Friday Night Videos: Missing Persons - Destination Unknown

 

I have to admit that I have been jonesing to post something about The Pretenders since I started this Friday night retro music video feature a couple of months back.

The Pretenders have been one of my favorite bands since the early 80s. Likewise their album 'Learning to Crawl' has been in my rotation (from album to CD to digital and back again) since it's initial release. Every track on that album is solid and stand up to the test of time.

Tonight we go a little further back to the band's second album with 'Talk of the Town'. The video for the song is straight forward studio performance that features some awkward camera angles (pointed up at singer Chrissie Hynde's crotch) and a black and white stage that messes with the eyes at times.

This was the first video from the band to appear on MTV:

History:

 "Talk of the Town" was inspired by a fan Chrissie Hynde had encountered on the band's first tour. She explained in a BBC Songwriters' Circle special, "I had in mind this kid who used to stand outside the soundchecks on our first tour... I never spoke to him. I remember that the last time I saw him I just left him standing in the snow, I never had anything to say to him. I kind of wrote this for him, so, in the unlikely event that you're watching this, I did think about you." It was also rumored that the song was written about Kinks frontman Ray Davies, whom Hynde would date and have a child with. The title itself was inspired by a London nightclub of the same name.

 "Talk of the Town", one of the first songs written following the Pretenders album, was recorded in Paris. At the time of the creation of Pretenders II, Hynde found confidence in the song's radio success, saying "I knew that people still liked us and we were getting airplay with 'Message of Love', 'Talk of the Town', [and] 'I Go to Sleep'".

Here is your bonus video for 'Brass in Pocket":

History:

Hynde, originally from Akron, Ohio, moved to London in 1973, working at the weekly music paper NME and at Malcolm McLaren and Vivienne Westwood's clothes store. She was involved with early versions of the Clash and the Damned and played in short-lived bands such as Masters of the Backside (1976) and the Moors Murderers (1978 lineup). The Pretenders formed in 1978 after Dave Hill at Anchor Records heard some demos of Hynde's music. He arranged a rehearsal studio in Denmark Street, where a three-piece band consisting of Hynde, Mal Hart on bass (he had played with Hynde and Steve Strange in the Moors Murderers), and Phil Taylor[ of Motörhead on drums played a selection of Hynde's original songs. Dave Hill was impressed and arranged a day at Studio 51 to record another demo. Although it was rough, he felt he had seen and heard enough "star potential" to suggest that Hynde form a more permanent band to record for his new label, Real Records. Hynde then formed a band composed of Pete Farndon on bass, James Honeyman-Scott on guitar, and Gerry Mcilduff on drums. This band, then without a name, recorded five tracks at Regents Park Studio in July 1978, including "Stop Your Sobbing". Shortly thereafter, Gerry Mcilduff was replaced on drums by Martin Chambers. Hynde named the band "The Pretenders" after The Platters song "The Great Pretender", which was the favorite song of one of her former boyfriends.

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