In their prime, BERLIN only actually recorded one mini-LP and two albums with the nucleus of Terri Nunn and John Crawford. Although not the original vocalist, Nunn joined multi-instrumentalist Crawford to become partners in life and music with BERLIN.
Although DEVO and OUR DAUGHTER’S WEDDING had featured electronics in a more artful fashion, BERLIN’s 1982 independent mini-LP ‘Pleasure Victim’ was one of the first occasions of an American pop act embracing the synthesizer which had changed the face of music in Europe. It led to a deal with Geffen Records and notoriety with the deviantly fuelled breakthrough single ‘Sex (I’m A…)’. At this point, mainstream USA was still getting excited about macho rock posturing like JOURNEY, TOTO or John Cougar (as the man born Mellencamp was then known)!
BERLIN’s brilliant songs such as ‘The Metro’ and ‘Masquerade’ with their motorik drum machines and Teutonic pulses were a far cry from the way instruments made by Sequential Circuits, Moog and their sisters were being used Stateside. “We were first inspired to create our sound from a couple of European bands ULTRAVOX and KRAFTWERK that were using these new kinds of keyboards that created very different sounds than those of a standard keyboard or piano.” said Nunn, “It created a whole new dynamic that we fell in love with”. Meanwhile, the title track with its pretty synth melody showed how emotive such instrumentation could be, even in songs that were perceived to be AOR ballads.
Featuring an expanded line-up including David Diamond (keyboards and guitar), Ric Olsen (guitar), Matt Reid (keyboards) and Rob Brill (drums) plus an array of devices such as the ARP Quadra, Memory Moog, Prophet 5, Pro-One, TR808, OBX-a, DX7 and Fairlight, Nunn and Crawford delivered their first full-length album together in 1984 called ‘Love Life’.
With this, BERLIN enhanced their reputation and planted the seeds that led to them becoming household names for a short while. Produced mostly by Mike Howlett who had worked with OMD, A FLOCK OF SEAGULLS, BLANCMANGE and MARTHA & THE MUFFINS, he brought his interest in German experimental music and experience as a seasoned musician with GONG to combine Eurocentric electronics with a Trans-Atlantic flavour that was perfect for the MTV generation. The revenge themed ‘Now It’s My Turn’ was the ultimate culmination of that, a mysterious monochrome verse counterpointed by a belting chorus that sounded like HEART’s Ann Wilson fronting ULTRAVOX.
Opening number ‘When We Make Love’ soared vocally and accompanied by some rousing modern backing, provided the cinematic mood for the rest of the album which was dressed in a sleeve picturing Nunn as a vintage film starlet. ‘Touch’ had a similar feel but was slightly more frenetic with synths and guitars blending to produce a unique sound for the time. However, despite starting side two, ‘Pictures Of You’ was really just a pedestrian rock retread of ‘The Metro’.
Taking the pace down, ‘Beg Steal or Borrow’ was BERLIN having fun in the vein of ALTERED IMAGES gone electro while ‘In My Dreams’ was melancholic but dreamy pop. With its atmospheric sweeps and chiming guitar lines, ‘For All Tomorrow’s Lies’ recalled A FLOCK OF SEAGULLS’ ‘Transfer Affection’ before the album closed with the lovely John Hughes’ movie romance of ‘Fall’. The end product resulted in BERLIN sounding neither entirely European or American, walking an enjoyable fine line between FM rawk and New Romantic. Despite the US Top 30 success of ‘Love Life’, the band fragmented, leaving only Nunn and Crawford plus Brill to continue…
By way of a musical prophecy, the album’s Top 30 US hit single ‘No More Words’ was to be the undoing of the close if tempestuous bond between Nunn and Crawford. That song and another album highlight ‘Dancing In Berlin’ were produced by Giorgio Moroder and the blueprint of the Linn driven synth / rock fusion later developed further on his album with THE HUMAN LEAGUE’s Philip Oakey.
