Welcome To The Pleasure Dome

The scene is the Whistle Test Studio, which despite the attempted rejuvenation is still as old and grey as ever. Richard Skinner – a podgy, eager, ageing, red-faced DJ is engaged in a live phone-in with Mark O'Toole, bassist with Pop phenomenon Frankie Go For Broke. (PS. The following transcript is not verbatim – the video went into shock and erased everything except Skinner's last lingering blush):

Skinner: You're playing in Washington tonight – the night of the American Election. Whose idea was that?

O'Toole: It was just a coincidence.

Skinner: I'll bet (chuckle) What special surprises do you have in store for the Washington audience?

O'Toole: Nothin'. We'll just be doing our regular set.

Skinner: Ho Ho! You must have some little shocks up your sleeves for them.

O'Toole: Well… not really… well, you know those little blue flags they have at elections here? We've sort of covered the stage with lots of them, so it looks really… eh… blue.

Skinner: Yeah, well I guess that looks amazing…

Such are the expectations of the media and the public following the success of 'Relax' and 'Two Tribes' that people refuse to believe Frankie capable of anything ordinary. They've megamixed and manipulated their way to the top of the top. Everyone wants to know what Frankie are going to do now that they've arrived in Hollywood. Shock Us! Shake Us! Entertain Us! They've crated a demand for something they can never guarantee to supply – fresh outrage.

Their debut LP has certainly dealt with the expectations as well as possible, simply by presenting a package that is intelligent, inventive and provocative – qualities notable by their absence from the vast majority of the pop industry's output. With its gatefold sleeve filled with Picasso pastiches, unusual photos, tasteful typography, quotes, quotations, mail order tattoos and Andre Gide socks – opening and playing the Frankie album is an event in itself; but what real treasures does The Pleasure Dome contain?

Side One: Frankie Goes Straight In Over The Top. The title track is a patent Frankie Horn rhythm track par excellence – long, sweaty and involving. If you thought the days of one song sides had gone out with Yes, think again – they're back with a twelve inch disco mix big bang! And at last they make sense – airy fairy neo classicism has been replaced with a beat too big and brutal ever to refuse when it asks you to dance.

Side Two: Frankie Says It Again, 'Relax', 'War' and 'Two Tribes' yet remixed up/shook-up and if you haven't played this story groove of sex and horror to death already… then you probably will!

Side Three: Frankie Goes To Lunch (in which the revolutionaries break for cover versions). Side Three is almost the moment of truth after the momentous hits and Frankie's mistake is to send themselves up. 'Ferry Across The Mersey' is sublime, Springsteen's 'Born To Run' is at least loud and raucous if out of place. But Bacharach and David's 'Do You Know The Way To San Jose' is twee and embarrassing. With its lyrical disillusionments with LA dreams it seems to be Frankie saying they don't want to go to Hollywood. It can only inspire giggles and the joke is on them – Frankie don't need to be camp to be clever.

The side closes with two originals 'Wish (The Lads Were Here)' and the instrumental 'Ballad Of Thirty Two'. The former is a stomping bass line and the latter a Pink Floyd guitar solo that are fine, even wonderful, but not a patch on Frankie's finest – setting the tone for…

Side Four: Frankie Goes Back To Their Roots. Of the four originals features here three – 'Krisco Kisses', 'Black Night White Light' and 'The Only Star In Heaven' – are strong, melodic witty and forward motivated disco songs, perhaps touched by Bowie. This is the kind of material that brought them to the attention of ZTT but it lacks the uniqueness (The Trevor Horn STAMP of Participation) of the singles and Side One. Only their ballad 'The Power Of Love' (the next single) goes for that greatness, though paradoxically by exposing itself and daring to be tender. When Holly sings "I'm so in love with you" you can't help but sign and believe him.

In conclusion: Frankie Goes To Hollywood are all this… but more! Welcome To The Pleasure Dome is envisaged as The Greatest Show On Earth and, despite its flaws, it is. Where else can you hear world beating rhythm music mixed with Ronald Reagan discussion revolutionary love and Prince Charles musing on the orgasm. Nowhere but here! Are we living in a land where sex and horror are the new gods? Frankie frankly hopes so. They pay lip service to peace (Frankie Say Disarm Today – Dat Arm Tomorrow) but they package war. They know the most potent brew must contain the strongest elements – and they want to see everyone drunk. They fall – as they inevitably must – because they started by promising the earth. But when pop music usually promises us nothing more than a hum and a heartthrob – what a glorious failure their's is. Will they run and run? Were they born to? Who knows? For now, Frankie Goes Straight To No. One.