Songoftheday 7/1/14 - I took a backseat a backhander I took her back to her room, I better get back to the basics for you...

Scritti Politti - "Perfect Way"
from the album Cupid & Psyche '85 (1985)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #11 (one week)
Weeks in the Top-40: 13

Today's Song of the Day is by the British group Scritti Politti, who started out as a post-punk leftist act whose name was a riff on a book by a Marxist writer. They started releasing underground singles in the late 70's, but it wasn't until 1981 that they nicked the British charts with a more reggae-tinged song called "The Sweetest Girl", which peaked at #64. That song, plus a couple more minor hits were included in their first full-length album Songs To Remember. However that version of the group would disintegrate, leaving lead singer Green Gartside to form a new trio under the Scritti Politti moniker that was much, much more mainstream pop-oriented, with just a hint of reggae undertones in the music. The first single for the revamped band, "Wood Beez (Pray Like Aretha Franklin)", turned out to be a big success, scoring their first top-10 single in the UK in 1984. It also made the top-5 on the dance chart in America as a double A-side with "Absolute".  Another single, "The Word Girl", did even better, making it to #6 on the British chart, and set up the release of their second album Cupid & Psyche '85. The album was a front-to-back pop masterpiece, with Green's etherally-high vocals over new-wave and reggae-lite beats. The fifth song to be released from the new set became their first single in America, and the one to finally break them on this side of the Atlantic. "Perfect Way" was a Spector-esque wall of new-wave goodness, and was tailor-made for pop radio in the middle of the decade. Written and produced by Green with bandmates David Gamson (keyboards) and Fred Maher (drums), "Perfect Way" was my gateway drug to the band...

"Perfect Way" almost made the top-10 as it peaked at #11 for a week on the American pop chart in December of 1985, while clearing that mark on the dance club play chart at #6. The single even spent a few weeks on the R&B chart, topping out at #85. Surprisingly, the single didn't have the same reaction in Britain, peaking at #48 (perhaps fans were more interested in buying the album, which went to #5 there).

The trio would release "Wood Beez" in America as its pop follow-up, but the single stopped at #91 on the Hot 100. They would go on to produce hits for Chaka Khan and the like, and released their next album Provision in 1988. I guess the relatively long break slowed their momentum, and the first single from the set, the extra-cute "Boom! There She Was" with R&B singer Roger Troutman only made it to #53 on the pop chart (it also went #12 dance and #94 R&B).

Scritti Politti started the 90's with their most recent top-40 hit, a cover of the Beatles' "She's A Woman" with toaster Shabba Ranks, which climbed to #20 in the UK in 1991. It would be another eight years before another album emerged, but the single from the album, "Tinseltown To The Boogietown", stopped short of the top-40 at #46. Green would assemble a new a new "Scritti Politti", and in 2006 released White Bread Black Beer, which didn't sell much but was a critical darling.

And despite their quick rise and fall in the States, Cupid & Psyche '85 remains one of my favorite albums of the 80s, sounding no less fresh as it did upon opening in my college days.

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Here's the remixed version of "Perfect Way" that went top-10 on the American dance chart...

Miles Davis covered "Perfect Way" on his pop-tinged album Tutu in 1986...

Up tomorrow: Texan trio go camping.