DAVID BOWIE, AIR, NINE INCH NAILS, YAZOO, GARY NUMAN… now that that diverse roll call has hopefully piqued your musical attention…
The new JOHN GRANT album takes elements from each and throws it all into a melting pot with a topping of mordant / sardonic lyrics which at points, either shock or genuinely make the listener laugh out loud.
On what is his third long player, Grant has added another layer to the modus operandi which he developed on ‘Queen Of Denmark’ and ‘Pale Green Ghosts’.
Number one – monophonic / dark synthpop and number two – downtempo soft-rock AIR / PINK FLOYD styled songs remain present and correct, but the contributions of keyboardist Bobby Sparks have meant that there is a more playful, funkier edge to many of the pieces here. Ever present throughout though are the confessional and acidic lyrics which help to keep a cohesive feel, even when styles lurch wildly from one song to next without much in the way of warning.
Bookended at either end of the album are spoken word quotations from the First Epistle of Saint Paul to the Corinthians: “Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud”. ‘Intro’ recalls YAZOO’s experimental ‘I Before E After C’ with its layers of vocals and the choice of text (deliberately) contrasts sharply with that of Grant’s own lyrical approach.
First full song and title track ‘Grey Tickles, Black Pressure’ takes no prisoners with Grant (who is HIV positive) wishing he was around in the promiscuous 70s so that he could have “got a head start in the world of disease”; additionally he discusses whether haemorrhoid creams are targeted at him and the fact that although his illness is serious, there are “children who have cancer” and “I can’t compete with that”.
Now if you can get past that lyrical whammy of an opener, a cornucopia of musical riches await… ‘Snug Slacks’ features funky synths and classic clavinets, Kaoss Pad-style effected vocals and an overall dry production style which is quite different to the lush sound which was present through much of ‘Pale Green Ghosts’. Most casual teenage listeners will be frantically reaching for Wikipedia when they’re confronted with a list of names including Joan Baez, Charlene Tilton and shock performance artist GG Allin which all get a name check in the song.
‘Guess How I Know’ is very NINE INCH NAILS in its conception, a quiet-loud dynamic with a filthy distorted guitar and vocal combo punching through on the chorus. A delightfully unhinged synth solo is featured in the middle 8 before Grant bids farewell in several languages during the outro to the song.
The intro of ‘You and Him’ sounds like UNDERWORLD’s Karl Hyde jamming with THROBBING GRISTLE before a Garage Punk Rock-style chorus takes the song to another level. Again the lyrics (especially in chorus) are particularly unhinged: “You and Hitler ought to get together, learn how to knit and make matching sweaters”. This track follows the character assassination route which was present on ‘Pale Green Ghosts’, where Grant bear his feelings about an ex-lover in an all-too public arena.
‘Down Here’ with its acoustic guitars brings a respite from the more in-your-face elements present at the start to the album. A meandering bass synth lifts the chorus for a song that at initial face value is pretty traditional until a woodwind solo pops up unexpectedly in the middle and during the outro. Grant is blatantly unafraid to experiment with unconventional sonic textures and that is one of the joys of this album.
‘Black Blizzard’ is the most electronic and genuinely dark track here, starting with a cut-off filtered sequencer part and programmed drums, and peaking with a chorus with fast, skittering hi-hats. Were it not for the synthetic nature of the song, lyrically it could easily soundtrack a ‘Game of Thrones’ episode, but mentally picture the added bonus of GARY NUMAN doing a walk on part towards the end with a Polymoog Vox Humana solo.
The lead single ‘Disappointing’ is a wonderful 21st Century Love Song with a shopping list of things / places / objects which pale in comparison with Grant’s love interest in the song. Based around a cheeky rework of YAZOO’s ‘Situation’ bassline, the song also features Tracey Thorn from EVERYTHING BUT THE GIRL on guest vocals, whilst channelling the spirit of Bowie’s ‘Ashes To Ashes’ in its pay-off chorus. Grant’s baritone verse vocals again recall Karl Hyde in a track which is the clear highlight here.
Towards the end of the album, ‘No More Tangles’, a wish for a simple life, cribs its concept and some of its lyrics from a shampoo, whilst ‘Geraldine’ recounts the story of Broadway actor Geraldine Paige who often had the reputation of being underused, despite being a consummate professional in her field. The closing piece is ‘Outro’ which brings the work full circle, this time with a solo child voice reading another piece from Corinthians.
If there’s a criticism of the album, it’s that some of the ideas are stretched a little thin and too many tracks follow the woozy downtempo soft-rock template which AIR used on ‘The Virgin Suicides’ album. The overall production style also feels a lot drier and abrasive sounding than the expansive feel cultivated on ‘Pale Green Ghosts’, but this is probably nitpicking in the overall context of the work.
