Arranged, co-produced and mixed with Benge at the latter’s Memetune Studios in Cornwall, the new BLANCMANGE album ‘Wanderlust’ is focussed on “the pretence of a normal world being erased.”
BLANCMANGE’s first phase produced just three albums ‘Happy Families’, ‘Mange Tout’ and ‘Believe You Me’ before art college friends Neil Arthur and Stephen Luscombe parted ways amicably in 1987.
But since his 21st Century return in 2011 with ‘Blanc Burn’, frontman Neil Arthur has become possibly the most prolific man in electronic music. ‘Wanderlust’ is the sixth long player of this second phase and all this without including Neil Arthur’s side projects FADER and NEAR FUTURE or the ‘Happy Families Too’ rework.
Beginning with ‘Distant Storm’, this is an unusual but brilliant BLANCMANGE tune with its incessant dance beat, reverberant Moog bassline and dreamy processed vocoder aesthetic; with a rousing, almost spiritual quality, there are even elements of JAMES’ ‘Come Home’ creeping in for good measure. Following on, ‘In Your Room’ is a great slice of vintage cold wave synth, with a vocoder aesthetic and an assortment of manipulated sounds.
The heavily percussive ‘I Smashed Your Phone’ uses noise and electronics to deal with the sensitive issue of domestic abuse, while the amusing ‘Gravel Drive Syndrome’ provides commentary on social climbing and keeping up with the Jones’ aided by an Eno-esque VCS3 joystick solo.
‘Talking To Machines’ deals with Arthur’s continuing love / hate relationship with smart phones and what is now becoming anti-social media, but also as he put it: “this Kafka-esque nightmare just to get to the person you want to talk to.”
Like a sombre Northern English KRAFTWERK, the marvellous metronomic ‘Not A Priority’ also adds the resonance of JEAN-MICHEL JARRE with some chilling string machine; “Be yourself, you can’t be anybody else” Arthur exclaims as Hannah Peel harmonises and counterpoints this marvellous concoction with her soprano stylings.
Inspired by the smarmy Victorian–minded politician and ‘Walter The Softy’ impersonator Jacob Rees-Mogg, the swirly robopop of ‘TV Debate’ captures Arthur’s anger at the state of the nation in a musical cross between PLASTIC ONO BAND and THE FLYING LIZARDS; “I’m creating imagery and now I’ve got politicians doing a conga, it’s a mess!” he reflected to ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK about the song, “We’re a nation who watch cookery programmes but can barely cook!”
Featuring David Rhodes on guitar, the heavier tones of ‘Leaves’, with its looming reverberant textures and discordant reverses, continues the gloomier mood before the Linn and guitar driven resignation of ‘White Circle, Black Space’. And with the aid of some haunting Vox Machina computer voices, the closing bittersweet title track explores the longing to be somewhere else while swathed in Roland vocoder towards the song’s conclusion.
“I’m catching up in what I think is unfinished business” Neil Arthur remarked on his artistic drive, “I’m just in a position where I’m experimenting all the time. I do what I want and it’s a bonus that some people like it.”
Possibly his best body of work as BLANCMANGE in its 21st Century incarnation, Neil Arthur has undoubtedly found comfort from working with Benge on what is effectively their third album together. That comfort has also provided an appealing palette of electronic sounds that acts as a fine platform for his not-so-merry lyrical witticism.
BLANCMANGE’s Neil Arthur is probably the most prolific man in electronic music at the moment.
Hot on the heels of 2017’s ‘Unfurnished Rooms’ comes ‘Wanderlust’, an album which sees a more expansive sonic palette after the minimalistic approach of its predecessor.
Co-produced again by Benge, the synth collector extraordinaire best known for his work in JOHN FOXX & THE MATHS, WRANGLER and CREEP SHOW, it sees the continuation of a productive relationship which has also led to artists such as John Grant and Hannah Peel contributing their talents to the BLANCMANGE cannon.
Although best known for hit singles like ‘Living On The Ceiling’, ‘Blind Vision’ and ‘Don’t Tell Me’, since the return of BLANCMANGE in 2011, there have been no less than six full length albums released, twice as many as there were during the first phase… and all this without including Neil Arthur’s side projects FADER and NEAR FUTURE.
In a break from making preparations to head out on another concert tour this Autumn, Neil Arthur kindly chatted about the making of BLANCMANGE’s latest opus.
‘Wanderlust’ comes over as possibly one of your best bodies of work during your 21st Century comeback? What are your thoughts?
I’m just digesting what you just said!! *laughs*
It’s difficult from my point of view to answer that question because obviously, I’m very close to it and it’s not long since I’ve finished it. I’m about to dissemble and deconstruct the whole thing to understand it in a different way to take it out on tour. As far as writing and producing it, you’re always learning. I don’t want to repeat anything really.
You’re always looking to surprise yourself and if it continues like that, I’m happy. I don’t really have a formula, I’m just following my nose. I know it’s a bit dark and I’m not writing; even in the old stuff like ‘Blind Vision’, ok it was a pop song because it had dance grooves in it, but it’s not exactly a happy song. Neither is ‘God’s Kitchen’ or ‘Feel Me’ or ‘I’ve Seen The Word’.
