TOP 2O GREATEST SINGLES BY 80S ACTORS
NOT CONTENT WITH FAME IN MOVIES AND TV, CHARTS IN THE 80S WERE AWASH WITH THESPIAN INTERLOPERS…
JON O’BRIEN
Actors moonlighting as pop stars wasn’t strictly an 80s development. Who can forget Telly ‘Kojak’ Savalas’ hitting No.1 in 1975 with his erm, interesting, spoken-word rendition of If, for example? But it was the following decade where pretty muchevery other thespian – from soap opera regulars to Hollywood A-listers – who could hold a note seemed to make a bid for the charts. Ignoring anyone already renowned as a double threat at the time, here’s a countdown of the era’s most listenable (and a few unlistenable) side hustles.
2O
NICK BERRY
EVERY LOSER WINS
Several years before his rendition of Buddy Holly’s Heartbeat instantly gave everyone that Sunday night dread, Nick Berry harnessed the power of another prime-time ratings hit to kickstart his intermittent music career. Co-penned by EastEnders’ theme tune composer Simon May, Every Loser Wins spent three weeks at the top of the UK charts in 1986. But its greeting card sentiments and schmaltzy melodies were first performed at the piano by Berry’s floppy-haired pin-up Wicksy in the Queen Vic.
19
DAVID HASSELHOFF
LOOKING FOR FREEDOM
Originally a local hit for Schlager singer Tony Marshall 10 years earlier, David Hasselhoff’s Looking For Freedom spent eight weeks at the top of the German charts in 1988. Despite his “Big in Deutschland” reputation, the self-parodying Baywatch star only scored a further two Top 10 hits in the country. But hovering above the Brandenburg Gate in a bucket crane, his memorable New Year’s Eve performance of the cornball anthem ensured that The Hoff would somehow always remain synonymous with the East-West reunification.
18
LETITIA DEAN AND PAUL MEDFORD SOMETHING OUTA NOTHING
Good ol’ Wicksy actually had a hand in this low-rent Five Star knockoff, too. The cheeky chappy ‘wrote’ the track as a member of EastEnders’ supergroup The Banned before leaving over that age-old problem of creative differences. Sharon (Letitia Dean), Kelvin (Paul Medford) and Ian (Adam Woodyatt) had no qualms about entering the song for the talent contest sponsored by who else but Walford Savings Bank (although a spot of self-sabotage denied them victory).