In an age of music where the life is often all but squeezed out of it, Grey Tickles, Black Pressure’ is full of personality and the sound of someone actually PLAYING a synth, and in many tracks actually taking a solo, is very refreshing.
For fact fans, the album title combines the Turkish for “nightmare” with the Icelandic for “midlife crisis” and although that sounds like a doomy proposal, the end result is far more up than it should be, resulting in a body of songs that require repeated consumption before fully taking hold of the listener.
Newcomers to Grant’s work who wish to explore more of his electronic side are also recommended to dip into much of ‘Pale Green Ghosts’ to sample a truly maverick artist who provides a welcome alternative to the sheer volume of vacuous pop around at the moment.
‘Grey Tickles, Black Pressure’ is released by Bella Union
JOHN GRANT 2015-2016 live dates include:
Dublin Vicar Street (9th November), Dublin Vicar Street (10th November), London Hammersmith Eventim Apollo (12th November), Brighton Dome (13th November), Glasgow Royal Concert Hall (26th January), Belfast Mandela House (27th January), Cork Opera House (28th January),Coventry Warwick Arts Centre (1st February),Cambridge, Corn Exchange (3rd February), Southampton Guildhall (4th February), Leeds Town Hall (5th February), Liverpool Philharmonic Hall (7th February), Manchester Hall (8th February), Gateshead Sage (10th February), Sheffield Octagon Centre (11th February)
Artist collaborations can be seen in several ways.
They are either a chance to take the best elements of great bands to form an even greater supergroup, or as has happened in many cases, there is a watering down of prime concepts which results in a fragmented mess of little interest to anyone.
So here are 25 artist collaborations that actually worked; the list is restricted to one song per main act, defined as being the one who released the parent album.
That means PET SHOP BOYS, who have been among the most ubiquitous and willing of conspirators, get to appear as themselves and as guests of ELECTRONIC and David Bowie while NEW ORDER’s Bernard Sumner appears as part ELECTRONIC as well as also moonlighting for THE CHEMICAL BROTHERS and Philip Oakey of THE HUMAN LEAGUE gets in there twice as a guest.
Over more recent years, there appears to have much more freedom for artists to collaborate, notably with SPARKS recently unveiled collaboration with Glasgow based art rockers FRANZ FERDINAND, named rather straightforwardly FFS. And this is reflected by this list here which has a bias towards new millennium recordings, although ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK is pleased to say, this is a Calvin Harris free zone 😉
SYLVIAN SAKAMOTO Bamboo Houses (1982)
David Sylvian and Ryuichi Sakamoto were making their artistic presence felt outside of JAPAN and YELLOW MAGIC ORCHESTRA, and having collaborated on ‘Taking Islands in Africa’, another project was always on the cards. ‘Bamboo Houses’ expanded on the electro-acoustic textures of ‘Tin Drum’ over a catchy percussive framework courtesy of Steve Jansen. Sylvian delivered his usual mournful vocal but Sakamoto’s monologue and marimba gave the track ethnic authenticity.
‘After A Fashion’ was a blistering sonic salvo that crossed the best of JAPAN’s rhythmical art muzak with ULTRAVOX’s ‘The Thin Wall’. However, it stalled at No39 in the UK singles charts and sadly, there was to be no album. But Karn later played on Ure’s ‘Remembrance Day’ in 1988 and Ure briefly joined JBK, the band formally known as JAPAN sans David Sylvian for an aborted project in 1992 that resulted in two songs ‘Cry’ and ‘Get A Life’. Sadly Karn passed away in 2011.
Available on the MIDGE URE album ‘No Regrets’ via Music Club Deluxe
Very much seen as the odd couple, the duo’s promotional photos captured the curly haired jazz funk aficionado with The Iceman! Bill Sharpe was pianist with jazz fusion group SHAKATAK. Together with their drummer Roger Odell, they had written a piece of computerised electrofunk that needed a vocal. Engineered by Nick Smith who had also been working with Gary Numan, he suggested that the former Mr Webb would be ideally suited to the futuristic backing.
Available on the SHARPE & NUMAN album ‘Automatic’ via Cherry Pop
LES RITA MITSOUKO & SPARKS Singing In The Shower (1990)
In France, LES RITA MITSOUKO became unlikely pop stars thanks to danceable hit singles such as ‘Marcia Baïla’ and ‘C’est Comme Ça’. Vivacious singer Catherine Ringer and oddball instrumentalist Fred Chichin were influenced by the eccentric overtures of SPARKS and with a moniker in a similar vein to their ‘Kimono My House’, an artistic union was inevitable. With the two duos “feeling dirty and feeling clean”, the catchy ‘Singing In The Shower’ was a hit in Europe.
