A Flock of Seagulls

The UK New Wave band A Flock of Seagulls are best known for singer Mike Score’s distinctive swooping hairstyle—a staple in the early years of MTV—and also their 1982 single “I Ran (So Far Away)”, a Top 10 hit in the US, France, and Australia. • Score, a former hairdresser who played keyboards and guitar, started the band in 1979 in Liverpool. The definitive lineup also included his brother Alister Score on drums, Frank Maudsley on bass and Paul Reynolds on lead guitar. • After reaching the US Dance Club chart with the 1981 double A-side single “Telecommunication”/“Modern Love Is Automatic”, A Flock of Seagulls broke through with a self-titled LP in 1982. The album peaked at No. 32 in the UK but reached the Top 10 in the US and Canada. • Though “I Ran (So Far Away)” was A Flock of Seagulls’ biggest hit worldwide, the band’s 1982 song “Wishing (If I Had a Photograph of You)” became their highest-charting single in the UK, reaching No. 10. It was the first single from their second album, 1983’s Listen, a Top 20 hit in the US and the UK. • When A Flock of Seagulls’ fifth album, 1986’s Dream Come True, didn’t make the charts at home or abroad, the band split before re-forming in 1988 with a new lineup backing Mike Score. • In 1995, amid frequent lineup changes, A Flock of Seagulls released The Light at the End of the World, their first new album in a decade. • Alister Score, Maudsley and Reynolds temporarily rejoined the fold from 2003 to 2004 and again in 2018, when all four original members reconvened to make Ascension, their first album together since 1984. Recorded with the Prague Philharmonic, the album comprised a dozen orchestral versions of A Flock of Seagulls songs.