Thompson Twins
British band
Thompson Twins were an English pop band, formed in 1977 in Sheffield. Initially a new wave group, they switched to a more mainstream pop sound and achieved considerable popularity during the early and mid-1980s, scoring a string of hits in the United Kingdom, the United States, and around the world. In 1993, they changed their name to Babble, to reflect their change in music from pop to dub-influenced chill-out. They continued as Babble until 1996, at which point the group permanently broke up.
The band's name was based on the two bumbling detectives Thomson and Thompson (who are close doubles, not twins) in the English-language version of The Adventures of Tintin (Les aventures de Tintin). At various stages they had up to seven members, but their best known line-up was as a trio from 1982 to 1986. The band became a prominent act in the US during the Second British Invasion, and in 1985 performed at Live Aid in Philadelphia, where they were joined on stage by Madonna.
Career
Early days
In 1977, the original Thompson Twins line-up consisted of Tom Bailey on bass guitar and vocals, Pete Dodd on guitar and vocals, John Roog on guitar, and Jon Podgorski (known as "Pod") on drums.
Arriving in London with little money, they lived as squatters in Lillieshall Road, Clapham. Future Thompson Twins member Alannah Currie lived in another squat in the same street, which is how she met Bailey.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Thompson Twins” as british band. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
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Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated May 16, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1500069. VIAF identifies the subject as 123504099. The Library of Congress control number is n85160513. 4 of 4 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1977, 1993, 1996 and 1982.
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This entry incorporates text from “Thompson Twins” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.