Chris Rea - C or D/S & D

We're sure if you try
You'll get by
Find a way

He ain't too bad, our Chris, but he's nowhere near the genius of DeBurgh in the silly stakes.

That's about as interesting as he gets.

I can take or leave the rest of Rea's stuff that I've heard.

i used to hear "on the beach" on the radio a lot in the late 80s. Then i started to hear it frequently in pharmacies, department stores, and furniture stores in the early to mid 90s. Awful, awful song.

Incorrect. I still love it even though he is a Tory scumshite.

Wait, so "The Road to Hell" predated Leonard Cohen's "The Future" (and clearly predated Dylan's "Things Have Changed")?

This feels like the middle ground between Nick Cave and Spandau Ballet, but props where props are due, and he must have felt pissed off when he heard those two other songs.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=abZlWqVeLzg

Then again, maybe Whitesnake was pissed that the prelude is like "Slow 'n' Easy pt. 2."

As a Michael Mann stan, how can I not be into this?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jffsG0VR4Gw&feature=related

Also, from Wikipedia:
Politics
In August 2008 it was erroniously reported that Rea had donated £25,000 to the Conservative Party [17]. This was followed by further incorrect reports in April 2010, just weeks before the UK general election, that Rea had donated a further £100,000 to the Conservatives[18]. The donations were in fact made by a businessman called Chris Rea and not the musician Chris Rea. This error has been acknowledged by The Daily Mail newspaper, which printed a retraction [19].

Still awful.

I'll disavow all this in the morning.

On The Beach, still *ace*. Especially the 'summer 88' remix (although having said that there's not a huge difference between the 2 versions).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aamvrc6woFM&feature=youtu.be&list=PL7P1WmoitGdh1pOCNTkWGUamNiyuA7yjO

incredible tune.

specifically:

https://youtu.be/aamvrc6woFM?list=PL7P1WmoitGdh1pOCNTkWGUamNiyuA7yjO

That's a lovely tune alright. I always liked Chris Rea, even as a kid his tunes always stood out when played on the radio

this is my new favourite chris rea jam:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nyJwM5_uT9k

i do like this slightly bonkers one too, chris in weird tropical skank mode:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6H7YVocYhEE

bombooooooooooooooo

this one is also really nice in a jj cale meets john martyn sort of way, but the chorus does make him sound like a huge paedo imo:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=91pVCQVb4-A

top notch chilled yacht rock sounds:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FT6GJnpeSE4

this sounds like a dry run for josephine:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FjJtvKHjefQ

this though, fucking hell - what a dream of a song:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4I_iIxd2qCg

there are some of his songs where you could conceive of him as kind of middlesbrough's answer to ned doheny. still plenty of dreck in the back catalogue though

The first CD my parents bought new in summer '89 was New Light Through Old Windows because a cousin, who to this day works for the Gloria Estefan org, recommended it after hearing it "non-stop" in Europe during the '88 Let it Loose tour.

some solid jams on that

actually i'm just looking at the tracklisting and they left 'fool if you think it's over' off the US version, but otoh you were also spared the horror of 'driving home for christmas'

"Fool (If You Think It's Over)" is an excellent, spare studio rock recording at the era's zenith that manages to avoid its commonplaces -- and isn't killed by American recurrent airplay.

yeah it’s wonderful and quite underrated over here now I think

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bUM88et2SZ0

This one is my shit, should make my eventual best songs of ‘98 list

deej, that's a beautiful song -- want to blast it from my balcony.

nice, i hadn’t heard that before

When I was fourteen I listened to Chris Rea and only Chris Rea for about a year or so.

im really curious if that song was somehow the uh inspiration for deepest blue by deepest blue
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HpQ5UEz0HSM

Dead? No.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yUY8wFaG1FE

When I was fourteen I listened to Chris Rea and only Chris Rea for about a year or so.

that's what being 14 is all about imo - obsessive dedication to questionable aesthetics. what were your favourite tracks? do you still like them? any deep cuts / dubbed out weirdo b-sides that we're missing?

