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NightAire
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| Posted: 17 August 2014 at 9:06pm | IP Logged
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I have a CD single from 1988 (Atlantic / PR 2465-2) which
was released in conjunction with "Alphaville: The Singles
Collection."
Its track listing includes:
1) LP version - 3:45
2) New single mix - 3:45
3) Special extended mix - 6:12
(all times listed)
I understand the "...singles..." album was supposed to be
remixes of a number of their releases, and certainly the
Special extended mix would be the one found on the album.
The LP version would be found on the original 1984 LP.
It's that middle track that's throwing me, and neither
Atlantic nor Wikipedia are helping me much.
Atlantic doesn't list a copyright date on this CD single,
instead opting to label it as (P) 1984. ...Were the
single mix and extended mix published in 1984, too, or
new for '88?
Wikipedia says the album is a compilation of mixes
"previously published, although for some this was the
first time on CD."
On the page for the single, it says "Originally released
by Alphaville as a single in 1984, 'Forever Young' was
available in both its original mix and also in a dance
version titled the 'Special Dance Mix.' Over the years
the band has released several remixes and demo versions
of the song."
...OK, that's clear as mud. (This is what I get for
using Wikipedia, I suppose.)
Was the 1984 radio promo the LP version, or the "New
Single Mix?" Or was one on one side and one on the
other... or was the new single mix truly a new mix for
'88?
FYI, "Forever Young's" best performance in the U.S. was
1984, when it made it to #65 on the pop charts and
apparently broke the top 40 on the dance charts (although
I wasn't able to track down a peak position).
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aaronk
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| Posted: 17 August 2014 at 10:22pm | IP Logged
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According to my Whitburn book, the song went to #93 in 1985 and #65 in 1988. So, technically, it was a bigger hit when it was reissued in 1988. I'll check to see if I have the stock 45s and report back shortly.
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aaronk
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| Posted: 17 August 2014 at 10:30pm | IP Logged
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I have both stock singles, and they both have the original mix (not the dance mix). I didn't time them--only played to verify which mix--but the stated times are 3:45 and 3:43 for the '85 and '88 singles, respectively.
I'm not sure if that's what you're looking for, but I think it's safe to say that the "hit" version is the original LP version.
Edited by aaronk on 17 August 2014 at 10:30pm
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NightAire
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| Posted: 17 August 2014 at 10:57pm | IP Logged
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Wait -- you're telling me Wikipedia got the year it went to #65 wrong? LOL! :-)
That's exactly the info I needed; thanks, Aaron!
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jimct
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| Posted: 17 August 2014 at 11:22pm | IP Logged
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Gene, my promo 45 for the initial release, confirmed as Atlantic 89578,
features a non-described version on both sides, but is, in fact, the LP
version. It has a listed time of (3:45) and an actual time of (3:43), with
deadwax info of "ST A-47139-1". I do happen to show different chart info
than you do above. My RR book has this 45 release peaking at #93 in
3/85, during a 4-week run on the Hot 100. We also got in a promo 12"
single for this initial release, as "DMD 814". One side features the same,
listed (3:45) version as my promo 45 does, but is noted here as "Vocal/LP
Version" on one side, while containing a listed (6:12), "Vocal/Extended
Version" on the other side.
My promo 45 for the 1988 release, confirmed as Atlantic 89013, features
a non-described version on one side, with both a listed & actual time of
(3:43). (Deadwax is "S TA -56098-1", followed by a crossed-out "ST-A-
56021-1"). This side features the same "LP Version" as both sides of the
earlier promo 45 did. The other side features the "New Single Mix", with
both a listed & actual time of (3:48). For this side, the deadwax info of
"ST-A-56021-1" was not crossed out, so the info was obviously meant to
appear on this side of the single. There was also a promo 12" single sent
to us for this release (PR 2464). Again, it has the listed (3:45) LP version
and a listed (6:12) version on it, but this time the latter version is called
the "Special Extended Mix". To my ears, both (6:12) promo 12" versions
sound identical, whether it's titled the "Vocal/Extended Version" or the
"Special Extended Mix", and that the "New Single Mix" is simply a first-
time-released, 1988 edit of the (6:12) 12" version. My RR book says that
the 1988 Hot 100 appearance of "Forever Young" peaked at #65 in
December, during a 14-week chart run.
This song got lots of airplay on MTV during its initial release. The debut
LP sold fairly well. It also got surprisingly solid recurrent/oldie airplay in
several formats, in subsequent years. I remember that some folks, both in
radio and at the record labels, felt back then that someone had surely
dropped the ball in regard to "Forever Young", and that it should've
initially been a big Top 40 hit. So my best guess is that when Atlantic
decided to release two different mixes for each of their four singles, some
new and some old, and title it "The Singles Collection" LP, Atlantic chose
to create/release the "New Single Mix", team it up with the original LP
version of "Forever Young" on a promo 45/CD single, and see if the song
would happen at Top 40 radio this time. It didn't, but it did do a bit
better, at least chart-wise, this time around.
