My favorite song is unashamedly
“One Night in Bangkok” by the most talented Murray Head, which was released
in 1984 (four years before I was born). On a historic note, the song was
composed as a part of the musical Chess. It was written by the guys from ABBA (named Björn
and Benny in the great Scandinavian naming tradition), and Tim Rice, who is
apparently a big deal in musicals. But the history isn’t why I like this song. It
is hard to quantify all of the reasons I love this song, but I will do my best.
First off, is my incalculable
love of 80’s music. The 80’s seemed to be a time of rampant creativity in music
among other things. The new tools available to musicians, such as synthesizers
and music videos were being explored and experimented with to great effect at
the time. Musicians weren’t afraid to be different, and there was no formula to
what made a hit song. The songs are typically so packed to the gills with intensity
that I can’t resist getting into the mood of the music. 80’s musical also has
the super convenient feature that all of the bad music has been filtered out in
the intervening years, and only the very best samples still circulate today (not
to say that there aren’t plenty of good songs that don’t get radio time).
To be completely honest I may also like 80’s music, and 80’s culture in
general, because of some subconscious desire to be different and shun popular
culture of my own time. Clinging to the culture of the past is an easy way
to do that, but I’m not a psychologist so this is only speculation (like my
self-diagnosed case of Asperger’s). Not only does this song fall into my
favorite genre of music, it is also in a couple of my favorite sub-genres.
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| Murray is having none of it |
One Hit Wonders have a very
special place in my heart. The fact that a song is a band’s only hit typically
ensures that it is high quality. Many mediocre songs have become hits just
based on the artist’s reputation (I’m looking at you “Say Say Say”). For
a song to come out of nowhere and become popular across the world means that it
has to be something special. “One Night in Bangkok” is just such a wonder.1
Even I will admit that I don’t like any of Murray Head’s other songs, but that
just makes “One Night in Bangkok” even more amazing. Many bands that are called
One Hit Wonders had other popular songs (see Two Tribes, or I Wanna Rock), but they just happened not to hit the American Top 40, so they
aren’t technically hits. “One Night in Bangkok” is fairly stylistically
different from anything else that Murray Head did, so it's like he condensed
all of his raunchy 80’s goodness into one song and got solid gold. To specialize
even further, my favorite One Hit Wonders are the ones from European artist. Thomas Dolby, The Boomtown Rats, and Nena are all among my favorite
musicians, all of them European One Hit Wonders (the Nena thing is probably due
to the fact that I have a huge crush on Nena herself, possibly even more than I
like Sheena Easton). Murray Head just happens to have being British
going for him, which is nice. If you reduce my favorite music down
as far as you can go, you will get “One Night in Bangkok.” In other words, it
is my atomic favorite song.
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| Nena: still being sexy to this day |
I don’t just like “One Night in
Bangkok” because it is the single best representative of what kind of music I
like. The song itself is also an excellent analogy for my whole life. The song
tells the story of an American Chess player who finds himself at a world class chess
match taking place in Bangkok, Thailand. The American continuously states that
he's only interested in chess, while a chorus repeatedly describes the
pleasures of Bangkok that he's missing out on. This parallels my life story in
the aspect that I prefer to follow intellectual pursuits, while seemingly
everyone around me pushes the importance of physical pleasures. My chess game
just happens to be activities like reading about philosophy or playing video games at home,
and my Bangkok is the much humbler night life of South Dakota. It may just be
the common plight of the nerdy introvert, but this song really speaks to me.
When I hear the American’s annoyed tone at having to explain why he's happy
with what he's doing, I know exactly how he feels. The whole song can be
summed up in my favorite line, “I get my kicks above the waistline, sunshine.”
I will quote that line at the drop of a hat, since it expresses my lifestyle
perfectly, and has a much better ring to it than “I don’t drink, I don’t smoke,
I don’t like casual sex, but I do like science fiction novels.” The song also
has other great lines and great rhymes. Other favorites are “This grips me more
than would a; muddy old river or Reclining Buddha” or “I’d let
you watch, I would invite you; but the queens we use would not excite you.”
There are also an epic intro buildup, some good Thailand puns, and Murray’s
American accent is entertaining all by itself. Basically, what is not to love
about this song? I rate it a Chess King.
[1] Authors Note: While doing research for
this post I found out the Murray Head another hit song with “Superstar”, from Jesus Christ Superstar, that made it to
#14 in the U.S. in 1971. That was way back in the 70’s though, so I’m still willing to call
“One Night in Bangkok” a One Hit Wonder within the boundary of the 1980’s.
