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Charted at No. 70 on 9th December 1986, moved slowly at first but then sped to No.3 by 10th February 1987 where it stayed for 3 weeks.'Down To Earth' is kind of an apt title actually, you get a sort of culture shock with the segue from early-60s proto-soul to this slickly-produced blue-eyed jazz-funk number. Apparently, when Curiosity first began work on their debut album, Sly and Robbie were the producers, which sounds potentially interesting; but in the event they were replaced by Stewart Levine, who's also credited on two other tracks on Now 9, and lends the track a rather saturated tone with plenty of fretless bass - the sort of thing that was radio friendly between about 1986-8 but sounds curiously unengaging now.
Ben Volpeliere-Pierrot is obviously a good singer, although again the very smoothed-out nature of the arrangement is matched by his vocal, so full of elongated and elided syllables as to obscure not only the words themselves but any curiosity (no pun intended) about them. It's mildly catchy but not unforgettable; but the images it puts in my mind aren't of whatever the song might actually about, they're of a slightly smarmy salesman with overpolished shoes.
Also appearing on: Now 10, 16
Available on: Music Of The Year - 1986/Compilation
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