Bananarama’s Stock Aitken Waterman-produced ‘WOW!’ album will be reissued on white vinyl next month.
The fourth album from the trio was originally released in 1987 and features the hit singles I Heard a Rumour, Love in the First Degree, I Can’t Help It and I Want You Back.
It’s the final LP to feature the original line-up of Sara Dallin, Siobhan Fahey and Keren Woodward and, in an HMV Exclusive, will be pressed on white vinyl for the first time.
WOW! Re-pressed on white vinyl sold exclusively in-store and online by @hmvtweets ❤️💿
— Bananarama Official (@VivaBananarama) January 16, 2023
Buy now: https://t.co/rkq4rumAn3 pic.twitter.com/jhXEFrtMwb
Bananarama’s ‘WOW’ is out on white vinyl via London Records on February 24, exclusively at HMV.
Last year, Bananarama celebrated their 40th anniversary with the release of their 12th album ‘Masquerade‘, with plans to mark the occasion set to continue into 2023.
Reflecting on four decades of success, Sara Dallin told RETROPOP in an August 2022 cover feature: “I don’t think we thought about how long it would last. It’s like, if you love your job, you don’t suddenly think, ‘Well, I’m 30 now, I won’t do that job anymore,’ or, ‘I’m 40, I won’t do it anymore.’
“It’s just something we love and we’ve been fortunate enough, because of the ‘80s and MTV, to have been internationally successful.”
Of their collaborations with the hitmaking trio, who also featured on the albums ‘True Confessions’ (1986), ‘Pop Life’ (1991) and ‘Please Yourself’ (1993), she added: “With each album, you’re in a headspace at that point, so you remember how you were feeling then and remember whether things were going well or they weren’t. So I think that has a certain shadow over how you feel about things.
“We’ve always loved the Stock Aitken Waterman stuff; we’ve never thought, ‘Oh, we shouldn’t say that,’ because a lot of people thought, ‘Oh, formula.’ But the thing about that was the three of us, we started with them before they’d had the huge success, so we kind of created a sound with them and we co-wrote with them, so the sound was definitely our Bananarama sound.
“What we wanted was a great pop album and I think we achieved that, because it has four or five big hits on it. And I love all of them,” she admits.
For Keren Woodward, it’s the feedback from fans at their shows that really brings certain tracks to life: “There may be one song in particular that jumps out at me that I don’t really like, but the crowd make you almost love it because it’s a fan favourite, so you’d be foolish not to do it because you want to get that vibe back from your audience.”