Available on the LES RITA MITSOUKO album ‘Marc & Robert’ via Virgin France
ELECTRONIC featuring PET SHOP BOYS The Patience Of A Saint (1991)
‘The Patience Of A Saint’ from ELECTRONIC’s debut was undoubtedly the highlight of that album. Featuring the involvement of both PET SHOP BOYS, the witty exchange between Bernard Sumner and Neil Tennant was accompanied by a gorgeous backing track of drum machine, swimmy string synth and minimal guitar. The song was premiered in front of 60,000 people when ELECTRONIC supported DEPECHE MODE at Dodger Stadium in August 1990.
Available on the ELECTRONIC album ‘Electronic’ via Warner Music
Following the departure of founder member Martin Price, ‘Gorgeous’ was 808 STATE’s first album as a three piece. Featuring early mash-up experiments based around UB40, THE JAM and JOY DIVISION, one of the wholly original compositions though was ‘Moses’, a rare electronically backed outing by ECHO & THE BUNNYMEN’s Ian McCulloch. Sounding like NEW ORDER with a Scouse snarl, the unusual but enjoyable partnership was the highlight of the album.
Available on the 808 STATE album ‘Gorgeous’ via ZTT Records
ELEKTRIC MUSIC featuring ANDY McCLUSKEY Kissing The Machine (1993)
Recorded for his ELEKTRIC MUSIC project after leaving KRAFTWERK, Karl Bartos’ collaboration with OMD’s Andy McCluskey featured one of his best melodies synth melodies. Bartos said “He suggested we do something together and I was up for it… We picked some cassettes and finally I found the opening notes of ‘Kissing The Machine’”. With fabulously surreal lyrics about a love affair with a sexy robot, it became a cult favourite. OMD resurrected the song in 2013.
Available on the ELEKTRIC MUSIC album ‘Esperanto’ via SPV Records
John Lydon had shown himself to be open to collaboration following 1984’s ‘World Destruction’ as TIME ZONE with electro rap pioneer Afrika Bambaataa. But ‘Open Up’ with the then relatively unknown dance duo LEFTFIELD came as something of a surprise. Lydon was suitably angry as he reflected on the tensions of his adopted home with a screaming “Burn Hollywood, burn!” over an intense electronic soundtrack.
Available on the LEFTFIELD album ‘A Final Hit’ via Sony Music
DAVID BOWIE featuring PET SHOP BOYS Hallo Spaceboy (1996)
BLUR’s Alex James once remarked that having a PET SHOP BOYS remix was like having your dog being taken for a walk, but then, when it came back, it was a different dog! PET SHOP BOYS certainly re-produced this Bowie/Eno composition from ‘1.Outside’ into a much more commercial proposition, even utilising the cut-up technique to decide which words Neil Tennant would sing. Reaching No12, ‘Hallo Spaceboy’ became Da Dame’s biggest UK hit since ‘Jump They Say’ in 1990!
THE CHEMICAL BROTHERS featuring BERNARD SUMNER Out Of Control (1999)
‘Out Of Control’ was THE CHEMICAL BROTHERS’ sonic template actually fulfilling its potential within a song based format with Bernard Sumner as the willing conspirator. ‘Out Of Control’ had everything from a bombastic backbeat and cerebral sequences to bizarre lyrics, especially when Sumner resigned that “maybe my moustache is too much…”. The association with Sumner continued when they produced NEW ORDER’s terrific ‘Here To Stay’.
Available on THE CHEMICAL BROTHERS album ‘Singles 93-03’ via Virgin Records
SYSTEM F featuring MARC ALMOND Soul On Soul (2001)
Ferry Corsten had a huge international hit in 1999 with ‘Out Of The Blue’ under his SYSTEM F moniker. It highlighted the spiritual connection between synthpop and trance so to substantiate the link further, the Rotterdam based producer recruited Marc Almond to guest on the blinding ‘Soul On Soul’ for a spirited, club friendly workout. This all tied in nicely with SOFT CELL’s comeback album ‘Cruelty Without Beauty’ in 2002.
The Dumbarton born TALKING HEADS frontman was back in the mainstream limelight for the first time since the band disbanded in 1991 with this superb online collaboration with British DJ duo X-PRESS2. David Byrne gave his best afflicted ‘Psycho Killer’ meets ‘Once In A Lifetime’ warble for what became a No2 UK chart hit. He later reworked ‘Lazy’ with orchestral embellishments for his 2004 solo long player ‘Grown Backwards’.
Available on the X-PRESS2 album ‘Muzikizum’ via Skint Records
‘Reload’ was a welcome relief after DEPECHE MODE’s paradoxically titled ‘Exciter’. The brief sojourn with Dutch producer Tom Holkenborg aka JUNKIE XL proved once and for all how well Dave Gahan’s voice worked on uptempo electronic dance tracks. He may be more interested in MUMFORD & SONS these days, but frankly, over a lively synth laden backbone is where he sounds best. The ‘Radio JXL: A Broadcast from the Computer Hell Cabin’ album also featured Gary Numan!