Moroder and Nunn got on very well during the sessions so he asked her to sing on a song he had written with his Ferrari mechanic Tom Whitlock entitled ‘Take My Breath Away’. It had already been demoed by Martha Davis of cult new wavers THE MOTELS who had a couple of US Top 10 hits including ‘Only The Lonely’. The Oscar winning ’Take My Breath Away’ became a No1 around the world in 1986 having been featured in the film ‘Top Gun’ but the success was bittersweet. While it was the ultimate guilty pleasure, the song was unrepresentative of BERLIN’s previous work, especially as it only featured Nunn with no input from Crawford who had been the band’s main songwriter.
Despite an extensive tour supporting FRANKIE GOES TO HOLLYWOOD, the accompanying rock oriented album ‘County Three & Pray’ (produced largely by Bob Ezrin) did not sell well despite the inclusion of ‘Take My Breath Away’ and another great single ‘You Don’t Know’. With confusion over their musical direction and deteriorating personal relationships, BERLIN fell apart, ironically three years before the actual city’s wall did!
The majority of the ‘Love Life’ line-up including John Crawford were persuaded to reform for VH1’s ‘Bands Reunited’ programme in 2004 but today, only Terri Nunn remains, touring regularly under the BERLIN name having bought the name from Crawford and occasionally recording. Sadly, their original Geffen back catalogue is difficult to obtain outside of North America and inferior re-recordings appear on various ‘Greatest Hits’ and ‘Live’ CDs.
It’s a shame because although they were plagued by the legacy of a massive hit song they didn’t write, BERLIN are worthy of recognition as American electronic pop pioneers for a sound that had been alien to most of their countrymen pre-MTV. For this reason alone, their work from this imperial period deserves to be heard.
ONE DOVE were a moody Glaswegian trio comprised of and Dot Allison, Ian Carmichael and Jim McKinven. Their only album ‘Morning Dove White’ took its title from the Native American name of Elvis Presley’s grandmother.
McKinven was best known for his stint in ALTERED IMAGES during their ‘Happy Birthday’ and ‘Pinky Blue’ period. This project couldn’t have been more different, especially when compared with his former band mate Johnny McElhone who formed TEXAS with Sharleen Spiteri.
Producer Andrew Weatherall signed them to his Junior Boys Own label after hearing their independently released single ‘Fallen’ and became involved in the recording process, along with Gary Burns and Jagz Kooner from SABRES OF PARADISE who both later went on to form THE ALOOF.
Seasoned by the icy but angelic voice of Dot Allison, ‘Morning Dove White’ was something truly unique in the sphere of post-Acid House electronic dance music.
Dot Allison’s resigned opening line on ‘Fallen’ of “I don’t know why I’m telling you any of this…” was simply seductive. The accompanying groovy rhythm section on a slight off-beat made it the most club flavoured track on here with the reggae-inflections of LEFTFIELD’s ‘Release The Pressure’ as its backdrop.
Although often referred to as a dance act, ONE DOVE’s sound was actually characterised by primarily electronic textures with heavy processing influenced by laid back Jamaican dub and Eno-esque ambience. This recalled the work of former PUBLIC IMAGE LIMITED bassist Jah Wobble who incidentally guested on ‘Morning Dove White’ and later recorded an album with Brian Eno called ‘Spinner’.
The single versions of ‘Breakdown’ and ‘White Love’ mixed by Stephen Hague were actually quite brilliant, accessible and are far less intimidating than the full-on dub attack of the lengthy album cuts. But even as radio mixes, they were hardly the glossy pop of SAINT ETIENNE.
London Records had taken over the Junior Boys Own label and wanted to make ONE DOVE’s music more radio friendly. The band may have been unhappy about the commercialisation of their sound and there is something to be said about fighting for your art, but what is the point if people can’t access your work through conventional media and grow into it, especially if it is relatively radical? In hindsight, London Records were being well intentioned, but this led to a dispute which delayed the release ‘Morning Dove White’ for a full year until 1993.