The sound is sort of fuller, a bit more expansive maybe?
I don’t like putting too much in, like with ‘Unfurnished Room’s which was pretty minimal at times, there was a deliberate thing to really strip back. But with ‘Wanderlust’, I didn’t concern myself so much with that, although me and Benge didn’t put anything on it that wasn’t needed. If each individual part can’t stand up, you don’t put something over the top to cover it up!
What I did was write the songs and send them down to Benge… we started replacing some sounds but my guitar stayed. Although David Rhodes is playing on one track, he didn’t do the others because Benge felt the guitar was working and served the purpose. With each of the synths, quite often we would replace but not add, we were just looking for better sounds. Benge is an analogue synth master, he has access to all this equipment but we don’t use everything.
Were there any particular synths you’d not used before that you got to play with?
We used a Canadian synth called a Modcan and I’d never even seen one before, plus we used a Putney and I played it with the joystick on ‘Gravel Drive Syndrome’. There’s also a Buchla 100 which I remember we used on the ‘Wanderlust’ track itself. There are probably more verses and choruses on this album, it just came out that way although lyrically, I’m just carrying on my not-so-merry way. I’m trying to be as honest as I can, I feel so lucky to be able to do what I want to do, for better or for worse, exactly how I want it. Putting it together is so exciting. Some of the synths we use never sound the same twice! *laughs*
Has some of the sonic progress come because you are now comfortable working with Benge as this is your third album together? Is he now someone you can trust to bounce off and realise your ideas in the way you did with Stephen Luscombe?
It’s a very different situation, I don’t think there’s any comparison actually. Studios were very expensive back then and we only got in there when got a big record deal. Today, technology and the digital process allows you to do a lot of stuff as prep to take into another environment like the fantastic space Benge has, and that frees you up because you’re not clock watching. But we don’t just spend endless weeks there, Benge has lots of projects on, so we do have to think quite carefully about how to get all this done.
You make decisions quickly and stick with it, which is not a bad thing. You have to let stuff go, you could fiddle around forever and maybe make it better, but how much better? When I work on FADER with Benge, it’s completely different approach because whereas with BLANCMANGE, I write the embryonic songs and I take them to Benge so we develop them further. In FADER, Benge will send me the embryonic musical idea and I’m reacting to what he’s given me.
Aspects of that are how me and Stephen would work. But we’d rarely sit and write a song absolutely together ever. It could be Stephen would come up with an idea and I’d react to it, or I’d come up with an idea and he’d react to it. Sometimes, one of us would write most of it on our own and then offer it into the pot.
‘Distant Storm’ is unusual with its dance beats and arpeggios, it has an almost spiritual quality about it?
Sometimes you’re writing, you think “oh, I should do something with more dancey grooves” and quite a few songs start off like that; ‘Last Night (I Dreamt I Had A Job)’ from ‘Commuter 23’ started as a loop and developed from there but it doesn’t tend to extend through the album.
But this time, I wanted to do more dance grooves, ‘Insomniac Tonight’ which is not on the album was one and ‘Distant Storm’ was another; I wanted to sing it as though it was really detached with my voice being synthesized. So the song went down this route, we had a sequence going and Benge added another one to it and dropped it down so it went to nothing. KINCAID has done a remix which is sounding terrific.
‘In Your Room’ is a nice bit of robopop? Was it influenced by anyone in particular musically?
That started life a number of years ago and I kept it on the backburner, it felt right for this album. The intention was to leave it pretty minimal… lyrically it was about being content with something quite simple, to keep away from being out there, of being in your comfort zone. The idea came from when I used to visit my partner when she was a student, that to be together was enough.
With those two, you play with vocal treatments a lot, something which is quite prominent on the album overall including the closing title track?
On ‘Wanderlust’, we used a Roland vocoder to treat some of the vocal parts in the latter part of the song and we felt it worked better at that point. You sometimes have to back off a bit and give a bit more space by changing the sound of the vocal, to create a more interesting type of vista sonically.
‘Not A Priority’ is like gloomy KRAFTWERK, I first thought those female backing vocals were you pitch shifting yourself and then I found out it was Hannah Peel!!
Ha ha! Hannah’s going to be well pleased when I tell her that! *laughs*
The idea of this was to keep it really simple and I wanted the music to carry the voice and storyline, so it’s borderline minimal wave. I wanted the vocal to be a straight delivery and it was Benge who suggested Hannah to sing higher register backing vocals. When she sent it back, she’d added vocal treatments other than on the chorus, so we used some of those which was fantastic.
I’m happy for people to have their own interpretation and if I start saying “this is what the song is about”, it’s a bit like telling you the last page of a book before you’d read the first, I like people to make their own minds up.
It drives me nuts when I see people living their lives in certain ways on social media, you’re thinking “hold on a minute, what about the rest of the people? Ease up a minute!”
There’s this feeling of a lack of empathy in the world and sometimes, you get the impression that people don’t see each other as equals in so-called friendship situations. I think a lot of this is down to the things that can be said without feeling the ramifications of what’s been said, for example via social media or text message or email. They’re very impersonal but to the reader, they can carry a massive weight. It’s very easily misconstrued.
