MY LIFE IN VINYL
If anyone could be said to define the sound of British pop in the 80s, it would be Trevor Horn. If the idea that someone who had previously earned a living playing in the band on Come Dancing would be the architect of the most forwardthinking pop of the decade seems unlikely, it’s nevertheless true. After hits with The Buggles, and an even more unlikely stint with progrockers Yes, he became a full-time producer, working with Dollar in 1982, which led to one of pop’s great imperial periods.
The Horn sound, where dazzling sonic modernity was lavished on great songwriting, became emblematic of one of pop’s golden eras, applied to old rockers reinventing themselves (Yes’s Owner Of A Lonely Heart), young guns in search of their first hit (ABC, Frankie Goes To Hollywood), sophisticated art pop (Propaganda, The Art Of Noise) and cross-cultural collisions (Malcolm McLaren’s Duck Rock). It’s one of British pop’s great CVs.
Sitting in the conservatory of his London home, looking in over his basement studio, Horn reflects on his life and career to select 10 albums that shaped his view of what music could be and how he put that view into practice.
THE BEATLES
WITH THE BEATLES
Parlophone
NOVEMBER 1963