Ms Lauper was heading towards a career renaissance with her excellent ‘Bring Ya To The Brink’ album in 2008 so her collaboration with ERASURE in 2007 was quite timely. A soulful slice of Trans-Atlantic synthpop, ‘Early Bird’ was an enjoyable duet between her and Andy Bell that turned out to be the one of the more memorable tracks that emerged from ERASURE’s rather lukewarm ‘Light At The End Of The World’ sessions.
Available on the ERASURE EP ‘Storm Chaser’ via Mute Records
LITTLE BOOTS featuring PHILIP OAKEY Symmetry (2009)
At the time ‘Symmetry’ was unveiled, THE HUMAN LEAGUE had not released any new material since 2001. With a fabulous chorus, this was the nearest thing to a new HUMAN LEAGUE track with Victoria Hesketh doing her best Susanne Sulley impression. So when it was Phil talking, it was magic. “Tell me your dreams and I’ll tell you all my fears” he announced, as they complimented each other in a way that had not really even been heard on a League record before.
Available on the LITTLE BOOTS album ‘Hands’ via 679 Recordings
MY ROBOT FRIEND featuring ALISON MOYET Waiting (2009)
MY ROBOT FRIEND aka Howard Rigberg created the song ‘We’re The Pet Shop Boys’ in honour of Messrs Tennant and Lowe, who subsequently covered it by way of a reverse compliment. Rigberg went recruited Alison Moyet for her first purely electronic adventure since the YAZOO days on ‘Waiting’. This welcome union with its off-kilter synth sounds alongside her voice no doubt helped ignite her interest in working within the genre again, the result of which was 2013’s ‘the minutes’.
Available on the MY ROBOT FRIEND album ‘Soft-Core’ via Double Feature/Worried Rainbow
PET SHOP BOYS featuring PHILIP OAKEY This Used To Be The Future (2009)
‘This Used To Be The Future’ was a dream trioet that featured Neil Tennant, Philip Oakey and Chris Lowe. With Lowe singing as opposed to just speaking, this triumphant celebration of yesterday’s tomorrow saw Oakey deadpan disappointedly that things didn’t quite turn out how Raymond Baxter predicted on ‘Tomorrow’s World’! He finally resigns himself and at grunts“AMEN!”.
RÖYKSOPP featuring ROBYN The Girl & The Robot (2009)
The centrepiece of RÖYKSOPP’s third album ‘The Girl & The Robot’ was perhaps the culmination of Robyn’s steady rise as a truly independent female artist. Despite having gained success in 1997 with the R’n’B tinged ‘Show Me Love’, her superiors at BMG reacted negatively to her new electropop aspirations inspired by THE KNIFE. Frustrated, she bought herself out of her contract and set up her own Konichiwa Records, giving her the freedom to work with whoever she wanted.
Available on the RÖYKSOPP album ‘Junior’ via Wall Of Sound / PIAS
BLANK & JONES featuring CLAUDIA BRÜCKEN Don’t Stop (2010)
The German dance duo had previously worked with Miss Brücken on ‘Unknown Treasure’, a most gorgeous electrobeat ballad from 2003. ‘Don’t Stop’ was a progression on that but with a wider texture pallet and more abstract electronic overtones. Despite being less song based and having been collaborated on seperately from Blank and Jones, vocally it is classic Claudia with its spoken verse and sexy ice maiden delivery in chorus.
CRYSTAL CASTLES featuring ROBERT SMITH Not In Love (2010)
Re-recorded for single release, Alice Beer took a breather to allow guest Robert Smith from THE CURE to take lead vocals on ‘Not In Love’, a dark but accessible number from CRYSTAL CASTLES’ second album. Smith more than fitted in with the Canadian duo’s aggressive and occasionally chaotic electronic template on this frantic uncovering of a song originally recorded by obscure Toronto new wave combo PLATINUM BLONDE.
Available on the CRYSTAL CASTLES featuring ROBERT SMITH single ‘Not In Love’ via Last Gang/Fiction Records
MOTOR featuring MARTIN L GORE Man Made Machine (2012)
MOTOR’s electro stomper ‘Man Made Machine’ featured vocals by DEPECHE MODE’s Martin Gore in a collaboration which came over a bit like a camp IGGY POP. Gore certainly sounded a touch nervous and uneasy, luring over the duo’s brand of harder edged schaffel techno which only enhanced its appeal. Incidentally, the same titled parent album also featured guests such as GARY NUMAN, BILLIE RAY MARTIN and NITZER EBB’s Douglas J McCarthy.
