On Monday, Bananarama announced they’d signed with the UK’s Fascination Records, joining a roster that also includes Girls Aloud and the Saturdays.

Now a duo consisting of original members Sara Dallin and Keren Woodward (Siobhan Fahey left the group in 1988), Bananarama’s tenth studio album, Viva, will be released in the UK on September 14. First single, “Love Comes,” is out about a week earlier, and set for the flip side is a newly recorded version of their hit, “Cruel Summer.”

This won’t be the first time they’ve given “Cruel Summer” another go. After Fahey’s departure, she was briefly replaced by Jacquie O’Sullilvan, and the revamped trio issued “Cruel Summer ’89,” inspired by the New Jack Swing movement. Sullivan left in 1991, and ten years later, Dallin and Woodward covered themselves again, giving “Cruel Summer” a Latin twist for their Exotica album. So with this upcoming take (likely more dance-oriented), there will be a total of four versions of “Cruel Summer,” each featuring various iterations of the group, adopting current sounds.

Bananarama first recorded “Cruel Summer” in 1983. The song was a top 10 hit in Britain, but it wasn’t until the song was included in the 1984 film The Karate Kid that “Cruel Summer” took off here. Twenty five years ago this week, on July 21, 1984, “Cruel Summer” entered the Billboard Hot 100 at #76.

I know it’s in the title and all, but boy, does this song capture summer well. Produced by Tony Swain and Steve Jolley (who wrote the tune with the trio), the girls sound as if they’re singing off in the distance, a mirage shimmering off the hot pavement. Of course, back when I heard “Cruel Summer” on the radio, we were suffering through the year’s highest temps, so that could very well be the link between song and feeling.

The video was inspired by The Dukes of Hazzard:

“Cruel Summer” was Bananarama’s first U.S. top ten hit, reaching #9 on September 29, 1984. Two years later, “Venus” would take them all the way to the top.

Purchase Bananarama – “Cruel Summer” via iTunes, Amazon MP3.