"Point Of No Return" is a freestyle favorite, one of many dance songs to cross into the pop charts in the late '80s. It was written and produced by Lewis Martineé, who also assembled Exposé.
It's a very passionate song, but it doesn't have to be dirty. "It's just a little song about loving somebody to the point of no return,"
Martineé told Songfacts. "It's like The Beatles said, it's a love song."
This was the first song Exposé recorded; at the time they were known as X-Posed. Lewis Martineé put it out on his own Pantera Records label in 1984 and brought it to clubs in South Florida. DJs at the hot clubs were inundated with records from producers looking to get some attention for their songs, and most never got a spin (at least without a little bribe). But "Point Of No Return" was red hot, and it was soon blasting out of clubs in Miami and Fort Lauderdale. It started getting local radio airplay, and Dave Jurman of Arista Records heard it on a trip to the area. Jurman helped convince Clive Davis to sign Exposé to Arista, and they issued the single in 1985. With the major-label backing, it went to #1 on the Dance chart in April 1985. In 1986, Exposé started working on their debut album, Exposure, but they didn't get very far before the decision was made to replace the group with three new girls. Martineé recruited a new lineup, and the album was released in 1987 with the original version of "Point Of No Return" on the tracklist. The song "Come Go With Me" was released as a single and crossed over to the pop charts, reaching #5 on the Hot 100. This convinced Arista to re-release "Point Of No Return," so they had the new version of the group re-record it and put it out as a single. It also went to #5.
Lewis Martineé started the song with the title, then put the track together using a Prophet-5 synthesizer and a Drumtraks drum machine. He also added live guitar, played by Jorge Finess.
"I wrote that song so fast it was crazy," he told Songfacts. "Like, literally 15 minutes. But then I didn't like the bridge and I changed it. I'm glad I did because the bridge actually came out really good at the end."
The lineup on the original version is Aléjandra Lorenzo, Sandra Casanas, and Laurie Miller, with Lorenzo on lead vocals. The 1987 re-release has Jeanette Jurado, Gioia Bruno, and Ann Curless, with Jurado on lead. The first few thousand copies of the Exposure album contain the original version, the rest have the version recorded by the new lineup.
Exposé followed up with "
Let Me Be The One," which reached #7. Next came a ballad: "
Seasons Change," which went all the way to #1.
Exposure was the first debut album by a group to land four Top 10 singles.
To get a party vibe going, Lewis Martineé incorporated chants into the song. "I got everybody in the studio to come up to the mic and just start chanting, so it sounded like a big crowd," he said. "That was an on-the-spot little idea."
This isn't the only '80s hit with the title "Point Of No Return." In 1986, Nu Shooz went to #28 with
their song of that title.
One look at the video, with the bright neon outfits and giant, dangling earrings, and you'll know you're in the '80s. It was directed by Ralph Ziman, who went on to do videos for Faith No More ("
Epic") and Alice Cooper ("
Hey Stoopid"). We see Exposé navigate through the paparazzi to a club, where they perform the song to an adoring crowd. For most, it was their first look at the group.
"Point Of No Return" is a favorite on RuPaul's Drag Race, where it's been used in three episodes. It also shows up in the movies Adventureland (2009) and The Front Runner (2018), and in an episode of Pose ("Mother's Day" - 2018).
