With a name that still perplexes some popsters to this day, the Thompson Twins were a British trio that enjoyed a measure of mainstream chart success in the mid-’80s (and quite a bit of hairspray in the process).

In August 1985, the Thompson Twins released Here’s To Future Days, the follow-up to Into The Gap. That album had gone platinum, thanks in no small part to “Hold Me Now,” which held the #3 spot for two weeks in May 1984, the group’s highest charting single.

Their fifth LP, Here’s To Future Days was produced by Nile Rodgers (Chic, Madonna), but it was actually the second time the Thompson Twins had recorded the album. They were finishing up sessions with Alex Sadkin, who’d helmed Into The Gap, when lead Tom Bailey had a nervous breakdown, putting the original Future on hold.

When Bailey recovered, the Thompson Twins decided to switch things up sound-wise, bringing in Rodgers for Here’s To Future Days, Take 2. The re-recorded album included a cover of The Beatles’ “Revolution,” which they performed at Live Aid in July, joined on stage by Nile Rodgers and Madonna (Rodgers, you recall, had produced Like A Virgin).

“Lay Your Hands On Me,” the first single from Here’s To Future Days, reached #6. But the second single taken from the set, “King For The Day,” remains my favorite Thompson Twins track. With its lyrical nod to The Beatles’ “All You Need Is Love,” the upbeat “King” reigned at #9 this week in 1986, and would climb one more notch to reach its high of #8 the following week.

The “King For A Day” video finds the Thompson Twins camping out at the Hard Cash Hotel. The clip is a total trip, with robot butlers, fringed leather jackets, upchucked pearls, and a backing band of nuns at the end. Oh, the Eighties. Always so totally random, and therefore, forever awesome:

The trio, it turns out, is named after the bumbling pair of detectives (Thomson and Thomson) in The Adventures of Tintin. In the early days of the Thompson Twins, there were as many as eight members in the band, so confusion about their musical moniker probably didn’t surface until they only numbered three.

Purchase Thompson Twins – “King For A Day” via iTunes, Amazon MP3.