Beyond that, in friendships, there are feelings where it’s not reciprocal, there’s not a balance. We all deserve to be respected, it’s an extension of that but you get the impression some people value themselves higher than certain friends. It’s very easy to distance themselves from the reality of what’s going on.
People will say things in a text message what they wouldn’t be able to say looking you in the eye. How did you think I was going to feel? It’s going to be much better just to have a talk about this.
‘Talking To Machines’, continues your love / hate relationship with smart phones and what is now becoming anti-social media?
There’s the ambiguity there. Everybody’s had this experience to try and deal with anything from banks, government departments or whatever it might be, you’ve got to go through this Kafka-esque nightmare just to get to the person you want to talk to. So there’s that which is on a sort of superficial level. But there’s other side of it when you could be having a conversation with somebody and you might as well be talking to a f***ing machine and they’re in the same room as you, it’s like talking to a brick wall! *laughs*
I like the idea of how we do talk to a lot of machines these days, but we interact with them. I mean, I’ve made a lot of music with them and I love it, I talk to them and they talk back to me. My reference for the music was actually PLASTIC ONO BAND and a bit of THE FLYING LIZARDS! There’s a good and a bad thing…
‘TV Debate’ covers politics and nobodies becoming celebs? There’s rather a lot of it at the moment!
I gave myself a bet that I could get Jacob Rees-Mogg, the b*stard, into a lyric! Smarmy b*stard! *LAUGHS LOUDLY*
I was listening to the radio one morning rather quietly and the bits I picked up, these words came out and I thought “I’m going to have them!”. I had been listening to some Northern Soul so when it got to the chorus, I thought I’d put that sort of rhythm on it and it went from there, this kind of poem that found itself in a song. It’s just disjointed fragments of observations.
I like what you’ve said, but the intention is to provoke some thoughts. I’m creating imagery and now I’ve got politicians doing a conga, it’s a mess! We’re a nation who watch cookery programmes but can barely cook!
You are extremely prolific and have now done twice as many BLANCMANGE albums as you did in your first phase, and this does not include NEAR FUTURE and FADER. How do you do it?
I am driven to write, it’s my art and I want to be creative. It’s one of the places I’m happiest and most comfortable. I’m bloody lucky to get to do it because I have a fantastic manager who helps create situations where I’m able to collaborate with new people, like Jez Bernholz and Benge.
I have no intentions of stopping and will do it as long as I am able to in the future. Within reason because I have my own label, we release when we want to. I’m not thinking about having to write singles and I’m not a young man anymore, I don’t do a lot of interviews or many photo sessions, all these things. But I’m happiest writing. although I love performing live… I don’t particularly enjoy touring, but enjoy the bit on stage.
Although I did a lot of stuff in the intervening years after BLANCMANGE first stopped, I’m catching up in what I think is unfinished business, I’m just in a position where I’m experimenting all the time. I do what I want and it’s a bonus that some people like it. I absolutely love collaborating, I’d advise anybody to do it.
With two albums released in two years, that must throw up some interesting conundrums with the setlist for the upcoming tour? How much flexibility can you give it in terms of pre-programming and learning new songs?
A good question! I don’t have a direct answer, obviously I’m promoting ‘Wanderlust’ so there will be a number of songs off there, and I haven’t decided which ones yet. We’re going to do a couple from the last album, but I’m thinking of a couple of surprises from several decades ago and giving them an airing. There will be the usual suspects because I know that the dedicated audience who come to see us, although they embrace the new material, they really enjoy hearing some of the old stuff.
It will be a balance, I’ve got quite a catalogue now as well as the stuff Stephen and I did all those years ago, so there’s a lot of songs to choose from. We normally do about 22 songs in rehearsal and a couple don’t make it but they’re there in case we decide to change it while were on tour. But once we’re there, we tend to jiggle it round and then it’s bedded in and that’s how it’s going to be.
ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK gives it sincerest thanks to Neil Arthur
Additional thanks to Steve Malins at Random Music Management
‘Wanderlust’ is released by Blanc Check on 19th October 2018 in CD, vinyl LP and digital formats, pre-order from http://blancmange.tmstor.es/
BLANCMANGE 2018 ‘Wanderlust’ tour includes:
Norwich Arts Centre (1st November), Nottingham Rescue Rooms (2nd November), Cardiff Acapela (3rd November), Bristol The Fleece (4th November), Darwen Library Theatre (7th November), 8 Edinburgh Voodoo Rooms (8th November), Glasgow Oran More (9th November), Newcastle The Cluny (10th November), Brighton The Old Market (15th November), Southampton Brook (16th November), Dover Booking Hall (17th November), Wolverhampton Robin 2 (22nd November), Gloucester Guild Hall (23rd November), Northampton Roadmender (24th November), Leeds The Wardrobe (29th November), Derby Flowerpot (30th November)
Neil Arthur and Jez Bernholz are NEAR FUTURE, a project featuring the BLANCMANGE front man and the Brighton based artist who also co-founded the Anti Ghost Moon Ray art collective that spawned GAZELLE TWIN , ROSEMARY LOVES A BLACKBERRY and ANNEKA.
