It’s 1978 and Paul Young is the Toast of the town; that is, he’s a square and his music is crumby. “Toast” is an unholy slice of inarticulate spoken nonsense, put to a sub-Stray Cats accompaniment. It describes the young Mr Young’s lifelong love of the foodstuff toast and, in trying to sound droll and surreal, simply sounds utterly banal.

Given this evidence, who could have known that Paul Young would go on to become Luton’s most successful recording artist? Not counting David Arnold, of course, and his soundalike soundtrack franchise (less “This Film’s Crap, Let’s Slash The Seats”, more “This LPs Shit, Let’s Slash That Arnold Twat”).

Anyway, apart from the sheer inanity of Toast, Paul Young will always be remembered for his:

– inexplicable string of early eighties top ten hits (cf: Shakin Stevens)
– singing/spoiling of the first line in “Do They Know It’s Christmas”
– remarkable haircut, as seen on the seven thousand unwanted copies of “No Parlez” in the basement of Notting Hill Record and Tape Exchange and in many barber shop windows.

Previous post

Next post