KB’s Look Back At The 80’s Music Scene: Pete Burns & Dead or Alive

By Karen Beishuizen

Picture This:

Liverpool, England, 1979

Pete Burns, Martin Healy, Mick Reid, Rob Jones and Paul Hornb form a band “Rainbows Over Nagasaki” which was renamed shortly after to “Nightmares in Wax”.

In 1980 the band was renamed again and this time to “Dead or Alive”.

In 1982 the song “The Stranger” reached the hit charts and the band was offered a record deal with Epic Records.

Their 1984 debut album “Sophisticated Boom Boom” was a moderate success but their second album “Youthquake” in 1985 changed everything.

On it was the monster hit “You Spin Me Round (Like a Record)” and the rest was history as they say…

The band released a third album in 1986 and a Greatest Hits album in 1987.

One year later Pete Burns and Steve Coy were the only band members left and released an album as a duo. Their fifth album came out in 1990 and the sixth album “Nukleopatra” in 1995.
Dead or Alive released “Fragile” in 2000 which included their cover of a U2 and Nick Kamen song.

Pete Burns released a solo song “Never Marry An Icon” in 2010.

The Person Pete Burns:

Peter Jozzeppi Burns was born on 5 August, 1959 in Port Sunlight, UK from a German mother and British father. As a kid he watched his mother’s need for alcohol, drugs and her suicide attempts. He also mentioned later in life as an adult that he had experienced child abuse with his mother being the abuser.

Before forming the band Dead or Alive, he worked in a record shop in Liverpool and was an attraction all by himself with make-up and flamboyant clothes.

He married his colleague from the hair salon and they were together for 26 years before divorcing her and entering into a civil partnership with a man.

He was addicted to cosmetic surgery and mentioned in an interview once that he had more than 200 with his first one taking place in 1984.
He was a rebel but one who never wanted to be successful.

Fast Forward to 2026:

Pete Burns died on 23 October 2016 of cardiac arrest. He was 57.

Steve Coy died on 4 May 2018 of cancer. He was 56.

Dead or Alive released eight studio albums, seven compilation albums, 28 singles and two video albums during their lifetime. The band sold over 17 million albums and 36 million singles worldwide.

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