THE REMAINDER are an electronic trio comprising Neil Arthur (vocals, guitar + synthesizers), Liam Hutton (drums, guitar + synthesizers) and Finlay Shakespeare (synthesizers + vocals).
The credentials of Neil Arthur and his work in BLANCMAGE are well documented, but Liam Hutton has a portfolio that includes Neneh Cherry while Finlay Shakespeare is an artist in his own right who also builds synths via his Future Sound Systems.
THE REMAINDER recently released debut album ‘Evensong’ has been many years in the making. Although both Liam Hutton and Finlay Shakespeare are recurring members of the BLANCMANGE live family, the project began before either was involved in the headline act.
The sound of THE REMAINDER is crisp yet hazy, with Arthur relinquishing total control and relishing in the altered dynamic coming from two younger and very capable collaborators, as he has done previous in his other side-projects NEAR FUTURE, FADER and KINCAID.
‘Evensong’ is an immediately enjoyable affair that sits nicely in the wider Neil Arthur canon. ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK had the pleasure of a three-way online chat with Neil Arthur, Liam Hutton and Finlay Shakespeare to discuss THE REMAINDER and its creative dynamic.
How did the idea of actually writing and producing music together come about, as opposed to just performing together?
Neil: Liam and I started work on the album in 2015, shortly after my manager Steve Malins introduced us. It wasn’t until a few years later that Liam joined BLANCMANGE on tour. We asked Finlay if he’d like to get involved later still. When was that? At that point, although Finlay had been a special guest with us, he hadn’t played with the Blancs.
Finlay: It was 10th November 2018 backstage at The Cluny, Newcastle!
Were the bones of the songs written together or by necessity due to your schedules, THE REMAINDER needed to a remote project?
Neil: Liam sent me his ideas electronically and I responded likewise. In fits and starts, eventually we had a body of work that we presented to Finlay to let his machines loose on. It was only then that we realised, “oh, we’ve got an album’s worth of noise here”. I think Liam and I got together in person only once before finally we went to join Finlay at his studio to fine-tune and mix the album.
Finlay: COVID didn’t help. I remember the dates of the mix session being set quite precariously, and a lot of my dabbling with the projects beforehand had to be done remotely anyway.
Did you set out any rules or restrictions in the way the music was constructed to set THE REMAINDER apart from your other work?
Neil: No, I think the three of us would hopefully be able create something uniquely different in the way each of us reacted to information / music / files / suggestion we in turn received from one another. A mutualistic 3 way symbiosis I reckon.
Finlay: Not strictly, but I remember using the opportunity to try some new techniques out. There’s a moment where a keyboard got played with my feet in ‘Dead Farmer’s Field’!
Was there anything that was applied more consciously, like for example live drum feels?
Liam: The decision to add live drums was definitely a ‘conscious’ one. All of the tracks began with programmed drums but ‘Evensong’ and ‘Dead Farmer’s Field’ just felt like they needed that extra punch!
The ‘Dead Farmer’s Field’ title has a goth rock air about it and that comes across in the music?
Neil: Oh, I hadn’t clocked that.
The ‘Evensong’ title track has this motorik backbone, how did that piece itself together and what influences went into the pot?
Neil: There was an intention to attempt towards that motorik drive, with NEU! and LA DÜSSELDORF being a reference to an extent.
Finlay: With the drum machine stem being sent over, I remember going straight for the sequencers at the studio, sending clock to as much stuff simultaneously as I could, then tweaking everything with each pass. Haswell’s Taiko, ARP 2600 clones, MS20, plenty of fun. That rigidly clocked feel definitely helps the motorik aspect.
Liam: I think we all had our eyes / ears on similar influences for this one! KRAFTWERK, CAN, NEU! et al. The idea started with the repetitive arpeggio played on an electric guitar, using that muted-harmonics technique everyone does when they first start learning to play. Then the drums were added at first using a Korg Vulca Beats which is quite a rudimentary but a fun little drum sequencer, and bass notes programmed on a computer. Neil then added vocals and synths and it took shape from there, going to Finlay for some grit and character!
The album opener ‘Broken Manhole Cover’ has this LCD SOUNDSYSTEM vibe, any thoughts?
Neil: Well, if you listen very carefully, you’ll hear me singing via a gated tremolo FX the words “LCD SOUNDSYSTEM” most of the way through the song. Maybe that’s got something to do with it. Subliminal suggestion. I can’t remember how I came to be singing that. Local amnesia possibly…
Finlay: The finger clicks and hand claps are pure Bowie, make of that what you will…
Was ‘Lift Music’ a track born out of frustration?
Neil: Lyrically, more monotonous repetition – hotels on tour. Forgetting where you are because once you’re in there, it may as well be anywhere or nowhere. Then there’s another level, get it? Lift music, to keep you calm in a small space. People get paid to curate a setlist of songs for lift travel. I want that job. CCTV watching your every move. Repeat and repeat.
Liam: I was messing around with the Ableton Looper and ended up making that sort of distorted, stuttery synth sound which you hear throughout. It has a sort of frustrated / anxious feel to it which wasn’t intentional, but it definitely informed the rest of the ideas that came after.
‘What Do You Want To Want’ asks existential questions?
Neil: Yes.
