When Soft Cell member Dave Ball passed away late last year, bandmate Marc Almond releveled that they had already recorded another album of material.
Now we’ve got our first taste of what may be the band’s final outing with a cover of the Was Not Was song Out Come the Freaks. For the new track Soft Cell have teamed up with the legendary Nona Hendryx.
Soft Cell toped the charts in the 1980s with songs including Tainted Love, Say Hello Wave Goodbye and Torch. The band would reform several times through the decades, and last year they toured Australia for the first time. Sadly Ball was unable to be part of the tour due to ill health.
Alongside Soft Cell Marc Almond has had a hugely successful solo career, while Ball was part of 90s band The Grid, and found success as a songwriter penning hits for artists including Kylie Minogue.
For this new release they’ve teamed up with Nona Hendryx who was a member of LaBelle, and had her own successful solo career. Hendryx has been an outspoken voice for the LGBTIQA+ communities and discussed being bisexual in a groundbreaking interview with The Advocate magazine in 2001. Her longtime partner is manager Vicki Wickham, the couple have been together for over 50 years.
Out Come The Freaks is a song that Was Not Was recorded several times and creating many different iterations. The tune appeared on their 1981 debut album. Each version of the song has different vocalists and verses, but the chorus remains the same chanting “Woodwork squeaks, and out come the freaks.”
After first releasing the song in 1981 the band created a second version in 1983 titled (Return to the Valley of) Out Come the Freaks, this take is slower and morse sparse than the original post-disco tune. In 1988 the band released their most successful album What Up, Dog? and a third take on the song was included, it’s referred to as Out Come the Freaks (Again).
The band also put out many different remixes of the song which have been popular with disco DJs over the decades.
Was Not Was created a fourth version of the tune on their final album Are You Okay? which came out in 1990. The final track on the album is called Look What’s Back and it’s a 43 second tracks that is an acoustic campfire chorus of people chanting “Woodwork Squeaks and Out Come the Freaks!”
