Dolby promoted himself as a kind of mad scientist, an egghead that had successfully harnessed the power of synthesizers and samplers, using them to make catchy pop and electro-funk. Before he launched his solo career, Dolby had already worked as a studio musician, technician, and songwriter. After starting out as a teenaged live sound man, mixing The Fall, The Members and others using a PA he built himself, he formed the arty post-punk band Camera Club (also known as Bruce Woolley & the Camera Club) with Bruce Woolley, Geoff Downes, Trevor Horn and Matthew Seligman. Within a year, he had left the group and joined Lene Lovich’s backing band and gave her his song "New Toy", which became a British hit in 1981. That same year, he released his first solo single, "Urges", on the English independent label Armageddon. By the autumn, he had signed with Parlophone and released "Europa and the Pirate Twins", which nearly cracked the UK Top 40.
Dolby started playing synthesizer on sessions for other artists in 1982. That year, he played keyboards on Def Leppard’s Pyromania and Joan Armatrading’s Walk Under Ladders. His most distinctive session credit is that keyboard line after the chorus on Foreigner’s "Waiting for a Girl Like You". In that eventful summer, Dolby also collaborating with New York rappers Whodini to create "Magic’s Wand" – a pivotal early hip hop track (the first rap single to shift 1 million copies), and it also single-handedly started the new jack swing movement.
Even with all of these achievements, 1982 was most noteworthy for the release of Dolby’s first solo album, The Golden Age of Wireless, in the summer of 1982, the landmark album reaching number 13. "Windpower", the first single from the record, became his first Top 40 UK hit in the late summer. Other cuts from the album include "The Airwaves", and "One of Our Submarines", a meditation on the futility of empire.
In January of 1983, Dolby released an EP, Blinded by Science, which includes what would become his most well-known track, "She Blinded Me with Science" featuring a cameo vocal appearance by the notorious British eccentric Magnus Pike, who also appeared in the song’s video. "She Blinded Me with Science" was a minor hit in England, but the EP and the single became a major American hit in 1983, thanks to MTV’s heavy airplay of the video. Eventually, the song reached number five on the US charts and it was included on a resequenced and reissued version of The Golden Age of Wireless, which peaked at number 13 in America.
The Flat Earth, Dolby's second album, appeared in early 1984, and harkens back to a time when songs mattered more than the video, even as MTV was discovering its strength. Opening with "Dissidents", conjuring up images of blacklisted authors and ugly snow, gray from oppression, with Matthew Seligman’s bass at the fore, lavish, growling, popping through octaves, funk-a-fied and twinkling with harmonics throughout the album. The title track is an R&B daydream of piano and Motown stabs of rhythm guitar. "Screen Kiss" has a similarly ethereal quality, and the lyrics are lush with imagery. The cover of Dan Hicks’ 1967 "I Scare Myself" is a balmy jazz club cocktail – faithfully nostalgic, right down to a bittersweet trombone solo from Peter Thomas. "Hyperactive" is one part bizarre to two parts infectious; guest vocalist Adele Bertei fuels the fire to what was already destined to be a memorable diversion beyond the reach of Top 40. The single became Thomas’ biggest UK hit, peaking at number 17.
During 1985, Dolby collaborated with artists including Stevie Wonder, Dusty Springfield and Herbie Hancock; and notched up some more high-concept production credits. George Clinton's Some of My Best Jokes Are Friends, Prefab Sprout’s Steve McQueen, and Joni Mitchell’s Dog Eat Dog were all midwifed by Dolby, who also was musical director for David Bowie at Live Aid. Also in 1985, he began composing film scores, starting with Fever Pitch. In 1986, he composed the scores for Gothic and Howard the Duck, for which he credited himself as Dolby's Cube. (That credit led to a lawsuit from the Dolby Labs, who eventually prohibited the musician from using the name "Dolby" in conjunction with any other name than "Thomas.")