Gene, I personally don't ever remember hearing the "New Single Mix" on
CHR radio in 1988, but it wouldn't surprise me if it did get some sporadic
airplay, especially since it was also included on the promo CD single you
have. I can only hope I've now made things less "muddy" for you. :)
(PS-researching all this took me a while. In the interim, I now see that you
and Aaron had exchanged some posts, so please forgive any redundant
info on my part.)
Edited by jimct on 17 August 2014 at 11:33pm
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aaronk
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| Posted: 17 August 2014 at 11:31pm | IP Logged
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Thanks for all the additional info, Jim! This song still gets airplay on my
local Jack-FM. It also probably had a minor resurgence in the mid-
2000s when it was included in the movie "Napoleon Dynamite." In fact,
I can no longer hear "Forever Young" without immediately thinking of
the prom scene from the movie :)
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Paul Haney
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| Posted: 18 August 2014 at 3:36am | IP Logged
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Here's some additional chart info on "Forever Young":
Peaked at #32 on the BB Hot Dance Club Play chart in 1985.
On the Cash Box Top 100, it peaked at #81 in 1988 and didn't chart at all in 1985.
Also, we played it quite a bit on my college radio station in 1985.
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80smusicfreak
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jimct wrote:
| This song got lots of airplay on MTV during its initial release. The debut LP sold fairly well. It also got surprisingly solid recurrent/oldie airplay in several formats, in subsequent years. I remember that some folks, both in radio and at the record labels, felt back then that someone had surely dropped the ball in regard to "Forever Young", and that it should've initially been a big Top 40 hit. So my best guess is that when Atlantic decided to release two different mixes for each of their four singles, some new and some old, and title it "The Singles Collection" LP, Atlantic chose to create/release the "New Single Mix", team it up with the original LP version of "Forever Young" on a promo 45/CD single, and see if the song would happen at Top 40 radio this time. It didn't, but it did do a bit better, at least chart-wise, this time around. |
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I agree that "Forever Young" - along w/ the group's first single, "Big in Japan" - are both great examples of '80s songs that underperformed on the U.S. charts when originally released (and that their peak positions didn't reflect their true popularity), but are considered classics today. Although I just barely passed on buying the Forever Young album in 1984-85, when Atlantic re-launched the "FY" single in '88, I immediately ran out and bought The Singles Collection on cassette. I've always had the sense that Atlantic issued The Singles Collection in '88 in simple recognition of the fact that they knew they'd "dropped the ball" on the group back in 1984-85, so it was nice to see the label make a second effort. To this day, VH-1 Classic still plays the videos to both "BIJ" and "FY" fairly regularly. I was always a bit surprised - and disappointed - that the group was never able to follow up those two initial hits on subsequent albums, as admittedly, some of their later singles weren't quite as catchy...
I just wanted to add one other reason for "Forever Young"'s popularity/longevity which has yet to be mentioned here, and was likely another motive for Atlantic's re-launch of the original Alphaville version in '88, along w/ issuing The Singles Collection: Less than six months after their version initially scraped the bottom of the charts here, Atlantic had fellow labelmate Laura Branigan record the song for her next album, Hold Me, which came out in the Summer of '85. And while her version was never released as a single, it was an immediate favorite w/ her fans, and thus became a concert staple of hers. TV performance from 1985 on YouTube: Laura Branigan - "Forever Young" I was fortunate enough to see Branigan live in concert twice (first in the late '80s, and again in the late '90s), and I recall she performed "FY" at least one of those times, if not both - what a voice! And again, while not a "hit" for her per se, the song has been included on multiple hits collections of hers over the years. It's always been a toss-up for me as to which version I like better - hard to believe that just eight more days will mark the 10th anniversary of LB's passing... :-(
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torcan
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| Posted: 18 August 2014 at 8:22am | IP Logged
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I agree that "Forever Young" should have been a bigger hit. There are some songs which are well-liked and well-known but for some reason never did well on the charts. Modern English's "I Melt With You" is another such example. It had a similar history of being re-released, but the band re-recorded it for the re-issue and it wasn't as a good as the original.
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MMathews
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| Posted: 18 August 2014 at 1:40pm | IP Logged
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Back in '84, the song got its heaviest airplay on Long
Island's new wave station WLIR. They only played the 12"
dance version. I went out and bought the 45 and was
dismayed to get a ballad instead of what I was hearing.