Their debut album ‘Ideal Home’ has been several years in the making, constructed through the modern medium of remote collaboration, although the pair have shared a stage on numerous occasions, notably on BLANCMANGE’s Semi Detached’ tour.
With both Arthur and Bernholz being vocalists as well as musicians, the pair experiment with voice-derived textures in NEAR FUTURE perhaps more than with their other work. Opening with the delightfully sombre ‘Ideal Home’ title track, it is a fractured number which takes a detached dual vocal into Eno-produced TALKING HEADS territory with a gently tribal rhythmic feel and asks “should I be full of regret?”
Meanwhile, ‘Field This’ is centred around a hypnotic bass mantra and a bleeping backbone surrounded by an impressionistic fourth world choir, as Arthur points to a period “pre-Madonna” while surreal lyrics recall “I remember when you were freshly peeled” before asking to “try semaphore”.
‘Overwhelmed’ captures shrill strings cocooned in an aural cavern with a claustrophobic Neil Arthur lead vocal that while recognisable, is quite different from anything by BLANCMANGE. The appropriately titled ‘Thought Terminating In Your Night’ sees Arthur’s voice raw and exposed before an eerie metronomic backdrop builds around him. The instrumental ‘Come And Play’ adopts a quite menacing atmosphere of synthetic chorals.
Based around a repetitive synth line, the spoken word art piece ‘Dawn’ features a skewed Bernholz reciting images of “coffee headaches” over sustained guitar sweeps and a building percussive rumble alongside uneasy thoughts of “teeth that felt like glassware”. But there’s the most amazing and chilling lead shimmer on ‘Gap In The Curtain’; driven by a primitive drum box, it comes over slightly like a contemplative OMD reimagining ‘Sad Day’… yes “you couldn’t make it up”.
Another spoken-word piece ‘Kites Over Waitrose’ is almost poetry over electronic backing with some exotic acoustic sounding Oriental textures where Arthur talks of the “scattering masses”, before closing with the sub-drone drama of ‘Bulk Erase’. Laced with a melancholic droll where “so much needs fixing but so little time”, Arthur takes the Eno-esque atmosphere into his own green world for “one thing at a time”, with the closing synthesized heartbeat echoing ULTRAVOX’s ‘Just For A Moment’.
‘Ideal Home’ is a fine debut record from NEAR FUTURE, and it’s one that sits well next to Neil Arthur’s BLANCMANGE and FADER as well as Jez Bernholz’s own brand of eccentric pop. It’s an extremely prolific period for Neil Arthur and with another BLANCMANGE album ‘Wanderlust’ on the way in the Autumn, there will be even more escapist expressionism to come.
A NEAR FUTURE live show plus Q & A with Neil Arthur and Jez Bernholz takes place at The Institute of Light, 10 Helmsley Place, London E8 3SB on Thursday 6th September 2018
Swelling in sonic density, NEAR FUTURE’s ten-track debut album ‘Ideal Home’ is an enjoyable experimental collection of songs and soundscapes.
From the art pop of the album’s title track and the serene ‘Gap In The Curtain’, to spoken word set pieces like ‘Dawn’, all blended in with assorted field recordings and neo-instrumentals, the album showcases the music combination of Neil Arthur and Jez Bernholz.
Arthur is best known as the front man of BLANCMANGE, while Bernholz will be remembered by some as the opening act on 2015’s ‘Semi Detached’ tour, having issued his first long player ‘How Things Are Made’ the year via the Anti Ghost Moon Ray art collective he co-founded with GAZELLE TWIN.
Having been involved in five albums since 2015, Neil Arthur is probably at the most prolific stage of his career. As well as juggling BLANCMANGE, there has also been FADER with Benge, resulting in the ‘Ideal Home’ album being several years in the making.
NEAR FUTURE kindly took time out to chat about their first full length fruit of labour and described how their partnership has allowed each of them to think outside of their regular artistic boxes to produce a quite unusual but accessible body of work.
Photo by GMB18
How would you each describe NEAR FUTURE compared with other projects you’ve been involved in?
Neil: Freeform. Good to share the work load. Half the pain, twice the gain!
Jez: Definitely. It’s been freeing as well, from a songwriting perspective. A lot less pressure than I put on myself as a solo artist.
You’ve shared live bills together but how was the bones of this album constructed? Has it been a lot of remote work?
Jez: I felt that it evolved from the email exchanges and anything goes approach, to when we prepared for our first live performance at Sensoria. Those rehearsals cemented everything for me, it gave the songs more structure and coherence.
Neil: Mainly by remote, with other parts on our meetings. The Sensoria cementing experience, followed by a trip to the home of gravity.
Being musicians of different generations, where did you find your common ground in influences and motivations?
Neil: No boundaries, anything goes. Discussions on lack of sleep and emergency repairs. Mundane everyday tasks, often became the detail of our focus I think.
Jez: The lyrics for me, ending the poetry in the everyday. We exchanged music by others and I discovered something new. I felt that subliminally we were both thinking of Michelson, NEU! and HARMONIA, but we never explicitly talked of other artists, it seemed to just gel naturally. Maybe I shouldn’t think too hard for fear of breaking the magic!
