The Records formed out of the ashes of the Kursaal Flyers, a pub rock group featuring drummer Will Birch. In 1977, John Wicks joined the band as a rhythm guitarist, and he and Birch quickly started writing songs together, Wicks as composer, Birch as lyricist. The Kursaal Flyers dissolved three months after Wicks joined, but he and Birch continued to write songs together with the hopes of starting a new four-piece group with Birch on drums and Wicks on lead vocals and rhythm guitar. Birch soon came up with a name for the formative band: The Records. The group's line-up initially included bassist Phil Brown and lead guitarist Brian Alterman, whose guitar riffs have been compared to that of the Byrds. Alterman played on two early demos that were later included on the album Paying for the Summer of Love, before joining another band. Alterman was replaced by Huw Gower in 1978. Like Birch and Wicks, Gower and Brown were music veterans: Gower had played with a band called the Ratbites from Hell and Brown had been the bass player for the Janets.
The new group was heavily influenced both by British Invasion bands like The Beatles and The Kinks and early power pop groups such as Badfinger, Big Star, and Raspberries. Power pop was experiencing a renaissance on both sides of the Atlantic, thanks in large part to the burgeoning punk/new wave movement.
They were hired to back Stiff Records singer Rachel Sweet on the "Be Stiff Tour '78". The Records opened the shows with a set of their own. Birch and Wicks also wrote a song for Sweet's debut album entitled "Pin a Medal on Mary". The songwriting duo also penned "Hearts in Her Eyes" for the Searchers, who made an unexpected comeback with their power pop oriented album The Searchers in 1979.
Based on their demos (later released as Paying for the Summer of Love), the band was signed to Virgin Records in 1978. Their debut single, "Starry Eyes", was released in the UK that December and has since become their best-known song and an oft-covered power pop standard. Allmusic called it "a near-perfect song that defined British power pop in the '70s". Due in part to its clear influence by American power pop, the song was a bigger hit in the US than in the UK; it peaked at No. 56 on the Billboard Hot 100 in October 1979.
The group prepared their debut album with producers Robert John "Mutt" Lange and Tim Friese-Greene. Huw Gower produced "The Phone", which was added to the album in preference to one of Lange's efforts, a cover of Tim Moore's "Rock 'n' Roll Love Letter". The debut LP Shades in Bed yielded another single, "Teenarama", their second-best known song. The album was released in the US in July 1979 as The Records with different song sequencing and with the original single version of "Starry Eyes" replacing Lange's re-recording that appeared on the UK edition. The album was sufficiently well received to peak on the Billboard chart at No. 41. Gower also produced the bonus four track disc of cover tunes included in the album release, which also received FM airplay, notably the version of Spirit's "1984", which was strong enough to become short-listed by Virgin as the second single off the album.
That was the pinnacle of their success. Returning to the UK, Will Birch engaged the services of producer Craig Leon to record two new songs and to remix two tracks from Shades in Bed for a possible single release. Huw Gower acted as co-producer. After an aborted German tour with Robert Palmer, Gower left the band and relocated to New York, where he joined forces with New York Dolls lead singer David Johansen. Their collaboration led to the successful album Live It Up.
Jude Cole, a 19-year-old American, who had been in Moon Martin's backing group The Ravens, joined for the album Crashes (1980). The album was not a hit, and did not yield any successful singles, and record company support for the band dried up during the Crashes tour. Cole stayed in the US, while the core of Birch, Wicks and Brown returned home to England.
The trio expanded into a quintet with guitarist Dave Whelan and lead singer Chris Gent. Previously, most of the songs had been sung by Wicks, but with other members frequently taking lead vocals for individual songs. Birch has since declared that the decision to recruit a lead singer was made "perhaps unwisely". This line-up recorded a third album for Virgin, 1982's Music on Both Sides. Like its predecessor, the album was not a hit.
After this, the band effectively broke up. Birch turned to tour managing, running 'Rock Tours', a sightseeing London Bus venture, producing and writing. In 1990 the original band briefly reformed to contribute a track for the 1991 Brian Wilson tribute album, Smiles, Vibes & Harmony. Birch, Brown and Wicks cut the basic track for "Darlin'" in London; Gower added his parts and mixed it in New York. The same year also saw the US release of Paying for the Summer of Love. Both recordings received great press, but were not enough to outweigh unresolved past issues within the core membership, which effectively killed any possibility of restarting the group. Wicks relocated to the US in 1994 and was writing, recording and performing both solo and with a new incarnation of the band up until 2018.
John Wicks died on October 7, 2018 in Burbank, California.