Not content with producing MARSHEAUX and collaborating with OMD on ‘Helen Of Troy’, Greek duo FOTONOVELA released a more song based second album featuring a number of prominent international vocalists entitled ‘A Ton Of Love’. One of the numbers ‘Our Sorrow’ featured James New from the much missed MIRRORS. In the vein of classic OMD, New’s majestic vocal touching the heartstrings, the wonderful melancholy was perfect, soulful electronic pop.
Available on the FOTONOVELA album ‘A Ton of Love’ via Undo Records
Foxx and Hulkkonen had worked together previously on various one-off songs like ‘Dislocated’ and ‘Never Been Here Before’ but had never before attempted a body of work with a conceptual theme. When the two found some collaborative time together, the result was ‘European Splendour’, an EP with a grainier downtempo template than before. The lead track ‘Evangeline’ was full of depth, coupled with an anthemic chorus.
Available on the JOHN FOXX & JORI HULKKONEN EP ‘European Splendour’ via Sugarcane Records
SIN COS TAN featuring CASEY SPOONER Avant Garde (2013)
SIN COS TAN’s Jori Hulkkonen first found fame as part of TIGA & ZYNTHERIUS back in 2001 at the height of the Electroclash movement. ‘Avant Garde’ saw Casey Spooner from the scene’s flag bearers FISCHERSPOONER make a guest appearance on the duo’s second long player ‘Afterlife’. The track itself though was more like THE CURE produced by PET SHOP BOYS with Spooner providing a suitably cynical snarl to contrast Juho Paalosmaa’s impassioned lost boy cry.
Available on the SIN COS TAN album ‘Afterlife’ via Solina Records
iEUROPEAN featuring WOLFGANG FLÜR Activity Of Sound (2014)
Although Wolfgang Flür’s last full album project was as YAMO with ‘Time Pie’ back in 1997, there was this marvellous electronic number entitled ‘Activity Of Sound’, recorded in collaboration with iEUROPEAN. The project of Dublin based artist Sean Barron, the additional female monologue was provided by Barron’s wife, Izabella. The track sees Herr Flür quoting an archive interview with the late avant garde composer John Cage to a soundtrack of hypnotic synthetic bliss.
Available on the iEUROPEAN featuring WOLFGANG FLÜR download single ‘Activity Of Sound’ via Subculture Records
A hilarious animation satirising the Château d’Hérouville studio sessions for David Bowie’s legendary ‘Low’ album has been gaining traction on the internet.
Produced by The Brothers McLeod, the short film captures Bowie, Brian Eno and Tony Visconti recording the album’s lengthy doom laden instrumental ‘Warszawa’ using a witty script and authentic voice characterisations by comedian Adam Buxton, himself no stranger to sending up the music scene via ‘The Adam & Joe Show’.
At West Berlin’s Hansa Studios where the ‘Low’ sessions were being mixed in 1976, the guards in the watch towers in East Berlin could look into the windows of the building! Although named after the Polish capital, ‘Warszawa’ accurately captured the post-war tensions within the divided city without the need for overt lyricism. However, Buxton’s send-up reimagines what Bowie may have had in mind lyrically, insecure in the fact that Eno had totally composed and realised the track!
The animation also accurately highlights Tony Visconti’s often under appreciated role in co-producing ‘Low’ plus the subsequent ‘Berlin Trilogy’ albums ‘Heroes’ and ‘Lodger’; the frustrated New Yorker is seen to be ranting about “doing a lot of co-production, probably more than people think…”, a credit which has frequently been incorrectly attributed to Eno.
But what gives this animation the ultimate credible edge is Buxton’s spot-on Bowie impersonation and his affectionate references to fan trivia.
‘Warszawa’ is available on the album ‘Low’ via EMI Records
The vast career of electronic innovator and ambient godfather Brian Eno has crossed genres, styles and instrumentation.
Ranging from his solo work with his use of simplistic keyboards and snake guitar to major rock productions and motivational techniques such as his famous ‘Oblique Strategies’ cards, Eno’s theories and thought processes have shaped the pop, rock and avant garde worlds.b“Anything that’s strong enough will stand up to any amount of analysis” Eno said profoundly.
While starting out in art rock with ROXY MUSIC as an EMS VCS3 wielding non-musician, a car accident in early 1975 left him temporarily immobile in a hospital bed. Ever the thinker, it allowed him to explore the possibilities of environmental music. Inadvertently, he had discovered the sub-genre of ambient.
One of his best known early compositions of this type was the short instrumental title track of his 1975 opus ‘Another Green World’ which combined voxless and vocalled tracks in equal measures; the track later became the opening title theme to the BBC2 arts programme ‘Arena’. He focussed on this wordless aesthetic, producing acknowledged ambient classics such as ‘Music for Airports’, ‘Thursday Afternoon’ and ‘Neroli’. His recent album ‘Lux’ on Warp Records continued this quality tradition.