Photo by Richard Price
With you both being vocalists as well as musicians, how did you decide who would sing lead on particular tracks?
Neil: I think we only once discussed who would do the vocals on one song, ‘Dawn’.
We’d send ideas to each other, eventually it’d be time for a voice and somehow one appeared. A bit like choosing another synth sound really, oh yes, except there’s the words too.
Jez: My own view originally was that whoever wrote the music, the other person would eventually add a vocal to it. It didn’t quite end up that way but it definitely started in that way. I actually remember the track ‘Ideal Home’ coming more musically from Neil as a starting point and I finished it with the lyrics and vocals. ‘Overwhelmed’ came more from an inspired Neil vocal in response to some music that I had written. But in the end, it was just going instinctively with what felt right and trying out different things.
As a result of that, there appears to be a lot more experimentation in NEAR FUTURE with vocal texturing and processing?
Jez: Without any pressures with this project, I was definitely a chance to take that process further. I enjoyed the idea of Neil’s voice being so familiar to so many people and perhaps producing it in a way that would be totally unexpected, like on the track ’Thought Terminating’ where, as Neil says, it definitely fits with the music and the lyrics.
Neil: It seemed to fit not only the music and field recordings, but also the lyrics on some tracks.
The album’s title track ‘Ideal Home’ was also the first single, what do you remember of its genesis?
Neil: Jez started this idea off and wrote the lyrics. I chopped stuff up and moved the arrangement around a bit to fit the sounds added. Oh hold on… scrap that, it must have been another song. I’ll have to look through my hard drive, to find the origins of this. No doubt the title would have been changed knowing me.
Jez: I remember it completely the other way around! This was the first project that we did together and Neil had the basis track written and I did chop it up a lot and added the vocals and lyrics. Neil responded by adding his vocal and some other synth parts.
Neil: I found it. Of course, Jez is correct, I started it off and it was called ‘Pallet’ and stuck in my BLANCMANGE hard drive.
Photo by Richard Price
There’s a tribal rhythmic feel on a number of tracks?
Neil: As Jez mentions, it just felt right. Sometimes as you listen through to the song or parts that make up the track, you start to hear other stuff, that isn’t physically recorded, but is suggested by the interplay of what has been printed.
Jez: I think it just felt right, particularly on ‘Dawn’, like an angry pagan army coming over the hills with the sunrise behind them, some kind of reckoning; it somehow seemed appropriate.
You got a most amazing and chilling lead shimmer on ‘Gap In The Curtain’?
Jez: It’s a very, very heavily stacked combination of sounds from a PSS-170, about 40 different layered guitars, sax and a synth made from vocals and it just keeps building. Lots of reverb too. It really turned out nicely and it’s one of those elements that keeps the track unique to us, I don’t think it would be easily replicated.
‘Kites Over Waitrose’ is a great title and almost poetry over electronic backing, what inspired that?
Neil: Pincer movement panic buying! Jez sent some music over and we weren’t sure if it would be best left as an instrumental as I thought it worked without words. A while later, rifling through notes, I had these words and tried it out with the music, and our field recordings.
Jez: I love Neil’s lyrics for this. Again, I think he just captures the poetic mundanity of these otherwise forgettable moments. The title really does capture the duality of that.
Another spoken-word piece is ‘Dawn’…
Neil: I couldn’t sleep, so went to do some writing and heard this amazing early dawn chorus, that I recorded on the phone.
When I listened back to it, there in the background was this mechanical throbbing rhythm. I enhanced that with synths, then Jez took over and came back with these wonderful words. Last, we added the feedback sounds.
Jez: I’d had some words for a while which I could never really make fit without them sounding rushed.
When I saw Neil’s working title ‘Dawn’ for the music, it made me think about how my life had changed since the birth of my son, and I revisited those words with more clarity about what they meant, added more to them referring not only the past, but also the near future. The pace of the music gave me the impetus to speak slowly, and they worked nicely.
‘Field This’ has a quite mechanical backbone, is the “prima-donna” referring to anyone in particular and where is this “car park” that was?
Neil: Ha ha! Yes well, last thing first, the car park was in Leeds and first thing last, the story line is set in the time before Madonna. So it’s pre-Madonna. Not though, pre-Maradonna!
The neo-instrumental ‘Come & Play’ has a quite claustrophobic atmosphere?
Jez: It is definitely about that, like being allured to stay somewhere that’s maybe not quite right, there’s something sinister underneath it all.
Is NEAR FUTURE likely to hit the road alongside your other commitments?
Neil: No doubt.
Jez: ASAP.
ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK gives its grateful thanks to NEAR FUTURE
“The medium of reinterpretation” as HEAVEN 17 and BEF’s Martyn Ware once put it, is an important creative opportunity that can widen a musical audience and expand the aural palette.
Although not really considered a covers record as such, ‘Switched-On Bach’ by Wendy Carlos in 1968 saw classical compositions by Johann Sebastian Bach performed using a Moog synthesizer. It played a key role in bringing the sound of synthesizers to a wider audience. On the bach of that, Gil Trythall released his “Country Moog” albums ‘Switched On Nashville’ and ‘Nashville Gold’ which included otherworldy takes on standards such as ‘Gentle On My Mind’, ‘Folsom Prison Blues’, ‘King Of The Road’, ‘Wichita Lineman’, ‘Tennessee Waltz’, ‘Ode To Billie Joe’ and ‘Yakety Sax’, best known as the Benny Hill theme tune but retitled ‘Yakety Moog’!
