If you’re looking for nostalgia with a conscience, Wang Chung may have just pulled off the most unexpectedly poignant remix of the pandemic. The band, best known for their 1986 party command “Everybody Have Fun Tonight,” turned the anthem on its head in 2020—reworking it as “Everybody Stay Safe Tonight” for a virtual concert benefiting frontline workers. You know, the kind of song rewrite that swaps shoulder pads for solidarity.
“We just wanted to do something with a bit of fun, but also a bit of good advice,” Nick Feldman tells me, sounding surprisingly upbeat for someone discussing a global crisis. The reimagined version wasn’t just pandemic-themed—it also nodded to the wave of Black Lives Matter protests happening at the time. “It became a statement of staying safe from racism, from disease, from COVID-19. It covered a lot of bases.”
And somehow, it still bangs.
The rework debuted as part of Back to the Basement, a quarantine-era streaming event organized by Abducted by the '80s, which featured a murderers' row of retro names. Wang Chung’s contribution came with an added guest vocal from Valerie Day of Nu Shooz, because apparently the '80s really do know how to call in favors.
But don't go thinking this is some one-off nostalgia act. Wang Chung has been busy pushing their legacy forward, not backward. Just last year, they released Orchesography, an album that reimagines their hits with the full sweep of the Prague Philharmonic. Because why not swap synths for strings when you've got a songbook that’s already halfway to cinema?
“It just made sense,” Feldman says. “We’ve always had songs used in movies and TV shows, and we've even scored a few films ourselves. So orchestral arrangements—it really felt natural.” Turns out it also felt like Prague, because that’s where they recorded, inside an old lecture hall once frequented by Einstein himself. Which, honestly, might be a better setting than a smoky club in Cleveland.
The orchestral treatments aren't the only vault-digging the band is up to. Wang Chung has been quietly assembling Clear Light Dark Matter, a multi-disc retrospective of rarities, B-sides, unreleased tracks, and “stuff even we hadn’t heard in ages.” According to Feldman, the first installment is due by the end of the year, with follow-ups rolling out gradually in 2021 and beyond. “It’s for the Wang Chung heads,” he says, proudly. “But we think it’s going to be something special.”
This is what reinvention looks like when you’re not desperately chasing TikTok virality. Wang Chung isn’t pretending to be young, cool, or ironic. They’re just doing what they've always done: writing great songs, finding new ways to play them, and—every now and then—rewriting a hit to fit the moment.
So yes, you can still Wang Chung tonight. Just maybe do it from six feet apart.
Listen to the interview above and then check out the videos below.