Aliens Ate My Buick, Dolby's long-delayed third album, appeared in 1988 to a mixed reaction, although "Airhead" became a minor British hit. That same year, Dolby married actress Kathleen Beller. For the rest of the late 80s and early 90s, Dolby continued to score films, producing and building his own computer equipment.
1992’s Astronauts and Heretics, features guest stars such as Eddie Van Halen, Jerry Garcia, Bob Weir and Ofra Haza. The album opens with "I Love You Goodbye", one of Thomas’ most evocative songs, and ends with "Beauty of a Dream" which is also a contender for that honour. Highlights found inbetween include "Cruel" (a duet with Fairground Attraction’s Eddie Reader), "I Live in a Suitcase" and "Close But No Cigar".
The following year, Dolby founded the computer software company Headspace in Silicon Valley, releasing The Virtual String Quartet as its first program, and also pioneered technology for music on mobile phones. For the rest of the 90s, Headspace occupied most of Dolby's time and energy. In 1994, he released The Gate to the Mind’s Eye, a soundtrack to the animated short film Mind’s Eye. Also that year, Capitol released the greatest-hits collection, Retrospectacle.
Thirteen years after Astronauts and Heretics, Dolby returned to live performance in 2006 with his solo Sole Inhabitant tour, which covered North America and the UK, with Thomas recreating the highlights of his earlier work from scratch, with a camera mounted like a miner’s lamp on his head, and a big screen showing the view from the artist, turning what would be a fairly dull one-man-and-a-rack-of-synths into a fascinating audio visual experience and an unintended masterclass for music technology students.
UK indie label Invisible Hands Music released a CD and DVD box set recorded on the Sole Inhabitant tour. These fresh and modern reinterpretations of Thomas’ work to date precedes a new studio album due in 2008, which is as-yet untitled, but does include a song about Britney’s ex Kevin Federline (“K-Fed”) who used an uncleared sample from "She Blinded Me with Science" and did not respond to legal approaches until a ‘cease-and-desist’ was posted in the comments field of his MySpace page. That song is called "My Karma Hit Your Dogma", and bodes well for a mighty return to form, combining Thomas’ humour and intelligence with a unique musical vision.
2011 saw Dolby get busy by returning with a new studio album A Map of the Floating City on 29 October. The album is broken down into three genres of Urbanoia's tales of city experiences; Amerikana as Dolby's take on his years living in America and it's roots music; and Oceanea: songs of life by the sea in his home country of England. The music was debuted first as download EPs to Dolby's online community and then previewed by a transmedia interactive game also called the FloatingCity.com.
Thomas Dolby is taking the music back on tour as a solo artist and with varying line-ups of bands, doing two tours of the UK in 2011, and has his first trip to Australia in February 2012 followed by dates in Japan. In March Dolby kicks off the Time-Capsule.tv tour at the SxSW Festival in Austin playing dates in USA and Canada through April. He will have a trailer parked at venues on his tour where you can produce a 30 second video offering words of wisdom to whoever will be walking the earth in the future. Dolby wants to give people a chance to “explain to an alien visitor what went wrong with our civilization. Our species may not be around on this planet much longer, so you might as well leave a welcome message for the next guys.”
Neon Sisters
Thomas Dolby Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
Neon, we were the neon sisters
Standing in the cold rain
Waiting for a home game
Neon, the neon sisters
Up and down the M1
95 and then some
And London was a bombsight
Frozen in the moonlight
And honey for the neon sisters
Honey came in all shapes
Pinafore and a snowflake
And you borrow from dream-mongers
And then you live to be 100
And you share the spoils you plunder
Until the day you wake up hungering for neon
Then where were the neon sisters?
Reeling from a cowpunch
Looking for a free lunch
Anywhere the wind blows the club for heroes
Blew me into Hollywood
Blew you to skid row
But I should have been there with you
The night you died
I think a part of me died with you
But in my heart
Where could I find it to forgive you?