A compromise was reached with ONE DOVE working with Stephen Hague in the studio during the remix sessions. ‘White Love’ was wonderfully dreamy with its subtle piano and gospel salvo predating Moby’s ‘Play’ by several years. Their biggest hit ‘Breakdown’ had a surprising Van Morrison influence, taking its chorus from THEM’s ‘Here Comes The Night’. In both, Dot Allison’s sexily whispering vocals were the distinctive key.
But the album’s crowning glory was the Phil Spector in the 23rd Century mystique of the stupendous ‘Why Don’t You Take Me?’ featuring Wall Of Sound effects galore and reverbed steel drum samples, it was almost funereal but actually possessed an uplifting quality. Although there was a Stephen Hague assisted mix sans steel drums available on the single release, in this case it was Andrew Weatherall’s original vision that is won the day.
Of the supporting features on ‘Morning Dove White’, ‘There Goes The Cure’ was very ‘Twin Peaks’ in atmosphere, punctuated by Dot Allison’s chants of “he’s gone”. Constructed around some tinkling piano and deep ambient drones, its heart was suddenly invaded by Jah Wobble’s distinctive bass run before returning full circle with the aid of a dramatic percussive climax.
Both ‘Sirens’ and ‘My Friend’ recalled Weatherall’s work on PRIMAL SCREAM’s ‘Screamadelica’ while ‘Transient Truth’ was a superb instrumental with an ‘Ipcress File’ meets King Tubby twist. The echoey drum machine and the various incessantly repeated spy drama riffs provided a suitably hypnotic soundtrack.
With a promising debut album greeted by enormous praise and critical approval, a follow-up was eagerly anticipated. A reworking of Dolly Parton’s ‘Jolene’ and the song ‘Skanga’ which were included as B-sides to’ Why Don’t You Take Me?’ gave an indication of the heavier dub reggae sound that was being pursued. There was even rumours of a cover version of SIMON DUPREE & THE BIG SOUND’s ‘Kites’, the concept of which had the potential to be amazing.
But there was no second album. It was recorded but never released. Frustrated and drained by business politics, ONE DOVE disbanded in 1996.
Dot Allison went on to release a series of acclaimed solo albums including ‘Afterglow’ and ‘We Are Science’ as well as working with DEATH IN VEGAS and MASSIVE ATTACK.
‘Morning Dove White’, like THE ALOOF’s ‘Sinking’, was infinitely superior to the overrated trip-hop albums such as PORTISHEAD’s ‘Dummy’ or TRICKY’s ‘Maxinquaye’ which dominated the mellow coffee-table dance niche of the time. Some of the full on dub excursions have degrees of over-indulgence and may not be to everyone’s taste, but one of the beauties of modern digital formats is the ability to compile a version of the album to suit the mood.
It may not have been the journey that the band intended but this collection is a challenging and rewarding listen that deserves reappraisal.
Robert Marlow’s ‘The Peter Pan Effect’ is a true lost album.
Recorded between 1982 to 1984, although four singles were released via his best mate Vince Clarke’s imprint Reset Records, parent label RCA declined to release the album.
It did not actually see the light of day until 1999 when Swedish electronic label Energy Rekords, whose roster included VNV NATION, S.P.O.C.K and ELEGANT MACHINERY, picked it up.
Often seen as a Vince Clarke curio recorded in the interim between YAZOO and ERASURE, the songs on ‘The Peter Pan Effect ‘were wholly written by Marlow with Clarke at the producer’s helm along with EC Radcliffe who worked on YAZOO’s ‘Upstairs At Eric’s’ and was the ‘Eric’ of the album’s title. Listening back, the end result is a charming collection of HI-NRG synthpop, almost like FAD GADGET on Prozac!
‘The Face of Dorian Gray’ is the track familiar to most, possessing that early monophonic ultrapop quality which featured so highly on Vince Clarke’s work as part of DEPECHE MODE and YAZOO. ‘Calling All Destroyers’ is another quirkily jaunty single but one track from the sessions that is also worthy of mention is the extended version of ‘No Heart’, the B-side of ‘I Just Want To Dance’ much acclaimed by electronic music enthusiasts around the world, which comes over like a pulsing take on ‘Fade To Grey’.
