Paul Carrack hasn’t been a regular band member for ages but has a thriving solo career and has worked with everybody. And the song “Open,” apparently about a wedding, is very upbeat and life-affirming.ĭifford and Tilbrook are still very much the driving force behind the band. I listened to it and it’s good! The title song is on pat with some of their best. In late 2015, the band released an album called Cradle to the Grave which was well-received. It looks they’re touring the UK in late 2017. It’s only the record companies and Wikipedia that seem to care.)Īnd while I had completely lost touch with the comings and goings of the band, it turns out they are very much still around (after the usual break-ups and reformings.) According to their web site, I just missed them in Boston a couple months ago. Carrack sang their later hit “Tempted.” They also had a hit with “Annie Get Your Gun” and “Breakfast in Bed.” (I don’t know nor much care how many of these were really hits.
![squeeze band squeeze band](https://lastfm.freetls.fastly.net/i/u/ar0/e17d7ce35fb94797a39b77d1e0bcebc9.jpg)
Jools Holland left the band in 1980 for a successful solo career and was replaced by Paul Carrack who had been a member of Roxy Music.
![squeeze band squeeze band](https://ambijans.files.wordpress.com/2012/03/squeeze-band.jpg)
One was called “Bang Bang” and the other was a little, wonderful, melodic ditty with a great chorus called “Take Me I’m Yours.” This song made it into the UK Top Twenty and got – and still gets – a lot of FM play in the States: I will now let AllMusic tell the tale: “Cale terrorized Squeeze, throwing out all of their existing material and insisting that they write new music on the spot, preferably songs that followed his half-baked idea of positioning the group as a bunch of “Gay Guys,” after his suggested title for the album.” (?)Īs it happens, the label liked only two songs which were the ones the band themselves produced. Their debut album called, what else, Squeeze (alternatively UK Squeeze), was released in March 1978. This recording was good enough to get them a contract with A&M records. To me they sound very much like early Police, especially the third song. (Standard packet of condoms if you absolutely must know.) This EP was punkier (is that a word?) than their subsequent output as if they were trying to fit into the current scene. Interestingly, the Velvet Underground’s John Cale produced their first EP (1977), Packet of Three. (I had no fucking idea they were named after a 1973 Velvet Underground album till I researched this. The band was originally called UK Squeeze but eventually dropped the ‘UK.’ There were some legal issues with another band that had a similar name. In their heyday of the late 1970’s, they were often compared to Lennon and McCartney (even their web site says it under ‘History’), due not only to their songwriting skills but also their harmony singing. Spawned in Deptford, an area of SE London, Squeeze’ original members were Chris Difford (guitar/vocals), Paul Gunn (drums), Julian “Jools” Holland (keyboard/vocals), Harry Kakoulli (bass), Glenn Tilbrook (guitar, vocals).ĭifford and Tilbrook formed the band and became its primary songwriters. Who doesn’t love Squeeze? Nobody I think.