Following the acclaim that was accorded to THE NORMAL, in 1979 Daniel Miller decided to start a new project where rock ’n’ roll standards such as ‘Memphis Tennessee’, ‘Sweet Little Sixteen’, ‘Just Like Eddie’, ‘Do-Wah-Diddy-Diddy’ and ‘Let’s Dance’ were reinterpreted in a lighter electronic pop style. The vehicle he used was SILICON TEENS, a fictitious group where Frank Tovey aka FAD GADGET and several young actors appeared in videos and did press interviews to promote one of the first synthpop covers albums ‘Music For Parties’.
But in 1981, SOFT CELL’s cover of ‘Tainted Love’ became ubiquitous as Synth Britannia’s first true crossover record. It reached No1 in UK, Germany, Australia and Canada while also breaking the US Top 10 a year later. A disgruntled rival musician had told Marc Almond only a few months before that “You couldn’t make a decent dance record if you tried”, but make one he did!
Written by Ed Cobb, ‘Tainted Love’ was recorded by Gloria Jones and became a Wigan Casino favourite on the Northern Soul scene. As a fan of that scene, David Ball knew the song and took it into haunting electronic torch territory. Segued with a Motown cover ‘Where Did Our Love Go?’ on an extended version, it became one of Sire Records biggest selling 12 inch singles in America. It was to be a double edged sword though as the coupling of two covers made SOFT CELL minimal money despite the record selling millions.
Thus successful cover versions generally only make the original songwriter any dough. Although often perceived as a sign of creative desperation, a fair number of cover versions are genuinely recorded as a labour of love.
So what of the other great synth reworkings? The covers in this listing are predominantly conventional songs reworked in a synthpop manner. And in several cases, the reworks have been so distinct and definitive that it is often forgotten they are actually covers! Restricted to one song per artist moniker, they are presented in chronological order.
VISAGE In Year 2525 (1978 – released 1983)
Zager & Evans’ pessimistic ditty ‘In The Year 2525’ was perfectly resigned aural dystopia for the first VISAGE demo steered by Midge Ure in 1978. Steve Strange’s deadpan fronted the sombre tone perfectly but Ure’s vocal backing and counterpoints added musicality. But when Ure presented the demo to his then-employers at EMI Records, it was rejected! Remixed by John Hudson, it was finally unleashed for public consumption in 1983.
Available on the VISAGE album ‘The Face’ via Universal Records
One of first Japanese bands to have a Top 20 hit single in the UK was YELLOW MAGIC ORCHESTRA in 1980. ‘Firecracker’ was a cover of a 1959 composition by Martin Denny, but actually released as ‘Computer Game (Theme From The Invader)’. Recorded in 1978, the parent self-titled album was noted for its use of the then brand new Roland MC8 Micro-Composer to control the synthesizers. The result was a clean, exotic pop sound.
Written by Jerry Leiber, Mike Stoller, Barry Mann, and Cynthia Weil, a quartet who between them have written some of the greatest songs in pop history, the original by THE DRIFTERS was a favourite in the Webb household. So Gary Numan did a live machine music rendition on 1979’s ‘The Touring Principle’. However, the star on this magnificent reinterpretation of ‘On Broadway’ is Billy Currie of ULTRAVOX with his screaming ARP Odyssey solo.
On paper it shouldn’t have worked; a funereal take of the song that heralded the birth of Rock ‘N’ Roll smothered in robotic vocoder. And it caused much head scratching when it became a UK Top 40 hit, although one person listening was Daniel Miller who borrowed the concept for SILICON TEENS. Belgian trio TELEX always had a sense of subversive irony about them. This mischief came to its head with their lampooning number ‘Eurovision’.
An all synth rework of Head Spider Mick Ronson’s guitar dominated cult favourite, the metronomic tension was enhanced on THE HUMAN LEAGUE version by the metallic sequence of a Roland System 100 while monophonic synth lines complimented the futuristic atmosphere. Oakey impressively bellowed away while Martyn Ware provided sprightly vocal support. ‘Only After Dark’ was due to be a single but was cancelled.
Available on THE HUMAN LEAGUE album ‘Travelogue’ via Virgin Records
Said to be Andy Warhol’s favourite Lou Reed composition, this interpretation of THE VELVET UNDERGROUND voiced by Nico was turned from a Teutonic funeral march into a looser, synth assisted beat ballad in the vein of ROXY MUSIC. Demo-ed under the supervision of manager Simon Napier-Bell in 1979 but remixed later by John Punter, ‘All Tomorrow’s Parties’ was to herald the sophisticated muzak direction that JAPAN were to become ultimately associated with.
Available on the JAPAN album ‘Quiet Life’ via BMG Records
This cover of ‘The More I See You’ had actually began musically as a new OMD composition until Andy McCluskey started improvising and using the words of this vintage tune written in 1945 by Harry Warren and Mack Gordon. It was subsequently a hit for Chris Montez in 1966, although OMD’s version was a far darker proposition, with the spectre of JOY DIVISION vocalist Ian Curtis looming over the bright synthesizer melodies and deep drones.