But who better to discuss ‘The Peter Pan Effect’ than the man himself. ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK caught up with Robert Marlow to chat about his cult classic.
How did you meet Vince Clarke and become involved in the Basildon music scene?
I met him when we were 8 years old at the Boys Brigade, we both shared a good friendship and a common interest in music.
He was having violin lessons, I was learning to play the piano and we both picked up the guitar. So that was how we got together doing music.
We diverged later in our teens when he went off to college and I got involved with Alison Moyet who invited me… well she bullied me into playing a gig with her band THE VANDALS in Southend. I got into that for a while and it was from there that the music bug gripped *laughs*
Meanwhile, Vince was doing more mellow acoustic things and we got together in a band later on called THE PLAN. He played guitar and I bought the first synthesizer in Basildon, an old Korg 700 on hire purchase…it made these really beautiful sounds and it was then that Vince got into synths and bought one himself. He went on to form COMPOSITION OF SOUND which as we know is the early incarnation of DEPECHE MODE. For a while, we were in two rival bands, there was COMPOSITION OF SOUND while I had a band called FRENCH LOOK and we both shared the very talented Martin Gore on keyboards!
What were the circumstances leading to you recording with him?
After Vince left DEPECHE MODE and was in the middle of the YAZOO project, I tapped him on the shoulder and said “I’ve got some songs, can you give me a day in the studio?” and he went “No, it’s very expensive… I can’t do it” and I was “Please! Please!” Eventually, we did one day and we recorded The Face Of Dorian Gray which actually then went on for about 3 to 4 weeks… after we spent all that time, Vince said “it seems daft just to do a demo, let’s get it released”. I was made up and we found RCA who decided to licence Vince’s own label Reset Records and that was it. What happened was four singles and the recording of ‘The Peter Pan Effect’ album.
What instruments and synths were you using?
I was very excited to use the LinnDrum Mk2 and there was a DX7 which was kind of the birth of digital. We also used the RSF Kobol, Sequential Pro-One, Minimoog and most excitingly, the Fairlight! We didn’t actually use the Fairlight that much because in those days, the samples were appalling… they were very short and you had to EQ them up to the hilt to get a discernable sound. On ‘The Peter Pan Effect’, you can hear it in a couple of songs just as effects more than anything else.
What was the creative dynamic between you and Vince with regards arrangements and production?
I did all of the music and melodies but I was rubbish at programming… Vince was a programming genius. In those days, we were working on a Roland MC4 Micro-composer which you had to programme in step times of 12, 24 and 48s… my maths was appalling but Vince was very quick at it. I used to say “I want it to sound like this…da-dah-dah”, and he would get it very quickly.
It was very time consuming so we did a lot of programming at his house beforehand and go to Eric Radcliffe’s home studio in Dartford. Then we took it into the studio at Blackwing but then Vince and Eric formed their own company within Blackwing and another studio was built in the drum store called Splendid studios and that’s where the rest of the album was finished.
‘The Face Of Dorian Gray’ should have been a hit. Any thoughts in hindsight as to why it wasn’t?
Well, in many respects I do think RCA at the time thought that they were getting Vince Clarke rather than his record company. So they thought merely his name could sell the record itself as he was so successful in DEPECHE MODE, YAZOO and THE ASSEMBLY. So their publicity machine wasn’t really up to full whack. In those days, you had to get three radio plays a day on Radio 1 and sometimes I was getting one or two so it did get some airplay but who knows… maybe it just wasn’t good enough, that’s the thing!
You got on perform in on Channel 4’s Switch. Can you remember much about it?
