Golden Brown

First, let's hear from Hugh Cornwell.

As frontman of The Stranglers, Hugh helped create some of the most memorable records of the late '70s and '80s, from Peaches and No More Heroes to Golden Brown and Always the Sun.

But Hugh has never been particularly interested in standing still.

He left The Stranglers in 1990 and has spent the decades since carving out a successful solo career, continuing to write, record, and perform on his own terms.

I think a word, the word experience i- is better than knowledge because you don't know how much, uh, knowledge you've got because you don't know what the ultimate amount of knowledge is.

Exactly.

Uh, I'm resolutely not gonna talk about Golden Brown in and of itself 'cause you've answered the question a million times, but it, it does lead on a little bit to what you were just talking about there.

As far as when looking for, for, for that great song, when you think back about that song, um, my understanding of it is that almost every stage of its creation seems to have involved somebody thinking it was either a bad idea or a bit crap, and I wonder whether there's a lesson in that when talking about songwriting, that the things which don't quite fit are sometimes the things where you've got to follow your gut and keep going.

Yeah, so my example is always The Stranglers.

If you listen to a radio station in the UK and they go, oh, we've got The Stranglers coming up next, you can almost put your mortgage on it that are going to play Golden Brown.

Yeah.

Chances are it's never going to be Always the Sun.

Oh, really?

Their "Golden Brown" fame.

"Golden Brown."

Yeah.

Do you want to do a couple of bars or just that?

It's a music clip.

I'm going to play you a top 40 single from 1991 by a band whose most successful tune was Golden Brown in the early 80s.

Can you identify them, please? MUSIC

PLAYS Here's the Stranglers.

So sorry for those listening.

Oh, I'm thinking of the Stranglers, the 1982 song Golden Brown.

Do you know that song? No, I don't.

Great song.

Anyway, it doesn't matter.

I'm pretty sure it's a harpsichord being played in that song.

Look up Golden Brown by The Stranglers.

Yeah, I'm just talking out of it.

Well, unless you buy a license for a cover song, you won't make any money off it.

So for me, so I recorded a song called Golden Brown, which everyone knows by The Stranglers.

And I recorded for a thing called The Carrie Diaries.

I had a publisher years ago in L.A. I've never been to L.A.

So I was like, I don't know if I can do 80s.

Is that really my vibe? And then I went...

And I think I'd been playing Golden Brown at the time.

I had just learned it.