| Push | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
_cover.jpeg) | ||||
| Studio album by | ||||
| Released | 28 March 1988 | |||
| Recorded | 1987 | |||
| Studio | Hot Nights Studio,Fulham, London | |||
| Genre | Teen pop,dance-pop | |||
| Length | 42:13 | |||
| Label | CBS | |||
| Producer | Nicky Graham | |||
| Bros chronology | ||||
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| Singles from Push | ||||
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Push is the debut album by Britishpop bandBros and was released on 28 March 1988 onCBS. The album peaked at number two in theUK Albums Chart and was certified quadruple platinum in the UK. It was also a worldwide success, reaching number one in New Zealand, and the top ten in Australia and several countries in Europe.
In late 2013, a 25th anniversary 3-CD remastered and expanded edition ofPush was released on the Cherry Poprecord label, a subsidiary ofCherry Red Records. The song "Silent Night", originally released as adouble A-side single with "Cat Among the Pigeons", was included on the expanded edition, as well as B-sides and remixes from the five singles that were released from the album.
All the songs were written byNicky Graham and Bros' managerTom Watkins, with Graham composing the music and Watkins writing the lyrics. The pair used the pseudonym "The Brothers" in order to imply that the songs had been written by the Goss twins, and that the group was not simply a manufactured pop outfit. In his autobiography Watkins described how he had deliberately come up with song titles and lyrics that the teen market could identify with, such as "Drop the Boy" being about a youth asking to be treated as an adult. Other themes includedchildhood poverty ("Ten Out of Ten"), the then-currentAIDS epidemic ("Shocked"), and past relationships ("I Owe You Nothing"). One of the album's more serious lyrical subjects was the closing ballad "Cat Among the Pigeons", which Watkins stated was about a friend who had struggled to cope with the early death of their father, and as a result had embarked on tempestuous and doomed relationships. Watkins also admitted that his original, more explicit lyric for "When Will I Be Famous?", a song that had been created for his own short-lived band the Hudsons, had been written as a conversation between two gay men: a young man desperate for fame and attention, and an older, more experienced man giving his advice. When he and Graham decided to give the song to Bros to record, Watkins toned down the lyrics and removed the references to homosexuality.[1]
Graham composed the music using some basic equipment at his home inWimbledon in south-west London, before taking the songs to his Hot Nights studio a short distance away inFulham. There he played all the instruments and programmed all the keyboards, before inviting the group to the studio to learn their parts and record Matt Goss' vocals.[2]
Talking toSmash Hits in April 1988, Matt Goss explained why the album was titledPush: "Well, when we were in the studio recording it, if one of us was really, like, going for it we'd say, 'Right man, that's really pushing it.' It's a word we all latched on to, and Nicky latched on to it too. We'd all be going, 'Is that pushing it? Yeah, that'spush.' So the album couldn't really be called anything else."[3]
| Review scores | |
|---|---|
| Source | Rating |
| AllMusic |   [4] |
| The Encyclopedia of Popular Music | [5] |
| Number One | [6] |
| Record Mirror | [7] |
Reviews ofPush in the UK music press were mixed. InMelody Maker Jonh Wilde described the album as "ten songs that are entirely modern in an entirely charmless way", and called it "sad and useless" and "mediocrity's snowy mountain-top".[8] However, Tim Nicholson ofRecord Mirror stated that "Push is perfectly crafted pop oozing pre-sex appeal".[7]
In a retrospective review forAllMusic, Brendan Swift highlighted "When Will I Be Famous?" and "I Owe You Nothing" as good examples of 1980s pop music, and that while the album contained few low points it also lacked depth, commenting that "Push makes for far better dancing than listening".[4]
In theUK Albums Chart,Push was kept off the number one spot by the compilation albumNow 11 for two weeks, and then byTracy Chapman'sself-titled album for a week, althoughPush went on to sell more copies than both albums in 1988 and ranked as the fourth best-selling album for that year in the UK.[9]
All tracks written by The Brothers (a pseudonym forNicky Graham andTom Watkins).