Available on the OMD album ‘Organisation’ via EMI Records
Before they became Birmingham’s most famous boat crew, DURAN DURAN recorded this speeded up version of David Bowie’s art funk co-write with John Lennon and Carlos Alomar for the 12 inch B-side of their flop single ‘Careless Memories’. As well as having a more frantic pace and layers of Nick Rhodes’ Crumar Performer string machine, Andy Taylor even aped Robert Fripp to add a screaming guitar solo that was not in the original.
A speedy manic darkwave rendition of an early Marc Bolan song, this was the one of the best tracks on the ‘Some Bizzare Album’ after DEPECHE MODE, SOFT CELL, B-MOVIE, BLANCMANGE and ILLUSTRATION. The screeching synths and aggressive unorthodox vocals are over in just a couple of minutes. THE FAST SET disappeared after one single ‘Junction One’ which featured ‘Children Of The Revolution’ on the flip.
DAVE STEWART & BARBARA GASKIN It’s My Party (1981)
Keyboardist Dave Stewart, once of prog rockers HATFIELD & THE NORTH recruited friend and backing vocalist Barbara Gaskin to sing on the second of his electronic pop covers, the first being ‘What Becomes Of The Broken Hearted’ with Colin Blunstone. Their inventively oddball synth version of ‘It’s My Party’ made famous by Lesley Gore was a triumph and a worldwide hit which reached No1 in the UK and Germany.
Available on the DAVE STEWART & BARBARA GASKIN album ‘The Singles’ via Broken Records
TECHNO TWINS were wife and husband duo Bev Sage and Steve Fairnie; they indulged in their own brand of ‘Technostalgia’ with silent partner Dave Hewson who later reappeared in POEME ELECTRONIQUE and more recently TWINS NATALIA. This abstract theatrical cover of the 1930 German song composed by Friedrich Hollaender as ‘Ich Bin Von Kopf Bis Fuß Auf Liebe Eingestellt’ and made famous by Marlene Dietrich actually managed to reach No70 in the UK singles chart!
Available on the TECHNO TWINS album ‘Technostalgic’ via Satril
‘Wichita Lineman’ was one of Jimmy Webb’s great narrative songs like ‘By The Time I Get To Phoenix’ and ‘Galveston’ which were made famous by Glen Campbell. Although included for the ambitious ‘Music Of Quality & Distinction Vol1’ project, BEF’s recording was originally recorded by the other Glenn as his HEAVEN 17 audition piece. The chilling electronic arrangement takes on an even darker turn as a magnificent cacophony of sound invades the climax.
Available on the BEF album ‘1981-2011’ via Virgin Records
NEW ORDER Turn The Heater On (1982 – released 1986)
‘Turn The Heater On’ by reggae artist Keith Hudson’s was a favourite of Ian Curtis and recorded by NEW ORDER for their second John Peel session as a tribute to the late vocalist of JOY DIVISION. Bernard Sumner’s melodica gave a claustrophobic dub laden vibe alongside the white noise rimshot of Stephen Morris, while Peter Hook actually played bass as opposed to his trademark higher register six string and Gillian Gillian’s ARP string machine added some appropriately frozen textures.
A cover of a cover, ‘No Regrets’ was written by Tom Rush and a comeback hit for THE WALKER BROTHERS in 1976. During an ULTRAVOX break, Midge Ure created this synth heavy rework. But that wasn’t all that was heavy… out of nowhere came a blistering guitar solo that would have made Gary Moore proud and a doubled Linn and Simmons pounding for the overdriven climax. Possessing high and lows in a way that previous versions never had, he made ‘No Regrets’ his own.
Available on the MIDGE URE album ‘No Regrets’ via EMI Gold
FRANKIE GOES TO HOLLYWOOD Ferry Cross The Mersey (1983)
FRANKIE GOES TO HOLLYWOOD were very good at covers as Born To Run’ and ‘War’ proved. With a superbly honest vocal from Holly Johnson, the Trevor Horn produced reworking of this paean to Liverpool’s famous river crossing, written by Gerry Marsden for the 1965 film of the same name, climaxed with some joyous cascading synth lines and a frantic Linn Drum programme that couldn’t have been originally imagined by its composer.
Available on the FRANKIE GOES TO HOLLYWOOD album ‘Frankie Said’ via Union Square / Salvo
NAKED EYES Always Something There To Remind Me (1983)
NAKED EYES comprisong of Pete Byrne and Rob Fisher had been in NEON with Roland Orzabal and Curt Smith. They had a huge US hit with a synthpop cover of this Bacharach and David classic produced by Tony Mansfield which was put together in the studio from memory. Rob Fisher later met Simon Climie and formed CLIMIE FISHER but he sadly passed away in 1999; Pete Byrne still continues to tour as NAKED EYES.
There once was a time when it was not cool to like ABBA and covering their songs was certainly not on many artists’ agenda. But BLANCMANGE changed all that with their version of what many regard as the last ABBA song. Combining that noted Swedish melancholy and melodicism with the artful quirkiness of Synth Britannia, ‘The Day Before You Came’ fitted well with Neil Arthur’s deep melodramatics.