Jo Hutton provides electro-acoustic interludes between all the tracks on ‘Evensong’? How did that come about?
Liam: It was suggested that my Mum, being a sound artist / experimentalist and sound engineer, should make some interludes and she gladly obliged! She used the stems from each track to create their respective interludes.
Will THE REMAINDER perform live or will it be more likely that the occasional song might pop into the BLANCMANGE live set?
Finlay: We’d love to do it, it’s just a case of getting our heads together and existing in the same room for more than 20 minutes! It’s also a case of getting booked, though we could always do a small DIY tour. Tiny venues, 20 people, dancing shoes, job’s a good’un.
Liam: I hope so!
What is next for you each?
Neil: More recording, then a break before festivals in Europe.
Finlay: A studio move-out, then a potential studio build. A new album’s finished though, set for release in 2024.
Liam: Recording and touring mainly. Hoping to finish some new music before the year is up…
ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK gives its grateful thanks to THE REMAINDER
Special thanks to Steve Malins at Random Music Management
Another year and it’s another Neil Arthur side-project. Following on NEAR FUTURE, FADER and KINCAID comes THE REMAINDER.
As well as Neil Arthur, THE REMAINDER also comprises live BLANCMANGE percussionist Liam Hutton whose portfolio includes Neneh Cherry and Finlay Shakespeare, an artist in his own right who also builds synths and is another member of the BLANCMANGE performing family.
Initiated in 2015, the sound of THE REMAINDER is crisp yet hazy, with Arthur relinquishing total control and relishing in the altered dynamic coming from two younger and very capable collaborators. Additionally, Liam Hutton’s mother Jo, a radio audio recording engineer and composer provides sub-20 second ‘feedback and situation’ interludes slotted between the songs for a considered body of work.
Beginning with the excellent dance friendly ‘Broken Manhole Cover’, Neil Arthur deadpans about “eating immature peppers”, “calcium build-up” and other earthy observations and as a hypnotic synthy shine bursts through, it recalls LCD SOUNDSYSTEM. Taking on a more midtempo pace, ‘Hoarfrost’ is spacey electronic pop with engaging keyboard passages where Arthur exclaims “I don’t do nostalgia” as he ponders the passing of time.
The ‘Evensong’ title track is gloriously motorik and brings in live bass alongside a blippy backdrop before some ragged guitar joins in the second half in a celebration of the outsider. A cousin of ‘Hoarfrost’, like VISAGE and TALK TALK, THE REMAINDER have an eponymous song too and the use of digital claps provides a fitting upbeat.
More sombre and perhaps autobiographical, ‘Awake’ sees Arthur sounding particularly weary in the character of a “very very busy, a very busy person”. Of a similar tone and sounding not unlike THE CURE, the angsty ‘Dead Farmer’s Field’ makes subtle but effective use of synths on top of the driving rhythm section.
With more great synth lines and tongue-in-cheek references to the classic BBC comedy show ‘Are You Being Served?’, ‘Lift Music’ excels within a cavernous downtempo trip-hop setting. With eerie horror film vibes in a song about denial, ‘Forgotten’ sees Neil Arthur get more animated and angry before the closer ‘What Do You Want To Want’ recalls JOY DIVISION courtesy of its almost funereal mood as it asks existential questions inspired by the Yuval Noah Harris book, ‘Sapiens; A Brief History Of Mankind’.
This first album by THE REMAINDER is an immediately enjoyable affair that sits nicely alongside FADER and NEAR FUTURE as part of the wider Neil Arthur canon. But what is next? There’s the rumour of an as yet unnamed covers project with Benge and a certain Vince Clarke… versions of ‘Stuck In The Middle Of You’, ‘Goodbye To Love’ and ‘Rock On’ are said to be among the works-in-progress 😉
With his third album, Finlay Shakespeare has produced his most pop work yet in ‘Illusion + Memory’.
Released by experimental musician Luke Younger’s Alter label, ‘Illusion + Memory’ is the follow-up to 2020’s ‘Solemnities’ which came out on Editions Mego, the independent record company established by the late Peter Rehberg to champion underground electronic music.
A graduate in audio engineering and an independent musical device manufacturer via his Future Sound Systems, Finlay Shakespeare is above all, an electronic pop fan with a love of KRAFTWERK, THROBBING GRISTLE, THE HUMAN LEAGUE, ASSOCIATES, OMD and JAPAN that came via his parents’ vast record collection.
With a passionate heart for sonically immersive electronic pop, the vocal delivery of Finlay Shakespeare can be intense and anguished although ‘Illusion + Memory’ reveals a more romantic nature to his music.
He kindly chatted to ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK about the new approaches he took in the production of his new album, his revived enthusiasm for live work and a new project with Neil Arthur of BLANCMANGE…
How do you look back on ‘Solemenities’ and its reception?
I think I’ve come a long way since that record, but it’ll always be special to me as it was my last album where Peter Rehberg from Editions Mego had a direct involvement. The release time coincided almost perfectly with Europe going into lockdown, so I remember it being rather stressful for all involved. The actual subject matter of the album, at least at the time of writing, seemed pretty sensational to me, always thinking “this end of the world stuff won’t happen”, though what we’ve seen over the last few years has gotten very close. It’s quite bizarre.
