November 6 - The 80s Wonder Cruise

I'm a one hit wonder, and I've made a career out of my song. There, I said it. I feel like I'm in One Hit Wonders Anonymous or something.
Yes, I'm a one hit wonder, and I've been riding my song's three minutes and 23 seconds for--no lie--25 years. The other day, my manager and I were trying to calculate how many times I've performed my hit, and we couldn't. Easily more than a thousand, though.
And that of course includes this gig, The 80s Wonder Cruise. It's a seven day cruise in the Bahamas with live music every night. They got me, a-ha, Animotion, Scritti Politti, Tommy Tutone, and Thomas Dolby. We play 30 minute sets every night and then hang out with the passengers during the day. And get paid. It's actually pretty cool, and it's all because of my song.
I always end my sets with it. Of course. What else am I going to do, play it and then follow it up with something new that, like, nobody knows? It'd be like a-ha not finishing their set with Take on Me, or Animotion not ending their set with Obsession. We're not stupid. We know that's what people are here to see.
It's kind of funny, but a lot of people just assume I hate it, you know, the song. But I don't. Yeah, it's an albatross, and yeah, it's my legacy, such as it is. It's very 80s, kind of synthy, kind of bouncy, kind of cheesy. OK, it's very cheesy, but whatever. It's also well-written and well-crafted. The critics all called it a throwaway hit, but screw them. It's still around. And like I said, it will be what people remember me for. Any obituary they do about me will definitely end with that song fading out and then freezing on a photo of me from '85 that fades into black and gets replaced with my name and 1961 - whenever I end up dying.
That song.
But here's the thing: It always gets me. I still feel it every time I sing it. Even to this day, 25 years after it came out, it still moves me and touches me and does all those other things that sound stupid when you say them out loud but when you're in the moment you know they're real.
And I get to feel that way every night on this cruise and it always takes me back: The tour with Howard Jones, my video on heavy rotation on MTV (back when they actually played videos), getting recognized on the streets, my mom getting interviewed for our hometown newspaper, the record company and my management and me choosing what the follow-up single was going to be.
And then all of a sudden, it was over.
The song peaked at #7, the follow up failed to chart, a few months later the label dropped me, and that was it.
And yeah, it was a let down. It was a blast while it was happening, and I wished it had lasted longer, but it didn't, and I was mostly OK with it. There were no Behind the Music meltdowns. I never got into drugs, never got carried away, didn't make an ass out of myself trying to stay in the spotlight. The moment just faded and that was that.
I kept doing music, though. People are always shocked when they find out I've released nine albums since then. And even though they get mostly positive reviews (when they get reviewed at all), if you add their sales together, it's nowhere near the numbers for that song. I'm like an unsuccessful Aimee Mann. (Apparently, there can only be one respected, semi-successful former 80s one hit wonder keeping it going on the adult alt. rock/folk scene. Oh well.)
But I'll tell you this much: I do not have a problem with 80s nostalgia. At all. All the people who were young when my song came out are in their 30s and 40s now, and they're the ones who come on these cruises. And it's totally cool meeting them and hearing their stories. They're always surprised when me and the other bands want to hang out with them, but it's like, sure, why the hell not. I mean, we get paid a little bit to come on these cruises, but we mostly do them as our vacations too. Not like we're super famous or anything. Not like we have entourages. We're just people.
A lot of folks who don't know better have hinted that it's pathetic I'm still milking that song after all these years. Whatever. They call it milking. I call it doing something I like and making people happy along the way. Screw them if you think it's pathetic.