks, becoming Simply Red's second Top 20 hit in Britain.

By coincidence, both A-Ha and Simply Red have recently completed long-trailled farewells; indeed Simply Red seem to have been splitting up for longer than I've been writing this blog but they seem to have been the tortoises here. After securing their place on Now 5 with the substantial hit 'Money'$ Too Tight To Mention' they missed the Top 50 three times and even after this they had to wait another six singles for a second Top 10. It's perhaps strange that the sleeve note doesn't mention one major reason why this track became a hit at the second time of asking - third if you count the original version by Hucknall's "punk" band Frantic Elevators - and rescued them from one-hit-wonderdom. For this is yet another US Number One single, although of course the Reds did eventually do what Genesis, Peter Gabriel and Bananarama couldn't by topping the British chart, but almost a decade later.

It's conventional to say that 'Holding Back The Years' is the acceptable face of Mick Hucknall, and generally, I'd be inclined to chisel away at that. To some extent I already have by revealing that I quite liked 'Fairground' after all, but I can't dispute that this is a good record. I can imagine that people who saw the band live - and they were really a band in those days - must have been utterly wowed by it. On record it suffers from a now rather dated production and of course from the sheer overexposure, but it's redeemed somewhat by what's probably Hucknall's best recorded vocal. Here's where I will slightly break from the consensus; people often say "the guy's a tit but you can't knock the voice," whereas I actually think his singing's got a lot worse over the years. He's in great form here though and does a good job of conveying regret. Perhaps he knew how many awful records he was going to inflict on us in the next 20 years.

Also appearing on: Now 5, 9, 20, 21, 23, 24, 32, 33
Available on: Classic Soul Anthems