Does ‘Illusion + Memory’ have a theme?
Not directly, it’s influenced by a bunch of different things I’m into. Somehow it’s come out as the most “song based” thing I’ve done so far, though that wasn’t a particular aim. I remember wanting to play with structure more deeply, but I’m unsure I really got that far with it, just getting distracted with sequencers instead!
Did you alter your equipment set up to inspire different ideas and approaches?
To a degree, yes… I was able to finish off a lot of DIY synthesizer projects over lockdown, so I ended up going back into the studio with a lot more equipment, particularly patchable analogue stuff. Parts of that equipment make an appearance on most tracks of the album in fact, so there’s perhaps a shift in sound palette thanks to that.
‘Theresa’ reveals a romantic side to you that hasn’t been heard before and has led to you adopting different vocal delivery styles?
Perhaps… the subject matter of Theresa is rather dark, but also relates to strength in the face of brutality. I thought the vocals should reflect that, and I’ve always been a fan of big overdubbed vocal sounds. I think I’ve also gotten a little more confident with using my voice – it’s something I’m always trying to push further.
The opener ‘Your Side of the River’ is like the ultimate homage to Synth Britannia, what is it actually about?
I don’t know! I had a few of the lyrics bouncing around in my head for years and it was time to turn them into something real. The musical elements also grew out of how I used to open the live set. Ironically I moved round the corner from a river after writing the song – I have to cross it on my way to work – so it all felt quite suitable.
‘Always’ appears to recall elements of Peter Gabriel’s 4th album but how did it come together?
‘Always’ began life by playing with the small Buchla system I had DIY’d over lockdown – that’s the first thing you hear in that track. I had this little arpeggiated thing going with the really lovely Buchla oscillator and recorded some of that, then came back to it weeks later. I remember trying to make the drums sound big but not overpowering – trying to mimic the style Liam Hutton has when he plays with BLANCMANGE in fact! Also trying to make my song structures more interesting, although still relatively simple.
Although the album has more of a song-based pop element, ‘Climb’ is the more experimental one…
Well, ‘Climb’ started as a test recording. I had been building some Serge modular equipment for some friends, and the sequence running through is a test of a programmer I built to complement the system. I knew I needed to do something with it, so the recordings made their way to the studio and were augmented by all sorts… there are a lot of toy Casio keyboards in that track!
Talking of experimentation, is that guitar making its presence felt about a third into ‘Ici’ which mutates over the various sections of its six plus minutes?
No guitar on that one, but a fair bit scattered throughout the rest of the record! That part in ‘Ici’ is a Yamaha string machine hooked up to a semi-broken Fender amp.
‘I Saw You’ could be considered classic Finlay Shakespeare, does this have its roots in earlier material you hadn’t used?
Nope! Akin to ‘Climb’, the sequence that runs through came from the programmer I built, but this time controlling a TTSH, the ARP2600 clone. I wanted that track to feel like it was filling up to the brim, eventually overflowing. Every part is a little out of tune with the next, and by the end the mix itself pretty much gets overdriven.
You play with Motorik rhythms on ‘Ready Ready’ with some rather nice synth tones, what was its inspiration?
It’s an absolute rip off of OMD’s ‘2nd Thought’! Lyrically, I had been reading a lot about numbers stations, and there was a theory that one of the automated voices might have come from an agent’s wife. I thought it would be interesting to write a song based around that – feeling at home through just a voice on the shortwave, when in fact you don’t know where you are and you could be in the crosshairs at any time and place. Sacha Baron Cohen’s ‘The Spy’ was another influence on this one.
Were you channelling your inner Vangelis on ‘Upcoming’?
Not quite, though of course I can hear the resemblance. If anything, I was going after a ‘Europe Endless’-esque top line. That part, once again, actually came from testing some equipment – a really cheap Alesis reverb that has this very evident echoing on long decay settings. You can hear that in the track from the offset, and that set the tempo of what became ‘Upcoming’.
A few years ago, you seemed to have become disillusioned with live work but you have been out and about performing again, most recently on a bill with Daniel Miller and Gareth Jones in their SUNROOF modular guise?
It’s tricky – I absolutely love playing live, but it’s becoming logistically and financially harder and harder to do so, especially in the UK. With Brexit, European promoters are understandably far more anxious to book any British acts. It’s a case of finding the right crowds at home too. Over the last year or so, it’s felt like I am finding an audience perhaps more suited to what I do, but there are still certainly times where I end up playing to the venue staff only. Getting people out of their homes to experience something that might be out of their comfort zone can be very difficult. The recent gig at Iklectik was easily one of the best UK experiences I’ve had though, particularly down south.
Your GOTO label has released some interesting stuff by people like Bella Unwin and the eponymous EP by LICKING ORCHIDS, is it progressing as you had hoped?
If anything it’s been somewhat overwhelming! I’m hugely grateful for the support the label’s received, and it’s great being able to put music I love into the world and share it with a wider audience. There’s more music in the pipeline, and really looking forward to seeing the roster grow.
What is next for you?
More recording – I already have the bones of an album that need fleshing out. The music is quite different I think, mainly because I’m trying to push my process and the equipment into different places. I also have some super exciting collaborative projects on the horizon – stay tuned!
