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Robert Frederick Zenon Geldof is an Irish singer-songwriter and political activist. He rose to prominence in the late 1970s as the lead singer of the Irish rock band the Boomtown Rats, who achieved popularity as part of the punk rock movement. The band had UK number one hits with his co-compositions "Rat Trap" and "I Don't Like Mondays". Geldof starred as Pink in Pink Floyd's 1982 film Pink Floyd – The Wall. As a fundraiser, Geldof organised the charity supergroup Band Aid and the concerts Live Aid and Live 8, and co-wrote "Do They Know It's Christmas?", one of the best-selling singles to date.
The Boomtown Rats are an Irish new wave band originally formed in Dublin in 1975. Between 1977 and 1985, they had a series of Irish and UK hits including "Like Clockwork", "Rat Trap", "I Don't Like Mondays" and "Banana Republic". The original line-up comprised six musicians; five from Dún Laoghaire in County Dublin; Gerry Cott, Simon Crowe (drums), Johnnie Fingers (keyboards), Bob Geldof (vocals) and Garry Roberts, plus Fingers' cousin Pete Briquette (bass). The Boomtown Rats broke up in 1986, but reformed in 2013, without Fingers or Cott. Garry Roberts died in 2022. The band's fame and notability have been overshadowed by the charity work of frontman Bob Geldof, a former journalist with the New Musical Express.
"Do They Know It's Christmas?" is a charity song written in 1984 by Bob Geldof and Midge Ure to raise money for the 1983–1985 famine in Ethiopia. It was first recorded by Band Aid, a supergroup assembled by Geldof and Ure consisting of popular British and Irish musical acts. It was recorded in a single day at Sarm West Studios in Notting Hill, London, in November 1984.
The Boomtown Rats is the debut album by Irish rock band The Boomtown Rats, released in September 1977. It included the Rats' first hit single, "Lookin' After No. 1", as well as the subsequent single, "Mary of the 4th Form". The album peaked at No. 18 in the UK Albums Chart in 1977.
A Tonic for the Troops is the second album by Irish rock band the Boomtown Rats, released in June 1978.
The Fine Art of Surfacing is the third album by Irish rock band the Boomtown Rats, released on 5 October 1979. The album peaked at No. 7 on the UK Albums Chart in 1979.
Mondo Bongo was the Boomtown Rats' fourth album. It peaked at No. 6 in the UK Albums Chart in February 1981, and No. 116 in the US Billboard 200. This is the band's last album to be recorded as six-piece band, as the guitarist Gerry Cott left the band shortly after the album's release.
The Best of the Boomtown Rats featured 19 of The Boomtown Rats best known work. A DVD was also available.
Patrick Martin Cusack, known by the stage name Pete Briquette, is an Irish bassist, record producer and composer. He is a member of the Boomtown Rats and has also played in Bob Geldof's band.
Philip Neil Wainman is an English record producer and songwriter, primarily active in the 1970s. He is noted for his work with Sweet, XTC, Dollar, Mud, and the Bay City Rollers. His greatest chart success, however, was the production of "I Don't Like Mondays" by the Boomtown Rats, written by Bob Geldof and arranged by Fiachra Trench.
"Rat Trap" is a single by The Boomtown Rats which reached No. 1 in the UK Singles Chart for two weeks in November 1978, the first single by a punk or new wave act to do so. It was written by Bob Geldof, and produced by Robert John "Mutt" Lange. It replaced "Summer Nights", a hit single for John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John from the soundtrack of Grease, at number one in the UK chart after the latter's seven-week reign.
"I Don't Like Mondays" is a song by Irish new wave group the Boomtown Rats about the Cleveland Elementary School shooting in San Diego. It was released in 1979 as the lead single from their third album, The Fine Art of Surfacing. The song was a number-one single in the UK Singles Chart for four weeks during the summer of 1979, and ranks as the sixth-biggest hit of the UK in 1979. Written by Bob Geldof and Johnnie Fingers, the piano ballad was the band's second single to reach number one on the UK chart.
Loudmouth – The Best of Bob Geldof and the Boomtown Rats is a 1994 greatest hits compilation album from Bob Geldof and the Boomtown Rats, consisting mostly of Boomtown Rats material but also some of Geldof's solo work. It peaked at No. 10 in the UK Albums Chart in July 1994.
