Two Tribes

"Two Tribes" is an anti-war song by British band Frankie Goes to Hollywood, released in the UK by ZTT Records on 4 June 1984. The song was later included on the album '' Welcome to the Pleasuredome''. Presenting a nihilistic, gleeful lyric expressing enthusiasm for nuclear war, it juxtaposes a relentless pounding bass line and guitar riff inspired by American funk and R&B pop with influences of Russian classical music, in an opulent arrangement produced by Trevor Horn.

The single was a phenomenal success in the UK, helped by a wide range of remixes and supported by an advertising campaign depicting the band as members of the Red Army. It entered the UK Singles Chart at number one on 10 June 1984, where it stayed for nine consecutive weeks, during which time the group's previous single "Relax" climbed back up the charts to number two. It was the longest-running number-one single in the UK of the 1980s. It has sold 1.58 million copies in the UK as of November 2012, being in the Top 30 best-selling singles in the UK as of 2022.

Songwriters Johnson, Gill and O'Toole received the 1984 Ivor Novello award for Best Song Musically and Lyrically. In 2015 the song was voted by the British public as the nation's 14th-favourite 1980s number one in a poll for ITV.

Music

A version of "Two Tribes" was originally recorded for a BBC John Peel session in October 1982. The session version makes clear that the basic structure of the song, including its signature bass-line, percussion arrangement and idiosyncratic introductory and middle eight sections, were already intact prior to any involvement from ZTT or eventual producer Trevor Horn.

Johnson also noted: "There's two elements in the music – an American funk line and a Russian line. It's the most obvious demonstration of two tribes that we have today." To accentuate the musical tension, Horn arranged the 'Russian' segments as a dramatic string arrangement. The driving funk/rock rhythm section was played on synthesisers.

Title and lyrics

The single was released at a time when the Cold War had intensified and fears about global nuclear warfare were at a peak. Although Johnson would attest in a 1984 radio interview that the "two tribes" of the song potentially represented any pair of warring adversaries (giving the examples of "cowboys and Indians or Captain Kirk and Klingons"), the line "On the air America/I modelled shirts by Van Heusen" is a clear reference to then US President Ronald Reagan. Reagan had advertised for Phillips Van Heusen in 1953 (briefly reviving the association in the early 1980s). The title of his first film had been ''Love Is on the Air''.

The lyric "working for the black gas" is, according to Johnson, "About oil surpassing gold. How you might as well be paid in petrol."''No 1'' magazine, 4 August 1984 http://www.zttaat.com/article.php?title=181 And the line "Are we living in a land where sex and horror are the new gods?" was inspired by the 1959 British film '' Cover Girl Killer''. Johnson explained, "The TV was on in the background while I was doing me ironing and suddenly this character came out with that statement." (The actual dialogue, which occurs at about 48 minutes 24 seconds into the film, is "Surely sex and horror are the new gods in this polluted world of so-called entertainment?")

The track featured snippets of narration from actor Patrick Allen, recreating his narration from the British '' Protect and Survive'' public information films about how to survive a nuclear war. (The original ''Protect and Survive'' soundtracks were sampled for the 7-inch mixes.)

The 12-inch A- and B-sides featured voice parts by British actor Chris Barrie imitating Ronald Reagan. Barrie also voiced the Reagan puppet on '' Spitting Image''. Barrie's parts as 'Reagan' included praise for the band, as well as parts of Adolf Hitler's speech to a court after the Beer Hall Putsch: "You may pronounce us guilty a thousand times over, but the Goddess of the Eternal Court of History will smile and tear to tatters the brief of the State Prosecutor and the sentence of this court, for She acquits us." Barrie also voiced the last sentence of "History Will Absolve Me" (Spanish: "La historia me absolverá") which is the concluding sentence and subsequent title of a four-hour speech made by Fidel Castro on 16 October 1953. Castro made the speech in his own defense in court against the charges brought against him after leading an attack on the Moncada Barracks on 26 July 1953. Barrie would return for the band's next single, " The Power of Love", imitating Mike Read in a parody of the DJ's ban on their previous single, "Relax".

The song's title derives from the line "two mighty warrior tribes went to war" from the film ''Mad Max 2'' (the line is also spoken by Holly Johnson at the beginning of the session version).

Critical reception

American magazine ''Cash Box'' called it "a more scintillating anti-war track than The War Song"">The_War_Song.html" ;"title="The War Song">The War Song", saying it is "both an effective dance cut and a piece of modern art." Richard Harris from ''New Musical Express">NME