One is THE REMAINDER; I was invited by Neil Arthur of BLANCMANGE to add some electronic elements and treatments to some tracks him and Liam Hutton had been working on. This slowly developed into a to-and-fro session sharing project that we made good progress on over the UK COVID lockdowns. At the point we realised we had an album up together, we found the time to meet at my studio in Bristol and get the whole thing mixed. As far as I understand, it’s been quite a long process – I only really came onboard halfway through, if not further in – so it’s quite an honour to be invited to work with Neil and Liam on all this! The album is called ‘Evensong’ and released 14th July 2023.
ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK gives its sincerest thanks to Finlay Shakespeare
Finlay Shakespeare appears with Nik Void + Russell Haswell at Bloc in Glasgow on Wednesday 31st May 2023 and with Chain of Flowers + Beauty Parlour Clwb Ifor Bach in Cardiff on 1st June 2023
Cherry Red’s ‘Musik Music Musique’ series now reaches its third volume and 1982 when there was “Synth Pop On The Air”.
From the team behind the ’Close To The Noise Floor’ compendiums, the excellent ‘Electrical Language’ set but also the rather confused ‘Music For New Romantics’ box, this 3CD collection documents the year after SOFT CELL hit No1 with ‘Tainted Love’ in the summer of 1981 while THE HUMAN LEAGUE did likewise with ‘Don’t You Want Me?’ to bag that year’s Christmas topspot. 1982 began with KRAFTWERK belatedly reaching a No1 too with ‘The Model’, a track from 1978’s ‘The Man Machine’.
It was as if the world had caught up with the sound of the synth. The period was also notable for affordable silicon chip based polysynths such as the Roland Juno 6 and Korg Poly 6 entering the market. In tandem with the improvement in quality of cassette-based 4-track Portastudios, electronic music became more accessible with basic home studios now a hive of musical creativity.
While the big hitters such as SOFT CELL, OMD, BLANCMANGE, THE HUMAN LEAGUE and ULTRAVOX are represented by album tracks and B-sides alongside breakthrough singles by NEW ORDER, FASHIØN and HEAVEN 17, the curiosity value of ‘Musik Music Musique 3.0’ is boosted by a greater proportion of lesser known tracks and acts compared with the first two compendiums.
Often dismissed as a MOR act thanks to the Giorgio Moroder produced ‘Take My Breath Away, BERLIN are provided a platform for the provocative and more classically Moroder-esque ‘Sex (I’m A….)’. Meanwhile with a not dissimilar throbbing template, DEAD OR ALIVE’s ‘What I Want’ in previously unreleased demo form captures the band in transition from proto-goth to HI-NRG disco and sounding like both simultaneously.
Wonderful lost synthpop jewels include the melodramatic ‘Juliet’ from PASSION POLKA and the bouncy SPANDAU BALLET inspired instrumental ‘Profile Dance’ by SERGEANT FROG, an early alias of PWL mixmaster Phil Harding. Echoing the slightly overblown vocal styles of the period, ‘Future Shock’ by COMMUNICATION falls under the spell of ASSOCIATES while both ‘Climb Down’ from THIRTEEN AT MIDNIGHT and ‘Instant Feeling’ by AERIAL FX are percussively anxious.
The two best rare highlights both come with links to Glasgow; fronted by David Rudden, ENDGAMES played with a brand polished synthpop funk of which ‘First Last For Everything’ is a good example. Meanwhile, LEISURE PROCESS were the duo comprising of Ross Middleton and Gary Barnacle whose small portfolio of singles were all produced by Martin Rushent; although the vocals were virtually unintelligible over the clattering Linn Drum, pulsing synths, squawky guitar and sax, ‘Love Cascade’ remains a cool dancefloor friendly number reflecting the decadent spirit of the times.
The underrated COLOURBOX are represented by the 1982 single version of ‘Breakdown’ while DRINKING ELECTRICITY’s ‘Good Times’ explores a synth art funk hybrid that threatens to turn into ‘The Locomotion’. An actual cover version, JULIE & THE JEMS take on ‘1-2-3’ is a reflection of how commercial pop had become synthed up, especially when it is learnt that front woman Julie Harris was part of the line-up of TIGHT FIT that got to No1 later in 1982 with ‘The Lion Sleeps Tonight’; incidentally that rework was produced by Tim Friese-Greene who later became Mark Hollis’s writing partner in TALK TALK who themselves are represented on ‘Musik Music Musique 3.0’ by their slightly underwhelming debut single ‘Mirror Man’.
There is a surprise in that Arthur Brown of ‘Fire’ fame with his synth experiment ‘Conversations’ and it is suitably crazy and enjoyable in the manner of early FALCO. The late Austrian himself is represented by ‘Maschine Brennt’ while German neighbours DIE KRUPPS’ ‘Goldfinger’ is a welcome inclusion that exposes their more DAF-like origins.
Adding a less confrontational continental tone, ‘Par Hasard’ by MIKADO is a slice of delightful electro-lounge, while Belgium’s TELEX bring swing into the mix with ‘Sigmund Freud’s Party’ and Switzerland’s YELLO exude their quirky playfulness on ‘Heavy Whispers’, albeit with a darker disposition.
