The lyrics of Enola Gay are in no way celebratory, highlighting the dichotomy of dropping the bomb being an unthinkably horrific thing to do, but that it did end World War II, meaning many more atrocities were possibly avoided. McCluskey has claimed that he was a “geeky kid” into airplanes, and that this led to a fascination with the horrors of war. Regardless, Enola Gay was so irresistible that it became the lead – and only – single to be taken from OMD’s second album, Organisation. Written by the duo’s Andy McCluskey, his core band partner Paul Humphreys didn’t like it much. Their name is enough of an indication of that! You wouldn’t normally expect a perfect synthpop experience to centre around the plane that dropped the bomb on Hiroshima, but then Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark never did things by the book. This time around we’re checking out OMD’s poptastic Enola Gay. Many movies rely on songs to set the mood, and there are some that are relied upon a lot – what we like to call ‘Soundtrack Staples’.
