Wow, that's a disgrace. I see that I haven't published one of these since last April. I had no idea I was so far behind. Anyway, let's talk about The Go-Go's and why they're on the My Favorite Artists list.
The Go-Go's are the most successful all-female band of all time, and this in spite of an amazingly small discography. Their entire recorded output basically consists of three studio albums released between 1981 and 1984, a compilation album that included some interesting early and unreleased stuff plus a successful new single in 1991, an excellent studio album that most people (except for hardcore Go-Go's fans) were unaware of in 2001, and a slightly successful single released in 2020 in conjunction with a documentary film about the band.
In spite of this, The Go-Go's have remained a popular touring band practically since their inception in 1978, except for some time off here and there, and their lineup has mostly remained consistent. Their classic lineup consists of Belinda Carlisle on lead vocals, Jane Wiedlin on backing vocals and rhythm guitar, Charlotte Caffey on lead guitar, keyboards and backing vocals, Kathy Valentine on bass, backing vocals and guitar, and Gina Schock on drums and backing vocals. And if you read their bios, you'll see that these gals have definitely taken a lickin' (drugs, sex, drugs, more drugs, etc.) and kept on tickin'.
In many ways, The Go-Go's are an unusual band. We'll start with the obvious - there just haven't been that many successful all-female rock bands that have played their own instruments, written their own music, etc.. Offhand, I can think of The Bangles, Sleater-Kinney, L7 ... I suppose it depends on how you define successful. (Even The Runaways are largely known today because of the careers Joan Jett and Lita Ford had after the group broke up.) You get my point - The Go-Go's are the queens of a pretty selective sub-category of rock and roll.
Then there's the structure of the band. Belinda Carlisle is the face of the band, and clearly their most successful member in terms of name recognition, the success of her solo career, etc. However, behind the scenes, Caffey, Valentine and Wiedlin did the lion's share of the songwriting. Don't get me wrong, Carlisle's vocals were and are hugely important to the group's success. But of those big first three albums that are responsible for The Go-Go's' fame and popularity, Carlisle only even received partial songwriting credits for her lyrics on a handful of tracks.
So how did a band with such a light recording output make the My Favorite Artists list, and do it slam-dunk style. Let me count the ways.
The first is the most obvious. I've made it clear in the past that I'm all about the vocals, and also that I've got a soft spot in particular for female singers. And this band has vocals up the wazoo. Belinda has always been a distinctive and very appealing lead singer. (Well, maybe not always, but we'll come back to that later.) The Go-Go's were pop punk before there was such a thing as pop-punk, and Belinda's cute little guttural growls fit their music perfectly. Add to that the fact that Jane Wiedlin is a fairly effective singer herself and all three of the other band members are also competent vocalists, and you've got a smorgasbord of sonic delight.
Next up is the songwriting. Once again, although their catalog is relatively small compared to a lot of other bands, its chock full of well written pop rock tunes. Consider if you will such tracks as "We Got the Beat", "Vacation", "Head Over Heals", "Our Lips Are Sealed" - these were some of the highlights of the early 1980's. The Go-Go's started as a punk band, and they never totally lost touch with the power of rock music - they just figured out how to imbue it with hooks.
Because their discography is so sparse, let's take a look at it album by album. Their first effort, 1981's Beauty and the Beat, was the LP that hoisted them to fame, and rightly so. Caffey's classic "We Got the Beat" was a #2 hit in the U.S., and was famously used in the opening sequence of Amy Heckerling's film Fast Times at Ridgemont High. (This was the film that launched Sean Penn's career, but let's forgive it for that.) Wiedlin and her former lover Terry Hall's song "Our Lips Are Sealed" was also a successful single, coming in at #20 on the Billboard charts. The LP also contained such other popular '80s songs as "Lust to Love", "This Town" and "Skidmarks on My Heart". The album itself reached #1 on Billboard, and has since gone double platinum. After the release of Beauty and the Beat, The Go-Go's were a world-famous band.
