Talking ’80s with Berlin singer Terri Nunn
The Force may not have been with Terri Nunn back in the ‘70s, but by the next decade, things were going just fine.
Nunn, lead singer for the Los Angeles new wave band Berlin, was an aspiring actress in her teens. In 1975 – four years before she joined Berlin – she auditioned for a new 20th Century Fox adventure movie, to be called Star Wars.
“George Lucas was a kid when I went in to read for this,” recalls Nunn. “He had done American Graffiti at that point. Which was a really good movie.”
The writer/director handed her a few sheets of paper and said she was to read the part of somebody called Princess Leia.
“I’m sitting there with Harrison Ford; he looks like he’s 20 and I look like I’m 16,” Nunn laughs. “And it’s, what the f— are we reading? It’s R2D2, where’s the phaser, and I don’t know what the f— any of this is. I’m just trying to make it sound real – and I don’t know how to do it. None of it existed yet.”
As everyone knows, she didn’t get the part, but Nunn’s audition video – with Ford reading Han Solo’s lines – is available on YouTube for anyone who wants to see it.
Berlin will perform Saturday at the Mid-Florida Credit Union Amphitheatre, on a bill with Boy George & Culture Club and Howard Jones.
It’s “I Love the ‘80s” all over again.
With Berlin, Nunn scored two platinum albums (Pleasure Victim and Love Life), and they became MTV darlings with the videos for “Sex (I’m a …),” “Dancing in Berlin” and “No More Words.”
And “Take My Breath Away,” the theme song from Top Gun, was a number one smash, and won the Academy Award for Best Original Song, in 1986. Sold a million copies.
Nunn, along with founding bassist and songwriter John Crawford, and keyboard whiz David Diamond (a veteran of the band’s “hit” era), are perfectly OK with “riding the nostalgia wave,” as the saying goes.
“A lot of people have a history with us,” the singer explains. “It’s how I feel when I go see bands that I’ve liked for a long time. There’s a history there. I grew up with these people. Or I went through different times of my life with these people. And it’s fun to watch these people get older and see what they’re about. ‘Cause they’re changing too, the people onstage.
“It’s a lot deeper than just going and grabbing a beer and dancing. There’s more to it with these shows for most people.”
Anyway, she adds, Berlin’s synthesizer-heavy sound is still in vogue today. “A lot of the ‘80s music was electronic music. And what kids are listening to (now) is electronic music as well. So I’m seeing a lot of different generations of people coming to these shows.
“Number one, because this music’s available, you can find it, it’s easy to stream any time. And it’s something that different generations are sharing because of this. I love that. It’s way more than when I was a kid.”
The association with Top Gun, as lucrative as it was, actually contributed to the band’s breakup.
Producer Georgio Moroder, who’d made a dozen dance hits with Donna Summer and other artists, wrote the song and recorded the instrumental track. “He tried a lot of different singers and bands on ‘Take My Breath Away’ that for some reason the producers – Jerry Bruckheimer and Don Simpson – didn’t like,” Nunn reports. “Any of them.”
Moroder had previously produced several tracks for Berlin, and he had Nunn come to the studio to take a pass at “Take My Breath Away.” No one else from the band – no Crawford, no Diamond – had anything to do with the song or the recording.
“John Crawford – my partner – didn’t want to do it,” Nunn says. “He was like ‘I’m writing songs for this band, and I’m trying to make music that everybody will like, and that will be a hit …’ And in waltzes Georgio Moroder, and the record company is slobbering all over the guy. Finally, there was a stalemate between me and John because he didn’t want to do it, and I did.
“The record label called it. They said ‘You’re doing this.’ They said ‘This is going to be in the soundtrack of a movie that’s coming out next year, and you guys need all the help you can get. And it’s a good song.”
Studio documentation does not indicate whether Carrie Fisher ever attempted “Take My Breath Away.”
It took a few years, and a few bumps, but nearly 40 years later, Nunn, Crawford and Diamond are back together, as the nucleus of a revamped Berlin.
“I like aging,” Nunn laughs. “It brings a lot of wisdom, and more relaxation with life. And more appreciation of what’s happened.”
Find tickets for Saturday’s show here.
