"Echo Beach" is a song recorded by the Canadian group

Martha and the Muffins Martha and the Muffins are a Canadian rock band, active from 1977 to the present. Although they only had one major international hit single " Echo Beach" under their original band name, they had a number of hits in their native Canada, and th ...

in 1979. Written by band member Mark Gane, it was released as a single from their album ''

Metro Music ''Metro Music'' is the debut album by Canadian new wave music, new wave band Martha and the Muffins. It was released in 1980 on Dindisc, the first album release for the label, and contains the international hit single "Echo Beach". The cover im ...

'' in 1980 and went on to reach number 5 in Canada, number 6 in Australia, and number 10 in the UK. It was certified gold in Canada on 1 October 1980, a month after ''Metro Music'' achieved gold status, and also won the

Juno Award for Single of the Year The Juno Award for Single of the Year has been awarded since 1974 for the best single in Canada. It has also been known as Best Single and Best Selling Single. The award goes to the artist. Best Single (1974) Best Selling Single (1975 - 1979) ...

. "Echo Beach" was the band's only significant international hit, although they had other popular singles in Canada. In 2003, '' Q'' magazine listed "Echo Beach" among the 1001 best songs ever. In 2005, it was named the 35th greatest Canadian song of all time on the

CBC Radio One CBC Radio One is the English-language news and information radio network of the publicly owned Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. It is commercial-free and offers local and national programming. It is available on AM and FM to 98 percent of Ca ...

series '' 50 Tracks''.

Background

Echo Beach, as mentioned in the song, does not refer to a real beach, but rather a symbolic notion of somewhere the narrator would rather be, somewhere "far away in time". The song was created while Gane was working checking wallpaper for printing faults. He found the work rather dull and his mind drifted to times he would like to live over again. One such time was an evening spent at Sunnyside Beach on the shoreline of

Lake Ontario Lake Ontario is one of the five Great Lakes of North America. It is bounded on the north, west, and southwest by the Canadian province of Ontario, and on the south and east by the U.S. state of New York. The Canada–United States border sp ...

in Toronto in summer. 'Echo Beach' was a reference made to a faded time and place gone in the lyrics of the song "Hiroshima Mon Amour" by the band

Ultravox Ultravox (earlier styled as Ultravox!) were a British new wave band, formed in London in April 1974 as Tiger Lily. Between 1980 and 1986, they scored seven Top Ten albums and seventeen Top 40 singles in the UK, the most successful of which was ...

. The map shown on the cover of one version of the single is of

Toronto Islands The Toronto Islands are a chain of 15 small islands in Lake Ontario, south of mainland Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Comprising the only group of islands in the western part of Lake Ontario, the Toronto Islands are located just offshore from the ...

, while another single shows the north-western end of the Fleet Lagoon and the bar of

Chesil Beach Chesil Beach (also known as Chesil Bank) in Dorset, England is one of three major shingle beach structures in Britain.A. P. Carr and M. W. L. Blackley, "Investigations Bearing on the Age and Development of Chesil Beach, Dorset, and the Associat ...

, the location of

Abbotsbury Swannery Abbotsbury Swannery is the only managed colony of nesting mute swans in the world. It is situated near the village of Abbotsbury in Dorset, England, west of Weymouth on a site around the Fleet Lagoon protected from the weather of Lyme Bay by C ...

in Dorset. In 2010, the band released a 30th anniversary version of "Echo Beach". A commentator described the new version as "definitely a different song compared to the previous version; it's slower and the famous guitar riff that introduces the song is acoustic.

he original He or HE may refer to: Language * He (pronoun), an English pronoun * He (kana), the romanization of the Japanese kana へ * He (letter), the fifth letter of many Semitic alphabets * He (Cyrillic), a letter of the Cyrillic script called ''He'' ...

was also good to be danced to, whereas the new one is darker and languid." Mark Gane explained, "We wanted to commemorate the 30th anniversary of the song, by not trying to replicate the version that we originally recorded, but as musicians who've experienced three decades of living. We'd like to refer to the new recording of 'Echo Beach' as our 'grown-up' version." In June 2011, concert promoter

Live Nation Live Nation Entertainment, Inc. is an American global entertainment company and monopoly that was founded in 2010 following the merger of Live Nation and Ticketmaster. The company promotes, operates, and manages ticket sales for live entertainme ...

opened a 4,000-person outdoor concert facility in Toronto and named it after the song.

