One of Britain’s standout blue-eyed soul vocalists from his generation, Paul Young rose to prominence amid the peak years of new wave and MTV, then kept his momentum alive over subsequent decades by circling back to his R&B foundations. His wide-ranging musical interests and sharp instinct for material surfaced clearly in two chart-topping singles: a brooding, elegiac take on Marvin Gaye’s “Wherever I Lay My Hat (That’s My Home)” that claimed the top spot on the U.K. charts in 1983 and an impassioned reading of Daryl Hall & John Oates’ “Everytime You Go Away” that reached number one in the United States in 1985. Young recast both tracks in a new-wave-soul mold, his silky, honeyed rasp anchoring sleek productions in which Pino Palladino’s supple fretless bass wound through layers of synthesizers. In the mid-eighties that buoyant style aligned with the prevailing New Music climate and elevated Young to transatlantic stardom. Recognition first bloomed at home with his 1983 debut No Parlez and its 1985 follow-up The Secret of Association, each of which topped the British album chart; between those releases his profile grew so luminous that Bob Geldof selected him to deliver the opening verse on Band Aid’s 1984 holiday single “Do They Know It’s Christmas.” Stateside, “Come Back and Stay” from 1983 introduced him to the Top 40, yet The Secret of Association ultimately became his strongest U.S. seller thanks to “Everytime You Go Away.” As the decade turned, Young continued to graze the upper reaches of the charts, notching a number-eight American hit in 1990 with a version of the Chi-Lites’ “Oh Girl” and reaching number four in Britain with “Senza Una Donna (Without a Woman),” his 1991 collaboration with Zucchero. Throughout the nineties he eased toward adult-oriented pop, a move that still permitted him to tap his soulful heritage on projects such as the 2016 album Good Thing and to explore unexpected detours like the 2006 set Rock Swings, which reimagined rock classics in big-band arrangements. That solid reputation as a soul singer also freed him to pursue side projects, notably Los Pacaminos, the Tex-Mex roots-rock group he launched in 1993 and maintained across the years.
Paul Young entered the world in Luton, north of London in Bedfordshire, on January 17, 1956. He began performing on bass and guitar in several local groups before steadily advancing to lead-singer roles. His first notable break came as frontman of the new-wave outfit Streetband, whose 1978 single “Toast” became a nationwide U.K. hit. After the band split in 1979, Young and some of its members promptly formed the Q-Tips, a retro-soul ensemble devoted to classic Motown. A self-titled album on Chrysalis and nonstop road work drew considerable attention to Young’s solo prospects, prompting him to sign with CBS in 1982 and prompting the Q-Tips’ dissolution.
Young quickly established a songwriting alliance with former Q-Tips keyboardist Ian Kewley, who also became a core member of the new backing unit the Royal Family, whose female backing singers were billed as the Fabulous Wealthy Tarts. His first solo single, “Iron Out the Rough Spots,” appeared in late 1982 and was followed by a cover of Nicky Thomas’s reggae-pop hit “Love of the Common People.” Neither made much chart impact, yet his interpretation of the lesser-known Marvin Gaye song “Wherever I Lay My Hat (That’s My Home)” proved an immediate triumph, topping the U.K. singles chart and lifting the accompanying debut album No Parlez to the same position later that year. No Parlez also supplied Young’s initial U.S. Top 40 entry, the Jack Lee composition “Come Back and Stay,” already a British Top Ten, while its unexpected cover of Joy Division’s “Love Will Tear Us Apart” attracted further notice. He then embarked on a worldwide tour supporting an album that ultimately sold several million copies globally.
Young’s first high-profile 1984 engagement was his contribution to the Band Aid single “Do They Know It’s Christmas?” Soon afterward he returned to the British Top Ten with a version of Ann Peebles’ “I’m Gonna Tear Your Playhouse Down.” That track featured on his second album, The Secret of Association, issued in 1985. During that year he achieved the largest success of his career with “Every Time You Go Away,” a once-obscure Hall & Oates album track from 1980. The single ascended to number one on both the U.K. and U.S. pop charts, becoming by a wide margin his biggest American hit. He followed it with another U.K. Top Ten original, “Everything Must Change,” and saw The Secret of Association become his second British chart-topping album.
On his third release, 1986’s Between Two Fires, Young focused chiefly on original songs co-written with Kewley. The album’s smoother, less overtly soul-oriented approach still sold solidly among his British audience, with “Wonderland” reaching the Top 30. He reappeared in 1990 with Other Voices, which included his treatment of the Chi-Lites’ classic “Oh Girl,” his only other U.S. Top Ten single. In 1991 he climbed back into the U.K. Top Five with “Senza una Donna (Without a Woman),” a duet with Italian pop singer Zucchero that appeared on the hits collection From Time to Time: The Singles Collection. The following year his cover of Jimmy Ruffin’s “What Becomes of the Brokenhearted,” drawn from the Fried Green Tomatoes soundtrack, topped the U.S. adult-contemporary chart despite missing the pop Top 20.
The Crossing, released in 1993, marked his final album for Columbia and yielded the U.K. single “Now I Know What Made Otis Blue.” Late in 1994 Young delivered an album of soul covers titled Reflections on the smaller Vision Music imprint. He spent much of the decade performing both solo and with Los Pacaminos, the roots-rock band he had formed in 1992. Eventually he moved to East/West, which issued a self-titled album in 1997. Displaying a pronounced country inflection, the record produced the U.K. Top 40 hit “I Wish You Love.” In 1999 he undertook a limited-venue British tour that received favorable notices, after which Los Pacaminos released their self-titled debut album in 2002.
Thereafter Young split his time between Los Pacaminos and solo endeavors, maintaining regular touring schedules and sporadic recordings with each. Non-musical activities also claimed attention, including appearances on the U.K. editions of Celebrity MasterChef and Hell’s Kitchen, platforms that showcased his culinary abilities. His initial televised outing occurred in September 2006 with a role on Celebrity MasterChef that coincided with the arrival of Rock Swings: On the Wild Side of Swing, an album on which he reinterpreted rock songs in big-band style. Continued television work and touring followed, yet one of the more notable recordings from this stretch arrived in 2010 when Chicane released the single “Come Back,” which interpolated Young’s 1983 hit “Come Back and Stay.” His next project was A Fistful of Statins, Los Pacaminos’ 2014 album. Two years later he returned to solo work with Good Thing, a 2016 release steeped in soul. Young finished a collection of songs left incomplete over the previous two decades for Behind the Lens, an album issued in May 2023, and supported it with a world tour.