It is interesting to look back at the lesser remembered Kim Wilde single ‘Child Come Away’ and Toyah’s 1982 re-recording of ‘Ieya’ which were both synth dominated but failed to crack the Top 40 despite the sound being ubiquitous on the airwaves. There was the beginning of a notable synth backlash after the triumph of 1981 and DEXY’S MIDNIGHT RUNNERS fiddly ‘Come On Eileen’ becoming the best-selling UK single of 1982 was a surefire sign. And that was without the Musicians Union motion to ban synths from recording and live performance.
Cult acts of the period FAD GADGET, THE PASSAGE, FIAT LUX, SECTION 25 and POEME ELECTRONIQUE along with the two Thomases, Dolby and Lang don’t miss out on the party, but notably absent are bands who had been part of earlier sets such as NEW MUSIK and VISAGE whose 1982 albums have worthy material to mine.
Closing with OMEGA THEATRE and the quite bizarre but entertaining ‘Robots, Machines & Silicon Dreams’, its classic pop theatrics are not entirely surprising as its creator John Carter co-wrote the 1970 Eurovision runner-up ‘Knock, Knock Who’s There?’ for Mary Hopkin, ‘Let’s Go to San Francisco’ for THE FLOWER POT MEN and ‘Beach Baby’ for THE FIRST CLASS.
However, as before, there are minor quibbles; while the correct 1982 versions of NEW ORDER’s ‘Temptation’, TEARS FOR FEARS ‘Pale Shelter’ and Paul Haig’s ‘Justice’ feature, ‘European Son’ by JAPAN comes in the earlier John Punter B-side version rather the snappier 1982 Steve Nye single remix. And then having mentioned in the booklet that OMD’s ‘She’s Leaving’ was released as a slightly remixed 1982 single in Benelux territories, the compilation goes with the familiar 1981 ‘Architecture & Morality’ album cut. Meanwhile the inclusion of ‘Sex Dwarf’ from 1981’s ‘Non Stop Erotic Cabaret’ is a head scratcher when the 1982 SOFT CELL B-sides ‘Insecure Me’, ‘….So’ or ‘It’s A Mug’s Game’ would have been more interesting.
Lessons have still not been learnt from previous booklets with photos of OMD from 1984 and DEAD OR ALIVE from 1985 appearing. Again, the booklet notes are a mixed bag; why bother to bang on about the John Foxx-era of ULTRAVOX with the limited word count when by 1982, the Midge Ure-led version were an established hit machine? Also, why does the story of JOY DIVISION need to be repeated ad nauseam in the context of NEW ORDER?
Meanwhile, DRAMATIS (who are represented by their best single ‘The Shame’) returned to being Gary Numan’s live backing band in 1983, not 1982! Then with the biggest gaff in the TEARS FOR FEARS section, Curt Smith played bass NOT guitar and vice versa for Roland Jaime Orzabal de la Quintana to give his full name!
So full marks for the amount of lesser known material gathered on ‘Musik Music Musique 3.0’, but please get the accompanying booklet sorted out for ‘Musik Music Musique 4.0’ as there have been enough opportunities now to get that side of the operation right. Roll on 1983…
“There is no musical barrier of peoples acceptance, the only musical barrier is the media. (music press, radio & television.) Remember what people cannot see or hear, they cannot think about.”: Some Bizzare ‘?’
Along with Factory and Mute, Some Bizzare was one of the focal points of independently minded music and culture. It can be credited with launching the careers of SOFT CELL and THE THE while DEPECHE MODE, BLANCMANGE, B-MOVIE, CABARET VOLTAIRE, EINSTURZENDE NEUBAUTEN, FOETUS and PSYCHIC TV have also been part of its story.
At the centre of it all was Stevo Pierce, a Dagenham lad who ran club nights playing electronic music and was bolshy enough to approach rock paper Sounds about publishing his Futurist chart.
Having helped get his charges SOFT CELL to No1 with ‘Tainted Love’ in the summer of 1981, Stevo caught an unsuspecting music industry on the hop. “I’ve got you by the boll*cks” he once declared and he could name his price as he shopped his roster to the major labels. His methods could be unconventional and there were legendary stories about teddy bears being sent to meetings with cassettes stating his demands including supplies of sweets for a year.
Stevo’s ace was often to get the major labels to underwrite recordings while still keeping ownership of them himself. And the majors loved dealing with him… for a while at least. But next to the million-selling singles, there were raids by the Vice Squad, sex dwarves, death threats, ecstasy parties and meltdowns with one notable incident when Stevo and Marc Almond trashed the offices of Phonogram Records in Spring 1983.
Wesley Doyle traces the weird and wonderful world of Some Bizzare in his new book ‘Conform To Deform’. It features new contributions from many of the major players in the story including Marc Almond, Dave Ball, Matt Johnson, Daniel Miller, Steve Hovington, Neil Arthur, JG Thirlwell aka Clint Ruin / Jim Foetus, Stephen Mallinder, Anni Hogan, Michael Gira and long suffering personal assistant Jane Rolink, as well as Stevo himself.
Documenting the rise and fall of Some Bizzare, Wesley Doyle chatted to ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK about how his excellent book came together as well as answering some hypothetical questions of interest…
What inspired you to document the story of Some Bizzare?
