Passion By The Flirts

Passion by The Flirts is a Hi-NRG track that was released in 1982. The music is by Bobby Orlando and the lead singer is Andrea Del Conte. Bobby Orlando is an influential Hi-NRG producer and is known for producing Native Love by Divine. The Flirts was a studio project by Bobby Orlando.

Passion broke into mainstream pop charts in Europe. It got to number four in the German national charts and was a top 40 hit in several European countries. In the USA it was a club hit, and charted in dance charts.

A Chicago Staple

Passion was played in all the Chicago scenes, and got radio play on WBMX. It was played by all the big name DJs and at the legendary clubs.

Every mix of Passion is a classic. The original mix is a banger, but there's also an instrumental mix and several great remixes.

Passion (Original Mix) By The Flirts

Passion (Special R.E.M.I.X.E.D. Disco Version)

Borrowed By Felix Da Housecat

When you hear the middle section of that remix (at about 4:10) it will either jump straight out at you or bug you (because you can't think where you heard it). If you didn't twig, it's the main hook from Silver Screen Shower Scene. Here it is in case you forgot.

Silver Screen (Shower Scene) By Felix Da Housecat

How Did Bobby O Achieve That Sound?

The abrasive hook in Passion (that Felix Da Housecat copied for Silver Screen Shower Scene) is the classic sound of oscillator sync. This is where one oscillator triggers a restart of a second oscillator with each wave cycle of the first oscillator. I think it's a sync lead from a Sequential Circuits Prophet-5.

Agressive oscillator sync leads were a favourite of The Prodigy about ten years after Passion. However, the early records by The Prodigy used a Moog Prodigy for their sync leads, not a Prophet.

Passion has the octave bass that's standard for Hi-NRG (and that we all know and love from Blue Monday by New Order). The clav patch is probably the Prophet as well as the sync lead. The bass and plucks are likely to be an early Juno, and the dreamy house-like stabs sound like a VP-330.

Even though the drums are deliberately simple, there are two drum machines playing, a Korg KR-55 and Linn LM-1. The LM-1 sounds really short and snappy (for example when compared to the same sampled drum on Sound of The Crowd by The Human League), which shows how much Bobby Orlando focussed on sound design. You might think this is a simple drum pattern but nothing about it is based on the default sounds of a drum machine. The sound design is intentional so that the synths can really complement each other.