#1426: Colin James Hay

80s Snapshot:

• Number of songs on Hot 100: 1
• Highest peak position: 99
• Cumulative weeks on the Hot 100: 1

Throughout this journey across the 80s, we will run into dozens of instances of solo careers spun off from massive hit-making groups. Going solo has always carried a varied range of success with it: towards the very end of this endeavor we’ll see examples like Lionel Richie and Phil Collins who fully surpassed the lofty accomplishments of their respective groups.

At the other end of this spectrum is Colin James Hay. As the frontman and only consistent member of Men At Work, he led the Australian band to numerous successes in the early years of the 80s. Chief among those successes were a pair of No. 1 singles (“Who Can It Be Now?” and “Down Under”) off the smash-hit album Business At Usual which sold 6 million copies in the U.S. alone and earned the band Best New Artist at the 1983 Grammy Awards.

Growing tensions within the band led to Men At Work’s dissolution shortly after their 1985 Live Aid performance with an already-diminished lineup. Hay then got to work on his debut solo album, Looking For Jack, which released in January 1987 to minimal success. The album reached just #126 on the Billboard 200 albums chart, faring slightly better in his native Australia (#58).

The lead single from Looking For Jack was “Hold Me”, a worldly arrangement that owes just as much to the then-recent success of Peter Gabriel’s So album as it does the inherent similarities to Men At Work’s output. The track made little splash on the Hot 100, debuting at #99 on the March 7, 1987 chart and falling off the following week. “Hold Me” did reach #40 on the Australian singles chart, Hay’s lone Top 100 entry in his homeland.

Though Men At Work reunited in 1996 and have performed on-and-off since then (including at the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney), they released no further studio albums. This freed up Hay to continue a somewhat prolific solo career (albeit without chart success), with his 15th solo album seeing release in 2022.

In addition to his solo work, Hay has also latched on as a regular member of Ringo Starr’s All-Starr Band, touring with Ringo in 2003, 2008 and consistently since 2018 (the band is set to hit the road again in June 2025).

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