I agree this is yet another 80's song that grew to be an
iconic classic in later years.
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NightAire
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| Posted: 18 August 2014 at 10:35pm | IP Logged
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Fantastic history! Thank you so much, everyone, for your
responses.
...Now I just have to decide, in my categorization of
songs for airplay... is it an '84 song or an '88 song?
It hit bigger on the charts in '88, but sounds like it
got more airplay (?) and WAY more play on MTV on its
original run... that makes me lean toward the "original"
release date.
Typically I put songs in their "biggest" release year,
but this one might be a logical exception.
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80smusicfreak
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| Posted: 19 August 2014 at 1:47am | IP Logged
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NightAire wrote:
| ...Now I just have to decide, in my categorization of songs for airplay... is it an '84 song or an '88 song? |
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Depends on your target audience. But if you're debating between '84 & '88, then it would appear you're trying to appeal primarily to an American audience. Don't forget, the '88 re-release of "Forever Young" and the issuance of The Singles Collection was strictly a North American (i.e., U.S. & Canadian) thing, obviously done in an attempt to boost Alphaville's audience here, since Atlantic clearly felt we'd "missed out" on the band previously (i.e., they'd underperformed on the charts here up to that point). So if that's your angle, then my answer to your question would be "neither"... :-)
Personally, I think you should go w/ 1985. Why '85??? Well, as aaronk & jimct both already mentioned above, upon its initial release, the song hit #93 in Billboard in March of that year. Remember, because the group was both new and German, they got signed by WEA over in Europe first, where their singles and debut album, Forever Young, launched in early to mid '84. After the group's first three singles - "Big in Japan", "Sounds Like a Melody", and the album's title track - all went over HUGE (top 10) in most European countries (see the "Singles" portion of the group's discography page on Wikipedia), Atlantic was finally swayed to step in and offer them a U.S. deal as well. But by the time the album & its lead single, "Big in Japan", were released here in November/December of '84, we Yanks were already some six months behind the curve. (Heck, to help us catch up, Atlantic even skipped releasing "Sounds Like a Melody" as a single here altogether, instead moving on to the title track as the second song promoted from the album!) So consequently, "Forever Young" wasn't a "hit" on the charts - or seen on MTV - here in the U.S. until early '85, which also explains why you found conflicting dates and chart info on Wikipedia. (Clearly, the person/people who wrote the band's entry there were speaking primarily from a European point of view - although I see they DID botch "FY"'s peak position here in the U.S. for its initial release in '85, stating "65" instead of "93"!) So while the song "Forever Young" was indeed recorded & first released in 1984 (including Stateside, when it appeared on the album at the very end of that year), I feel that most Americans would associate it w/ 1985 - but your logic may vary... :-)
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Paul Haney
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| Posted: 19 August 2014 at 4:29am | IP Logged
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I think most US music fans would place this song in March of 1985.
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80smusicfreak
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| Posted: 19 August 2014 at 12:30pm | IP Logged
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Taking a fun trip down memory lane by researching old issues of Billboard magazine dating from late '84/early '85, I can also relay the following tidbits about Alphaville's "Forever Young":
* February 9, 1985, issue: The single (Atlantic 89578) was reviewed (pg. 65). It was listed in the "POP" section under "RECOMMENDED" (defined by the magazine as "records with potential for significant chart action") instead of one of the weekly "PICKS" ("new releases with the greatest chart potential"). No additional comments given...
* February 16, 1985, issue: The following week, the magazine's Brian Chin had this to say about the 12" version in his weekly "Dance Trax" column (pg. 58): "Alphaville's 'Forever Young' (Atlantic 12-inch promo), remixed for the clubs, is a very flexible cut indeed. Good beat, haunting melody, and AOR should even be interested. This is a rare occasion where a second single could outdo the first, especially on the pop side..."
* February 27, 1985: MTV adds the video to "Forever Young" under its "new rotation" category (as reported in the March 9 issue of Billboard - pg. 39)...
* March 6, 1985: MTV holds the video under "new rotation" (its lightest category) during its second week there (Billboard, March 16 - pg. 33)...
* March 9, 1985, issue: Song debuts at #59 on the magazine's "Hot Dance/Disco" chart (pg. 72); it also sneaks onto the "Bubbling Under" chart at #105 (pg. 81)...
* March 13, 1985: MTV continues to hold the video under "new rotation" for its third week (Billboard, March 23 - pg. 31)...
* March 16, 1985, issue: Song moves up to #103 on the "Bubbling Under" chart (pg. 70), while continuing its 6-week run upward on "Hot Dance/Disco" (pg. 58)...
* March 20, 1985: MTV holds the video under "new rotation" for its fourth and final week there (Billboard, March 30 - pg. 31, although magazine states the date as "March 30" at the top of the MTV programming list, which is a typo)...
