Tracie

During the middle of the 1980s Tracie rose to attention as the voice behind buoyant dance-pop numbers including “The House That Jack Built” and as a protégé of Paul Weller. Attached to his Respond imprint, she appeared on the Jam’s closing single “Beat Surrender” and took part in the earliest incarnation of the Style Council. Her 1984 long-player Far from the Hurting Kind blended effervescent girl-group energy with sleek dance-pop flair, suggesting a lengthy trajectory ahead. After moving to another label and completing a follow-up that remained unreleased for years, a discouraged Tracie stepped away from the industry. Later reissues of her debut and the long-shelved No Smoke Without Fire made clear that the short span of her career was not due to any shortcoming on her part; the albums still stand as gleaming examples of sophisti-pop at its finest.

A devoted music fan and regular reader of Smash Hits, Tracie Young noticed a 1982 advertisement placed by the newly launched Respond Records seeking vocalists between the ages of 18 and 24. Although she had not yet turned 18, Young recorded a Phoebe Snow-styled rendition of Betty Wright’s “Shoorah Shoorah” and mailed the tape after seven days. Three days later she received a call inviting her to Paul Weller’s Solid Bond studio for an audition. She and Weller performed duets on the soul standards “Band of Gold” and “Reach Out I’ll Be There,” after which another three days passed before a cassette containing “The House That Jack Built” arrived with a request that she learn the song. Once she had done so, a second package brought the track intended as the Jam’s next single, “A Solid Bond in Your Heart,” whose vocal was meant to build recognition ahead of her own debut. Those plans shifted, and she instead contributed to the Jam’s final release, “Beat Surrender,” issued at the end of 1982. When Weller formed the Style Council he invited Young to sing on their opening single “Speak Like a Child” and to accompany the group on its first concerts; those shows also served to showcase Respond’s roster, so Young performed her own set backed by labelmates the Questions. Her first single, “The House That Jack Built,” appeared in March 1983. Weller produced the track and performed every instrument, crafting a lively fusion of Shalamar-styled pop-funk and crisp 1960s girl-group snap that suited Young’s voice exactly. The record climbed into the U.K. Top Ten, and its similarly styled follow-up “Give It Some Emotion,” released that July, reached the Top 20.

Young soon assembled a live band featuring bassist Kevin Miller, keyboardist Helen Turner, and drummer Steve Sidelynk; together with Weller on guitar they recorded her 1984 album Far from the Hurting Kind. The collection mixed sophisticated dance pop with expansive, synth-laden ballads and included a song written expressly for her by Elvis Costello. Three singles from the set charted in the lower half of the Top 100, as did the album itself. Young maintained a touring schedule and issued a cover of George McCrae’s “I Can’t Leave You Alone” in July 1985, followed in 1986 by the Polydor singles “Invitation” and “[When You] Call Me,” her first releases after Respond closed. At Polydor she recorded a more mature album blending Madonna-like bubblegum with Swing Out Sister elegance; the label chose to withhold the project, slated to be titled No Smoke Without Fire, and ended her contract. At that juncture Young withdrew from music and, by the late 1990s, had begun working as a radio presenter on several stations.

She resumed occasional live performances in the late 2000s, including radio sessions and a 2009 appearance with Billy Franks of the Faith Brothers at Shepherd’s Bush Empire. Shortly afterward Cherry Red reissued Far from the Hurting Kind in 2010, adding numerous rarities to a freshly remastered version of the original album. Four years later No Smoke Without Fire finally emerged under the name Tracie Young and incorporated several previously unheard tracks. A decade after that release, Cherry Red gathered every Tracie and Tracie Young recording on the box set Souls on Fire: The Recordings 1983–1986, which comprised four audio discs plus a DVD of videos, Top of the Pops appearances, and a concert filmed in Japan.