Their second album, Vacation, was a great deal less consistent, probably because the band was exhausted after the touring, hubbub, etc. leading up to and following Beauty and the Beat. Nevertheless, the title track was another iconic hit, reaching #8 on the Billboard charts, and it also had some other fine songs, including "Girl of 100 Lists," "Beatnik Beach", "Cool Jerk" (which was a cover of a 1960s song by The Capitols) and "Get Up and Go" (which achieved only minor success as a single). Vacation charted #8 in the U.S. on the Billboard album charts.
The Go-Go's third album, Talk Show, is really the one responsible for rocketing them onto my My Favorite Artist's list. For a long while, I would have told you that I thought it was the best overall album of the 1980s. In recent years, I've moderated that a little, and I now place Synchronicity by The Police and The Unforgettable Fire by U2 slightly above it. Nevertheless, it's still in the conversation for me as far as the best albums of the 1980s. It starts off on a high (and highly energetic) note with "Head Over Heels", which was the band's third most successful single of all time, and as far as I'm concerned, it never lets up. Other standout tracks include the LP's two other singles, "Turn to You" and "Yes or No", as well as Jane Wiedlin's "Forget That Day" and the slow but powerful "I'm With You". Talk Show reached #18 on the Billboard album chart.
After that, drugs, personality conflicts and exhaustion let to a breakup. This lasted until 1990, when they reunited for a benefit concert and a rerecording of "Cool Jerk" for a greatest hits comp. They reunited again in 1994 for the compilation LP Return to the Valley of The Go-Go's, which included a number of fun rarities including a live version of "Johnny Are You Queer?" (which they were the first band to ever perform live) and three newly recorded tracks. One of these, "The Whole World Lost Its Head", was another successful single. This kick-started the resumption of The Go-Go's' touring career.
Now that they were back together, in 2001, The Go-Go's released their final LP (to date), God Bless The Go-Go's. The album did come in at #57 on the Billboard albums chart, and honestly, quality-wise, it was probably as good as anything else the band had ever done. But by now there was a whole new generation dominating the music scene, and their one single from the LP, "Unforgiven", co-written by Charlotte Caffey and Billie Joe Armstrong of Green Day fame, never really gained any traction in the charts, fine though it was.
In the meantime, in between Go-Go's tours, all of the ladies have had solo careers. Belinda's has obviously been the most successful - with strong charting singles like "Heaven Is a Place on Earth", "I Get Weak" and "Mad About You", and several albums (especially her earlier solo efforts) selling quite well too. Wiedlin has had some moderate success herself, her highest-charting single being "Rush Hour" (at #9), and honestly, her Very Best Of comp is as strong a collection of songs as you could possibly ask for. The other ladies have also continued to stay active, playing in bands like The Graces (Caffey), House of Schock (Schock. Duh.) and The BlueBonnets and The Delphines (Valentine).
As for their reunion tours, I've seen them live twice. I saw them at Jones Beach in 2000, and they were excellent. I saw them again at The Westbury Music Fair in 2002, and at first, I was disappointed that the sound man had the instruments cranked up so loud that it drowned out Belinda's vocals. Then when I listened more closely, I realized that it was probably by design - she didn't sound great, and I assumed she had blown out her voice like Ian Anderson. Years later, when I read her autobiography Lips Unsealed: A Memoir, I realized that was probably when she was going through one of her struggling-with-addictions periods. I've heard clips of her singing after that, and her voice was fine (although in recent years, she's lost a step to age. But so have I.) Denise and I had tickets to see them live in 2020. Unfortunately, the pandemic put the kibosh on that.
The Go-Go's have added a few new lines to their resumes recently. Their music was made into a Broadway Musical, Head Over Heels, in 2018. They were the subject of a documentary film in 2020 (for which they released their first new single since 2001, "Club Zero"). And most recently, they were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2021.
To wrap it up, although they only ever released just the four studio albums, the quality of those LPs was so high as to easily move The Go-Go's onto the list of My Favorite Artists. Belinda is still scheduled to be on the 80's Cruise that Denise and I will be sailing on this coming March, so maybe I'll even run into her then. Although I have no idea what I'd say to her - unless she cuts me off on the buffet line! Then I'll have plenty to say to her.
Next up in this series is a band that has gone through several incarnations: Fleetwood Mac!
