Background
"Love Action (I Believe in Love)" was the second of three songs from the Dare album to be released in advance of the album itself in 1981. It was released as a double A-side single with the non-album track "Hard Times". Some copies of the single were mispressed, with Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark's "Souvenir" as the A-side. In the US, "Love Action (I Believe in Love)"/"Hard Times" made the dance charts twice: in 1981, the tracks first peaked at number thirty-seven, and one year later, re-entered the dance chart and peaked at number fifty-seven.
The song is a semi-autobiographical account of Oakey’s relationships. Oakey often refers to himself and at one point uses the lyric "this is Phil talking." The line was inspired by Iggy Pop's line "Jesus, this is Iggy". The Human League had previously supported Iggy Pop live. Oakey borrows from another of his influences and the title "Love Action (I Believe in Love)" is named after the Lou Reed song "I Believe in Love". The song contains another cryptic reference to Lou Reed in the lyric, "I believe what the old man said". Oakey, speaking in 1982 said, "no one ever asks me who the old man is... it's Lou (Reed)."
The single was designated 'Red' on the Human League’s short-lived self-imposed labelling system of 'Blue' for pop songs and 'Red' for dance tracks.
The single made number 3 in the UK charts and placed The Human League in the forefront of media attention. It also renewed Virgin Records' faith in the band and guaranteed the release of the album that was to become Dare, just four months later.
The song was sampled in the UK hit single from dance duo Utah Saints in the mid-1990s and by George Michael for his politically charged 2002 hit "Shoot the Dog."
The song is featured on the video game Grand Theft Auto Vice City Stories and in the series 1, episode 4 of Ashes to Ashes. The song was also used for an episode of Skins in 2009.
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