"Rough Justice" is a song by English girl group

Bananarama Bananarama is an English pop group formed in London in 1980. The group, originally a trio, consisted of friends Sara Dallin, Siobhan Fahey, and Keren Woodward. Fahey left the group in 1988 and was replaced by Jacquie O'Sullivan until 1991, when ...

. It was co-written by group members Sara Dallin, Siobhan Fahey, and Keren Woodward and the writing-production duo

Jolley & Swain Steven Nicholas Jolley (born April 1950) and Tony Swain (born 20 January 1952, London, England) were a successful songwriting and record production duo in the United Kingdom in the early to mid-1980s, producing some of the top artists and song ...

who also produced the song. The song was released in May 1984 as the third single from their self-titled second album.

Song topic and reception

The song is one of several composed by

at the time which lyrically addressed "serious" topics. The song was written about Thomas "Kidso" Reilly, the band's road manager and brother of Fahey's boyfriend

Jim Reilly James G. Reilly (born 9 May 1957) is the second drummer for the Northern Ireland based punk band Stiff Little Fingers, with whom he played from 1979 to 1981. He played on the LPs '' Nobody's Heroes'', '' Go for It'' and ''Hanx''. In 1981, he ...

(drummer of the Northern Irish punk band

Stiff Little Fingers Stiff Little Fingers are a Northern Irish punk rock band from Belfast. They formed in 1977 at the height of the Troubles, which informed much of their songwriting. They started out as a schoolboy band called Highway Star (named after the Deep P ...

), who was shot and killed by a British soldier in Belfast in August 1983. Although the music was upbeat, the heavy lyrical content did not prove to be as successful as their prior single (" Robert De Niro's Waiting..."). It peaked at number 23 on the UK Singles Chart. In Australia, the song failed to chart and it was not released as a single in the United States. "Rough Justice" was

remix A remix, also sometimes called reorchestration or rework, is a piece of media which has been altered or contorted from its original state by adding, removing, or changing pieces of the item. A song, piece of artwork, book, poem, or photograph ca ...

ed slightly from its album version when released as a single, most notably in the track's introduction.

Music video

The

music video A music video is a video that integrates a song or an album with imagery that is produced for promotion (marketing), promotional or musical artistic purposes. Modern music videos are primarily made and used as a music marketing device intended to ...

features the girls preparing for an appearance on a show at a TV studio. The video begins with a young boy dressed in a tuxedo entering the girls' dressing room to give them congratulatory flowers only to take pictures of them without asking, which causes Keren Woodward to eject him from the room. As soon as the boy is gone, the girls see a TV news report which is actually being made in the studio next door (the report was presented by

BBC The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...

newscaster A news presenter – also known as a newsreader, newscaster (short for "news broadcaster"), anchorman or anchorwoman, news anchor or simply an anchor – is a person who presents news during a news broadcasting, news program on televisio ...

Peter Woods, who made a cameo in the clip). The

studio floor manager A floor manager or floor director is a member of the crew of a television show. The floor manager is responsible for giving information from the director in the control room, to the crew on the studio floor, and then back to the director. Duties * ...

, played by the band's then-choreographer

Bruno Tonioli Bruno Tonioli (; born 25 November 1955) is a British-Italian television personality, choreographer and dancer. He has judged on the British television talent shows ''Strictly Come Dancing'' (2004–2019), ''DanceX'' (2007) and ''Britain's Got Ta ...

, comes to take the girls to the studio where they will be filming their appearance but as he is looking away, the girls head into the other studio. They end up hijacking the news broadcast in order to get their message out to the public.

Track listing

UK & NL 7" vinyl single (UK: London Records NANA 7 / NL: London Records 820 081-7) #"Rough Justice" (single version) – 3:38 #"Live Now" – 3:31 + some copies of the 7" came with free poster + some copies of the 7" came with a 3D sleeve ''NAND 7'' 12" vinyl single (London Records NANX 7) #"Rough Justice" (12" version) – 5:13 #"Rough Justice" (album version) – 5:05 #"Live Now" – 3:31 + some copies of the 12" came with three 3D cards ''NAND X7''

Charts

References

1984 singles Bananarama songs London Records singles Songs written by Sara Dallin Songs written by Siobhan Fahey Songs written by Keren Woodward Songs written by Tony Swain (musician) Songs written by Steve Jolley (songwriter) Song recordings produced by Jolley & Swain 1982 songs {{1980s-pop-song-stub