Smokie

2010 has seen Smokie gain new chart success with an album of brand new material "Take a Minute". It's the twenty first studio album by British rock band Smokie. Released initially in Denmark in August, the album went up to No. 6 in the charts. It finally reached No. 3 and spent eight weeks there. The album was also successful in Norway, where it peaked at No. 6 during a six weeks chart run. Take a Minute was released in Germany on 15 October 2010 and internationally in February 2011. The first single from the album is "Sally's Song (The Legacy Goes On)". The song is a continuation of the story of the other character, Sally, in "Living Next Door to Alice". The second single is "Nothing Hurts Like a Broken Heart".

Surprisingly, no hits surfaced when The Montreux Album was released. The great "For a Few Dollars More" is here, and along with the original "The Girl Can't Help It, " they should have had much more success than they did. This is a solidly played and recorded work…

Smokie's final album, 1982's Strangers in Paradise was the ideal follow-up to the now three-year-old Other Side of the Road – musically and lyrically, it's as strong as Smokie ever were, with the title track and "Two Strangers Falling" surely ranking up there with the best of the band's output. But the production was distinctly old-fashioned, as though the entire album had been recorded four or five years earlier, then left in a box 'till the time was right. Or, in this case, wrong. Add a record label that really didn't raise a finger to promote the band, and a musical climate that had long since moved away from the standards that Smokie held so dear, and the band weren't simply out of time, they were out of place as well.

Alan Barton was a British singer and member of the hit-making duo Black Lace, alongside Colin Gibb. Their hits included: "The Music Man", "Agadoo" and "Superman". They also represented the United Kingdom in the Eurovision Song Contest 1979 in Jerusalem, with the song "Mary Ann", which finished seventh. Barton replaced Chris Norman in Smokie in 1986, recording six albums with them, and touring extensively as their lead vocalist and rhythm guitarist. He was the lead singer on Smokie's revival of their hit, "Living Next Door To Alice", recorded with British comedian Roy 'Chubby' Brown, as "Who The …. is Alice?". In the early 1990s he released his one and only solo album, Precious (1991) and two accompanying singles: "July 69" (1990) and "Carry Your Heart" (with Kristine Pettersen) (1991).