I’ve been a fan of the label since my early teens, and it was a really important part of my growing up and development. I’d been waiting for years for somebody to write a book, because I wanted to see all those stories collected in one place, but it seemed no writer or publisher wanted to take it on. So I thought I’d do it myself. I wrote a feature for Record Collector, a kind of top 20 Some Bizzare releases, which in the back of my mind I thought I could use as part of a book pitch. Which I did, and Jawbone picked it up.
With ‘Conform To Deform’, you’ve opted for a chronological quotes narrative?
I like oral histories – everyone has their own truth, and I think juxtaposing people’s recollections in their own words is a really interesting way of finding out what actually went on. But initially I started writing the book as a third person narrative, mainly because I didn’t think some of the key players would be willing to talk. It soon became apparent most people were happy to share their recollections, so I shifted it to the oral history format.
I think it works well, and it captures the personality of the characters involved. Some of the characters were so larger-than-life and their voices so strong, and there was a lot of humour that may have been lost otherwise. Stevo’s way of communication is famously unique, and people like Marc Almond, Dave Ball, Anni Hogan and Jane Rolink are all Northerners, so they have this innate sense of humour that wouldn’t have come across if I’d had been pontificating in some kind of flowery prose. Matt Johnson as well is a very funny man, which might surprise some people.
Compared with Mute and Factory, Some Bizzare was more stable than label… see what I did there! *laughs*
That’s good, I wish I’d thought of that!
I guess it’s in the book’s title, ‘Conform To Deform’; Stevo wanted to get in bed with the major labels so that he had their clout. He worked closely with Daniel Miller at the beginning but Mute were a small operation and at the time Daniel wanted to keep it that way. Stevo always thought big – from the very beginning Some Bizzare wasn’t aiming for a minority audience. There were no little independent releases, the first album came out on Phonogram, as did the first run of singles from SOFT CELL and B-MOVIE. Stevo really wanted to hit a big audience, although I don’t think it did him any favours in the long run. As Daniel says in the book, knowing what Stevo’s taste in music was, it was only going to end in tears.
But you can’t deny the success of ‘Tainted Love’. It’s hard to make a comparison now, what with success being measured in billions of streams. In 1981 over a million people in the UK left their homes, walked into their local record shop and handed over money to own that song. And that gave Stevo carte blanche to go to the major labels with bands like THE THE, EINSTÜRZENDE NEUBAUTEN and PSYCHIC TV and they would take a punt on them.
I don’t know if you remember a quote from Marc Almond and I think it was in NME; he said that an artist can only truly be subversive if they have access to the mainstream…
I think it’s true – again, ‘Conform to Deform’. I found out about FOETUS because Marc brought him on TV when SOFT CELL covered SUICIDE’s ‘Ghost Rider’ on Channel 4’s ‘Switch’ show – which was on a teatime on a Friday! I was speaking to Karl O’Connor aka Regis and we both had the same response to that appearance, it totally changed us. So in that respect, getting music like that on mainstream television was a truly subversive act. It was all well and good when CABARET VOLTAIRE were on Rough Trade or Crépuscule and their music reached a few thousand people in trench coats, but it’s only when they were on Some Bizzare and had access to Virgin’s money that people paid real attention. If you want reach people, you’ve got to go though the most popular channels, you’re just in an echo chamber otherwise. Which is fine, but you’ll never change anything.
It’s amazing to think that a lot of the stuff that we were into around that time was being featured in a so-called teen pop magazine like Smash Hits. But talking about the serious music press, it’s interesting that Sounds, at the time known for being more of a rock and heavy metal music paper, published Stevo’s Futurist chart and employed Beverley Glick aka Betty Page to interview these new acts using synths, rather than say the NME?
I remember Sounds being the most open minded of the big four papers generally. They were always seen as the lesser of NME, Melody Maker and Record Mirror, so they really had to fight for their place at the table. Editor Alan Lewis wanted to reach as many people as possible, so you had Garry Bushell writing about the Oi! movement, Geoff Barton writing about heavy metal, Jon Savage writing about post-punk, and Beverley Glick writing about what became the New Romantics. In retrospect it was far more open minded than the other papers.
Your book discusses the Futurist / Blitz Kid divide when New Romantic was not actually a thing yet, which is something the media, fans and record labels have forgotten…
In 1981 I was 12 years old and buying Smash Hits, so New Romantics and Futurists were the same thing to me, I wasn’t aware that there was a perceived difference. But Beverley and Stevo in particular were quite clear that New Romantics DID NOT exist in 1980, it was a retrospective thing.
Rusty Egan was on the Blitz Kid side and Stevo was on the Futurist side, and what surprised me was how visible both were when it came to the press. Stevo was so embedded in Sounds, he was a big character in that paper.
Having spoken to the people that were there, no-one said anything about New Romantics, it was Futurists and Blitz Kids. Blitz Kids were ULTRAVOX, SPANDAU BALLET, DURAN DURAN and VISAGE while Futurists were slightly edgier stuff like SOFT CELL, BLANCMANGE, FAD GADGET and CLOCK DVA. And never the twain would meet!
The whole thing got put on a pedestal when the ‘Some Bizzare Album’ came out in early 1981, it’s now become iconic and prescient but how do you think it stands up today?