It was my first TV, it was a live show filmed out in Bushey! I was on the same bill as ANIMAL NIGHTLIFE and Elvis Costello! It was a long, long day and I thought: “this is not glamourous at all!”. We were just sitting around. I remember we had a big backdrop made of the Dorian Gray single cover and some slides made up of me getting older using make-up. Anyway, when I went and did the first rehearsal, it was just me singing to taped backing, this voice from the gallery went: “Is that all he does?”… it was the director! *laughs*
During the performance, I was all over the place doing this weird dancing to look more animated and the slide show went a bit weird. It was all quite exciting because afterwards, we went by fast car to the West End of London to play a gig at a club in Mayfair called The Titanic Club!!! *laughs*
It was a weird club, they had almost early electronic house music in the DJ sets and had someone on stage doing spot welding…it was very performance art!
‘Crying For The Moon’ almost has a SILICON TEENS vibe to it like an electro-‘Great Balls Of Fire’…
It is, that was exactly what I wanted… the riff is almost Eddie Cochran, very SILICON TEENS! I wanted that cod, camp Rock ‘n’ Roll feel to it with synths. It was good.
Do you think ‘Claudette’ musically may have sounded too much like THE ASSEMBLY’s ‘Never Never’?
It did, it has a similar chord construction but it was recorded before ‘Never Never’. I’m certainly no Fergal Sharkey and that’s why when the single came out, we used cellos and made it different. It’s a shame but I don’t know the masters for that are!
Photo by Brian Hedges
How was it working with Eric Radcliffe in the studio?
Lovely, very talented. I was so pleased to be working with him as he was instrumental in the career of FAD GADGET who I worshipped.
Eric reminded me a lot of Charlie Drake and had a real “can do” mentality. He did a lot of the drum programming on ‘The Peter Pan Effect’, he was a very accomplished rock musician who played guitar, bass and banjo!
What was the relationship with RCA like because they eventually passed on the album?
I was not particularly involved in dealing with RCA as we had a label manager and she did a lot of negotiation. I think Vince and everyone else involved were trying to keep that from me that they were losing interest. So the first thing I heard about it was when Vince came down to see me and said: “RCA are withdrawing but we’re going to go with Sonet”. Sonet licensed ‘Calling All Destroyers’ and ‘Claudette’ so there wasn’t a big difference but we didn’t have the power of RCA. But we didn’t get the airplay.
It was disappointing that the album didn’t come out. But when you work on a project like that, you can’t see the logic when you think of the cost in studio time and all of that. It wasn’t a big production compared with other artists. Just stick it out… if it sells, it sells; if it doesn’t, it doesn’t! To sit on the shelf, it just didn’t make any sense. Contractual issues stopped us from putting it out ourselves at the time but I wasn’t very good at following things up like that so I accepted it and calmly dropped out of the music scene.
Was there ever any talk of you and Vince working in a more permanent set-up, or even joining what was to become ERASURE?
No, I’ll be honest with you… Vince is my best friend and I love him dearly but he has a particular way of wanting things done and is very, very driven. And it’s different to what I want. So although I’m very proud of ‘The Peter Pan Effect’ and all the music I did with Vince, perhaps if he wasn’t Vince, it would be a different sound. At times, it did get a little fraught, nothing terrible but some frustrations now and then. So I don’t think it was ever on the cards for us to work that way.
How did the arrangement with Energy Rekords in Sweden come about to finally release the album in 1999?
Vince and I’s publisher was a real Rock ‘N’ Roll character named Rob Buckle who ran Sonet Records who were based in Sweden. It was a subsidiary of a blues label for people like Muddy Waters. He got in touch with me and said “I’ve been to a music fair and there’s this small label who want to put the album out” and I was made up. But our relationship with Energy didn’t really kick off, I think there were some language differences so we didn’t do anything more. But it was great to have the album remastered at Polar Studios where ABBA had worked and going over there to play the Helsingborg Festival and a small tour of Scandinavia later that year. I still go over to Sweden two or three times a year, I was there last week in Malmo.
How was the reaction to the album?
