Lost or Forgotten Oldie of the Day 07/16/2019

Soho was a musical group formed in the UK by guitarist Timothy London and identical twin sisters Jacqueline Cuff and Pauline Cuff.  The twins quit their jobs as psychiatric nurses to sing full time with the band. At least five other musicians have worked as part of the group from time to time.

The group began recording in the last eighties, and their album Goddess contained the song Hippiechick. A single version of the song was released in 1990 as well as a dance version. The record did not do well in the UK, only reaching the top 60. A disc jockey in Texas got a good response to the song and put the record into rotation in Houston and the song rapidly picked up in the US. Eventually, the record reached #14 on the pop charts and #2 on the US Dance charts. The response in the US caused the record company to reissue the record in the UK, and in 1991 it finally got into the UK top ten.

At least five versions of the song exist thanks to the extended vocal, dance, and instrumental versions of the song, but it was the base single version that was eventually used for the video.

While the song is easy to pass off as a simple dance number, Tom told Songfacts something a little deeper about the lyrics:

“Hippychick was written as a short blues-based pop song, written from the perspective of a young woman arrested by her boyfriend (who is a policeman) on a demonstration. She is basically telling him it’s over, because, as a cop, he supports an establishment she wants to get rid of.”

The group was able to lip-sync the record on a nearly endless series of television shows, including Top of the Pops, but also managed to perform the song live (it’s unclear how much of the music was performed live and how much was samples and other taped sounds added to the mix on stage).

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