What I found interesting was that Stevo did ask lot of established bands to be on it, like CABARET VOLTAIRE, THROBBING GRISTLE and CLOCK DVA. He wanted it to reflect what he was playing out as a DJ rather than a showcase for new acts. But those bands didn’t want to do it, so by default it became a compilation of new artists. It’s a weird one, when you listen to the ‘Some Bizzare Album’ now, there’s a lot of very strange stuff on there. You’d be hard pushed to listen to even the BLANCMANGE or THE THE tracks and think “Ooh, they’re going places!” *laughs*
ILLUSTRATION’s ‘Tidal Flow’ is one of the most commercial things on it but they didn’t do anything else. B-MOVIE’s ‘Moles’ is pretty strong, but even SOFT CELL’s ‘The Girl With The Patent Leather Face’, although a highlight, you still wouldn’t think, “This is a multi-million selling act we have here”.
But the ‘Some Bizzare Album’ does have DEPECHE MODE on it, one of the biggest bands in the world and ‘Photographic’ is one of their best songs, and I think a lot of the album’s reputation rests with that. So it’s a real curio, if you listen to the other label compilations around the time like Virgin’s ‘Methods Of Dance’ and stuff like that, they were probably a bigger indicator of what people were actually listening to.
On the ‘Some Bizzare Album’, what do you think are the best tracks outside of the “BIG 5” of DEPECHE MODE, SOFT CELL, THE THE, BLANCMANGE and B-MOVIE, I nominate ILLUSTRATION and THE FAST SET?
The ILLUSTRATION one is good and THE FAST SET’s cover of ‘King Of The Rumbling Spires’ is OK, but the single ‘Junction 1’ which they put out on Axis / 4AD is a better song I think. I really like the BLAH BLAH BLAH one, I’m a big fan of Tom Waits so when I think back to my own musical development, something like ‘Central Park’ would have teed me up for stuff like that.
A purely hypothetical question, what would have happened if DEPECHE MODE had been on Some Bizzare and SOFT CELL had been on Mute?
That’s a great question. Well for a start I think Dave Gahan would have had to go into rehab sooner! *laughs*
Seriously though, I don’t think either band would’ve been as successful, either creatively or commercially. You only have to listen to the demos SOFT CELL did with Daniel to hear that the regimented, sequenced production that worked so well for DEPECHE MODE didn’t for them, the exception being ‘Memorabilia’ of course. Plus SOFT CELL wouldn’t have gone to New York and had the experiences they did, which changed not only their creative direction but so many of their label mates too.
And with his more leftfield musical tastes, Stevo would’ve grown tired of Depeche’s early poppier stuff pretty quickly. And I don’t think he would’ve been emotionally mature enough to support them through Vince leaving and encouraging them to carry on. I think they would’ve have gone the way of B-MOVIE had they signed Some Bizzare.
Although Paul Statham from B-MOVIE could be considered Some Bizzare’s silent success story with his later co-writes for Peter Murphy, Dido and Kylie, why do you think out of the “BIG 5” that the band did not break into the mainstream?
Like lot of people, the first time I heard B-MOVIE was on the Flexipop flexidisc when ‘Remembrance Day’ was paired with SOFT CELL ‘Metro MRX’. If you follow the threads, then there were the singles ‘Marilyn Dreams’ and ‘Nowhere Girl’ plus there were two EPs before that, which positioned them as a perfect post-punk band. Personally, I always thought B-MOVIE had more in common with THE TEARDROP EXPLODES, THE SOUND and ECHO & THE BUNNYMEN. And Rick Holliday’s keyboard playing was very accomplished, much more musical and didn’t really fit in with that one-fingered synth thing. B-MOVIE’s singer Steve Hovington speaks very openly in the book about how at the time B-MOVIE thought they were geniuses and felt they should have been given a lot more respect than they got. And people at Phonogram genuinely thought they had a rival to DURAN DURAN on their hands. But it soon became apparent they weren’t that kind of band.
Rick Holliday was the last to join B-MOVIE and the first to leave when he went off with Cindy Ecstasy so I think the chemistry and group mentality of the band got really altered…
With most bands the chemistry is unique, and once you start to tamper with it, you lose something. As soon as Rick left, they changed the line-up and got session players in to re-record and re-re-record those early songs. By the time they finally released an album, they really weren’t the same band and they’d kind of lost what made them great. They were signed to Sire by that point and maybe weren’t really in control. Sometimes limitations are better and working within those parameters becomes part of the end result. Other times, you can give musicians access to big studios and big money, but they just lose what was good about them. I actually think B–MOVIE are a much better band now than they were during that mid-80s period.
Which version of THE THE ‘Uncertain Smile’ is your favourite, ‘Cold Spell Ahead’, the single version produced by Mike Thorne or the ‘Soul Mining’ one?
I’m going to be pedantic and say it’s actually none of those, it’s the 10 minute 12 inch version with the flute and sax produced by Mike Thorne. Outside of his work on ‘Untitled’, that was the first thing I heard by Matt Johnson. And taken with the two B-sides – ‘Three Orange Kisses From Kazan’ and ‘Waitin’ For The Upturn’ – it’s simply some of the best music ever recorded in my opinion.