I was amazed because the album has never sold massive amounts but having the played that festival gig on the eve of the album coming out in Helsingborg, there was about 500 people there and they knew all the words! Not just the singles but the album tracks as well. I don’t know how, maybe it had been going backwards and forwards as a bootleg on cassette or something…but these kids weren’t born when the album was recorded so I was really, really gobsmacked to have such a reaction. It’s been like that since… every time I get p*ssed off and I think “I’m a 50 year old bloke, what am I doing this for?”, there’s a gig like last week in Malmo or Berlin or Budapest. You’re making people happy and that’s the thing.
What are you up to now musically?
For the past 10 years, I’ve been in a partnership with my friend Gary Durant in a project called MARLOW. Unfortunately, pressures of work and musical differences have led to us to part ways which is a shame as we have an album’s worth of material ready to go. We may actually release it at some point, probably on Electro-Shock records but we want a rest from it. We’ll see where the land lies and possibly it may see release next year.
You recorded the album between 1982 and 1984. Listening back to the album, what were your favourite tracks at the time and which do you think truly stand up today?
I’ve always liked ‘That Dangerous Age’, the sound on it is good and ‘The Kiss’ because it was quite dramatic and intense…that was my best vocal performance. Yes, it’s an album recorded in 1982-83 and it will sound like early ERASURE, YAZOO, DEPECHE MODE because it’s the same synths being used. But it is definitely my album, I wrote all of the music and Vince added his bits so it would be ungenerous to say he didn’t add his musical bent to it. He put the sounds on it and made it was it is. I’m very proud of it and I think it’s great.
What’s the funniest story you can tell us involving you and Vince?
There’s one that doesn’t particularly involve me but one that happened during the time I worked with Vince but he was still working with Alison Moyet in YAZOO… they was driving backwards and forwards from the studio back to Basildon. His and Alison’s relationship was going its course and on the way back from London, they were in the Dartford tunnel and he ran out of petrol which she was not best pleased about!! *laughs*
So he had to walk through the Dartford tunnel to get petrol! Bearing in mind he’s been on Top Of The Pops two nights before, I was saying to him “surely you had money to get enough petrol?” That always amused me, the idea of him struggling through the Dartford Tunnel leaving Alison fuming in the car! *laughs*
And on the 12 inch version of ‘The Face Of Dorian Gray’, there’s a bit where we decided to physically whistle the tune. So that involved me and Vince in studio, and Eric running from the control room to join us at the mike after he hit record.
We lined it all up to go as everything had to be done in one take. But we unplugged his headphones, so when Eric came in and started whistling, he couldn’t hear a thing and we cracked up… you can hear us laughing on the record!
ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK gives its sincerest thanks to Robert Marlow
Whenever the legend of THE BLUE NILE is mentioned, it’s their 1983 album ‘A Walk Across The Rooftops’ and the single ‘Tinseltown In The Rain’ that are always discussed in breathless awe. But actually, it’s the follow-up ‘Hats’ that is the trio’s crowning glory.
Both ‘A Walk Across The Rooftops’ and ‘Hats’ were licenced to Virgin Records through an innovative deal with Linn, the Glasgow based high quality Hi-Fi manufacturer.
THE BLUE NILE’s crisply produced albums were used by dealers to demonstrate the sonic range of Linn’s flagship Sondek LP12 turntable. Then acknowledged to be the best record player at its price, in 1989 it was a whopping £585.35 without the tonearm. The tonearms would then start at £150.00 with a suitable budget cartridge such as the Linn K9 costing an additional £59.00!
From day one, THE BLUE NILE symbolised the tastes and aspirations of the discerning music enthusiast. Six years in the making, a lifetime in a period when bands who took a two year gap risked losing momentum, like its predecessor, 1989’s ‘Hats’ featured seven lengthy exquisitely crafted tracks.
AppleMark
But the differences with ‘A Walk Across The Rooftops’ lay in the songwriting and musical construction. THE BLUE NILE’s enigmatic leader Paul Buchanan took sole credit for composition while production was a joint effort with Robert Bell and Paul Joseph Moore having an equal say and each of the band having no fixed roles in the studio. Instrumentally, more synthesizers and drum machines were in evidence after the comparatively conventional sound of ‘A Walk Across The Rooftops’.
