"Whether They Like It Or Not" was a European-only single released from the album "Boyfriend". It was originally recorded for the album "High Hat" in 1989, and was written by Gene Griffin, Boy George and Bernard Belle (credited as "Bell" on all his work with Boy George.) Following the relative success of the US Top 40 hit "Live My Life", Virgin America insisted on a new direction for Boy George. They wanted something aimed for the urban / dance market that was breaking into US mainstream with acts like Bobby Brown and Bel Biv Devoe crossing over into the Billboard top ten.
When the album "Tense Nervous Headache" failed to chart in ever-faithful Europe, plans to release the album in the UK and USA were scrapped and New Jack Swing royalty Teddy Riley and Gene Griffin were called in to create new material with George specifically aimed for the American US dance market. Four new songs were crafted, and "Whether They Like It Or Not" is one of only two of those that George wrote or co-wrote lyrics for.
It is a song about a defiant artist who will do as his muse directs him, and we are cautioned to not believe the media machine that warps and dilutes more often than not. It's also a proud song, George perhaps daring his label bosses and managers to back off the criticisms of his new "out and proud" attitude, having finally and unashamedly confirmed his homosexual (not bisexual) status with the release of the previous year's political anthem "No Clause 28". It is certainly a celebratory song- of a new found freedom and of a man with a plan in place.
Sadly, the song did not chart- and the fault does not fall solely on the quality of the material itself (even George has called it one of his worst ever records), but also on the lack of support from the label and distributors. At the height of the promotional tour for the record, which included multiple television performances and interview for both radio and TV, the record was nowhere to be found. Outside a TV studio, George was presented with copies of older records to autograph and when he asked the fans why none of them had the new single, they answered "none of the shops had copies to buy". The mortified label escort had nothing to say on the subject except to blush and hurry a visibly angry George into a waiting car.
The single was released in Germany and France on 7" and 12", as was an Austrian CD single marked very clearly "European Release Only- Not For Export". The French version featured slightly different lettering on the cover and a mirror image to the German version of the main picture. The back cover features a child-like drawing of Boy George by filmmaker John Maybury, who had also worked as director of some of George's earlier videos.The CD single is one of the rarest collectibles from George's entire catalogue, and sells for hundreds whenever it turns up on the second-hand market. There are two different remixed versions of the A-side, a 7" and a 12" mix, both by Vlad Naslass and are very different from the album version. A choir of children was added to vocals, and the additional instruments added to the mix give the song a more organic feel. The B-side, a remix of "Little Ghost" by Jeremy Healy, was originally intended to be the final single from the "Sold" album. But plans to release that single were scrapped when the original version by Max was re-released at about the same time. Virgin would not make a video for George's version, so he decided not to release it at all. A "Scratch Mix" of "Little Ghost" appears on the 12" and CD, also by Jeremy Healy, and is really more of an abstract dub loosely based on the song and filled with multi-layered samples. The 7" version of "Whether They Like It Or Not" has appeared on several European hit collection CD's, all of which are easier to find than the actual CD single, but neither the 12" mix or either version of "Little Ghost" have been made available anywhere else.
"Whether They Like It Or Not" has never been performed in concert, and no video was made. However, at least two different studio performances were broadcast on German TV, featuring MC Kinky on percussion and Amanda Vincent on keyboards.
0 Comments