BREAKFAST IN AMERICA / GONE HOLLYWOOD

The title track from their "Breakfast in America" album (composed and sung by Roger Hodgson) was released in the Side "A" of this single. It is now known, thanks to some interviews that can be found in the web, that Rick Davies did not like this song, and also that he did not want the album to be titled as "Breakfast in America". He suggested "Hello, Stranger" as one of the possible titles for the album, but Hodgson said that he finally won about the use of the title of this song to be used as the title of the album and for the song to be included in the album. It seems that he also won that this song was also released as a single.

"Breakfast in America", as a song, is a very Pop Rock song, not bad. A very commercial song with a simple lyric, but it is maybe my less favorite song from that album. It has some very good brass arrangements (sounding a bit like Dixieland Music to my ears), with the help from session musician "Slide" Hyde playing tuba and trombone, and with a very good clarinet solo played by John Helliwell. If I remember well, Hodgson said that this song was really an old song that he wrote when he was very young. It still is played in some oldies FM Radio stations in my city, and it also was a Hit Single for the band. The band even played this song on their tours without Hodgson since 1988, being sung initially by Mark Hart, and this song was also released in their "Live '88" and "It Was the Best of Times" live albums, sung by Hart. It seems that Davies finally thought that the band had to play some Hit Singles on their tours without Hodgson, even if he did not like "Breakfast in America" as a song, to please the fans.

"Gone Hollywood", in the Side "B" of this single, is also the opening song from the "Breakfast in America" album, and was composed and sung by Davies. It is mostly a "serious" and "reflective" song. It is a more Progressive Rock influenced song than the "Breakfast in America" song, and maybe it was a bit strange to be used as the opening track in the "Breakfast in America" album. But the album as a whole worked very well, bringing a lot of success for the band. even being their peak point in their popularity as a band, it also brought some problems and frictions inside the band in the next years which also influenced Hodgson to leave the band in late 1983 after one more album ("famous last words" from 1982) and tour.