Comments for Thompson Twins, Set

I find SET to be one of my most favourite of the TTwins albums, mainly due to the vocals by J. Leeway. To this day I still think his voice should have been more upfront and not so background.

The second album. By this time, Alannah Currie had returned to join the group permanently (while sax player Jane Shorter had left) and a new bassist was brought in, Matthew Seligman. Now the "Twins" were a seven piece band, still turning out their experimental pop. Renound producer Steve Lillywhite (U2, Simple Minds....) was selected. There is more evidence that the the band was trying to sound more textured than on the previous LP, but this album wasn''t any stronger than "A Product Of...", but it has some songs that are worth noting. One interesting fact is that Thomas Dolby plays additional synths on the album, and it sounds as though Tom Bailey might have learned a thing or two about synth techniques from Dolby, as Dolby''s influence can be heard, especially on the track "Runaway", one of the most beautiful songs on the album. "The Rowe" is a track that creates a calming mood with its soft intro, moody syths and dramatic build-ups to the next verse. "Fool''s Gold" is one of the tighter numbers, with a crisp, straightforward "poppy" sound, that gives you a hint at the bouncy commercial Twins of the mid-eighties. They still dabbled with African stylings, such as on the Leeway-penned "Tok Tok", followed by another Joe song, "Good Gosh", a fine display of absurdity, including sounds of bottles crashing against the floor. Now that I think of it, this would be a perfect track for Yoko Ono to cover! "Living In Europe" and "Bouncing" are 2 of the quirkiest tracks, and they sound like pure British guitar pop. "Blind" and "Crazy Dog" are the 2 tracks that are the least memorable, with their morbid melodies, they somewhat spoil the album. I thought I''d save my comments about the opening track ''till last. "In The Name Of Love" has a story: for some reason the band felt that the LP was one track short. So one day, Tom Bailey arrived at the studio with this song he had written to fill that gap. "in The Name Of Love" sounded comepletely different from anything they''ve ever done because it contained, gasp, perish the thought - synthesizers and a drum machine!? Unknowingly (to the band anyway), this song was released in the States where it climbed the US dance chart to #1 and stayed there for 5 weeks. Needless to say, the band, especially Bailey, Allannah Currie and Joe Leeway, were stunned. This is something they''ve actually never considered - having true success with the music. The rest of the band were less thrilled, partly because they were devided on how they felt about "In The Name Of Love" and its success. Seeing as that was the case, Bailey, Currie and Leeway left, and continued on as the 3rd and most successful incarnation of the Thompson Twins. "In The Name Of Love" helped them take off and make a little chart history.

The second Thompson Twins album. Most of the tracks along with two tracks from A Product of... have been taken and reworked and used to make the album In the Name of Love.