“Take On Me”
“Take On Me” by A-ha is an iconic hit of the Eighties. It got here out in October 1985 with an equally iconic music video that helped define the age of MTV. It hit #1 in the US and in international locations everywhere in the world. And it’s nonetheless massively fashionable at present. It presently has over two and a half billion streams on Spotify. So, with all of that, it’s straightforward to think about that this was all inevitable. However really, the tune took so many steps and missteps earlier than it turned the hit that everyone is aware of. I talked to Paul Waaktaar-Savoy from A-ha, who wrote the unique bones of the tune again when he was a youngster in Norway, years earlier than it got here out. The tune really got here out and flopped TWICE within the UK, earlier than it discovered a foothold within the US. So for this episode, Paul took me by way of the entire historical past of the tune, and all of the totally different variations that existed. And he instructed me how he and his bandmates, Magne Furuholmen and Morten Harket, pushed and pushed and persevered. “Take On Me” was their first single as a band, and it made them essentially the most profitable Norwegian pop group of all time.
You should purchase or stream “Take On Me” here.
Illustration by Carlos Lerma.
“Lesson One” – first demo model of “Take On Me”
Alan Tarney – producer & backing vocals
Gerry Kitchingham – mixer
Steve Barron – music video director
Bridges
“Aladdin Sane” by David Bowie
Joe Cocker
Melody Maker and Music Express magazines
John Ratcliff, Terry Slater, Andrew Wickham, Tony Mansfield, and Jeff Ayeroff
Fairlight CMI
PPG Wave synthesizer
Yamaha DX7 synthesizer
“Commuter” – movie
