• Source: Temptation (Heaven 17 song)

"Temptation" is a single by British band Heaven 17 featuring Carol Kenyon, originally released in April 1983 by Virgin Records, peaking at number two on the UK Singles Chart. This was the second single to be taken from their second album, The Luxury Gap (1983), after "Let Me Go" in November 1982. It was written by Glenn Gregory, Ian Craig Marsh and Martyn Ware, and produced by B.E.F. and Greg Walsh. The music video for the song was directed by Steve Barron. "Temptation" was certified silver by the BPI in May 1983, for sales exceeding 250,000 copies, subsequently listed by the Official Charts Company as the 34th best-selling single of 1983 in the UK.




Composition and recording


Martyn Ware explained the subject matter of the song as "I woke up one morning and thought I've got to write a song about sex, I've never written a song about sex. So the song is about rising sexual tension; it has chords that keep going up like an [M. C.] Escher staircase and in the end there's this big release." Glenn Gregory later recalled that he laughed "when Martyn walked in and said he had this great idea for a song based on the Lord’s Prayer with a never-ending chord structure" (the line "lead us not into temptation" is taken from the Lord's Prayer).
Carol Kenyon provided guest vocals on the recording and continued to work with the band on the Pleasure One and Teddy Bear, Duke & Psycho albums. The song featured a 60-piece orchestra, arranged and conducted by John Wesley Barker, which was also featured on the single "Come Live with Me" and a third track on the parent album. In a 2016 interview Ware said that he told Barker that he wanted the arrangement to be "sweeping and expressionistic", giving the theme from The Big Country as an example of the kind of sound required.




Performance


Heaven 17 performed this song on Top of the Pops' 1000th edition in 1983.




Critical reception


Upon its release, the song was poorly received by Smash Hits reviewer Dave Rimmer who wrote: "The boys from the BEF seem hell-bent on making brilliant disco records. Unfortunately this isn't one of them. They've got all the right ideas, but seem to get them in the wrong order. And the smoochy vocal intro is horrid."
Retrospectively, Record Collector reviewer Daryl Easlea stated in 2012 that "Temptation remains the best Northern soul single written in another era", and described it in an earlier review for the BBC as typical of the "superiority" of Heaven 17's "hooks and nuances, fluid funk and sultry soul."




Remix and re-recording


In 1992, the song was remixed by Brothers in Rhythm and released on 9 November 1992. This version charted at No. 4 on the UK Singles Chart, and reached No. 1 in the UK Dance Chart. The 1992 remix of "Temptation" was certified silver by the British Phonographic Industry (BPI) in January 1993 for sales exceeding 200,000 copies.
In 2008, the song was re-recorded for Heaven 17's album Naked as Advertised with Billie Godfrey as guest vocalist. On 19 October 2010, Heaven 17 performed the song on Later... with Jools Holland on BBC Two in the United Kingdom.




Music video


The music video for "Temptation" was directed by Irish-British filmmaker Steve Barron. It shows the band dressed in black in drab surroundings in a style of German Expressionism, and has segments of what looks like an abstract office interview between vocalist Glenn Gregory and actress Gillian de Terville (who lip syncs Carol Kenyon's vocals). Kenyon does not appear in the video because of a disagreement over appearance money.




Personnel


Credits are adapted from the album's liner notes.
Heaven 17

Glenn Gregory - vocals
Martyn Ware - synthesizers, Linn LM-1 programming, backing vocals, producer
Ian Craig Marsh - synthesizers, producer
Additional personnel

Greg Walsh - producer, engineer
Carol Kenyon - vocals
John Wesley Barker - orchestral arranger and conductor




Charts






= Original version

=




= Brothers in Rhythm remix

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Cover versions


At the NME Awards 2007, Jarvis Cocker and Beth Ditto performed "Temptation", and released it as a charity single.
Cradle of Filth covered the song in 2006 on their album Thornography.
Heaven 17 collaborated on a new performance of the song with La Roux at Maida Vale Studios on 26 January 2010 for BBC 6 Music. At Glastonbury on 25 June 2010, Glenn Gregory was invited on stage to perform the version again with La Roux during their set.




References in popular culture


"Temptation" was used in the 1996 film Trainspotting and appears on the second volume of the official soundtrack. It was also used in the 2010 Plusnet advert, where the band were featured in a tongue-in-cheek appearance performing the song.
In September 2024, Ware said Rockstar Games had asked to license "Temptation" for its upcoming video game Grand Theft Auto VI for US$7,500 per writer; Ware countered with an offer for US$75,000 or "a reasonable royalty" but said Rockstar declined. Ware responded "Go fuck yourself", citing the estimated US$8.6 billion revenue earned by the game's predecessor, Grand Theft Auto V. Naomi Pohl, the general secretary of the Musicians' Union, felt Ware's reaction was unsurprising and said the game's high profile would not necessarily translate to higher exposure for the song, noting that "streaming doesn't sustain careers".




References






External links


Temptation at Discogs (list of releases)

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