Song:One Night In Bangkok
Album:Class Reunion: Greatest Hits of '85
The 1984 top five hit One Night In Bangkok was the biggest hit for British singer actor Murray Head. It might surprise you that he's been around since the 60s. He was born Mar. 5, 1946 in London, England. His father was documentary filmmaker Seafield Head. His mother actress Helen Shingler starred in the 60s BBC TV series Maigret. His brother is actor Anthony Head of the TV series Buffy The Vampire Slayer. Head recorded a few singles in the 60s. But when they didn't take off, he took a job selling insurance. Head also appeared in the 1966 film The Family Way and the 1971 film Sunday Bloody Sunday. Tim Rice produced one of Head's singles. So when Rice was casting Jesus Christ Superstar, he hired Head to play Judas Iscariot and Head sang lead on the hit single Superstar. It didn't help his music career. Though Head's 1975 album Say It Ain't So was critically acclaimed, it didn't sell though the title song was successfully covered by Roger Daltrey in 1977. Tim Rice wanted to write a show about the Cold War. It was suggested he work with Benny Andersson and Bjorn Ulvaeus who wanted to work on projects outside of Abba. At the time, there was a rivalry between American Bobby Fischer and Russian Anatoly Karpov. So Chess was a metaphor for the Cold War. They decided to record Chess as a concept album first and then produce it on the stage. Murray Head and Elaine Paige were the leads and the big surprise was that One Night In Bangkok became a worldwide smash hit. It reached #3 on the Billboard Hot 100. You can get One Night In Bangkok on this various artists budget CD. Head and Paige also appeared in the 1986 London stage production of Chess. Since then, Murray Head has had moderate success singing in French. He is currently touring France. And he has acted occasionally on British TV. His latest CD My Back Pages is an album of pop covers and was released in 2012. Here's the video for One Night In Bangkok by Murray Head.
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