The Communards - "Never Can Say Goodbye"

(Debuted January 30, 1988, Peaked #51, 9 Weeks on the Chart)

For my friends who tried to tell me in 1988 that disco was a long-dead relic of the 1970s, here's part of the fodder I tossed right back at them. "Never Can Say Goodbye" is a remake of a song that was one of the earliest disco hits (by Gloria Gaynor, which itself was a remake) done in the then-current Hi-NRG dance beat. At the time I was asking what the problem was with 1970s disco when the same songs were being recycled with a new beat, and was essentially told that the beat was what made the "new" versions better. I disagreed then and still do.

The Communards were a British-based dance group led by Jimmy Somerville, who was featured here a few weeks back as a member of Bronski Beat. It was the second of two Hot 100 hits for the band, and both were songs that had been big disco singles in the 1970s. Though "Never Can Say Goodbye" failed to reach the Top 40, it was a #2 dance hit, as well as a #4 hit in the band's native U.K.