Dead Or Alive - You Spin Me Round (Like a Record) (1984)

“You Spin Me Round (Like a Record)” is a song by British band Dead or Alive on their 1985 album Youthquake. ...

“You Spin Me Round (Like a Record)” is a song by British band Dead or Alive on their 1985 album Youthquake. Released as a single in 1984, it reached No. 1 in the UK in March 1985, taking 17 weeks to get there. It was the first UK No. 1 hit by the Stock Aitken Waterman production trio. On the U.S. Billboard Hot 100, it peaked at No. 11 on 17 August of that year. In 2003, Q ranked the song at number 981 in their list of the “1001 Best Songs Ever”, Blender listed it at number 289 on its ranking of “Greatest Songs Since You Were Born” in 2005 and in 2015, it was voted by the British public as the nation’s 17th favourite 1980s number one in a poll for ITV. Musician and actor Gary Kemp described the song as “one of the best white dance records of all time.”

The video, which features a disco ball, waving gold flags and an evocation of the six-armed Vishnu, was directed by Vaughan Arnell and Anthea Benton.

Chart performance

The song has been re-released three times since its original release in 1984. Each time of its release, it achieved success, but failed to match the success of the original. However, after lead-singer Pete Burns’s appearance on Celebrity Big Brother, the single was re-released and managed a Top 5 peak on the UK Singles Chart in 2006.

According to Burns, 12-inch singles comprised over 70% of the original sales of You Spin Me Round, and because these were regarded by the record label as promotional tools rather than sales, the band had to threaten legal action against the label before they received the royalties on them.