Girls That Don't Exist
The Records Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
And the train
Running round to shelter
From the rain
With the taste on my lips
Of some girl I just kissed
I'm surrounded by
The girls that don't exist
As I roam the alley
And the street
I will walk the shoes
Right off my feet
What I see isn't real
But I just can't resist
I'm surrrounded by
The girls that don't exist
Girls that don't exist
Dressed up in clothes
I've never seen
On every subway wall
In every magazine
Well maybe it's a con-spiracy
(conspiracy)
Girls that don't exist
Are haunting me
As I search (as I search)
The corners of the world
In a bid to find (in a bid to find)
A certain girl (find a certain girl)
If we meet on the street
Then I'll know what I've missed
Cause I'm searching for
A girl that don't exist
Girls that don't exist
Dressed up in clothes
I've never seen
On every wall
In every magazine
Well maybe it's a con-spiracy
(conspiracy)
Girls that don't exist
Are haunting me
(girls that don't exist)
Girls that don't exist
Are haunting me
The Records's song Girls That Don't Exist describes the feeling of being surrounded by an illusion that is driven by desire. The singer is on the subway, running around to shelter from the rain, and he is tasting the lips of a girl he just kissed. Despite being in a crowd of people, the singer feels the loneliness of chasing something that doesn't exist. He is surrounded by the girls that don't exist - the perfect image of a girl that he envisions in his mind but can never find in reality. The same feeling of emptiness persists as he walks the streets and sees the perfection in every magazine and on every wall.
The song highlights the idea of the idealised girl - the perfect image that we build in our minds based on external influences. The singer is searching for a certain girl, but he doesn't know what he is missing because he has never found the girl that doesn't exist. The song symbolises the unrealistic expectations that society and the media set forth for females and how it affects individuals' perception of beauty and happiness. The lyrics emphasise the singer's journey to find the girl that doesn't exist, which is an unattainable dream for him, and he is haunted by this idea.
Line by Line Meaning
As I ride the subway
Traveling on public transport underground
And the train
While the train is moving
Running round to shelter
Frantically seeking cover from the rain
From the rain
Water falling from the sky
With the taste on my lips
Having the flavor of someone's kiss on my mouth
Of some girl I just kissed
Having recently kissed a girl
I'm surrounded by
Being encircled by a group of people
The girls that don't exist
The concept of the girls who are not real
As I roam the alley
Walking through a narrow street
And the street
A paved road in a city or a town
I will walk the shoes
Endlessly traverse long distances
Right off my feet
Until my feet are tired and sore
What I see isn't real
Noticing something which does not actually exist in reality
But I just can't resist
Not being able to help myself
I'm surrounded by
Being encircled by a group of people
The girls that don't exist
The concept of the girls who are not real
Girls that don't exist
The idea of girls who are not real
Dressed up in clothes
Wearing apparel
I've never seen
Which I have never witnessed before
On every subway wall
Displayed on every wall inside the train
In every magazine
Printed in every publication
Well maybe it's a con-spiracy
It might be a plot against me
(conspiracy)
A secret plan by a group of people to do something unlawful or harmful
Girls that don't exist
The idea of girls who are not real
Are haunting me
Are distressing me with their imaginary existence
As I search (as I search)
While I quest for something, somewhere
The corners of the world
Concealed and remote extents of the planet
In a bid to find (in a bid to find)
Attempting to locate something, in an effort to gain it
A certain girl (find a certain girl)
An explicit female individual that I am looking for
If we meet on the street
When we accidentally encounter each other
Then I'll know what I've missed
At that moment, I will realize what I had lost
Cause I'm searching for
As I endeavor to find the girl of my dreams
A girl that don't exist
The girl that I'm searching does not actually exist
Girls that don't exist
The idea of girls who are not real
Dressed up in clothes
Wearing apparel
I've never seen
Which I have never witnessed before
On every wall
Decorating every wall around me
In every magazine
Displayed on every publication
Well maybe it's a con-spiracy
It could be a conspiracy against me
(conspiracy)
A secret plan by a group of people to do something unlawful or harmful
Girls that don't exist
The idea of girls who are not real, haunting me
Are haunting me
Are distressing me with their imaginary existence
(girls that don't exist)
The concept of the girls who are not real
Girls that don't exist
The idea of girls who are not real, haunting me
Contributed by Evelyn W. Suggest a correction in the comments below.
Bruce Zimmerman
This album was a pure slice of power pop heaven. Every song could have been a single: All messed up..., Teenarama, Girls that don't exist, Affection rejected and of course the incredible Starry eyes. The drummer in the group, Will Birch, wrote a great biography of Nick Lowe.
sounder9393
This should have been a single. Might have been their biggest hit.
Andriy Yurchyna
Just absolutely amazing, incredible song, their best for me along with girl and hearts in her eyes
Karl Stuber
My fav. I think they could of done better, seems too cupcake for me. But Girls is better then Starry Eyes and that’s a good song.