* March 23, 1985, issue: Song graduates to the "Hot 100" chart at #95 (pg. 68), commencing a 4-week run there, although by its third week on the chart (issue dated April 6), MTV support would be gone! So did MTV pull the plug TOO SOON, thus hurting the song's potential on the pop chart, and maybe even costing the band a gold album here??? Billboard's weekly-published MTV playlists (provided by the network itself, and not actually monitored at that time) clearly seem to suggest that this song's video didn't get quite as many plays on the iconic channel as some of us seem to remember - myself included!
Oh, and I just want to add that Google's search engine for keywords printed in these old issues of magazines SUCKS!!! So don't trust it - it misses a LOT! :-(
And lastly, the band's Wikipedia page states the following regarding "Forever Young", which caught my attention: "Amid reports that pop star Laura Branigan was featuring the song on her next album, Hold Me, Alphaville's "Forever Young" was re-released as a single in the US, but it did not prove to be massively popular...The Alphaville version was released a third time in the US in 1988..." After scouring multiple sources - including the old issues of Billboard, eBay, Discogs, etc. - I found absolutely NO evidence to support the comment that the single was actually released/promoted TWICE here in the U.S. back in late '84/early '85, prior to the re-launch in '88! So needless to say, I strongly question that claim...
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NightAire
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| Posted: 19 August 2014 at 9:25pm | IP Logged
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Absolutely amazing info; I can't thank you all enough!!!
I just lap this kind of history up... absolutely
fascinating.
I have to agree with the consensus: this song would have
entered the American consciousness in about March of
1985. (MTV ruled.)
P.S. - while I currently am focusing on the U.S. audience
(it is my biggest audience, and quite frankly I have my
hands full just tracking down everything that hit the
U.S. Billboard pop charts!), my hope is to one day expand
not only into "songs that hit on Cashbox but missed
Billboard" and British, Irish, and Australian 80s pop
charts, and possibly others.
...That's still a ways off. :-)
P.P.S. - I find it amusing that, even though I'm playing
from strictly the U.S. charts, we're Big In Japan
(*rimshot*), with them being our #3 biggest audience in
both tune-ins and minutes spent listening. (#1 is
U.S.A., U.K. is #2 for tune-ins and Canada is #2 for
minutes spent listening.)
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NightAire
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| Posted: 26 August 2014 at 10:38pm | IP Logged
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80smusicfreak, I think you may be on to something about
the chart run / MTV airplay. It peaked its second week
on the charts... so either MTV could read the writing on
the wall by the end of the second week, or MTV pulling
its airplay killed the song's chances at pop radio.
I knew MTV was powerful at the time; it's pretty amazing
to see what appears to be cause and effect like this.
FYI, the radio single re-release from '88 has the LP
version listed as 3:45, but after trimming the silence
(not much) and taking it to the absolute end of program
audio into the hiss, it runs 3:43.955.
It's almost a full second more audio than Jim quoted for
the 45, but you REALLY have to strain to hear it (I
cheated in the digital domain by boosting the volume to
check) and I suspect it was below the surface noise at
this point on the vinyl.
My impression is that they are identical length and
speed.
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80smusicfreak
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Currently slated to drop on January 20, 2015, as shown on Amazon: ALPHAVILLE - "SO80S Presents Alphaville (Curated by Blank & Jones)" It's a 2-CD set meant to celebrate the group's 30th anniversary, and is a European import. It will feature the (6:10) "Special Dance Version" of "Forever Young" as originally issued in 1984-85, as well as FOUR versions of the group's other U.S. hit, "Big in Japan": the (7:26) "Extended Re-Mix" (1984), the (6:00) "Extended Instrumental Mix" (1984), the (6:58) "Remix '88" (1988), and the (7:51) "Torsten Fenslau Remix" (appears to be a new mix for 2015)...
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Bellenger1981
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The "New Single Mix" is identical to the "Version
Rapide", originally released in 1985 on the 7" B-side of
the "Forever Young" single in France. So, this "New
Single Mix" was not a new edit re-created in 1988 in
order to promote the album/single. By the way, this "New
Single Mix" (AKA "Version Rapide") appears on the 2019
2-CD (and deluxe box set) reissue of the album.
Edited by Bellenger1981 on 01 November 2019 at 7:15pm
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Santi Paradoa
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Does the Napolean Dynamite soundtrack have the LP version on it? The consensus is the LP version is/was the "hit" version correct?
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aaronk
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I can dig out my Napoleon Dynamite soundtrack to find out for sure, but I'm nearly 100% certain it's the LP version.
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Topic: (O.T.) Alphaville - Forever Young
