Alphaville "Afternoons In Utopia"

Afternoons in Utopia is the second album released by Alphaville in 1986, by Warner Music. The album was recorded between September 1985 and May 1986, and Alphaville employed no less than 27 guest musicians and singers to record the songs. 500,000 copies of the album have been sold.

The album's lyrics make several references to cosmic entities ("sci-fi" as one reviewer called it), including comets, the planet Mars and its landscape, and a starship. When the word "smile" is used in the songs "Afternoons in Utopia," "Lassie Come Home," and "Red Rose," it's printed in the liner notes as the acronym S.M.I².L.E., a reference to Timothy Leary, which stands for "Space Migration, Increased Intelligence, [and] Life Extension."

Marian Gold, singer and songwriter for the band, acknowledged that the message of their music was different from their previous album with this comment, which accompanied the song "Sensations" in the liner notes for the 1992 release First Harvest 1984-92:

“ Sometimes people used to say, "Have they gone crazy now? Talking with dolphins and all that!!" But I think that once we've learned the language of the dolphins - this mutual approach - that could be the moment of significant change in our messed up civilization. ”

Track listing

All tracks are written by Marian Gold, Bernhard Lloyd and Ricky Echolette, except as noted.

1. "IAO" 0:42
2. "Fantastic Dream" 3:56
3. "Jerusalem" 4:09
4. "Dance With Me" 3:59
5. "Afternoons in Utopia" 3:08
6. "Sensations" 4:24
7. "20th Century" 1:25
8. "The Voyager" 4:37
9. "Carol Masters" 4:32
10. "Universal Daddy" 3:57
11. "Lassie Come Home" 6:59
12. "Red Rose" 4:05
13. "Lady Bright" Albert & The Heart of Gold 0:43

The first song, "IAO" (which stands for International Aquarian Opera), begins with the word "night" and fades into the short IAO chorus (which itself is a lyric from the song "Afternoons in Utopia"). The album ends with the song "Lady Bright", a limerick about relativity, wherein the Lady Bright leaves one day and returns "the previous ...[night]", with the word "night" omitted. Thus the album loops back to its beginning.

The song "Afternoons in Utopia" is dedicated "For Inka" in the liner notes for the album.