Album: Vicious Rumors
Video: From YouTube.
Billboard Hot 100 Peak: 8
MTV Top 20 Peak: did not chart
MTV Top 20 Weeks: 0
Let's take a little detour from the list and pay tribute to a jam that took the radio by storm in 1986. I was not aware that this song even had a video. I believe the Timex Social Club was a bit too, er, ethnic for MTV.
But any comprehensive discussion of music in 1986 must include "Rumors". Its popularity is rooted in its universal appeal, as every living soul has been impacted by the phenomenon of rumors. While listening to this tale over the backdrop of the infectious grooves of the Timex Social Club, each of us may harken back to our own specific memories of wild speculations, half-truths, or even outright lies. The rumors that you imagine may be quite different from those that occur to me. But the result in both cases is the same. All these rumors have permanently altered our sense of reality.
The song is kind of a rap-pop hybrid, combining a toe-tapping beat with striking imagery. We discover the personality traits of the jealous people who start rumors, along with vivid pictures of the tales they tell. Although the lyrics are humorous, there is a fundamental darkness to the story. The singer is clearly distressed about his exposure to such falsehoods, and displays a hopelessness that the condition will ever end. Still, he maintains enough of a positive outlook to propose creative solutions to the problem, including passing legislation that would cause those who spread rumors to be murdered.
It's an impressive effort that led to Timex Social Club's first brush with national notoriety. The success of "Rumors" led to their selection as the opening act for Run-DMC's "Raising Hell" tour. A different incarnation of the group would go on to much greater fame as Club Nouveau, scoring a #1 smash hit covering the Bill Withers classic "Lean On Me".
I know for a fact that I never saw the video linked above, until finding it for this post. I just so happened to find five awesome things about it.
1) The first three seconds. Check out the woman's hand that picks up the phone to start spreading those nasty rumors. Impossibly long, snake-like fingers topped off by blood-red fingernails, coated in a mesh half-glove. It sets the tone for the weird, stylized animation to come.
2) Disembodied mouths yapping with huge red lips, seguing into broken hearts and multi-colored snakes.
3) A conga line of females dressed in alternating red/blue tops and bottoms, each spreading a rumor to the next.
4) A flashing neon sign announcing the chorus. Always a helpful feature, it avoids confusion.
5) The imaginary congressman, clearly disapproving of the spreading of rumors, brandishing a firearm to punish the guilty. He looks like the late Ossie Davis.
Let's take a little detour from the list and pay tribute to a jam that took the radio by storm in 1986. I was not aware that this song even had a video. I believe the Timex Social Club was a bit too, er, ethnic for MTV.
But any comprehensive discussion of music in 1986 must include "Rumors". Its popularity is rooted in its universal appeal, as every living soul has been impacted by the phenomenon of rumors. While listening to this tale over the backdrop of the infectious grooves of the Timex Social Club, each of us may harken back to our own specific memories of wild speculations, half-truths, or even outright lies. The rumors that you imagine may be quite different from those that occur to me. But the result in both cases is the same. All these rumors have permanently altered our sense of reality.
The song is kind of a rap-pop hybrid, combining a toe-tapping beat with striking imagery. We discover the personality traits of the jealous people who start rumors, along with vivid pictures of the tales they tell. Although the lyrics are humorous, there is a fundamental darkness to the story. The singer is clearly distressed about his exposure to such falsehoods, and displays a hopelessness that the condition will ever end. Still, he maintains enough of a positive outlook to propose creative solutions to the problem, including passing legislation that would cause those who spread rumors to be murdered.
It's an impressive effort that led to Timex Social Club's first brush with national notoriety. The success of "Rumors" led to their selection as the opening act for Run-DMC's "Raising Hell" tour. A different incarnation of the group would go on to much greater fame as Club Nouveau, scoring a #1 smash hit covering the Bill Withers classic "Lean On Me".
I know for a fact that I never saw the video linked above, until finding it for this post. I just so happened to find five awesome things about it.
1) The first three seconds. Check out the woman's hand that picks up the phone to start spreading those nasty rumors. Impossibly long, snake-like fingers topped off by blood-red fingernails, coated in a mesh half-glove. It sets the tone for the weird, stylized animation to come.
2) Disembodied mouths yapping with huge red lips, seguing into broken hearts and multi-colored snakes.
3) A conga line of females dressed in alternating red/blue tops and bottoms, each spreading a rumor to the next.
4) A flashing neon sign announcing the chorus. Always a helpful feature, it avoids confusion.
5) The imaginary congressman, clearly disapproving of the spreading of rumors, brandishing a firearm to punish the guilty. He looks like the late Ossie Davis.
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