Following his acclaimed solo album ‘Before & After Science’ in 1977, he largely steered clear of conventional vocal led material until 2005’s excellent ‘Another Day On Earth’. However, he maintained a presence within the pop and rock sphere as a producer with ULTRAVOX! and later acts such as DEVO, TALKING HEADS, U2 and JAMES.
“Being a record producer is the best form of cowardice. Producers often get praised but they have to do a really bad job for anyone to criticise them” he said of his occasionally hands-off approach, “The way I work is to try to find out what isn’t being done that ought to be done. Sometimes that means somebody ought to make the tea. Sometimes it means somebody ought to re-write the whole bloody song”. Such is Eno’s magic, he even managed to steer COLDPLAY into making their most bearable track ‘Viva La Vida’! Eno’s influence in the studio has been significant, even when not actually behind the desk.
While often miscredited as the producer of David Bowie’s Berlin trilogy ‘Low’, ‘Heroes’ and ‘Lodger’, he was paramount in directing Bowie’s train of thought towards a new school of pretension beyond conventional rock ’n’ roll. The result was half instrumental tracks such as ‘Sound & Vision’ and doomy neo-classical electronic pieces such as ‘Sense Of Doubt’, while both the ‘Low’ and ‘Heroes’ albums were conceptualised into vocal and instrumental sides.
Other Eno collaborators have included HARMONIA, LARAAJI, ICEHOUSE and SUEDE as well as John Cale, Jah Wobble, Leo Abrahams, Jon Hopkins and Karl Hyde among many. Scouse pranksters HALF MAN HALF BISCUIT even sent up this artistic rite of passage in a song called ‘Eno Collaboration’. Eno’s catalogue is far too extensive to summarise in a short synopsis.
So what material would serve as an introduction to his varied career as a recording artist, producer, remixer and collaborative muse? Here are eighteen affectionately chosen examples. As with all previous Beginner’s Guides by ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK, the list is not definitive, presented in chronological order and limited to one track per moniker, project or artist. The intention is to act as an oblique strategy to inspire further investigation…
ROXY MUSIC Ladytron (1972)
‘Ladytron’ was a gloriously arty adventure; the inclusion of otherworldly sonic manipulations on Andy MacKay’s oboe and sax alongside Eno’s striking VCS3 sourced electronics signalled a futuristic vision that was later to reveal itself in the New Romantic scene. But Eno’s tenure in ROXY MUSIC wasn’t to last; tensions had been running high at Roxy gigs.Following Roxy’s second album ‘For Your Pleasure’, Eno was gone!
Available on the ROXY MUSIC album ‘The Early Years’ via Virgin Records
Eno’s solo debut ‘Here Come The Warm Jets’ followed a trashy energetic guitar style inspired by THE VELVET UNDERGROUND, but his sophomore offering took in more esoteric approaches and an interest in Chinese Communism. The skippy waltz of ‘Back In Judy’s Jungle’ with percussion by Phil Collins headed towards the 38th Parallel as an infectious guitar melody (borrowed from a Korean folk tune) took hold alongside whistles and electronic effects.
Prog rockers KING CRIMSON shared management with Roxy and Eno; their guitarist Robert Fripp made his first collaboration with Eno in 1973 on ‘(No Pussyfooting)’. Comprising of two long spiky improvisations, it used a live tape loop technique christened Frippertronics which allowed Mr Toyah Wilcox to layer guitar sounds. This was put to good use on ‘Evening Star’ which had more melodic components in comparision and gentle harmonics.
Available on the FRIPP & ENO album ‘Evening Star’ via Opal Records
‘Warszawa’ was named after the Polish capital city but captured the post-war tensions in West Berlin without the need for lyricism. At Hansa Studios where ‘Low’ was being mixed, the soldiers in the East Berlin watch towers could look into the windows of the building! Tony Visconti’s production enhanced the drama between Bowie’s enigmatic wailing over Eno’s Minimoog and Chamberlain keys. This formed part of an all instrumental suite on the album’s second side.
Available on the DAVID BOWIE album ‘Low’ via EMI Records
Using Eno’s Minimoog with a knob marked with a sheep sticker to indicate it made woolly sounds, Billy Currie’s classical sensibilities combined with John Foxx’s detached dissatisfaction on ‘My Sex’. Despite being accorded joint billing with Steve Lillywhite and the band in the ‘Ultravox!’ album’s production credits, drummer Warren Cann later revealed that Eno had only worked on four tracks and was not quite the accomplished studio technician the band hoped he would be!
