Music Friday: Amethyst and Sapphire Make Glittering Cameos in Wang Chung’s ‘Dance Hall Days'

Welcome to Music Friday when we bring you cool songs with jewelry, gemstones or precious metals in the title or lyrics. In 1984, British New Wave band Wang Chung helped define a generation with its international hit “Dance Hall Days.” The memorable song, which continues to be a darling of Hollywood filmmakers, includes last-verse mentions of two popular gemstones — amethyst and sapphire.

Lead singer/composer Jack Hues sings: “So take your baby by the wrist, and in her mouth an amethyst. And in her eyes two sapphires blue, and you need her and she needs you.”

Hues explained the curious mouthful-of-amethyst reference in a recent interview with “Just My Show” podcast host Eric Greenberg. The song begins innocently, he said, with the line, “Take your baby by the hand.” But, by the last verse, the tone has escalated to “Take your baby by the wrists, and in her mouth an amethyst.”

“It’s all a bit more hallucinogenic in a way, how things that start off simple get complex,” he said.

“Dance Hall Days,” which charted in 12 countries and peaked in the U.S. at #16 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, put a New Wave timestamp on a slew of popular movies, including Bachelor Party, Pretty in Pink, Gotti, Romy and Michele’s High School Reunion, Adventureland, The Informers and The Fighter.

The band’s unusual name translates to “yellow bell” in Mandarin Chinese. Wang Chung is also the first note in the Chinese classical music scale.

Don’t miss the 2012 live performance of “Dance Hall Days” at the end of this post. The lyrics are below if you’d like to sing along.

“Dance Hall Days”
Written by Jack Hues. Performed by Wang Chung.

Take your baby by the hand
And make her do a high handstand
Take your baby by the heel
And do the next thing that you feel

Chorus:

We were so in phase
In our dance hall days
We were cool on craze
When I, you, and everyone we knew
Could believe, do, and share in what was true
Oh, I said

Dance hall, days love

Take your baby by the hair
And pull her close and there there there
Take your baby by the ears
And play upon her darkest fears

Repeat Chorus

Dance hall, days love
Dance hall days
Dance hall, days love

So take your baby by the wrist
And in her mouth an amethyst
And in her eyes two sapphires blue
And you need her and she needs you
And you need her and she needs you

Repeat Chorus

Dance hall, days love
Dance hall, days love
Dance hall days
Dance hall, days love
Dance hall days
Dance hall, days love
Dance hall days
Dance hall, days love