A Bittersweet Plea in a Glam Glow: Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel’s “Make Me Smile (Come Up and See Me)”
In the vibrant spring of 1975, Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel, London’s art-rock renegades, unleashed “Make Me Smile (Come Up and See Me)”, a single that soared to #1 on the UK Singles Chart, reigning for two weeks from February 22 after its January 31 release by EMI Records. Drawn from their third album, The Best Years of Our Lives, which hit #4 in the UK, this Harley-penned gem—produced by Harley and Alan Parsons—sold over a million copies worldwide, earning gold status. For those of us who swayed through the mid-‘70s, when glam shimmered and rock carried a poet’s edge, this song is a faded velvet curtain—a sly jab cloaked in charm, a memory of nights when heartbreak danced with hope. It’s the sound of a jukebox flickering in a smoky café, tugging at the soul of anyone who’s ever smiled through the sting.
The birth of “Make Me Smile” is a tale of rupture and redemption. By late 1974, Steve Harley—once a journalist, now a glam bard—was reeling from Cockney Rebel’s implosion, his original bandmates—Jean-Paul Crocker, Milton Reame-James, and Paul Jeffreys—quitting over his iron grip. Holed up at AIR Studios with a new lineup—Jim Cregan, George Ford, Duncan Mackay, and Stuart Elliott—he channeled the fallout into this track, a veiled dig at the defectors. “It’s about betrayal, but I wanted it to sound like a love song,” Harley later smirked. Recorded in a single day, Parsons layered Cregan’s lilting guitar and Elliott’s crisp drums under Harley’s wry croon, a choir of backing vocals—featuring Tina Charles—lifting it to pop perfection. Released as glam waned and punk loomed, it was a phoenix moment—Harley’s biggest hit, born from a band reborn, a peak before his star softened.
At its core, “Make Me Smile” is a cunning serenade—a lover’s taunt with a hidden blade. “Come up and see me, make me smile / Or do what you want, running wild,” Harley sings, his voice a velvet barb over that iconic riff, “There’s nothing left, all gone and run away / Maybe you’ll tarry for a while.” It’s a man scorned yet beckoning—“You’ve done it all, you’ve broken every code / And pulled the rebel to the floor”—wryly defiant: “Blue eyes, blue eyes, why must you tell so many lies?” For older listeners, it’s a portal to those ‘70s nights—spinning 45s in a bedsit, the air thick with wine and wit, the ache of a grin masking the hurt. It’s the echo of a phone left off the hook, the sway of a flared trouser, the moment you laughed at the wreckage. As the final “make me smile” fades with that choral hum, you’re left with a tender twist—a nostalgia for when every note was a game, and even heartbreak wore a dazzling grin.