In 1983, Bananarama began the task of producing the difficult "Second Album". While commercially successful, their first album Deep Sea Skiving had tagged the band with a reputation of being a 'covers' group. They were also dogged with the age-old "can't-sing-can't-dance" criticisms. The girls were determined to create a record tat would silence their critics for good.
Where, Deep Sea Skiving had been produced by a variety of producers, the girls set to work with 80s combo Jolley & Swain to record the album. Spurred on by the success of Deep Sea Skiving AND the wish to be seen as more serious about music, Bananarama, the album is perhaps the group's only album to try and tackle more challenging topics. But it's an area the girls themselves struggled with:
"We were weaned on the punk thing and just because we’re not making records like “Anarchy In The UK” doesn’t mean we haven’t got integrity. We just say what we want to and if it’s political then it’s political, and if it’s not then it’s not. We don’t go out of our way not to be political, although we did at first but I think that’s just embarrassment at expressing your own opinions. Look, I’d write about Northern Ireland if I could find some decent way of doing it. There’s no point in sloganeering. I think it stinks when people use a political situation to be ‘hip’ or whatever." (Siobhan NME 1983)
It would be a battle the group would finally concede with the Britsh Press, Bananarama revieved mixed reviews, although some of the singles released from the album are amongst their most memorable (Cruel Summer, Robert De Niro's Waiting). The album did fairly well in the UK Charts where it reached #16 in April of 1984. In Canada, the album was released featuring a new track "The Wild Life" which was written for a movie of the same name. Sadly, the movie didn't do as well as their previous soundtrack smash hit, Cruel Summer from The Karate Kid (1984).
UK
1983 Decca RAMA2
Released: April 1984
UK chart position: 16
