“Well! Here we are again!” Sorry, that’s actually a lyric from another band touring on the 40th Anniversary of a classic 1981 album.
Despite saying hello and waving goodbye with a final show at London’s O2 Arena in 2018, SOFT CELL have not only got a new album ‘*Happiness Not Included’ slated for release in February 2022, but they will also perform their seminal debut album ‘Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret’ in its entirety for the first time. But as SOFT CELL celebrate the legacy of ‘Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret’ alongside their other hits, they will also be previewing tracks from ‘*Happiness Not Included’.
Although it has been four decades since the seedy personas of Marc Almond and Dave Ball, photographed by Peter Ashworth, adorned the front cover and hit the shelves of WH Smith, Boots, Littlewoods and Woolworths, the fact that ‘Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret’ was available where your parents and grandparents shopped can now be seen as being one of the most subversive acts in popular culture.
Art students who met at Leeds Polytechnic, the album title came from one of the neon signs outside The Raymond Revue Bar in London’s Soho where Almond lived, an area that at the time was full of strip clubs, sex shops and entrances saying “model upstairs”.
While JAPAN glamourised Chinese Communism on ‘Tin Drum’ and THE HUMAN LEAGUE presented working class aspiration like a synthpop ABBA on ‘Dare’, SOFT CELL told of the grit that could come with glitter in musical tales about dirty old men, prostitutes, grooming, sexual deviance, personal grievance, tabloid sensationalism, middle class entitlement and living in squalor. Only the pair of tunes by OMD about the brutal execution of a teenage girl on ‘Architecture & Morality’ were historically darker than SOFT CELL’s gutter heart take on reality.
The recent Twitter listening party hosted by Tim Burgess highlighted the worldwide love and affection for ‘Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret’. With Marc Almond and Dave Ball on hand to provide insights and memories on the making of the record, a number of interesting points of trivia were provided.
While the duo were in New York to record and mix the album with producer Mike Thorne, ‘Tainted Love’ became a hit in Germany. So with Ball otherwise engaged in working the state-of-the-art NED Synclavier and the much more basic Roland Synthe-Bass SB100 which provided SOFT CELL with a very distinct sound, Almond was despatched to perform the song on TV show ‘Disco’ with a Dave Ball lookalike who ZDF tried to keep in shadow and out of shot, but failed!
Of ‘Entertain Me’, Marc Almond said “This is about people who are just never satisfied. The pop star world we found ourselves in after the success of ‘Tainted Love’”; but of this new world they were now part of, Dave Ball recalled “it was all a big adventure. Highlights were meeting Divine and Madonna in Danceteria then meeting Andy Warhol at The Factory”
‘Secret Life’ was revealed to be a preceding song to ‘Say Hello Wave Goodbye’ about a politician’s affair with a prostitute whose other secret is that he is also a cross dresser… with sex scandals still rife in Parliament, the songs on ‘Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret’ are as relevant as ever.
‘Bedsitter’ is another case in point which despite its bittersweet ode to nightlife, on which the Roland TR808 Rhythm Composer was heard on a UK hit single for the first time, reflects on the poor quality accommodation offered by private landlords thanks to the selling off of affordable council housing in Britain; the effects of this Thatcherite policy are sadly still felt today.
Photo by Peter Ashworth
Although with a lyric originated by Dave Ball about his own father, the most sinister song when applied to the present is ‘Frustration’ which could be a narrative on incels or “involuntary celibates”, the deeply unpleasant right wing faction of males who are unable to get a romantic or sexual partner despite desiring one, but whose misguided and ignorant anger spills into misogyny and racism.
The most important aspect about ‘Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret’ though is that it possessed catchy off-kilter tunes with great synth hooks and edgy lyrics over infectious machine beats. With its No1 single and a pair of Top 5s, SOFT CELL initially stole a march on DEPECHE MODE whose own debut ‘Speak & Spell’ paled in comparison. But while Almond and Ball first spilt in 1984, PET SHOP BOYS picked up their baton and although they smoothed the template out, proved that the technologically assisted pop duo format still had legs.
