Alphaville: Forever Young

The 80’s were an amazing time for music. This decadent decade changed the way we listened to music, mostly because it brought a visual aspect to it through music videos. Somehow, it was suddenly hip for men to wear makeup, tease their hair, and look like women. The music became sonically HUGE, with layer upon layer of what-have-you… it isn’t too difficult to pick out a song from the 80’s. The guitar tones became thin and processed, the drums became over-the-top enormous, and the vocals were drenched in effects.

Perhaps one of the most important contributions of the decade was the act of bringing the synthesizer into the forefront of popular music, making it the defining instrument of the time.

Synthesizers introduced a plethora (what IS a plethora?) of new sounds, giving artists a new palette to work with. A whole league of sounds could be brought on by pressing down just ONE key… and some keyboardists at the time made a great living by doing just that.

Synth bands/artists started to pop up, making an undeniable impact on many of the artists we enjoy today… bands like Nine Inch Nails, The Killers, and She Wants Revenge find their roots in 80’s artists like Kraftwerk, Depeche Mode, Thomas Dolby, and Howard Jones.

One 80’s synth band that has somehow been mostly overlooked is this German group, Alphaville.

Now, just to make sure we’re all on the same page, a “Synth Band” is merely a band that uses the synthesizer as the dominant instrument. This does not mean that ALL sounds were made by the synthesizer; it just means that MOST sounds were.

Alphaville fits right in this category, and in 1984 the released one of the best synth albums of the decade, their debut record Forever Young.

Formed in 1977, the group originally went by the name “Forever Young,” mainly because it was one of their strongest songs at that time. According to Oldies.com, “In mid-1983 they changed their name to Alphaville, inspired by Jean-Luc Godard’s eponymous science fiction film from 1965.” I totally dig “Alphaville” more than “Forever Young.”

A name like “Forever Young” doesn’t really lend itself to grand entrances at a concert:

Yeah, doesn’t quite do it for me. But “Alphaville” is just COOL.

Yes, VERY cool.

Anyhow, their first single, “Big in Japan,” was a smash hit across the globe, reaching number one in countries like Germany, Switzerland, Italy, and even in the US (Billboard Hot Dance Club Play charts). The album Forever Young was then released, and two more singles were released: “Sounds Like A Melody” and “Forever Young.”

Neither of these other two singles made as big a splash as “Big in Japan,” but “Forever Young” has taken on a life of its own, becoming an 80’s standard. The song has been covered by quite a few artists, most notably Laura Branigan and Youth Group.

The song also breathed new life by being featured in the cult-classic film Napoleon Dynamite. It has also been played on television shows like Passions, It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, One Tree Hill, and The O.C.

I can’t begin to tell you how many of my high school friends wanted to use the lyrics, “Youth’s like diamonds in the sun / and diamonds are forever” as their yearbook quote. I think many of them declined for fear of being accused of copying someone else.

The popularity of the song has helped the album surpass the two million sales mark.

The album is more than just that one song, though. It contains some of the most interesting pop songs of that time, vocally and instrumentally. Check out the massive symphonic instrumental that closes “Sounds Like A Melody,” the vocal structure of “Fallen Angel,” or even the synth-drum interplay in “To Germany With Love,” and you’ll begin to see that Alphaville’s arrangements were as complex as their subject matter. Singer Marion Gold’s voice may have been considered the focal point of the record, but without a strong supporting backdrop, the album would have been lost.

Now, I’m not discounting Gold’s vocal performance at all here… his range is amazing, from the deepest registers of “A Victory of Love” to the highest of highs in “Fallen Angel,” there is no question of his abilities.

The Dig-It section contains a couple of tracks off Forever Young, and choosing them proved to be a difficult task. I wanted to pick two songs that exemplified the album… two songs that summed up everything in this article… I chose “To Germany With Love” and “Sounds Like A Melody” because not only are they great songs, but they demonstrate the vocal and synthesizer talents of the group.

And for those that need a “Forever Young” fix, I’ve also included a live version of the song below. This is an excellent recording that is sure to bring back some wonderful memories of the 80′s (if you were alive back then). How many of you remember this song at your school dances? I remember dancing to this ditty with my high school girlfriend, Amy Chow… I was smart enough to NOT sing along, especially during the high notes. I wasn’t smart enough, though, to shut-up during “Pour Some Sugar On Me.” Yeah. To quote Amy, “Ouch. That didn’t sound good… did you pull something?”

The synthesizer got a bad rap at the end of the 80’s. The tinny-tinky-tink “Rhodes” patch of the DX-7 will always resonate as a sign o’ the times, but there was so much more to the synth than that. Synthesizers continue to reshape the way music is performed, recorded, and heard… and without bands like Alphaville to help showcase that ability, synths probably would have faded away as quickly as they came.

Buy Alphaville on Amazon
Buy Alphaville on iTunes

Your Dig-It Downloads: (right click on link to download)

Download: To Germany With Love
Download: Sounds Like A Melody
Download: Forever Young (live)

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