1986 in British music cover of the disco song "Don't Leave Me This Way". The band included singer Jimmy Somerville who had previously enjoyed success with Bronski Beat, and later started a solo career. The Christmas number one single was something of a surprise, a re-issue of Jackie Wilson's 1957 single "Reet Petite". Wilson had died in 1984, but the song been re-issued after being used in a television advert for Levi's, with a new video made of a Claymation version of Wilson. Having first been released 29 years earlier, it broke the record for the longest time between a single being released and
Billy Davis (songwriter) these was "Lonely Teardrops", written by Davis, Gordy, and Gordy's sister Gwen, who was Davis's girlfriend at the time. Davis and Gwen Gordy later founded Anna Records, which was the distributor of the early singles from Berry Gordy's newly formed Tamla label. The two also wrote "Reet Petite (The Finest Girl You Ever Want To Meet)" for Wilson, which was a Top 10 hit for the singer in the UK and later topped the British charts in 1986 when re-released. Another success for the two was Marv Johnson's major hit in 1959, "You Got What It Takes" (#2 R&B, #10