Dexys Midnight Runners - the name consistently spelled without an apostrophe - were a British post-punk and northern soul band who achieved their major success in the early to mid 1980s. The word "Dexys" in this case, comes from a colloquialism of "dextroamphetamine" or "purple hearts," a type of amphetamine diet pill that was a popular "upper" drug with England's Northern Soul scene in the 1960s. Founded by former singer of The Killjoys, Kevin Rowland and guitarist Kevin "Al" Archer, in Birmingham (UK) 1978. The band name was taken from a colloquialism for dextroamphetamine (ie, "dexies" or "dexys"), a drug commonly abused by the UK's Mod/Northern Soul scenes of the 1960s. ...show more

Dexys Midnight Runners - the name consistently spelled without an apostrophe - were a British post-punk and northern soul band who achieved their major success in the early to mid 1980s. The word "Dexys" in this case, comes from a colloquialism of "dextroamphetamine" or "purple hearts," a type of amphetamine diet pill that was a popular "upper" drug with England's Northern Soul scene in the 1960s. Founded by former singer of The Killjoys, Kevin Rowland and guitarist Kevin "Al" Archer, in Birmingham (UK) 1978. The band name was taken from a colloquialism for dextroamphetamine (ie, "dexies" or "dexys"), a drug commonly abused by the UK's Mod/Northern Soul scenes of the 1960s.

The band, especially at its beginnings, was unique in that musically, they seemed best suited to the budding mod/Skinhead Revival scene in the United Kingdom, but in many ways, especially fashion, they came off as rather hard to "sell" to any particular scene. Musically, they've always been a sort of "soul-fusion." An early single, "Geno" (written as an ode to American Northern Soul singer, Geno Washington), was immensely popular, despite being repeatedly bad-mouthed by the NME. In fact, "Geno" remains their biggest-selling single in the UK, thanks in part to at least one re-issue. The following album, Searching for the Young Soul Rebels (1980), was an interesting punk and soul fusion, and despite (or perhaps because of) decidedly mixed reviews by the press, it was extremely well-recieved by the public.

Their second album, Too-Rye-Aye (1982), had a decidedly different sound, thanks largely to an immense line-up change, most notable for the fact that the horn section of ...Young Soul Rebels had been replaced by "the Emerald Express," the band's Celtic folk section (featuring violinist Helen O'Hara). The sound was still obviously soul influenced, at the very least, but this time it was Celtic soul. The album's first UK single was even titled "Celtic Soul Brothers." Too-Rye-Aye was the most popular Dexys album Stateside, in fact it was the only one to break US charts, (though the album itself was only a modest to intermediate success in the US). This is largely because the US a-side single for "Come On Eileen" was debatably too popular (the single has been re-issued at least once in the UK; despite this, "Geno" was still their biggest-selling UK single). ...show less