I'd have to revisit them actually, it's been a while. And this thread made me want to do just that. But from what I can remember it was the whole Water Sign - Wired To The Moon - Shamrock Diaries - On The Beach - Dancing With Strangers and then New Light... cycle, with shifting allegiances. They were originally my father's but I made them mine, then forgot about them when I left home and decided to find my own path, I guess. But the feeling of listening to them over and over again in my bedroom has remained, and since my father died a year ago I have been thinking about them more often. I'm going to try to dive in a bit over the next weeks. Will keep you updated.

please do!

"I can hear your heartbeat" was one of those tunes I waited by the radio all day so I could get a chance to tape it

I think Rea was huge in Ireland before anywhere else iirc?

huge

I think I used to get Chris Rea and Chris De Burgh confused.

And then there's Stephen Rea. Never liked that guy.

Bob Mortimer talking about when Chris Rea was on Shooting Stars

I've been playing the remix of "Josephine" around the new Grimes all afternoon.

'crack that mould' is the best disco-not-disco track i have ever heard.

really enjoying this edit of “loving you again”

https://storken.bandcamp.com/track/chris-rea-loving-you-again-storken-la-mer-baltique-edit

Used to be weirdly huge in France. Josephine still hits a sweet Balearic spot. I should check out more of his stuff

“on the beach” (the song) rules

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qqBCurSwK3k

Love this song so much. Brings back lots of fond memories of that era.

"She says 'what?'"

lived my whole life til last month never hearing part 1 of road to hell

The title track!

it's Knopfler done right

its exactly that!

tho i hope by agreeing im not signing up unwittingly to knopfler slander generally

Is there a thread for this already?

It's a real big loss. The patience of his music is a real attracting factor, but, appropriately for a car lover, it's never stillness per se - even when the music seems to stand still it hangs heavy with pregnant drones and menace, waiting for its anchor. In his music I hear shades of all sorts of things - blues, of course, but also Steely Dan, sorta-locals Prefab Sprout, lots of profound ECM-ish ambience, and (famously) Balearic sunniness. Which is why for me (and houdini said, who I've been chatting about him with) he is not easily described as blues rock, soft rock, yacht rock etc. He's a guitar hero but not an especially 'rock' one. His ambience and spare guitar playing combine in a way that is similar to similar moments by e.g. Dire Straits but less roots, Pink Floyd but less prog, Mike Oldfield but less new-age. It's sorta it's own thing, as was he, an everyman but not in a desultory rubbish way, his music shot through with his politics, especially noticeable when a storm approaches on his otherwise idyllic music - actually (thinking aloud here) he is probably adjacent to (ahem) soulcialism, just with Charlie Patton in place of Levi Stubbs.

He really deserved his revival among a younger audience - the sort that love their Steely Dan and indeed Prefab Sprout. The fact of him having some Ibiza classics is, from one angle, a happier and more 'credible' fate than Dire Straits' anyway.

'indeed' meant to be before 'love their'

Josephiiine
I send you all myyyyy luuuuuv

Always assumed Mac DeMarco was a massive fan

Xxp great post. ECM reference spot on. Love the sunbaked emptiness in his music

i think that Lowell George and Ry Cooder were his guitar heroes, and I also hear a fair bit of JJ Cale in his music too, and in terms of playing, all those guys for me are on the sparer, less-is-more side of things. Knopfler was more of a Chet Atkins country picking guy, a bit more flash in his own way, could probably play most people out of the park. But i guess Chris Rea's songs weren't really about the guitar playing in the way that Dire Straits were, the guitar is there to add mood and character but not really the fundamental purpose of the song, it gets out of the way more when it needs to. Much more chill, bit less air guitar.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZvopSM-XICw

One of my favourites.

Man the ‘88 mix of On The Beach is a bloody lovely thing, I associate it so much with early-teens summers.

I always think of On The Beach as a well-executed attempt at making a record that sounds like Sade, but it's no worse for that.

Also this is the best Josephine edit though there are other good ones: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FJCg_3DfKvU

Lovely blogpost by Richard Williams https://thebluemoment.com/2025/12/22/the-man-with-the-blue-guitars/