Until the night
You went and stuck a dirty needle in your vein
Of all the fires
That ever thawed a cooling planet
Yours burned bright
With no chemical fan to it
So tell me why
If there's a good and there's an evil
On one of those nights
Did you stick a dirty needle in your vein?
The lyrics of the song "Neon Sisters" by Thomas Dolby portray a nostalgic and wistful reminiscence of a group of sisters who used to hang out together in the past. They are referred to as the "neon sisters" as they used to wait for a home game in the cold rain, and their vibrant energy was reminiscent of the colorful neon lights adorning the streets. The sisters were always on the go, moving up and down the M1, 95, and beyond, driven by their quest for excitement and adventure. The lyrics of the song depict how the sisters' lives took different paths, with one sister going to Hollywood while the other ended up on skid row, only to meet a tragic end by sticking a dirty needle in her vein.
The song's lyrics reveal a sense of loss and regret, as the singer laments not being there for his friend when she needed him the most. The guilt and grief are palpable as the singer questions why his friend would take such a drastic step. The song's melancholic tone is accentuated by the haunting melody and the use of electronic instruments. Overall, the song is an ode to the innocence and vibrancy of youth, and a poignant reminder of how time and circumstances can change the course of our lives.
Line by Line Meaning
Neon, we were the neon sisters
We were simply attention-seeking, vibrant young women
Standing in the cold rain
Standing under the night sky, soaking wet
Waiting for a home game
Eagerly waiting to be a part of the excitement of a live sport event
Neon, the neon sisters
We had a flamboyant style that made us stand out in a crowd
Up and down the M1
Travelling frequently down the highway M1
95 and then some
Driving at high speeds, not restricted by the speed limit
Midnight for the neon sisters
We were often out late at night, out of control and reckless
And London was a bombsight
We found London to be chaos and destruction, much like a warzone
Frozen in the moonlight
The city was eerily quiet and deserted in the light of the moon
And honey for the neon sisters
Many people, including men, were attracted to our flashy style
Honey came in all shapes
We had many different romantic partners
Pinafore and a snowflake
Some of our romantic interests were innocent and pure
And you borrow from dream-mongers
We lived our life by borrowing ideas from various sources
And then you live to be 100
We expected to have a long life, despite our recklessness
And you share the spoils you plunder
We intended to share our experiences and possessions with each other
Until the day you wake up hungering for neon
One day, we knew we would have an insatiable desire for the thrills and excitement of our youth
Then where were the neon sisters?
When we finally grew out of our neon phase, where did we end up?
Reeling from a cowpunch
Dealing with a sudden blow or setback in life
Looking for a free lunch
Desperately trying to find an easy way out of our problems
Anywhere the wind blows the club for heroes
We were willing to go anywhere to feel like we were a part of something special
Blew me into Hollywood
I ended up in Hollywood, living the crazy and luxurious life
Blew you to skid row
You ended up living in the poverty-stricken and dangerous neighborhood of Skid Row
But I should have been there with you
I regret not being able to help or support you when you were going through tough times
The night you died
The night when you passed away
I think a part of me died with you
Your passing had a deep impact on me and it felt like a part of me died too
But in my heart
In my deepest emotions and feelings
Where could I find it to forgive you?
I struggle to find it in my heart to forgive you for the choices you made in your life leading up to your death
Until the night
It wasn't until this event or realization
You went and stuck a dirty needle in your vein
You made a very poor choice that ultimately led to your death
Of all the fires
Among all things that burned bright in the world
That ever thawed a cooling planet
That ever heated up a world that was cold and unfeeling
Yours burned bright
Yours shone the brightest and was the most intense
With no chemical fan to it
It was simply pure and genuine without any artificial additives or enhancements
So tell me why
I want to understand and know the reasoning behind what happened to you
If there's a good and there's an evil
If we believe there are moral and immoral actions or decisions
On one of those nights
On that particular, fateful night
Did you stick a dirty needle in your vein?
Why did you choose to make that decision which led to your untimely death?
Contributed by Daniel D. Suggest a correction in the comments below.