Most artists have no choice as to when they leave the music business behind. Forced retirement is the norm — generally due to lack of interest from record companies or lack of sales from the public — and it applies to both struggling young artists compelled to look elsewhere to pay the bills and veterans maybe a little past their hit-making prime. Most will cling to the bitter end.

Almost never do you see a band willingly walk away after their biggest album and simply never come back. Almost…

Welcome to The Sundays!

Harriet and Dave never wanted to be pop stars. They met at university in England in the mid-1980s and sort of fell into writing songs together as a creative outlet, a fun thing to do together, even though Harriet had little musical experience. They sort of fell in love while they were at it, and after university, the pair moved to London, grabbed a bassist and a drummer, and dubbed themselves The Sundays.

The band wasn’t showy but they wrote good songs. They came to public attention after opening for a buzzy band at a showcase gig where members of the music press attended. As it happened, all the reporters ended up writing about The Sundays, completely ignoring the headlining act they ostensibly came to see. A record deal came along shortly afterwards.

The Sundays became indie darlings and a favorite of DJ John Peel upon release of their first single and subsequent debut album. Harriet and Dave were never the fastest of songwriters and by the time their second album, Blind, rolled out in 1992, they needed a B-side.

They chose to cover “Wild Horses” by The Rolling Stones, but it’s unclear if the duo ran out of material or if they simply loved this song — it’s the only cover they would ever release. The song remained a B-side in the UK, but proved very popular in the US, subsequently added to Blind and later featured in a number of TV shows and movies.

Five years later, The Sundays released their third album which spawned their biggest UK hit, “Summertime.” But Harriet and Dave wanted out of the music biz. They hoped to settle down to a quiet domestic life. So they did just that, retiring after only three albums (although it’s been reported that they never stopped writing and recording — they’ve just chosen to never release anything else). It’s all a matter of priorities.

So let’s do some living after we die… with The Sundays.

“Wild Horses” never charted but it’s probably the song Americans think of first when The Sundays are mentioned. Officially, however, the band’s biggest US hit was their second single, “Here’s Where The Story Ends,” from 1990. Inexplicably, this wasn’t released as a single in the UK, where it likely would have been a big hit, too: