Positive Touch

Positive Touch is a 1981 album by The Undertones. The album, the third to be released by the band and the last to be produced by Roger Bechirian, was recorded between January and February 1981 at Wisseloord studios in The Netherlands. The LP was released in May that year, reaching number 17 in the UK album charts.

Contents

• Undertones positive touch
• Track listing
• Personnel
• Songs
• References

The original LP release included the UK chart hits: "It's Going to Happen!", which reached number 18 in the UK Singles Chart in May 1981, and an album version of "Julie Ocean", which reached number 41 upon release in July the same year.

Although the majority of the songs contained upon this album were largely inspired by the same subjects as the songs upon the two previous albums released by the band at this stage in their career (both of which generally contained lyrical matter concerning teenage angst), Positive Touch was the first and only album released by The Undertones to contain songs which drew lyrical inspiration from the Troubles relating to the political and social background in which the members of the band had been born and raised. The single "It's Going to Happen!" was directly inspired by the 1981 hunger strikes in Northern Ireland and was performed on Top of the Pops on the day one of the participants in these hunger strikes, Bobby Sands, died. Three further songs upon the LP ("You're Welcome", "Crisis of Mine" and "Sigh and Explode") were also lyrically inspired by the Troubles, although none of the material the band were to subsequently release drew influence from these sources.

In 1986, one album track on Positive Touch, "When Saturday Comes", became the inspiration for the title of the UK football fanzine of the same name. This song was not released as a single in the United Kingdom, but was released as a single in the Netherlands.

Positive Touch was voted number 28 in the 1981 NME 'Albums of the Year'.