human league

The Human League"Bought him a synthesiser/ Got the Human League in to advise her" - The Undertones, My Perfect Cousin

Who?Depends on when you're asking. At first, Kraut rock's first UK flirtation, heavy on the technology, complete with slides but lacking the sort of tunes that would get you a Smash Hits cover. Then, following the declaration of independence that was ther tricky Heaven 17 demerger, they picked up a couple of schoolgirls - it wasn't illegal in those days, of course - learnt how to do milkman-friendly pop and went on to hold the charts hostage in early 1980. An all-music remix album of Dare, their masterpiece, released under the League Unlimited Orchestra umbrella kept BBC Sport going until Madchester arrived and gave them something else to play over goal compilations. A less succesful follow-up album or two later, and the League's star began to wane.

Essential?Although the shaky grasp of Middle East politics and disrespect for English language demonstrated on The Lebanon still causes some people to curl their toes up and pretend that it never happened, anything from any period of the League's history should stand you in good stead. If you're inviting twenty/thritysomethings over, and want a good laugh, slip them half a bottle of something fermented and stick Dare on the turntable.

Yes, Anna, they were from...Post-Joe Cocker Sheffield

Popstars in Reduced Circumstances?Though there are reports of the band doing an office party just before Christmas, the fortunes of the band haven't taken much of a battering in the past decade. Phil Oakey provided guest vocals on a couple of tracks on the Allseeingi's Pickled Eggs and Sherbert album, and he's subsequently carved out a semi-career in the "I love Stuart Maconie' mode. Might be time to stop sounding so bitter about OMD also using a tape machine on stage Phil. Let it go now.

In a nutshell, then:Version One was The Cure with a Dixons gold card; Version two was electro-Abba.

Never mind the music, give us trivia:Back when having TWO ears pierced was thought something of a statement, and no man beside Rodney Bewes had a pierced ear, Phil Oakey had his nipple pierced. He also had a floppy, distinctive hairstyle that, unlike the Flock of Seagulls crash helmet, actually still looks good today. John Shuttleworth speculates that he might have done a Harry Worth and pretended to be all man, or all woman, by using a shop window.

In more depth:Blind Youth - early league stuff

Hysteria - formed out of a megamerger between two of the bigger human league sites, apparently

Lemons - an irritating to fuck customised cursor, but thankfully worth putting up with

Don't forget to check out the Human League stuff from a 1981 Smash Hits we've now got online

Try these, too...Allseeingi
ABC
Heaven 17
The Cure
Kraftwerk
very early OMD
early Depeche Mode