Rarely has a band changed direction quite so radically, frequently and successfully as The Thompson Twins.

First formed in punk’s Year Zero of ’77, they found success as a synth trio in the mid-80s. But before that they were playing New Wave music similar to XTC.

In between, for a year or two, they became a guitar band.

That’s when they recorded this single, and it’s still the best; much more to my taste than their synthy pop hits like Hold Me Now, Love On Your Side and the novelty-ish We Are Detective, and better than those early jerky New Wave efforts.

The Thompson Twins were, of course, not twins, not siblings, and not even a duo, but were named after the Tintin cartoon characters.
They formed in Sheffield back in punk’s Year Zero of ’77, when Tom Bailey from Halifax met a wannabe actor called Joe Leeway, though Joe didn’t join them until five years later.

At first they were a trio of Bailey on vocals and keyboards, guitarists Pete Dodd and John Roog, and a drummer called ‘Pod’ but by the time they moved to London in 1980 Pod had been replaced by Chris Bell and they had expanded to include Jane Shorter on sax.

I think I first saw them in 1980 or ’81, by which time they were squatting in Clapham. Mainly what I remember about them is that there were six or seven of them on stage, they wore big baggy clothes, and sported big messy hair. Well, it was the early ’80s.

By then Shorter had moved on and been replaced by Bailey’s girlfriend on percussion and vocals, along with ex- Soft Boys bass guitarist Matthew Seligman (Bailey switching to keyboards) and – at last – Leeway on congas.

They had already released a couple of singles, Squares And Triangles and She’s In Love With Mystery, both of which really could be by XTC, on their own Dirty Discs label.

But this is my favourite period, producing a trio of excellent singles – Perfect Game, Politics, and the African-influenced Animal Laugh (Oumma Aularesso), before they downsized again in 1982.

Back to a trio of Bailey, Currie and Leeway (and, for a brief period, Thomas Dolby), they leapt aboard the synthpop bandwagon and found the chart success that had eluded them until then.

They called it a day in 1993, when they changed their name to Babble and changed direction once again, this time to dub-influenced chill-out music, but broke up again three years later.