"Banana Republic" was the first single from The Boomtown Rats' album Mondo Bongo. It peaked at number three in the UK Singles Chart.
"Like Clockwork" is a single by The Boomtown Rats. It was the band's first to reach the Top Ten in the UK Singles Chart, peaking at No. 6.
"She's So Modern" is a song by The Boomtown Rats. It was the first single taken from the band's second album A Tonic for the Troops, whose title comes from a line in this song: "Charlie ain't no Nazi, she just likes to wear her leather boots, 'cos it's exciting for the veterans and it's a tonic for the troops". The single continued the Rats' high-energy post-punk/new wave sound that had typified earlier releases, but its fame would later be eclipsed by that of the band's more ballad-like global hit "I Don't Like Mondays". It has been described as "harmlessly smirking bubblegum a la The Knack".
"Mary of the 4th Form" is the second single by The Boomtown Rats. It was the first song taken from the band's first album The Boomtown Rats but the single is a different, re-recorded version from that on the album and 19 seconds longer. On French and Dutch releases of the single, "Do the Rat" was the A-side. The song's theme, of a teacher's sexual attraction to a pubescent girl, who behaves in an overtly sexual manner, was resonated in the Police song "Don't Stand So Close to Me".
"Lookin' After No. 1" is the first single by The Boomtown Rats. It appears on their first album The Boomtown Rats. The single was released in August 1977 after the band had performed a five-date tour supporting Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers. "Lookin' After No. 1" was the first so-called new wave single to be playlisted by the BBC and the Boomtown Rats subsequently became the first New Wave band to be offered an appearance on Top of the Pops, performing the song. The song reached number 2 on the Irish Singles Chart and spent nine weeks in the UK Singles Chart reaching a peak of number 11. Different covers were produced for releases in the Netherlands and Japan. Reviewer David Clancy described the song as having a "breakneck sneering selfishness".
The discography of Irish new wave group The Boomtown Rats consists of seven studio albums, seven compilation albums, 23 singles and three video albums. The Boomtown Rats' debut release was the 1977 single "Lookin' After No. 1" which was originally written by frontman Bob Geldof in 1975 while waiting for his local unemployment office to open in his native Dun Laoghaire then a major port an hour south of central Dublin. The group's next single "Mary of the 4th Form" was released in the same year, along with their self-titled debut album.
Back to Boomtown: Classic Rats Hits is the fifth greatest hits album by Irish band The Boomtown Rats. It was released by Virgin EMI on 9 September 2013. The album was announced in June 2013 along with news of the band's UK and Ireland tour. Back to Boomtown: Classic Rats Hits is the first album to be released since The Boomtown Rats reunited and the band's first greatest hits album since 2003's The Best of The Boomtown Rats. The album contains fourteen of the group's singles, as well as two new tracks, "The Boomtown Rats" and "Back To Boomtown". The digital version of the album features two additional songs. Following its release, Back to Boomtown: Classic Rats Hits debuted at number thirty-five on the Irish Albums Chart.
References
- 1 2 3 "Boomtown Rats, The - Someone's Looking At You (Vinyl) at Discogs". Discogs.com. Retrieved 2014-04-10.
- ↑ "Music Week" (PDF). p. 18.
- ↑ DeGagne, Mike. "Someone's Looking at You by The Boomtown Rats - Track Info | AllMusic". allmusic. Retrieved 5 March 2023.
- ↑ William Ruhlmann. "The Boomtown Rats | Biography". AllMusic. Retrieved 2014-04-10.
- ↑ Roberts, David (2006). British Hit Singles & Albums (19th ed.). London: Guinness World Records Limited. p. 71. ISBN 1-904994-10-5.
- ↑ Archived July 9, 2009, at the Wayback Machine
- ↑ "Top RPM Singles: Issue 9488b." RPM . Library and Archives Canada.
- ↑ "The Irish Charts – Search Results – Someone's Looking At You". Irish Singles Chart.
- ↑ "The Boomtown Rats – Someone's Looking At You" (in Dutch). Single Top 100.
- ↑ "The Boomtown Rats – Someone's Looking At You". VG-lista.
- ↑ "Boomtown Rats: Artist Chart History". Official Charts Company.
