Songfacts®:

• In 1980, Hazel O'Connor starred in the film Breaking Glass; she was plucked from obscurity to play the lead role and write the soundtrack. As soon as she heard she'd got the part, she wrote "Big Brother." In her 1981 autobiography she wrote that this is "a song about social repression. Something in the script had sparked off my imagination."
• By the time she auditioned for the film, the free spirited O'Connor had traveled the world and was fluent in five languages including Japanese. The sentiments in this song are undoubtedly as much hers as those of Kate, the character she played.
• O'Connor met David Bowie on the set of Breaking Glass, and he asked her if she wanted any more songs for the film; she told him she'd already written them all. She did not appear to know that he had already written a song with the same title. >>>

  Suggestion credit:
  Alexander Baron - London, England, for all above