Songfacts®:

• Nik Kershaw says "Wouldn't It Be Good" is "about envy from two people's perspectives."
  
  The song is a dialogue where each person (both played by Kershaw) gets a verse. The first one goes on about how wonderful the other's life must be, and then that person comes back with the rejoinder:
  
  You must be joking
  You don't know a thing about it...
  Stay out of my shoes
  If you know what's good for you
  
  Kershaw wrote the song soon after securing a deal with MCA records.
  
  "'Wouldn't It Be Good was written in the knowledge I had a record contract, things were starting to happen and I was heading for world domination," he told The Guardian. "Why was it so melancholic? You'd have to ask my analyst. I had so much confidence, which hadn't been beaten out of me yet. I spent time on the lyrics but didn't question where they came from."
• Along with "The Riddle," "Wouldn't It Be Good" is one of Nik Kershaw's best-known songs. It was his second single, following "I Won't Let the Sun Go Down on Me."
  
  Kershaw is from the UK, where he had most of his success but also took a drubbing in the press for being a "weenybop sensation." He charted eight songs in the UK Top 40 from 1984-1986 but then fell out of favor and lost his record deal in 1989. He emerged as a songwriter for hire in 1991 with "The One And Only," a #1 UK hit for Chesney Hawkes.
• The music video was high-tech for 1984, with video inserted on top of Kershaw's suit. In the end he goes to a giant satellite and gets beamed into space.
  
  The video was directed by Storm Thorgerson, who did all that crazy artwork for Pink Floyd; that last shot took place at Mullard Radio Astronomy Observatory in Cambridge.
  
  The key to the special effects was a suit Kershaw wore made of Scotchlite, a highly reflective fabric that provided enough contrast that video could be keyed into it.
  
  "The most uncomfortable three days of my life was shooting that video," Kershaw said. "I had to be lowered into the suit, and couldn't bend or go to the toilet."
  
  This wasn't the first time Scotchlite was used in sci-fi. Marlon Brando wears it in the 1978 movie Superman.
• The title was originally "Wouldn't It Be Nice," like the Beach Boys song, but Kershaw's producer, Peter Collins, convinced him to change it.
• According to Peter Collins, they used real drums on the track, bucking the drum machine trend. They also decided to overdub horns played by Jerry Hey, known for his work on Elton John's "Little Jeannie" and Michael Jackson's "Wanna Be Startin' Somethin'."
  
  "It was a complex production with an unusual structure, which was a major part of its appeal," Collins told The Guardian. "I remember trying to get Nik to put it into a more conventional pop format and he wouldn't, which I totally accepted. I had no doubt it was going to be a monster. Nik was so committed and dynamic in his performance. The way he delivered the main lyric was unique for the time."
• Kershaw closed out his set at Live Aid with this song. He was so nervous, he forgot the words and ended up making some up.