Victims (song)

"Victims" is a single from UK band Culture Club's album Colour by Numbers, released in 1983. As with most early Culture Club singles, the song is about Boy George's then publicly unknown relationship with drummer Jon Moss.

Although previous single "Karma Chameleon" had been a huge hit single in many countries, "Victims" only charted in the UK, Ireland, Australia, and Germany. It peaked at #3 on the UK Singles Chart. In Ireland it peaked at #2, and in Australia it peaked at #4.

The single was not released in countries like United States, Canada and Japan, where they released "Miss Me Blind" instead; reportedly, Epic felt that the song was too depressing.

Its B-Side was the then unreleased track "Colour by Numbers", which is the title of the album but not included on it. An instrumental version was also issued on the 12", re-named "Romance Revisited". Both extra tracks are now available on the 2003 remastered version of Colour by Numbers.

An early demo version of the song was released re-titled "Shirley Temple Moment" on the Culture Club box set. The track is a candid glimpse of the relationships within the band as they argue viciously amongst one another between takes, before Boy George finally walks out. It is notable also for the different lyrics which appear in the first verse:

"We love and we never tell what places our hearts in the wishing well / Strange lover I've never been, but you must be strong, you must come clean / And I keep on loving you, it's the only thing to do / There are stranger things, if I do those things, I'm a puppet king for you."

Boy George re-recorded the song himself, now as a solo artist, in a folk arrangement and with his older voice, in 2002. That version can be found on the Culture Club box set that was out the same year.

Charts