16 January 1988
The video for ‘Heaven Is A Place On Earth’ was directed by Diane Keaton! The lucky guy smooching with Belinda Carlisle in the video is the lucky guy who happens to be her husband, and who also happens to be the son of James Mason; next time you catch North By Northwest on TV remember that you’re watching Belinda Carlisle’s father-in-law. And on the record itself, the backing singers include Michelle Phillips of the Mamas and the Papas, and Diane Warren, who didn’t write this song even though it sounds like prime ’80s Warren product. Now there’s some factoids for you.
As for the singer, since I was too young to have known of The Go-Go’s, Belinda Carlisle was always a mainstream pop star to me, the way I heard Feargal Sharkey’s solo singles before finding The Undertones. Stylistically, ‘Heaven Is A Place On Earth’ is what our American friends call adult contemporary – one foot in the bombast of soft rock, the other in the melodrama of power balladry. Carlisle’s forceful, slightly raspy voice contributes the radio-friendly pop fizz, especially when she changes gears for the dramatic pre-chorus and obligatory key change. Her subsequent singles run this sound into the ground and become ever more formulaic, but here it still sounds relatively bright and sparky. Okay, so it isn’t even the best solo Go-Go’s single of 1988, which would be Jane Wiedlin’s swooning ‘Rush Hour’, but you can see how ‘Heaven Is A Place On Earth’ made Belinda Carlisle a star.
Irish Number Ones 