Everything went really fast. Moroder, the genius producer taught us so much, not least about working strict hours in the studio, fueled by endless expressos and the fact that he had such great people working with him, made it all look so easy. We met Sparks there and Moroder was recording the Top Gun soundtrack at the same time in the other studio next door. I still swear he nicked the tune for Take my Breath Away from our Sex Bomb Boogie!!
My biggest problem was the movie samples element used so brilliantly on “Love Missile.” Now the lawyer hounds were watching my every move and at the very hint of a recognisable sample everyone jumped all over me.
We put ourselves in Moroder’s hands. I had no choice because the clock was ticking.
I bought loads of Japanese Robot toys in Japan town in L.A which is where the sleeve design came from with its manga / Robot toy design. I was always on the look out for anything new.
The album may have been recorded in a rush but as a live band we were match fit , having played the songs continuously for the past year and knowing the demos inside out. But still as we drove back to LAX airport I left Hollywood with the beginning of a heavy feeling in my heart that I was to get to know so well. I was having the time of my life, but there just wasn’t time to get everything perfect anymore. I was gradually loosing control of my baby but for my own sanity I had to let it go, to be less pedantic about every minute detail and to care less. Any artist will tell you that is fatal.
Back in the UK we shot a video for 21st Century Boy, ready for it’s release in May. The five years of ideas and plundering that I had funneled into the Love Missile promo were not around for the second single. Yes we could play with the Sputnik Corporation / Big Business fantasy and we hired Limos and helicopters to illustrate a day in the life of those fun loving, consumer electronic Sputniks, but the video lacked a true narrative which had informed Missile.
I’d done so many TV shows all over Europe by now, talked so much that I lived the Love Missile story in my sleep now. How could we possibly top that with the next one? No one else seemed worried. Not that I asked. Someone asked me the other day what I thought about the others at that time and I had to say, as I have said earlier, that I didn’t think about them, not at all, except if they were late, which was every time, and then of course no one said a thing.
