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MacColl's "They Don't Know" reached number two on the Music Week airplay chart without generating sufficient sales to reach the UK Singles Chart - a shortfall blamed on a strike at the distributors for Stiff Records keeping the single out of stores, although its producer Liam Sternberg attributes the failure of "They Don't Know" to ill feeling which developed between MacColl and Stiff Records president Dave Robinson: The B-side to "They Don't Know" was MacColl's recording of her composition "Turn My Motor On" - some copies read "Motor On" -, a setlist staple of Drug Addix, the band MacColl had recently left (consideration had been given to making "Turn My Motor On" the A-side). īesides the regular vinyl single release of 1 June 1979 a picture disc edition was issued 6 July 1979. I played it incessantly for about twelve hours a day, working out all the different parts and harmonies. I played it so much he just said: "have it". Recorded in Stiff Records' mobile studio, The China Shop, in the spring of 1979, Kirsty MacColl's original recording of "They Don't Know" "emphasized layered harmonies in which MacColl turns her own voice into a chorus of over-dubbed parts" - an evocation of a long-standing admiration for the Beach Boys engendered at age 7 by hearing her brother's copy of the " Good Vibrations" single: I went round with a cassette, singing to an acoustic guitar. Then I thought: "Oh God, I'd better write something before I go in to see them." And that's when I wrote "They Don't Know". When they asked if I had any songs, I said: "Oh yeah, loads!", even though I didn't at all. When they heard that I'd eventually left they called me & said: "We'd like you to come & play us anything you’ve got." I said: "I thought you didn't like the demos", and they said: "We hate the band, but we quite like you". When I was with the R&B outfit Drug Addix, Stiff Records paid for some demos to be done with the band, but they didn't really like them. Original version Composition and release Kirsty MacColl on the genesis of "They Don't Know" 2.2 Comparison with Kirsty MacColl's original version.