The Story Behind The Song: The truth behind ‘Come On Eileen’
In 1982, Dexys Midnight Runners released their iconic hit ‘Come On Eileen’ as the second single from their album Too-Rye-Ay. The best-selling track has become synonymous with the 1980s, despite differing quite distinctively from other hits of the era. The Birmingham band cleverly used unusual instruments for a pop track, such as the banjo, accordion, fiddle and saxophone.
Although Dexys Midnight Runners swayed from the mainstream synth-drenched sounds that were topping the charts, their efforts paid off and ‘Come on Eileen’ won a Brit Award for Best British Single and hit number one in several countries, including the United States, knocking Michael Jackson’s ‘Billie Jean’ off the top spot. The song was the only American success for the band, whose follow-up single ‘The Celtic Soul Brothers’ only reached number 86.
Nevertheless, the band’s one-hit wonder is still a staple of weddings, parties and cheesy club nights 40 years later. The track even appeared in the coming-of-age film The Perks of Being a Wallpaper, giving it a new lease of life amongst a younger generation.
The upbeat track, featuring the inescapably catchy hook “Toora, loora, toora, loo-rye-aye”, has a fascinating history behind it – one that hints towards the band’s lack of continued success. Kevin Archer was Dexys Midnight Runners’ guitarist, leaving the band after the first album due to lead singer Kevin Rowland‘s challenging behaviour. In a 2009 interview with Mojo (via SongFacts), Archer shared, “Kevin ruled the group with a rod of iron – he wouldn’t speak to us personally. After shows, we’d be in a room on our own; it became ‘hate Kevin Rowland time.'”
He continued, “We were in Switzerland, we’d played to 2,000 people, and Kevin and I got on a plane to Luxembourg, and the rest got in a van and went to England. That was it. Kevin got me to help form a new group, rehearsing in a freezing industrial unit in Birmingham. He was irritable, treating everyone like they were nobody.”
This led Archer to form a new band called the Blue Ox Babes. “I did the ‘Plan B’ demo, Kevin wasn’t happy with it. It got too much,” he recalled. “We met in the little Nibble caff in Bearwood, and I said I was leaving. He never showed any emotion. He got me to go round to Billy (Adams), the new guitarist’s house to teach him the new chords.” After forming his new band, Archer showed Rowland “a tape with three of our songs on, including ‘What Does Anybody Ever Think About.'”
Not long after, ‘Come On Eileen’ became a massive hit. It didn’t take Archer long before he realised that Rowland had stolen the build-up of ‘What Does Anybody Ever Think About’ and ripped off the Blue Ox Babes’ whole style for Too-Rye-Aye. Eventually, Rowland admitted to copying Archer’s ideas and paid him royalties for the track.
The lyrics for the song, however, came from Rowland and a sexual experience he had with his own Eileen. The pair had grown up within a strict Catholic community, even attending church together. The track, therefore, touches on these conflicting feelings of desire and shame, Rowland told Melody Maker: “It’s absolutely true all the way. I was about 14 or 15 and sex came into it and our relationship had always been so clean. It seemed at the time to get dirty and that’s what it’s about. I was really trying to capture that atmosphere.”
Still, Rowland has enthusiastically discussed the making of the track, and in 2014 he sat down with Songfacts to share more facts about ‘Come On Eileen’. He said, “We wanted a good rhythm, and we found one. Lots of records we liked had that rhythm: ‘Concrete and Clay,’ ‘It’s Not Unusual’ by Tom Jones. Lots of records we liked had that ‘Bomp ba bomp, bomp ba bomp.’ We felt it was a good rhythm. We came up with the chord sequence ourselves and just started singing melodies over it. I remember thinking, ‘We’re really onto something here.'”
He continued, “I came up with that, ‘Too ra loo ra,’ and I remember thinking, ‘Wow, this is sounding really good.’ You get a feeling when you’re writing a song. Something happens. And in the end, it kind of finished itself.”
Despite accusations that Rowland had stolen Archer’s ideas, the frontman crafted an image he would upkeep off-stage, such as wearing patched-up denim, to assure fans that the band’s new sound was authentic. He once shared with Smash Hits: “I take deadly serious what I do. It’s very important to me to be an individual. I don’t care if people laugh. That’s what Dexys Midnight Runners is all about: showing your feelings and not giving a damn what other people think.”