The Motels

Martha Davis brought her magnetic stage presence to the Motels, a band that ranked among the most celebrated acts to surface from Los Angeles’s vibrant new wave community and scored its signature success when “Only the Lonely” entered the Top Ten in 1982. While residing in Berkeley, California, Davis assembled the original lineup in 1972, enlisting guitarist Dean Chamberlain and bassist Richard d’Andrea; the ensemble first performed as the Warfield Foxes before adopting the Motels name after moving south to L.A. Although several record companies expressed interest, repeated personnel shifts ultimately led to the group’s dissolution in 1976.

Davis promptly assembled another Motels configuration that included guitarist Jeff Jourard, his brother Marty on saxophone and keyboards, bassist Michael Goodroe, and drummer Brian Glascock. The refreshed unit signed with Capitol and delivered its self-titled debut album in 1979, which produced a modest hit in the ballad “Total Control.” Prior to the 1980 release of the follow-up, Careful, guitarist Tim McGovern, previously of the Pop, took over for Jeff Jourard. After Capitol declined to issue the band’s third effort, Apocalypso, McGovern departed; the Motels then re-recorded the project with guitarist Guy Perry and additional session players.

The label finally approved the reworked material, issuing it in 1982 as All Four One. Bolstered by the atmospheric single “Only the Lonely,” which climbed to number nine, the album attained gold status. The evocative “Suddenly Last Summer,” drawn from the 1983 album Little Robbers, also reached number nine the following year and was accompanied by the Top 40 track “Remember the Nights.” Shock, released in 1985, supplied the group’s last chart entry, “Shame.” A cancer scare led Davis to disband the Motels in 1987, the same year she launched her solo career with the album Policy.

In mid-1998 she revived the group for touring under the billing the Motels Featuring Martha Davis. Between 2000 and 2007 six compilation sets appeared, and September 2007 brought the new studio album Clean Modern and Reasonable. The long-unreleased Apocalypso finally emerged in 2011 on the archival imprint Omnivore.