Buchanan said “All of our songs are love songs”. With their hushed sparse grandeur, he added “The songs deal rather well with that 4 am sort of feeling”. ‘Hats’ starts with ‘Over The Hillside’, a steadily canter that builds to the closing neo-industrial clanking and sombre, detuned synthetic strings that recall ‘Architecture & Morality’ era OMD. It is mechanised experimentation delivered with hopeless romanticism where the girl never comes back. “What’s the point in trying it all again!” despairs Buchanan.
‘The Downtown Lights’ is monumentally windswept with a tension that increases as the pace becomes more frenetic and leads to a crescendo where Buchanan breaks down: “The neons and the cigarettes, the rented rooms, the rented cars, the crowded streets, the empty bars” he yells, “the chimney-tops, the trumpets, the golden lights, the loving prayers, the coloured shoes, the empty trees, I’m tired of crying on the stairs. . .”; the resigned sub-TOM WAITS tone crossed with the smokiness of Sinatra resonated among many. Although not a hit single, the song was later covered by ROD STEWART and ANNIE LENNOX.
‘Let’s Go Out Tonight’ is glum but ethereal with a haunting, slow burning melody. The soundtrack of shimmering electronic textures and lonely ivory tinkling capture that empty feeling. The glorious centrepiece of ‘Hats’ is ‘Headlights On The Parade’. It’s a rainy cinematic drama in just over six minutes with haunting piano, swaths of synths and a collage of modulated sequences aurally photographing the dazzling glare of street lighting and rush hour traffic.
‘From A Late Night Train’ captures the come down of a train journey home after the rejection. Almost Sylvian-esque, the lonely sampled trumpet gives a solemn jazzy feel along with the piano accompaniment.
Off-beat and off-kilter, the pitch bent fuzzed bass and the pulsing drum machine of ‘Seven AM’ is counterpointed by the minimal but tense rhythm guitar. It’s not really a song either, more fragments of sound gathered together with synthetic finger clicks and atonal stabs symbolising the strain of having to face another new day. “Where is the love?” Buchanan asks.
‘Saturday Night’ tries to end with an optimistic tone, with Buchanan stating that “An ordinary girl will make the world all right, she’ll love me all the way… Saturday night”. The rich synthetic strings pull the heart in this emotional ballad. Buchanan’s voice is fragile and anxious but hopeful. It all ends with a chime of harmonic guitar.
Photo by Sheila Rock
Although it received positive reviews and reached No12 in the UK chart, ‘Hats’ was never as highly regarded as THE BLUE NILE’s debut despite it being something of a masterpiece.
It would be another six years before THE BLUE NILE returned with the lacklustre ‘Peace At Last’ in a major deal with Warners. By that time, Buchanan briefly experienced being tabloid fodder after dating Hollywood actress Rosanna Arquette and rediscovered his acoustic guitar. Things were never really the same after that…
‘Individuellos’ was the third and final official album from the project fronted by the late Klaus Dinger of NEU!
As with the first two albums ‘La Düsseldorf’ and ‘Viva’, the self-produced ‘Individuellos’ released on TELDEC developed on the proto-punk first showcased on the second side of ‘Neu! 75’. But for this 1980 release, there was a greater presence of keyboards from Dinger under his pseudonym of Nikolaus Van Rhein and as usual, he contributed his trademark gibberish that passed for vocals.
Variations on a theme have long been a staple of German Kosmichemusik so the first half of ‘Individuellos’ was dominated by ‘Menschen’, a grand statement with layers of synths that were simultaneously melodic, mad and magnificent. Those who liked their Motorik beats were not disappointed as percussionists Thomas Dinger and Hans Lampe effectively played the telephone directory with their Apache drums.