Available on the BLANCMANGE album ‘Mange Tout’ via Edsel Records
They did the ‘ABBA-esque’ EP and the mid-career crisis ‘Other People’s Songs’ album but ERASURE’s best cover was right at the beginning with this Hi-NRG romp in the big shadow of DIVINE. Turning ‘Gimme! Gimme! Gimme!’ into the ultimate anthem, the progressively faster ending made for an appropriately thrilling climax. Following not long after BLANCMANGE’s cover of ‘The Day Before You Came’, the seeds of an ABBA revival were now well and truly planted.
Remix version available on the ERASURE deluxe album ‘Wonderland’ via Mute Records
Written by Paul Haig and Malcolm Ross, ‘Sorry For Laughing’ was the key song on from the only JOSEF K album ‘The Only Fun In Town’. A favourite of ZTT arch strategist Paul Morley, as per the label’s early policy, he persuaded PROPAGANDA to the rework the frenetic guitar track into a more moodily percussive electronic one. However, Ralf Dörper later said: “I very much would have preferred to have a THROBBING GRISTLE cover version…”
Available on the PROPAGANDA album ‘A Secret Wish’ via Union Square
Having written and sung lead vocals on ‘In A Manner Of Speaking’ with TUXEDOMOON which was later covered by a certain Martin L Gore, Winston Tong embarked on a solo electronic pop adventure with Alan Rankine of ASSOCIATES fame at the production helm. The subsequent album entitled ‘Theoretically Chinese’ dealt with the theme of cultural identity and an excellent pulsating cover of Marianne Faithfull’s ‘Broken English’ slotted into the overall concept perfectly.
Written by Bobby Troup and covered by Nat King Cole and The Rolling Stones, this signalled the start of DEPECHE MODE’s fixation with a more blues based sound. While largely guitar driven, the rhythmical structure was driven by drum machine and sequences while the instrumental break of’Behind The Wheel’ made a guest appearance during the middle eight. It was performed during the ‘World Violation’ tour in 1990, but with Dave Gahan on lead vocals instead of Martin Gore.
Available on the DEPECHE MODE single ‘Behind the Wheel’ via Mute Records
Often having his biggest hits with covers, you could be forgiven for thinking Jimmy Sommerville was a falsetto karaoke machine. But for the most part, his reinterpretations were good. One of his lesser known covers was ’From This Moment On’, a throbbing contribution to the charity album ‘Red Hot & Blue’ of Cole Porter standards. With a snatch of ‘I Feel Love’ thrown in for good measure, this was one of the best on the collection.
Available on the album ‘Red Hot & Blue’ (V/A) via Chrysalis Records
Performed at The Hacienda in 1991, ‘Go West’ had been due to be released in Christmas 1992, but PET SHOP BOYS bottled it when it was pointed out a VILLAGE PEOPLE cover would look like the duo were aping ERASURE’s ‘Abba-esque’. ‘Go West’ was based on Pachebel’s ‘Canon’ and its elegiac quality was particularly poignant with AIDS still very much in the news. Meanwhile the ‘Oklahoma’ male choir styled key change gave the song a lift that was never apparent in the original.
Available on the PET SHOP BOYS album ‘Pop Art’ via EMI Records
Written by Moon Martin, an American rock artist who also wrote ‘Bad Case Of Loving You (Doctor, Doctor)’ which was covered by Robert Palmer, ‘Bad News’ with its metronomic core had been popular in German new wave clubs, which was how CAMOUFLAGE came to hear it. Given a pacey Eurodance treatment that was very much of its time, it also mixed in twangy ‘Pulp Fiction’ surf guitar elements alongside the trancey electronics for an unusual but successful hybrid of styles.
Available on the CAMOUFLAGE album ‘The Singles’ via Polydor Records
A song by Wakefield indie band BRICK SUPPLY released in 1994, DUBSTAR made ‘Not So Manic Now’ their own with the Northern lass earthiness of Sarah Blackwood providing the chilling commentary of an attack on a helpless pensioner. the wonderful Stephen Hague production fused electronics with guitars and cello in fine fashion, while the incessant programmed rhythms drove the song along without being obtrusive to the horrifying story.
Available on the DUBSTAR album ‘Disgraceful’ via Food Records
We use cookies to ensure that we give you the best experience on our website. If you continue to use this site we will assume that you are happy with it.Ok
has been several years in the making, constructed through the modern medium of remote collaboration, although the pair have shared a stage on numerous occasions, notably on BLANCMANGE’s Semi Detached’ tour.
via Universal Records
via Sony Music
via Beggars Banquet Records
via EMI Belgium
via Virgin Records
via BMG Records
via EMI Records
via EMI Records
(V/A) via Some Bizzare Limited
via Broken Records
via Virgin Records
via Strange Fruit Records
via EMI Gold
via Union Square / Salvo
via Cherry Pop
via Edsel Records
via Mute Records
via Union Square
via Mute Records
(V/A) via Chrysalis Records
via EMI Records
via Polydor Records
via Food Records
Follow Us!