Terence Edward Hall (19 March 1959 – 18 December 2022) was a British musician who came to prominence as the lead singer of the 2-tone band the Specials, and later recorded with groups such as Fun Boy Three, the Colourfield, Terry, Blair & Anouchka, and Vegas.
He released two solo studio albums and also collaborated with many artists including David Stewart, Bananarama, the Lightning Seeds, Sinéad O'Connor, Stephen Duffy, Dub Pistols, Gorillaz, Damon Albarn, D12, Tricky, Lily Allen and Shakespears Sister.
Early life
Terence Edward Hall was born on 19 March 1959 in Coventry, England, where he was also raised. He had a German-Jewish grandfather, and said of his heritage, "I grew up in an environment where you didn't really know where you were from. Coventry was built on immigrants because it was an industrial city looking for cheap labour. I don't think it's an accident that a group like the Specials came out of that".
Hall was abducted by a paedophile ring on a trip to France at the age of 12. He wrote about it in an autobiographical song "Well Fancy That!" on the Fun Boy Three's second album. He suffered from depression afterwards, ultimately leaving school before his fifteenth birthday, taking various short-term jobs, such as a bricklayer, quantity surveyor, and apprentice hairdresser.
Career
Early years
Hall became an active member of the burgeoning Coventry music scene of the late 1970s, playing in a local punk band called Squad and being credited as a composer on their "Red Alert" single.
The Specials
Initially the frontman of 'the Coventry Automatics' in 1977–78, which became the Specials in early 1979, Hall first came to prominence in the UK in 1979 when BBC Radio 1 disc jockey (DJ) John Peel played their debut single "Gangsters" on his show. The band then went on to release their debut studio album, The Specials, which also contained the hits "A Message to You Rudy" and "Too Much Too Young". In October 1980 the group released their second studio album, More Specials, which contained three more hit singles: "Do Nothing", "Stereotype" and "Rat Race".
The single "Ghost Town", released in June 1981, spent three weeks at number one and ten weeks in the top 40 of the UK Singles Chart. The double A-side song, "Friday Night Saturday Morning", penned by Hall, described a night out at the Coventry Locarno.
Fun Boy Three
After the Specials' single "Ghost Town" was released, Hall left the band to start a new group called Fun Boy Three with two of his Specials bandmates, Lynval Golding and Neville Staple. Fun Boy Three's first hit single, "The Lunatics (Have Taken Over the Asylum)," was released in 1981 and was followed-up in 1982 with "It Ain't What You Do (It's the Way That You Do It)," a duet with Bananarama. Fun Boy Three then provided guest vocals for Bananarama's single, "Really Saying Something." In the same year, Hall and his bandmates appeared in the music video for "Driving in My Car" by Madness and released their debut studio album, Fun Boy Three, which reached No. 7 in the UK Albums Chart. In February 1983, Fun Boy Three released their second studio album, Waiting, which contained two Top Ten hits: "The Tunnel of Love" and "Our Lips Are Sealed". The latter was a song Hall had written with Jane Wiedlin, who had already had success in the US with a version of the song by her group the Go-Go's.
The Colourfield
Hall formed the Colourfield in 1984. The band released the 1985 studio album Virgins and Philistines, which included the hit single "Thinking of You". The album spent seven weeks in the UK chart, peaking at No. 12. This new musical direction would culminate in collaborations with Ian Broudie and Hall contributing a number of songs to Broudie's albums as the Lightning Seeds. Hall also co-wrote the song "Smoke Ring" for Broudie's debut solo studio album Tales Told. The song was also released as the lead track on the Smoke Rings EP. A second Colourfield studio album, Deception, was released in 1987, reaching No. 95 on the UK Albums Chart.
Terry, Blair & Anouchka
Hall teamed up with American actress Blair Booth and jeweller Anouchka Grose and began recording under the moniker of Terry, Blair & Anouchka in 1989. After two singles which both scraped into the top 80 of the UK Singles Chart, the trio released their debut studio album Ultra Modern Nursery Rhymes, which failed to chart.