Friday, November 30, 2007

Wang Chung - Dance hall days

Wang Chung are a British New Wave musical group.

The group found their greatest success in the United States with five Top 40 hits including the 1986 #2 hit "Everybody Have Fun Tonight" and their only UK hit, "Dance Hall Days".

Originally called Huang Chung the band formed in 1979. The lineup consisted of vocalist/guitarist Jack Hues, bassist Nick Feldman, and drummer Darren Costin. Hues originally met Feldman after answering Feldman's ad for a musician in the classifieds section of the weekly British music magazine, Melody Maker, in 1977.

Soon afterwards, Hues and Feldman formed with Bud Merrick and the late Paul Hammond in late 1977/early 1978 as 'The Intellektuals'. In less than a year, the band split up, as Hues and Feldman joined up with future Wang Chung drummer Darren Costin, along with keyboards Simon Campbell, Leigh Gorman and Glenn Gregory, to form '57 Men'. This lineup lasted for less than a year as well.

Huang Chung's self-titled debut album was released by Arista Records in 1982 after several singles, including the minor post-punk hit "Isn't It About Time We Were on TV". In 1983, after being dropped by Arista and signed to Geffen Records, they changed their name to Wang Chung (at Geffen's suggestion, to make pronunciation easier for English-speakers—consistent with the claim by VH1's Pop Up Video that they changed it because people kept calling them "Hung Chung") — and subsequently they released Points on the Curve, which yielded two major hits, "Don't Let Go" (#38 US) and "Dance Hall Days" (#16 US).

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