The Human League

Biography

The Human League helped prove synthesizers could headline pop without apology in the early 1980s.

Philip Oakey's deadpan intertwined with female vocal hooks became a template for British chart futurism.

Dare! and later singles still rotate wherever programmers want melodic machine-pop with hooks.

Remastered audio highlights Simmons hex, string machine pads, and vocal stacks that cassette wore smooth.

The Human League began in Sheffield as an experimental electronic group with Ian Craig Marsh, Martyn Ware, and Philip Oakey. When Ware and Marsh left to form Heaven 17, Oakey kept the name and recruited two teenage dancers, Joanne Catherall and Susan Ann Sulley, whom he had spotted in a nightclub.

Dare! (1981), produced by Martin Rushent, paired icy synthesizers with pop hooks and included Love Action and Don’t You Want Me. Human (1986), produced by Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis, brought another hit with Human, and the group has continued to tour and record since.