This first movement was segued into the title track which was a close cousin with its shifting bass octaves and pounding keys before returning to ‘Menschen2’. An interlude ensued with ‘Sentimental’, an abstract tape collage that sounded like a church service in reverse before hitting with ‘Lieber Honig 1981’, effectively a live version of ‘Menschen’ that basically forms the blueprint for Phil Lynott’s ‘Yellow Pearl’… Attack! Attack! Attack! Attack!
The second half opened with the neo Volksmusik of ‘Dampfriemen’ and its pretty anthemic synth motif before the Dinger brothers joined in sounding like they’ve had a few too many Tizers at Oktoberfest, with of all things, a kazoo section kicking in!
‘Tintarella Di’ followed with an opening section similar to the keyboard intro of SIMPLE MINDS’ ‘Life In A Day’. With the canter of horses hooves helping to continue the Volks theme, this pair of tracks may have confused those who loved their proto punk but it was obvious Dinger and Co were having a lot of fun with their reinterpretations of traditional German culture. In another aural sculpture, ‘Flashback’ featured a boat rowing in an echoing cavern before the church organ from ‘Sentimental’ made a reappearance.
The beautiful piano laden ‘Das Yvönnchen’ was the closer; played by guest musician Andreas Schell (who sadly passed away during the album recording), it was melodically more in line with Michael Rother, Dinger’s former partner in NEU! It underlined the ethereal qualities Dinger was capable of when he put his space cadet mind to it.
Thus ‘Individuellos’ was an album of two distinct halves like many great albums of the period such as Bowie’s ‘Low’ and ‘Heroes’, Eno’s ‘Before & After Science’, and JOY DIVISION’s ‘Closer’. It was 1983 before the final LA DÜSSELDORF release, a maxi-single featuring ‘Ich Liebe Dich’ and ‘Köksnödel’. The former possessed a brooding gothic drama like ‘Organisation’-era OMD while the latter was the most crisply electronic track LA DÜSSELDORF ever recorded. The Japanese reissue CD of ‘Individuellos’ on Captain Trip from 1997 featured these two songs as bonuses, while the recent German reissue on Warners omitted them.
However, the LA DÜSSELDORF story quite didn’t end there as a fourth album was recorded but due to legal reasons, it was released in 1985 as ‘Néondain’ by KLAUS DINGER & RHEINITA BELLA DÜSSELDORF with the subtitle of ‘La Düsseldorf 4’. Given a limited reissue in 2006 as LA DÜSSELDORF.DE ‘Mon Amour’, this included both tracks from the 1983 maxi-single as extras and although patchy, the collection also featured worthy highlights such as the tremendous ‘Mon Amour’ title track and the abridged Linn Drum assisted reworking of ‘Cha Cha 2000’.
There was a NEU! reunion in 1986 during which tensions between Dinger and Rother came to a head. The recordings remained unreleased until 1997 when Dinger issued the album as ‘Neu! 4’ on Captain Trip without Rother’s consent. This strained relations further and although a further reconciliation with Rother was attempted in 2000 as part of the NEU! CD reissue campaign on Grönland Records, this came to nought.
Klaus Dinger continued recording and touring as LA! NEU? particularly in Japan where he had a huge cult following but sadly passed away in 2008. As a final tribute to the madman known as ‘KD’, that final NEU! album was reworked by Rother and finally officially released as ‘Neu! 86’ in 2010. He leaves a charming and simultaneously erratic musical legacy.
‘Individuellos’ is available as part of the LA DÜSSELDORF 3CD boxed set ‘The Triple Album Collection’ released by Warner Music
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and later recorded an album with Brian Eno called ‘Spinner’.
than the man himself. ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK caught up with Robert Marlow to chat about his cult classic.
and 
were licenced to Virgin Records through an innovative deal with Linn, the Glasgow based high quality Hi-Fi manufacturer.
in a major deal with Warners. By that time, Buchanan briefly experienced being tabloid fodder after dating Hollywood actress Rosanna Arquette and rediscovered his acoustic guitar. Things were never really the same after that…
released by Warner Music
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