Available on the ULTRAVOX! album ‘Ultravox!’ via Universal Music
While the 1976 sessions with cult German band HARMONIA featuring Michael Rother of NEU! remained unreleased until 1997, collaborations with two of the collective Dieter Moebius and Hans-Joachim Roedelius aka CLUSTER proved to be more successful. With a wonderful ambient collection ‘Cluster & Eno’to their name, their second album ‘After The Heat’added Eno’s contemplative voice to the experimentation, the best of which was the gentle sequencer led beauty of ‘The Belldog’.
Available on the ENO MOEBIUS ROEDELIUS album ‘After The Heat’ via Bureau B
With ‘Music for Airports’, No1 in his Ambient series, the concept had been to create soothing pieces for inducing calm in those who had a fear of flying. Unlike ‘Music For Films’ which consisted of short musical fragments, ‘Music For Airports’ comprised of four extended sketches utilising piano, synths and vocal tape loops. ‘1/1’ was a magnificent 17 minute calling card that was “ignorable as it is interesting”.
Strangely enigmatic, Hassell’s muted avant garde trumpet playing and use of Prophet 5 processing in partnership with Eno on ‘Delta Rain Dream’ from ‘Fourth World Vol 1 Possible Musics’ provided a backdrop for a type of percussive primitive futurism where it was envisaged what indigenous tribes would have done if a solar powered synthesizer had been dropped in at the beginning of time and become their instrument of choice.
Eno had produced and issued Budd’s ‘Pavilion Of Dreams’ on Obscure, but didn’t directly collaborate on a full album project with the American self-taught pianist until ‘The Plateaux Of Mirror’; ‘First Light’ was typical of an Eno collaboration where the musician of the partnership was allowed to breathe and build tension before Eno’s magical layers of synthesizer appeared in the final quarter. The approach could be compared to Eno choosing a tie for Budd’s shirt and suit…
‘Once In A Lifetime’ may have been the hit but ‘Crosseyed & Painless’ was the key track from ‘Remain In Light’, TALKING HEADS’ third album with Eno. Incorporating funk rhythms alongside assorted instrumentation modulating around a very basic repetitive chord structure, there was tension within the dance as David Byrne preached like an inebriate evangelist. The credit “All songs written by David Byrne, Brian Eno and Talking Heads” infuriated the other band members.
Available on the TALKING HEADS album ‘Remain In Light’ via WEA Records
Recorded during ‘Remain In Light’, ‘My Life In The Bush Of Ghosts’ was the playroom that nearly drove TALKING HEADS apart. This influential album used taped speeches by personalities of assorted faiths effectively as lead vocals. Featuring the found voice of Lebanese mountain singer Dunya Yusin, ‘Regiment’ was mildly funky and its assortment of rhythmical clarity, synthetic atmospheres and sustained guitar textures proved to be a forerunner of JAPAN’s ‘Tin Drum’.
BRIAN ENO, DANIEL LANOIS & ROGER ENO Deep Blue Day (1983)
The ‘Apollo’ album was a soundtrack to a documentary film about the mission to the moon. Its intention was to react against the newsy manner of space travel presented by most TV programmes of the day with its fast cuts and speeded up images. Feelings of weightlessness were captured among the collection’s aural clusters and atmospheres. ‘Deep Blue Day’ with its accessible countrified twang from Lanois was used in the infamous ‘toilet’ scene of the film ‘Trainspotting’.
Available on the BRIAN ENO album ‘Apollo’ via Virgin Records
It seemed a most ludicrous union at the time… the flag waving over earnest rock group teaming up with the thoughtful, ambient egghead! With Bono and Co doing their best ‘New Gold Dream’ period SIMPLE MINDS impression, ‘The Unforgettable Fire’ captured the harrowing trauma of Hiroshima in layers of Yamaha DX7 and Fairlight as Eno pushed the Irish quartet into a more esoteric mind process to counter their bombastic tendencies.
Brook was a studio engineer who could see the possibilities of stretching out the timbres and textures of the electric guitar. His experiments led to his development of the Infinite Guitar. Co-produced by Eno, ‘Hybrid’ was the first album to fully exploit this instrument and the title track very much followed the percussive possible musics of Eno’s ‘Fourth World Vol 1 Possible Musics’ collaboration with Jon Hassell. This wasn’t entirely surprising as Brook had played live with the duo in 1981.
Available on the MICHAEL BROOK album ‘Hybrid’ via Virgin Records
After their ‘Seven’ album, JAMES were accused of heading down the U2 route so in a replicant move, Booth and Co secured the services of Eno for ‘Laid’, which was released in Autumn 1993. While driven by frantic acoustic guitar, the lead single ‘Sometimes’ benefitted from Eno’s input by steadily building and adding glistening ambient synths. A most gloriously harmonic vocal section towards the conclusion appeared for yet another lift when it was least expected… pure Eno!
