Put The Needle On The Record - Week #50

Put The Needle On The Record Week #50 The Human League - Travelogue.

For this weeks feature we go back to May 1980 and The Human League album "Travelogue".

"Travelogue" was the second album released by The Human Leage, the follow up to their debut "Reproduction". This was the last album released by the original line-up of The Human League before the big split, Phil Oakey continued under The Human League name with a new line up and retained the services of Adrian Wright, whilst Martyn Ware and Ian Craig Marsh went on to form Heaven 17, it was a very acrimonious split and time doesn't seemed to have eased relationships.

"Travelogue" is once again one of my all time favourite albums, I just love the sounds and the structures of the songs and believe me, there are some bloody good songs to be found on the album, "The Touchables" (how this wasn't a single I will never know), "Dreams Of Leaving", "The Black Hit Of Space" and the brilliant closing track "WXJL Tonight", one of my favouyrite tracks of all time.

The album has aged incredibly well considering it is nearly 45 years old!

Surprisingly only two singles were released from the album, "Only After Dark", which actually wasn't a single in the true sense as Virgin Records decided to release "Empre State Human" as a single, a track on their album "Reproduction" and package the pressed copies of "Only After Dark" as a free single with the first 15,000 copies of the "Empire State Human" single and "Being Boiled", a re-recorded version which formed part of the "Holiday '80" EP, which also included the tracks "Marianne" (a track that should have been on the "Travelogue" album), "Dancevision" and a medley of "Rock 'n' Roll" and "Nightclubbing" (which reached number 56 in the UK singles chart).

The album reached number 16 in the UK album chart.

Track Listing

The Black Hit Of Space
Only After Dark
Life Kills
Dreams Of Leaving
Toyota City
Crow And A Baby
The Touchables
Gordon's Gin
Being Boiled
WXJL Tonight

If you have this album in your collection, dig it out and give it a spin