Song ID : 80s OMD-ish tearjerker

Godley & Creme, "Cry".

Hmm no. The drums are the first thing to be heard (and they are quite heavy - think OMD's "Sailing on the Seven Seas"), then strings, then singing.

any lyrics?

I can't remember :|

Possibly the track is JOAN OF ARC, from "Architecture & Morality". Is starts off with this looped female "oooh" vocal, then tinkly noises, then heavy sounding drums - boom thwackthwack-boom thwack.

lyrics =

A little catholic girl
Who’s fallen in love
A face on a page
A gift from above

She should have known better
Than to given her heart
She should have known better
Than to ever part

(etc)

Could this be it?

That's closer. I think the song in question really is by OMD.

The drums are more like thwa'thwa'thwa'thwa'BOOM-thwa'BOOM - the "thwa'thwa'thwa'thwa" bit sounding like one of those sobbing breaths you draw when crying hard. Also the song got a lot of radio play about 20 years ago so it's probably a single. I'll go see if there's an OMD singles comp on slsk.

Thanks everyone, I found it! It's Maid of Orleans. Sorry for my inaccurate description!

I can't believe I forgot about all the droning in the beginning... that used to freak me out when I was little.

So Pasmina's suggestion was 'Joan of Arc' and the actual song was 'Maid of Orleans'. That's odd.

She's Leaving is the real tearjerker from that album - fantastic track. The bit where McCluskey goes up an octave on the last chorus '...waited for so loooooong'. Magical. Actually I love Andy McCluskey - totally uncool, possibly bonkers but a great singer. And *that* dance. Hell I love OMD - Messages, Electricity, Julia's Song, JoA, even Souvenir. Classic.

Classic

'N', there's 2 tracks on that album w/almost the same name, one is the one j4n is referring to, the other is in waltz time, they were both singles, and also both GREAT.

Listened to A+M on the way to work this morning - uncommercial and strange for a hit album. JoA (waltz time) - a v.bizzarre song for a top 5 hit. These are *good* things.

Been listening to Dazzle Ships a lot lately. Great stuff. "Genetic Engineering" is *so* great.
I'm going to dust off A+M as well. Good idea.

I love the fact that "A&M" is so utterly contrary - the opening track is all jangling guitars, as if to say to the listener "THIS is OMD?", the pop songs all have strange noises throughout them and it sounds like nothing else of its time, or any other time.

The warmth of the sound seems to come from the fact that all the synths were recorded through amplifiers, rather than direct injection as was normally the way of recording synths, which gives them a sense of atmosphere (recording the room as well as the synth) and warmth unusual for electronic music. Compare "A&M" with - say - "Rage in eden" and the sound is totally different, less upfront, more in a gauzy distance. And this, of course, is a bloody wonderful thing.

Of course, they took the experimental theme a step further with "Dazzle ships" which I can't be objective about as it's the first album I ever bought, but it's still as wonderful, the pop moments are fewer but the ideas are superb.

OMD - I love 'em.

Never quite got the grip on "Architechture And Morality" as an album. I love the singles from it (particularly the beautiful "Souvenir" - best thing they ever did IMO), but as a whole, don't really like it.

I like their first two albums a lot better.