The Buggles
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The Buggles were a New Wave band formed in 1977 consisting of Geoff Downes (percussion, keyboards), Trevor Horn (bass guitar, guitar, percussion, vocals) and Bruce Woolley. Before their first release, Woolley left the band to form The Camera Club, which included Thomas Dolby and Hans Zimmer.
The Buggles shot to fame with their first single, "Video Killed the Radio Star", released in late 1979 to become the 444th number one in the UK charts. The novelty value of the song led to them being perceived as one-hit wonders, though follow up single "The Plastic Age" reached number 16, but its success was sufficient to launch both members of the band onto successful careers. The video for the song, directed by Russell Mulcahy, was the first video aired on MTV North America two years later, at 12:00 a.m. on August 1, 1981. There also was a Camera Club version of the song. The song appeared on the group's first album, The Age of Plastic (1980).
Later in 1980, Horn and Downes began work on a second album, working in a studio next door to Yes, who had recently lost vocalist Jon Anderson and keyboardist Rick Wakeman. The Buggles sought to sell a song to Yes, "We Can Fly from Here", but ended up joining the band, replacing Anderson and Wakeman, for the album Drama. "We Can Fly From Here" did not in fact appear on Drama, but the band did perform the song on the Drama tour, and a 1980 performance can be heard on Yes's The Word Is Live CD set (2005), along with another unreleased Buggles/Yes track from that era, "Go Through This."
With the break-up of Yes in early 1981, work resumed on the second Buggles album, but Downes soon left the group (going on to join his former Yes bandmate Steve Howe in Asia). Horn continued to work on the second album, Adventures in Modern Recording, with several new players. The album included the song "I am a Camera", an alternate version of "Into the Lens" from Drama.
The band's sound was characterized by a deliberately synthetic quality in keeping with the technological subject matter of their songs. Horn said he chose "The Buggles" for the band's name because "It was the most disgusting name I could think of at that time."
The Buggles never toured as such, being largely a studio creation. There were some performances for promotional purposes in support of the second album, but the first live outing by the original duo came in a low-key appearance in 1998 [link]. Later, an appearance at a charity show celebrating Horn's career as a producer in 2004 was billed as the band's first ever live appearance.
Discography
Singles
- Video Killed The Radio Star (1980) #1
- The Plastic Age (1980) #16
- Clean Clean (1980) #38
- Elstree (1980) #55
- Adventures In Modern Recording (1981)
Albums
- The Age of Plastic (1980)
- Adventures In Modern Recording (1981)
External links
- [Fan site]
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