One Hit Wondering – Stacey Q

One Hit Wondering is a series of columns where I listen to the album of a one hit wonder, and find three songs, other than the hit, that people should hear. 

One of the most inescapable songs of the second half of 1986 was Stacey Q’s dance pop mega-hit “Two of Hearts.”

Released in June of ‘86, the song raced up the chart, peaking at #3 on the Billboard Hot 100 on its way to becoming one of the best selling singles of the year.

The song, however, almost didn’t happen.

When producer Jon St. James brought it to Stacey Q she initially balked at recording a song she didn’t have a hand in writing. Thankfully, she had a change of heart about “Two of Hearts,” and decided to hit the studio, and make it happen.

The song was an immediate smash, and not just in America. Japanese singer Yōko Nagayama released a cover of the song that same year, so if you’ve ever wondered what “Two of Hearts” would sound like in (mostly) Japanese, here ya go!

For most artists, a quick rise to fame in the ‘80s would have been a wild time, but Stacey Q had a unique performance history well before any of us heard “Two of Hearts.” As a child she was a dancer, and performed at Disneyland’s Christmas Fantasy on Parade events. She then literally ran off to join the circus immediately following high school, becoming a member of the famed Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey Circus. She was a showgirl in her first year with them, and an elephant rider the following year.

After you’ve ridden an elephant, pop music stardom has to be a little easier to handle.

That said, with a gigantic hit on her hands, Stacey Q still faced one major problem – she didn’t have an album recorded, so as “Two of Hearts” was climbing the chart she knocked out Better Than Heaven over the span of three weeks.

The album was released on October 17th of 1986 (just two days after my eighth birthday!).

The follow up single to “Two of Hearts,” was “We Connect,” which connected with some listeners, but not enough, as it stalled at #35 on the chart. Two subsequent singles failed to chart altogether.

“Two of Hearts” was one of the biggest hits of 1986, but there wasn’t another hit on Better Than Heaven.

Stacey Q released two more albums in the ‘80s – Hard Machine, and Nights Like This – before taking a break that ended in 1997 with Boomerang. A 13 year hiatus after that concluded with the release of her 2010 album Color Me Cinnamon.

Getting back to Better Than Heaven, while the album didn’t spawn the single, the single spawned the album, that doesn’t mean the single was the only song worth listening to on the LP.

With that in mind, here are three songs from Better Than Heaven, other than “Two of Hearts,” that you should hear.

“Dancing Nowhere”

 

With a nighttime vibe, accentuated by darker synths, and Stacey Q using vocals that aren’t as sunny/high pitched, “Dancing Nowhere” might actually be the best song on Better Than Heaven. This legitimately sounds like it could be released today, and make waves in the indie synthwave scene.

“Music Out of Bounds”

 

Featuring dance, pop, freestyle, funk, and even a little bit of hip-hop all mixed together, “Music Out of Bounds” has something for everyone. It’s a shame listeners had moved on from Better Than Heaven by the time this was released as the album’s fourth single, because it really is great, and I could imagine a host of guests wanting to be on remix versions of the song.

“Love or Desire”

 

“Love or Desire” would have been the perfect follow up to “Two of Hearts.” It’s similar to the mega-hit, but different enough so that people would recognize it as its own entity. A very danceable song, I think it would’ve held on to pretty much the entire audience from “Two of Hearts.”

If only I’d been running the label! Of course, I was eight at the time, so it would’ve been weird for me to be holding down such a position.

Until next time, here’s to discovering more great music from one hit wonders!