Los Angeles, CA · new-wave

The Motels

1 upcoming festival

Martha Davis's smoky torch-song new wave — noir atmosphere on the radio, 'Only the Lonely' still aching.

The Motels formed in Los Angeles in the mid-1970s around singer and songwriter Martha Davis, and became part of the city's new wave scene as it moved from clubs onto commercial radio. Davis's low, unhurried voice and the band's use of saxophone and reverbed guitar gave the songs a lounge-noir quality that set them apart from more frantic new wave contemporaries.

Their best-known recordings, "Only the Lonely" and "Suddenly Last Summer", both reached the American top ten in the early 1980s and remain the songs most associated with the group. The band broke up in the late 1980s, and Davis has since led revived versions of the Motels alongside her own solo work.

new-wave