Track listing

* 7" single :A. "Echo Beach" – 3:38 :B. "Teddy the Dink" – 3:32

Charts

Weekly charts

Year-end charts

Certifications

Toyah version

British singer Toyah

covered Cover or covers may refer to: Packaging * Another name for a lid * Cover (philately), generic term for envelope or package * Album cover, the front of the packaging * Book cover or magazine cover ** Book design ** Back cover copy, part of co ...

"Echo Beach" on her 1987 album ''

Desire Desires are states of mind that are expressed by terms like "wanting", "wishing", "longing" or "craving". A great variety of features is commonly associated with desires. They are seen as propositional attitudes towards conceivable states of aff ...

''. The song was released as the lead single from the album and reached number 54 in the

UK Singles Chart The UK Singles Chart (currently titled Official Singles Chart, with the upper section more commonly known as the Official UK Top 40) is compiled by the Official Charts Company (OCC), on behalf of the British record industry, listing the top-s ...

. It is Toyah's last charting single in the UK to date.

Track listing

* 7" single :A. "Echo Beach" – 3:20 :B. "Plenty" – 3:40 * 12" single :A. "Echo Beach" (Surf Mix) – 5:36 :B1. "Echo Beach" (7" Mix) – 3:20 :B2. "Plenty" – 3:40

Charts

Other versions

Robert Forster Robert Wallace Forster Jr. (July 13, 1941 – October 11, 2019) was an American actor, known for his roles as John Cassellis in ''Medium Cool'' (1969), Captain Dan Holland in ''The Black Hole'' (1979), Abdul Rafai in ''The Delta Force'' (1986), ...

covered the song on his 1994 album ''

I Had a New York Girlfriend ''I Had a New York Girlfriend'' is the third album by Robert Forster. It consists of cover versions of his favourite songs and unlike his previous albums contains no original compositions. Critical reception ''Trouser Press'' called the collecti ...

''. * An adaptation of the song, titled "Egoiste" (translated as "Selfish"), was released by French singer-songwriter

La Grande Sophie Sophie Huriaux (born July 18, 1969 in Thionville), better known by her stage name La Grande Sophie, is a French singer-songwriter who got her start in the mid-1990s in the Paris alternative scene. Biography Childhood Sophie lived the whole of h ...

on her 2005 album ''La Suite'', in which the lyrics have been changed, while the music and layout of the song remains the same. *

Gabriella Cilmi Gabriella Lucia Cilmi ( ; ; born 10 October 1991) is an Australian pop singer. A contralto, Cilmi is known for her distinctive raspy singing voice. Her debut album, ''Lessons to Be Learned'', was released in March 2008, becoming a moderate int ...

covered the song; her version was used as the theme for the soap opera of the same name and appeared exclusively on the deluxe UK edition of her 2008 album ''

Lessons to Be Learned ''Lessons to Be Learned'' is the debut album by Australian singer-songwriter Gabriella Cilmi. It was released in the United Kingdom on 31 March 2008 by Island Records and in Australia on 10 May 2008 by Mushroom Records. Co-written and produced by ...

''. * The 2009 song "Box 'n' Locks" by

MPHO Mpho Skeef (pronounced /mpʰo skʲɪəf/), known by her stage name of Mpho, is a South African-born British singer-songwriter based in London. Early and personal life Skeef was born during the apartheid regime in South Africa to Sipho Mabuse ...

samples the melody from Echo Beach.

In popular culture

"Echo Beach" was used in the 2005 British film '' The Business'', the 2008 comedy series, ''

Moving Wallpaper ''Moving Wallpaper'' is a British satirical comedy-drama television series set in a TV production unit. It ran on ITV for two series in 2008–09. The subject of the first series was the production of a soap called ''Echo Beach'', each episode of ...

'', for which it can be heard in the first episode, and it was also part of the soundtrack for the 2016 Greek film, '' Suntan''.

References

External links

The official Martha and the Muffins website

The official Toyah website
{{authority control 1980 songs 1980 singles 1987 singles Martha and the Muffins songs Toyah Willcox songs Gabriella Cilmi songs Song recordings produced by Mike Howlett Juno Award for Single of the Year singles Songs about beaches