Bronski Beat achieved success in the mid-1980s, particularly with the 1984 single "Smalltown Boy", from their debut album, The Age of Consent.

Around the same time, the band headlined "Pits and Perverts", a concert at the Electric Ballroom in London to raise funds for the Lesbians and Gays Support the Miners campaign.

The third single, released before Christmas 1984, was a revival of "It Ain't Necessarily So", the George and Ira Gershwin classic (from Porgy and Bess).

However, the single was shelved as tensions in the band, both personal and political, resulted in Somerville leaving Bronski Beat in the summer of that year.

Somerville went on to form the Communards with Richard Coles while the remaining members of Bronski Beat searched for a new vocalist.

During this period, the band teamed up with producer Mark Cunningham on the first-ever BBC Children In Need single, a cover of David Bowie's "Heroes", released in 1986 under the name of The County Line.

Steinbachek and Bronski toured extensively with the new material with positive reviews, however the project was abandoned as the group was dropped by London Records.

Also in 1987, Bronski Beat and Somerville performed at a reunion concert for "International AIDS Day", supported by New Order, at the Brixton Academy, London.

In 1989, Jonathan Hellyer became lead singer, and the band extensively toured the U.S. and Europe with back-up vocalist Annie Conway.

Foster and Bronski Beat teamed up again in 1994, and released a techno "Tell Me Why '94" and an acoustic "Smalltown Boy '94" on the German record label, ZYX Music.

The album Rainbow Nation was released the following year with Hellyer returning as lead vocalist, as Foster had dropped out of the project and Ian Donaldson was brought on board to do keyboards and programming.

In 2007, Steve Bronski remixed the song "Stranger to None" by the UK alternative rock band, All Living Fear.

Bronski also remixed the track "Flowers in the Morning" by Northern Irish electronic band Electrobronze in 2007, changing the style of the song from classical to Hi-NRG disco.

In 2015, Steve Bronski teamed up as a one-off with Jessica James (aka Barbara Bush) and said that she reminded him of Divine, because of her look and Eartha Kitt-like sound.

On 12 January 2017, it was revealed that Steinbachek had died the previous month after a short battle with cancer, with his family and friends at his bedside.