Your almost totally forgotten classic song of the day is “New Romance (It’s a Mystery)” by a group called Spider. The song was released in April of 1980 and peaked at #39 on the Billboard Hot 100. The video might have received a little play on MTV, had MTV been around in 1980. (The network launched a year later, on August 1, 1981.)
“New Romance (It’s a Mystery)” was written by group members Holly Knight and Anton Fig. You may have heard of at least one of those folks, based on what they did later.
Spider was a New York City group that first got together in 1977. They released three albums between 1980 and 1982, but never really caught on. Singer Amanda Blue Leigh had a long career in the industry but never broke through into the big leagues. Keyboardist Holly Knight left the band after their second album and gained success as a songwriter; her hits (for others) include “Rag Doll” for Aerosmith, “Obsession” for Animotion, “Better Be Good to Me” for Tina Turner, “Love is a Battlefield” and “Invincible” for Pat Benatar, “The Warrior” for Patty Smyth and Scandal, “Change” for John Waite, and “Never” for Heart. Drummer Anton Fig joined up with Paul Shaffer and the World’s Most Dangerous Band and made a big name for himself playing in the house band for two iterations of David Letterman’s late night shows.
All that said, Spider remains a curiosity from the immediate pre-MTV rock era. Others did it better and with better timing, but the song “New Romance” is still pretty good.
Which leads us to today’s daily bonus video of the day, Spider’s official pre-MTV music video for “New Romance (It’s a Mystery).” Yep, that’s Anton Fig on drums, all right.
