GO WEST SHOW THEIR TRUE COLOURS LIVE AT THE ROBIN, BILSTON (2004)

English 80`s pop was never really my thing, i was more into american AOR and soft metal than stuff like SPANDAU BALLET, PSEUDO ECHO and DURAN DURAN. The closest i got to being a fan of english music growing up in the 80`s was the pop metal of DEF LEPPARD or the folky blues of DIRE STRAITS, with the odd exception. One of those exceptions was a GO WEST song called TRUE COLOURS, a rather offbeat melodic rock diversion for an otherwise synth pop band. Vocalist PETER COX and guitarist RICHARD DRUMMIE, along with 'unofficial' band member ALAN MURPHY, were one of the more accomplished and musically diverse pop bands coming out of England during the fairy floss 80`s, the band's 1985 self titled debut was a smash hit in the UK and sold quite well in the US too. Often tagged as being blue eyed soul as much as pop, the debut produced a trifecta of classic soulful pop classics - WE CLOSE OUR EYES, CALL ME and DONT LOOK DOWN. A re-mix album ensued the following year, the year after that GO WEST released their second album of new material called DANCING ON THE COUCH. In comparison to the debut, the album bombed commercially. Although it made the UK Top 20, none of the singles made any dent in the charts. Besides the pop song DONT LOOK BACK - THE SEQUEL, which wasn't actually on the UK release, one other fantastic song off DANCING ON THE COUCH, which lends quite heavily on ROBERT PALMER's then very fashionable beefed up pop rock is TRUE COLOURS. I couldn't track down the original 80`s album version on You Tube, but i found this one, a live performance of the song by Cox and Drummie and the band DEERAL, who i've never heard of before. The members of that band are GREG HAREWOOD, RICHARD BROOK and LYNDON CONNAH. It features on the KINGS OF WISHFUL THINKING live DVD, apparently! Very english, very stripped down and earthy compared to how the song sounds on DANCING ON THE COUCH. The sound volume of this vid lets it down a bit, my laptop speaker isn't exactly a sub woofer (laugh).