“When Will I Be Famous?” is a song by British boy band Bros (previously Gloss) of Twins Matt and Luke Goss, along with schoolmate Craig Logan, with their trademark crewcuts and bomber jackets, started in Peckham, London. “When Will I Be Famous?” was written by Nicky Graham and Tom Watkins, who managed the Pet Shop Boys and who discovered them, gave them a new name and managed them, They let everyone believe that the song was written by the band itself, as, at the time, songwriters were held in higher esteem rather than singers who didn’t write their own songs. A similar dynamic happened when Meat Loaf was required by his producers to write his own songs and Jim Steinman gave his “Total Eclipse of the heart” to Bonnie Tyler, if things went as Meat Loaf said. “When Will I Be Famous?” was released as a single on 16 November 1987, (B-side “Love to hate you”) and peaked at #2 on the UK Singles Chart and at #1 on the Irish Single Chart, as well as reaching the top 5 in several other countries. “When Will I Be Famous?” would later be included in their 1988 album, Push. It was one of many hits in the late 1980s, when the band was one of the hottest in the UK, with great teenage following and fans. The trio turned into a duo when Logan left, due to health reasons, and Bros carried on as a duo with popularity dwindling almost as quickly as it came and eventually broke up in 1992, only later reuniting, in 2017.
The video has almost 7,5 million views, at the time of writing (Aug 2022), 4 minutes long, while the album version was 5.
Rolling Stone ranked the song at #72 in their list of “75 Greatest Boy Band Songs of All Time” in 2020. In 2017, ShortList’s Dave Fawbert listed this song at number one on his list of the “Greatest Key Changes in Music History”.
“When Will I Be Famous?” was a #1 single in Ireland, as well as reaching #2 in the UK, Denmark, Norway and Switzerland. In Finland, Iceland and West Germany it reached #4, #5 in Australia and Netherlands, in France #7, in Austria #9, #10 in Spain, #20 in Sweden and #43 in New Zealand.
