Colour By Numbers [Remastered] - Culture Club > Reviews > The oddest kind of pop group

Author's product rating:   

Originality	Average
Lyrics	Standard
Quality and consistency of tracks	Mixed
How does it compare to the artist's other releases	Good
Value for Money

Advantages:	Some good numbers
Disadvantages:	Mostly pap

Recommend to potential buyers:

no

Full review

The most remarkable aspect of Culture Club’s rapid rise to fame was the trasnformation of the group’s lead singer, Boy george, from an emblem of London’s bizarre transsexual demi monde into an all round family favourite. His appeal rapidly took him from the style conscious pages of ID magazine to the cover of Woman.

Previously, male pop artists with a penchant for cosmetics and female clothing appealed to a marginal, mainly student audience. their sexuality was regarded by others as deviant, an affront to middle class family life. But in 1983, Boy George, self confessed bisexual in lipstick and frocks, was basking in the sort of widespread affection reserved for the tame and unthreatening.

The band’s drummer, Jon Moss, was for several years a lover of George’s. the rest of Culture Club were guitarist Roy hay and bass player Mikey Craig.

Their artistic and commerical peak was with the Colur By Numbers album in 1983. The success was due in no small part to the beefy vocal additions of Helen terry, whose soaring voice provided a stunning counterpoint to george’s on Church of the Poison Mind.

The album also included Victims, Black Money and the massive hit Karma Chameleon. It was all pleasant family listening but it was nevertheless superficially attractive. There’s little depth here, nut it’s all a question of taste in the end. I don’t like it, apart from Church of the Poison Mind.