The Associates were a Scottish Post-punk and New wave band from the early '80s, consisting of Billy Mackenzie and Alan Rankine. Under the name The Associates, they achieved Top of the Pops fame, despite their unconventional approach to pop music which inspired music critics to label it as "new pop."
Mackenzie and Rankine met in 1976 and formed the band The Ascorbic Ones and soon after they changed their name to The Associates. Their debut single was David Bowie’s song “Boys Keep Swinging”, which to great surprise was also released before Bowie’s version. This song attracted a good deal of attention and by 1980, they were touring with The Cure and The Passions and were signed to Fiction.
In the same year, the band released their debut The Affectionate Punch. By this time the duo was extended to a group by adding bassist Michael Dempsey and drummer John Murphy, even though in most promotional material the group were still marketed as a duo.
The Associates' breakthrough came in 1982 with the release of the single "Party Fears Two." Riding the wave of synth-pop popularity at the time, the song reached No. 9 on the UK singles chart. Following this success, two more hits emerged: "18 Carat Love Affair" and "Club Country." Martha Ladly, of Martha and the Muffins, contributed backing vocals and keyboards to this album. Sulk became Melody Maker's Album of the Year.
The Associates disbanded in 1982 just before the Sulk Tour. Billy Mackenzie continued to write and record music under The Associates banner until 1990 and then under his own name. However, without the guiding hand of Rankine, recordings were sporadic and arguably failed to reach the majesty or inventiveness of his earlier work. Alan Rankine on the other side recorded three albums and singles until the end of the decade without any big success, but continuously worked as producer with Paul Haig and Winston Tong.
In 1988, WEA/Warner rejected the fourth Associates album The Glamour Chase considering it not commercially viable. Mackenzie signed to AVL/Virgin subsidiary Circa Records, to release the fifth Associates album Wild and Lonely. However, recordings were sporadic and subsequent records failed to reach the UK chart and sold far fewer than their/his early albums.
Between 1987 and 1992, Mackenzie worked with Blank and musical partner Dieter Meier of Swiss avant-garde outfit Yello. Mackenzie wrote the lyrics of the song "The Rhythm Divine". In 1992, Mackenzie released an electronica-influenced solo album, Outernational, for Circa Records with limited success.
Before Mackenzie's death, almost all Associates records had been deleted. Former band member Michael Dempsey and the MacKenzie estate began a reissue programme to make sure the band's legacy continued, reissuing almost every Associates album, including a 25th anniversary edition of The Affectionate Punch in 2005.
The Tom Doyle book The Glamour Chase: The Maverick Life of Billy Mackenzie, first published in 1998 and reissued in 2011, documented the band's career and Mackenzie's subsequent life.
Alan Rankine use to be a lecturer in music at Stow College in Glasgow, and worked with Belle and Sebastian on their debut album, Tigermilk. Rankine died on 3 January 2023 at age 64.
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