| No. | Title | Length |
|---|---|---|
| 1. | "When Will I Be Famous?" | 5:02 |
| 2. | "Drop the Boy" | 4:08 |
| 3. | "Ten Out of Ten" | 4:06 |
| 4. | "Liar" | 3:42 |
| 5. | "Love to Hate You" | 5:17 |
| No. | Title | Length |
|---|---|---|
| 1. | "I Owe You Nothing" | 3:40 |
| 2. | "I Quit" | 3:32 |
| 3. | "It's a Jungle Out There" | 4:14 |
| 4. | "Shocked" | 4:19 |
| 5. | "Cat Among the Pigeons" | 4:05 |
| No. | Title | Writer(s) | Length |
|---|---|---|---|
| 11. | "I Owe You Nothing" (7" mix) | 3:35 | |
| 12. | "I Quit" (single mix) | 3:32 | |
| 13. | "Drop the Boy" (single edit) | 3:49 | |
| 14. | "When Will I Be Famous?" (single edit) | Nicky Graham, Tom Watkins | 4:00 |
| No. | Title | Writer(s) | Length |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1. | "The Boy Is Dropped" | Nicky Graham, Tom Watkins | 3:54 |
| 2. | "Silent Night" | Traditional | 3:53 |
| 3. | "Shocked" (live) | Nicky Graham, Tom Watkins | 6:07 |
| 4. | "The Big Push Overture" | Nicky Graham, Tom Watkins | 5:50 |
| 5. | "I Owe You Nothing" (ThePettibone Remix) | 6:38 | |
| 6. | "I Owe You Nothing" (Pettibeats) | 3:41 | |
| 7. | "I Owe You Nothing" (The Voice) | 3:18 | |
| 8. | "I Owe You Nothing" (Club Mix) | Nicky Graham, Tom Watkins | 7:42 |
| 9. | "I Owe You Nothing" (The Beats) | Nicky Graham, Tom Watkins | 3:42 |
| 10. | "I Owe You Nothing" (Over 18 Mix) | 18:01 |
| No. | Title | Writer(s) | Length |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1. | "When Will I Be Famous?" (Contender Dub Mix) | 8:21 | |
| 2. | "When Will I Be Famous?" (Infamous Mix) | 5:44 | |
| 3. | "When Will I Be Famous?" (Club Mix) | The Brothers | 8:11 |
| 4. | "When Will I Be Famous?" (Acapella Mix) | 4:05 | |
| 5. | "When Will I Be Famous?" (Bonus Beats) | 2:56 | |
| 6. | "Drop the Boy" (Art Mix) | 5:56 | |
| 7. | "Drop the Boy" (Shep Pettibone Dub Mix) | 7:04 | |
| 8. | "Drop the Boy" (Shep Pettibone Mix) | 6:47 | |
| 9. | "I Quit" (Acid Drops) | 4:01 | |
| 10. | "I Quit" (The "Turn-On" Mix) | 6:55 | |
| 11. | "I Quit" (The Acidic Mix) | 8:07 |
Bros
Additional personnel
| Production
|
Weekly charts[edit]
| Year-end charts[edit]
|
| Region | Certification | Certified units/sales |
|---|---|---|
| Australia (ARIA)[33] | 2× Platinum | 140,000^ |
| France (SNEP)[34] | 2× Gold | 200,000* |
| Germany (BVMI)[35] | Gold | 250,000^ |
| New Zealand (RMNZ)[36] | Platinum | 15,000^ |
| Portugal (AFP)[37] | Gold | 20,000^ |
| Spain (PROMUSICAE)[38] | Gold | 50,000^ |
| Switzerland (IFPI Switzerland)[39] | Gold | 25,000^ |
| United Kingdom (BPI)[40] | 4× Platinum | 1,200,000^ |
* Sales figures based on certification alone. | ||
| Region | Date | Label | Format | Catalog |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| United Kingdom & Europe Australia | 28 March 1988 | CBS | LP | 460629 1 |
| LPpicture disc | 460629 0 | |||
| cassette | 460629 4 | |||
| CD | 460629 2 | |||
| limited edition picture CD | 460629 9 | |||
| Japan | 22 June 1988 | Epic | cassette | 25 6P-5022 |
| CD | 25 8P-5022 | |||
| United States | July 1988[41] | LP | E 44285 | |
| cassette | ET 44285 | |||
| CD | EK 44285 | |||
| Canada | LP | BFE 44285 | ||
| cassette | BFET 44285 | |||
| CD | BFEK 44285 | |||
| United Kingdom & Europe | 24 July 2004 | Columbia | remastered CD | 460629 2/4606292004 |
| United Kingdom | 4 November 2013 | Cherry Pop | 3-CD deluxe version | CRPOPT137 |
| United Kingdom | 23 June 2023 | Music on Vinyl | 1000 copies limited edition on blue vinyl | MOVLP3341 |
