[1] Guitarists Peet Coombes and Dave Stewart were members of the folk rock band Longdancer,[1] which was on Elton John's Rocket Records label.

[1] This was the beginning of a productive period for the band and they released three albums: The Tourists (1979), Reality Effect (1979), and Luminous Basement (1980), as well as half a dozen singles, including "Blind Among the Flowers" (1979), "The Loneliest Man in the World" (1979), "Don't Say I Told You So" (1980), and two hits, the Dusty Springfield cover "I Only Want to Be with You" (1979)[3] and "So Good to Be Back Home Again" (1980), both of which reached the top 10 in the UK.

Lennox and Stewart soon split as a couple, but decided to continue working as an experimental musical partnership, under the name Eurythmics.

Coombes' death in March 1997 acted as a catalyst for Lennox and Stewart to revive their friendship and musical partnership, after they had previously disbanded Eurythmics in 1990.

Drummer Jim Toomey (no longer using his "Do It" nickname) published the book We Were Tourists in 2018, describing the band's career.