Фрэнки Гоуз ту Холливуд: История британского поп-феномена 80-х

British pop band
2=the video game

Frankie Goes to Hollywood were an English pop band that formed in Liverpool in 1980. They comprise Holly Johnson (vocals), Paul Rutherford (backing vocals), Mark O'Toole (bass), Brian Nash (guitar) and Peter Gill (drums). They were among the first openly gay pop acts and made gay rights and sexuality a theme of their music and performances. Frankie Goes to Hollywood signed to ZTT Records in 1983. Their debut album, Welcome to the Pleasuredome (1984), produced by Trevor Horn, achieved advance sales of more than a million, and their first three singles, "Relax", "Two Tribes" and "The Power of Love", reached number one on the UK Singles Chart. Their provocative themes led them to be briefly banned by the BBC, drawing further publicity. In 2014, the music journalist Paul Lester wrote that "no band has dominated a 12 month period like Frankie ruled 1984". The lead singer, Holly Johnson, had previously played in Big in Japan and had released some unsuccessful solo singles. He formed the first version of Frankie Goes to Hollywood with Phil Hurst (drums), Ambrose (bass), Steve Lovell (guitar), but the group soon split. The name came from an advertisement announcing Frank Sinatra's film debut. In 1982, Johnson restarted the group with Peter Gill (drums) and the brothers Mark (bass) and Jed O'Toole (guitar). Jed left before 1983, and was replaced by his cousin, Brian Nash.

In February 1983, Frankie Goes to Hollywood performed on the Channel 4 show The Tube, dressed in fetish wear. That May, they became the first act signed by ZTT Records, a new record label co founded by the producer Trevor Horn. "Relax" was released in October 1983, backed by a music video set in an S&M club. Sound on Sound described it as a "hi NRG brand of dance synth pop" that "broke new sonic ground, while epitomising '80s excess in all its garish, overblown glory". "Relax" won the 1985 Brit Award for Best British Single. The ZTT co founder Paul Morley devised a promotional campaign involving "advertising based slogans, playful propaganda and pseudo philosophy". This included a line of T shirts inspired by shirts created by Katharine Hamnett, bearing slogans such as "Frankie say relax" and "Frankie say arm the unemployed". Morley said he wanted to challenge the idea of music merchandise, asking: "Why did it have to have a face on it, couldn't it be a walking billboard?" The shirts quickly became popular, and Music Week reported in July 1984 that they were outselling the singles in some stores. By the end of the year, more than 250,000 T shirts had been sold. Frankie Goes to Hollywood appeared in the 1984 thriller Body Double by Brian De Palma. That August, "Relax" rose to number two, marking the first time the top two positions had been held by a single act since the Beatles in 1968. It had advance sales of a million copies. Their fourth single, "Welcome to the Pleasuredome", was released in March 1985, and reached number two.

By the end of 1984, during sell out shows in Los Angeles and promotional touring in the United States, Johnson had distanced himself from the band, spending time with his new boyfriend, Wolfgang Kuhle. The media reported that disputes had formed within the band. In August 1986, the first single from Liverpool, "Rage Hard", was released, reaching number 4 in the UK. Liverpool was released in October 1986 and reached UK No. 5. It received poor reviews and chart returns declined rapidly with the follow up singles "Warriors of the Wasteland" (No. 19) and "Watching the Wildlife" (No. 28). Horn spent three months creating remixes of "Watching the Wildlife" and "Warriors of the Wasteland" for the single releases, spending an estimated £50,000. Before a concert at Wembley Arena in January, a fight broke out backstage between Johnson and O'Toole. Johnson said that ZTT had encouraged the rift as a means of divide and rule, Nash recalled: "During the last tour, everybody knew it would end, as the relationship between Holly and the rest of us was so strained. He didn't want to be in a band situation anymore. Everybody was fed up with the whole thing." His second solo album, Dreams That Money Can't Buy, released in 1991, was unsuccessful. That year, Johnson was diagnosed with HIV and retreated from public life to focus on his health. He has since released further albums and studied at the Royal College of Art. He published a memoir, Nasher Says Relax, in 2012. Gill toured as part of an Australian soap actor's band, and formed a music production company, Love Station, which released singles featuring vocalists including Lisa Hunt. The band was led by an American using the stage name Davey Johnson, who claimed he was Holly's brother and had performed uncredited on Welcome to the Pleasuredome.

The members of Frankie Goes to Hollywood reunited in Holloway, London, for a 2003 episode of the VH1 show Bands Reunited, but did not perform. In an interview the following year for Uncut, Johnson said he had not wanted to perform with the band again and felt the episode was a "debacle". In his 2012 memoir, Nash, who had also been uninterested in a reunion, described the VH1 episode as a "circus" that had tried to depict Johnson negatively. On 11 November 2004, Frankie Goes to Hollywood reunited without Johnson and Nash to perform at a Prince's Trust charity concert at Wembley Arena celebrating Horn's 25 years as a record producer. Johnson and Nash declined to take part. Ryan Molloy was selected as the new vocalist. O'Toole's brother Jed, who had played in the band in the 1980s, replaced Nash. PopMatters wrote that the Wembley performance had "unstoppable 1984 pop glory" and that "even strong detractors of the group would likely be won over by energy the band members radiate". The Independent wrote that it "fell somewhat flat". Writing in The Guardian, Alexis Petridis wrote that the show "ultimately underwhelms" and that the songs "were designed as studio bound production extravaganzas, not live showstoppers". Nash praised the performance and wrote that "Molloy did a great job filling Holly's shoes". and Big Gay Out in Finsbury Park, London. In 2006, Molloy said he had written new songs for Frankie Goes to Hollywood. However, the material went unreleased and a European tour was canceled. In April 2004, Johnson attempted to register the name Frankie Goes to Hollywood as a trademark for his exclusive use, arguing that it was his intellectual property as he had used it for a previous band.

In 2011, ZTT reissued Liverpool in an expanded edition, plus The Art of the 12", a compilation of tracks from ZTT artists including Frankie Goes to Hollywood. Universal Music acquired the Frankie Goes to Hollywood back catalogue when it purchased ZTT in 2017. On 7 May 2023, Frankie Goes to Hollywood, including Johnson and Nash, reunited for a concert featuring multiple acts celebrating Liverpool music for the Eurovision Song Contest. They performed one song, "Welcome to the Pleasuredome". The Telegraph gave it three out of five, writing that Johnson remained "a commanding presence" but that the short set was disappointing.

Johnson and Rutherford are openly gay, and Frankie Goes to Hollywood made gay rights and sexuality a theme of their music and performances. As Frankie Goes to Hollywood rose in popularity, some outlets reported that they were a "manufactured" group controlled by ZTT. A 1984 article in the Washington Post described them as "a modern day Monkees, a post punk Village People sprung forth fully armed from the brow of junk culture". Johnson said the media had undermined them and underestimated their contributions to their records. Horn said later that the British music media often misunderstood the processes involved in studio recording. He said the band were "better than people gave them credit for", and cited "The Power of Love", "Born to Run" and "Krisco Kisses" as examples of their playing on Welcome to the Pleasuredome. In 2014, the music journalist Paul Lester wrote that although Frankie Goes to Hollywood were "arguably the last great British pop sensation", they were rarely cited as an influence on other artists. He wrote that this was because "it would be impossible to recreate what they did". Morley observed that despite having released two of most successful records of the 1980s, they had become "slightly lost The fact that something was so successful yet is part of a shadowy history is ultimate proof that it was special. They were like some contorted, profound novelty band." However, he argued that they had changed how commercial pop music was marketed, with more artistic and "beautiful" packaging and music videos.