Available on the JAMES album ‘Laid’ via Mercury Records
Using the percolating bass sequence and chilling stabs from the original album version plus slices of Martin Gore’s backing vocal, Eno’s Apex Mix of ‘In Your Room’ was almost Zen-like in its meditative qualities. Legend has it that while Martin Gore was playing this version in his car, he had to turn it off as it was sending him to sleep! In true Eno style, the backing built slowly and made the most of the song’s inherent tension.
Available on the DEPECHE MODE CD single ‘In Your Room’ via Mute Records
The first co-write between the two former sparring partners with perhaps some nostalgic lyrical reference to the fledgling days of ROXY MUSIC, ‘Wildcat Days’ was the best track from Ferry’s arduous ‘Mamouna’ project, the original sessions of which had started as far back as 1989! Lots of weird noises, detuned swoops and a seasoned supporting cast including Andy MacKay, Chester Kamen and Steve Ferrone combined for this marvellous slice of electronic art funk.
Available on the BRYAN FERRY album ‘Mamouna’ via Virgin Records
BRIAN ENO & J PETER SCHWALM From This Moment (2001)
For his project with German DJ and percussionist Schwalm, Eno took a more rhythmically colourful approach to his ambient philosophies that coincided with the emergence of chill-out rooms within the club scene. Certainly, ‘Drawn From Life’ possessed more accessible entry points for those who maybe found works such as ‘Music For Airports’ too sedate. The album’s opener ‘From This Moment’ was great soundtrack music, bolstered by live percussion and strings.
Available on the BRIAN ENO & J PETER SCHWALM album ‘Drawn from Life’ via Virgin Records
Last Autumn saw the release of ‘The Lost Are Found’, an emotive body of songs recorded by Claudia Brücken in collaboration with top producer Stephen Hague, best known for his work with PET SHOP BOYS, OMD, NEW ORDER and ERASURE.
Each of the compositions came from their very own world and were respectively adopted to form an eleven episode triste drame. One of the album’s highlights Everyone Says Hi’ has just been released as a single ahead of Claudia’s upcoming UK and German tour.
Claudia Brücken’s lively reinterpretation of one of David Bowie’s latterly compositions from ‘Heathen’ is dressed with catchy synth riffs and fuzzy shades. And the fabulous accompanying promo video could be interpreted as a visual dramatisation of Major Tom’s final voyage from ‘Space Oddity’.
Claudia only features halfway through but also look out for cameos from Glenn Gregory, Andrew Poppy, Paul Humphreys and even Claudia’s dog Patsy… joyous it may be but poor Major Tom is ultimately doomed, left to drift in space’s wilderness. So “Tell my wife I love her very much…”
As well as touring in March. Claudia will be making a very special guest appearance on the new OMD album ‘English Electric’, to be released on 8th April 2013. She will feature on a new version of ‘Kissing The Machine’, a track written by Andy McCluskey with the electronic godfather Karl Bartos in 1993 for the ELEKTRIC MUSIC album ‘Esperanto’ which has been reworked by her ONETWO partner and OMD founder member Paul Humphreys. The track which could be perceived by many to be KRAFTWERK vs OMD vs PROPAGANDA is eagerly awaited.
‘Everyone Says Hi’ and ‘The Lost Are Found’ are released by There (there)
Claudia Brücken ’s 2013 Spring tour includes:
Glasgow O2 ABC2 (12th March), Birmingham O2 Academy 3 (13th March), Manchester Academy 3 (15th March), London Borderline (16th March), Brighton Concorde 2 (17th March)
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DAVID BOWIE, AIR, NINE INCH NAILS, YAZOO, GARY NUMAN… now that that diverse roll call has hopefully piqued your musical attention…
First full song and title track ‘Grey Tickles, Black Pressure’ takes no prisoners with Grant (who is HIV positive) wishing he was around in the promiscuous 70s so that he could have “got a head start in the world of disease”; additionally he discusses whether haemorrhoid creams are targeted at him and the fact that although his illness is serious, there are “children who have cancer” and “I can’t compete with that”.
The intro of ‘You and Him’ sounds like UNDERWORLD’s Karl Hyde jamming with THROBBING GRISTLE before a Garage Punk Rock-style chorus takes the song to another level. Again the lyrics (especially in chorus) are particularly unhinged: “You and Hitler ought to get together, learn how to knit and make matching sweaters”. This track follows the character assassination route which was present on ‘Pale Green Ghosts’, where Grant bear his feelings about an ex-lover in an all-too public arena.
If there’s a criticism of the album, it’s that some of the ideas are stretched a little thin and too many tracks follow the woozy downtempo soft-rock template which AIR used on ‘The Virgin Suicides’ album. The overall production style also feels a lot drier and abrasive sounding than the expansive feel cultivated on ‘Pale Green Ghosts’, but this is probably nitpicking in the overall context of the work.
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