Songfacts®:

• By the time The Innocents was released, Erasure had several hits in the UK, but this single and "A Little Respect," broke them in America, where it was rough sledding for synthesizer bands, who were mostly confined to club play.
  
  "Chains of Love" was a more accessible synth sound, and the heartfelt lyrics coming together and breaking down the barriers that divide us played well in the States, where it took a while for audiences to get used to a guy singing over programmed beats.
  
  Vince Clarke formed Erasure after spending time in Depeche Mode and Yazoo. Teaming up with Andy Bell brought a new songwriting style to Vince Clarke, who told us: "Up to Andy, it was a mystery to me how people write songs together. Andy I, we've been together a long, long time and we feel very comfortable around each other. Andy is much better at offering his heart to the world and expressing how he feels, he's a king at that, I think. And also, Andy is not particularly interested in programming computers or synthesizers. And I'm not particularly interested in attempting to sing, so the relationship works out perfectly." (See our full interview with Vince Clarke.)
• Andy Bell is openly gay, although American audiences didn't really pick up on this, with radio stations sometimes asking him in interviews what he thought of American girls. His lyrics address universal themes and aren't gender specific, but songs like this carry a lot of weight in the gay community for their message of tolerance.