Paradise/No Promises/Mr. Big/Angel Street/The Flame/Regular Boys/Cross the Border/Spanish Gold/Lucky Me/Baby, You're So Strange/Too Late Now/Into the Wild/ Just a Word/The Flame (live)/No Promises (live)/Sister (live)
Icehouse are an Australian rock band, formed as Flowers in Sydney in 1977. Initially known in Australia for their pub rock style, they later achieved mainstream success playing new wave and synthpop music and attained Top 10 singles chart success locally and in both Europe and the U.S. The mainstay of both Flowers and Icehouse has been Iva Davies (singer-songwriter, record producer, guitar, bass, keyboards, oboe) supplying additional musicians as required. The name Icehouse, which was adopted in 1981, comes from an old, cold flat Davies lived in and the strange building across the road populated by itinerant people.
Measure for Measure is the April 1986 studio album by Australian rock/synthpop band Icehouse and was the third album in the world to be recorded entirely digitally. The album, which peaked at #8 on the National albums charts, features the singles "No Promises", "Baby, You're So Strange", "Mr. Big", "Cross the Border" and "Paradise". "No Promises" had been released as a 7" vinyl single in November 1985, it peaked at #30 on the Australian singles charts. It was used for the Boxes ballet created by Icehouse members Iva Davies and Robert Kretschmer together with Sydney Dance Company's choreographer Graeme Murphy, Davies and Kretschmer performed the score with guest percussonist Masaki Tanazawa.
Both "No Promises" and "Cross the Border" were remixed and released as 12" singles, and while a major US pop hit would elude them until the following year, "No Promises" went Top 10 on both the Billboard Rock tracks and Dance / Club charts. "Cross the Border" did not see as much club play in the US, but was a Top 20 rock hit there. In Australia, the two further singles lifted from the album, "Baby, You're So Strange" and "Mr. Big", both reached the pop Top 20, higher than the Australian chartings of the singles which achieved international success. "Paradise" was released as a late 1986 US / UK single but achieved no notable chart success in either market.
There are various versions of this album; the Australian and American releases each feature different artwork and track running order while the 2002 Australian remastered version features bonus tracks.
The title Measure For Measure refers to the Shakespearean play of the same name, which in turn derives from a Bible verse: "For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you."
