“Relax” is the debut single by Frankie Goes to Hollywood, released in the United Kingdom by ZTT Records in 1983. Although fairly inauspicious upon initial release, “Relax” finally reached number one on the UK singles chart on 24 January 1984, ultimately becoming the seventh best-selling single in the UK Singles Chart’s history. Following the release of the group’s second single, “Two Tribes”, “Relax” climbed back up the UK charts to re-attain number-two spot behind “Two Tribes” at number one, representing simultaneous chart success by a single act unprecedented since the early 1960’s. (More from Wikipedia)
Other 1970’s recordings have danced around gay issues, such as Rod Stewart’s 1976 minor hit “The Killing of Georgie” – about the murder of a gay friend of his in New York back when he was in Faces – and it was an open secret that Freddie Mercury was gay though closeted; he was the frontman of a band called Queen after all. It was many years later though before openly gay songs and performers would arrive on the popular music scene, such as British musician Tom Robinson in the late 1970’s (he collaborated with Peter Gabriel on one EP that I own), and mid-1980’s sensation Frankie Goes to Hollywood. By the way, it is interesting that the first hit songs by arguably the two most famous Liverpool rock bands – the Beatles’ “Please Please Me” and Frankie Goes to Hollywood’s “Relax” – deal fairly openly with the topic of oral sex.
(March 2013)