I always thought it was a shame Matt Johnson didn’t stay working with Mike Thorne…
Yeah, that was a Stevo thing…
Some Bizzare’s union with CABARET VOLTAIRE’s club-oriented era now seems obvious but at the time, it wasn’t because they were known to be uncompromising and independent on their own?
I didn’t really know anything about CABARET VOLTAIRE before their Some Bizzare period, ‘Just Fascination’ was the first thing I heard by them. As far as I was concerned, they were like a new band who had just signed to Some Bizzare. Mal (Stephen Mallinder) told me they felt they had gone as far as they could go with Rough Trade and wanted to move onto bigger budgets and bigger studios. I was astounded to find they had nothing prepared when they made ‘The Crackdown’, they went into Trident Studios for a week, having never worked with a producer before, and just made it from scratch. Flood was engineering, Dave Ball played some keyboards and Stevo shopped the end result to the major labels.
What do you think was the seed of it going wrong for Some Bizzare?
That’s a tough one… I think Stevo wasn’t able to find another SOFT CELL, a big-selling pop act which could balance out his more left-field artists. So he didn’t have a contingency when bands wanted to leave. Also, this amazing idea of getting leftfield bands to be treated as bona-fide unit shifting pop stars, soon fell apart when the amount of money that the majors were spending on the records wasn’t being reflected in the amount of money being made. It was the cold hard facts of business that bit them on the arse in the end. I agree with Jim Thirwell aka FOETUS that the A&R decisions went out of the window. Maybe if Stevo had signed YELLO, who he was after at one point, things may have been different. But he signed TEST DEPARTMENT instead… which kind of sums it up! *laughs*
Some Bizzare had a great visual identity, so what was your favourite artwork?
The childish part of me wants to say, “the w*nking devil” on the cover of the ‘Infected’ 12”. I have the design on a T-shirt which I’ve only wore out once and even then kept it covered up! *laughs*
I love Andy Dog Johnson’s stuff for THE THE; I interviewed Matt a couple of times for the book and he was super generous. The second time I went to see him, he let me look at some of his brother’s sketchbooks… the guy was astounding, the colour palettes he used were incredible. I love Val Dehnam’s stuff although I know that’s not to everyone’s taste, but the cover of ‘Torment & Toreros’ is amazing. And I love the cover to the second compilation album too.
Of Huw Feather’s work it would be ‘Torch’ for me, such an incredible, confusing, vibrant image. There was a lot of one-off bits of artwork produced for the label, and over the years I’ve tried to track down all the fan club stuff and merch flyers that were produced. There were some brilliant single-use magazine adverts, too. In particular one for ‘Bedsitter’ from Sounds – a line drawing of what a bedsit would look like looking up from a bed. It didn’t appear on anything else, it was unique piece of artwork for the music press. I had far too much visual material to include in the book so a lot of it got left out. I’m aiming to get some of it up on my Instagram feed around the time of publication so people can see it.
What is the ultimate Some Bizzare record?
I think THE THE’s ‘Infected’ project is the ultimate crystallisation of what Stevo was trying to do. It’s a challenging piece of work – both musically and lyrically – and visually very strong. And there was an accompanying film which was incredibly expensive and again very cutting edge for the time. And of course Stevo got it bankrolled by a major label who lost their shirt on it – there was no way it was going to recoup. Yet it still stands up to this day – you can watch the film now and still be impressed by its production values, and the music is still incredible. The Some Bizzare ethos runs all the way through ‘Infected’.
What about the legacy of Stevo and Some Bizzare?
Stevo would disagree, but I think there are still people doing what he tried to do. DJ Food in the book mentions James Lavelle which I thought was a good example. Also Wiley too, who uses mainstream channels when they suit him, and goes underground when they don’t. A lot of legacy artists who now own their own means of production make their albums and then shop them to whichever label that gives them the best deal. People like Damon Albarn, Paul Weller and Nick Cave who retain artistic control but use the clout of a major, that’s definitely a Stevo thing.
As far as trying to push boundaries and change people’s minds about artistic expression, I don’t know. Things like the ‘Sex Dwarf’ video would be seen as relatively tame and facile now, I don’t think it would shock anybody…
…it’s not RAMMSTEIN’s ‘Pussy’ is it? *laughs*
No, it’s not, thank god! *laughs*
I don’t really know what sort of boundaries stuff like that is pushing to be honest, it doesn’t seem to have a point. The thing about Some Bizzare and what Stevo was trying to do, whether he knew it or not, was he allowed people who would not have access to that kind of platform to be heard. For a while, you could find out about bands like EINSTÜRZENDE NEUBAUTEN or SWANS, read about what they were trying to do, and then decide for yourself if you wanted to pursue their music further.
Your website is testament that the early-to-mid 80s period was a golden age for leftfield artists moving into the mainstream, which was great for the most part. But a lot of those acts adjusted their music to make it more palatable. THE FUTURE changed to THE HUMAN LEAGUE who signed to Virgin, and then split into THE HUMAN LEAGUE MKII and HEAVEN 17, and both made concessions to ongoing commercial success, for better or worse. But Neubauten always sounded like Neubauten, and Stevo’s attitude was, “Why shouldn’t they be on Virgin too? Get the music out there, and let people make up their own minds.”
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