There is much to reasonably justify ‘Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret’ as the Best Album of 1981, but if it isn’t, then it is certainly in the Top 5 alongside THE HUMAN LEAGUE, JAPAN, KRAFTWERK and OMD in what was a sensational year for electronic pop music.
Glasgow O2 Academy (10th November), Manchester O2 Apollo (12th November), Leeds O2 Academy (13th November), London Hammersmith Apollo (15th November), London Hammersmith Apollo (16th November) – tickets available from https://myticket.co.uk/artists/soft-cell
So come on, whose first album was a various artists compilation?
They were the biggest sellers for a decade and had dominated the UK album charts so much so that they were given their own!
In 1966, the Canadian budget household gadget firm K-Tel diversified into the territory of compilation albums with ‘25 Country Hits’; it was a surprise success and this comparatively new idea of collecting a number of artists onto an album based around a single theme was expanded further.
K-Tel negotiated directly with artists and labels for the rights to reproduce the original recordings, but where this was not possible, the company would contract “one or more of the original artists” to make a new recording for the compilation, under the premise that the public generally could not tell the difference between a re-recording and the original.
However, UK budget label Pickwick Records via their Hallmark imprint went one step further in 1968 by producing compilations of the latest hits but as rush-recorded soundalike cover versions under the title ‘Top Of The Pops’ which had nothing to do whatsoever with the BBC TV show; it was all perfectly legal thanks to an oversight by the corporation on trademark.
Purchasers unknowingly got treated to unique interpretations of ‘Autobahn’ and ‘The Model’ by anonymous session musicians who quite obviously had only learnt the song ten minutes before entering the studio. Although demand for such records had dimmed by 1981, acts such as SOFT CELL were still unable to escape with ‘Say Hello Wave Goodbye’ hilariously reduced to geezer pub rock! The singer was revealed to be one Martin Jay who a few years earlier had treated the world to his cloak and dagger take on ‘Are Friends Electric?’.
The albums from K-Tel attempted to cram as many songs as possible onto the 12 inch vinyl format. In order to accommodate this philosophy within its physical limitations, many of the tracks were faded out early or came in unusual and often clumsy edits. But even these versions were sought after by loyal fans, thus making the records they came from valued collector’s items.
The various artists compilation album changed forever in 1983 when Virgin and EMI joined forces to produce the ‘Now That’s What I Call Music’ series which at the last count had reached ‘Now 106’ and spawned numerous spin-offs and even cable TV channels. In 1984, Sony BMG and Warner Music joined in the action with the ‘Hits’ series, but such was the domination in the UK of these types of albums that in 1989, they were given their own chart and excluded from the main one!
For electronic pop, ‘Machines’ released by Virgin Records in 1980 was one of the first attempts to gather music using synthesizers into one place, but the entry point for many new fans was 1981’s ‘Modern Dance’ on K-Tel. This well-thought out collection saw youngsters saving up their pocket money for their first record purchase or asking Santa to put it into their Christmas stocking, thanks to Radio1 DJ Peter Powell declaring that ‘Modern Dance’ was “The best of total danceability, the sounds of modern dance, on one LP!”.
As with greatest hits albums, what makes a great various artists compilation is a seamless listening experience where possible, or at least more killer than filler. However the continuous DJ mix was a particular irritant running through compilations for a period and rarely worked with classic material or recordings not specifically aimed at the clubland.
Staying within theme on a compilation though is VERY important and straying just slightly can spoil a whole concept, especially if it has been outlined in the title. Soul Jazz Records’ lushly packaged ‘Deutsche Elektronische Musik’ sets over two volumes contained a wide range of freeform experimental works from Germany, but occasionally forgot about the Trade Descriptions Act implications of its title. Meanwhile, ‘Reward’ by post-punk trip-poppers THE TEARDROP EXPLODES had a regular place on collections such as ‘Club For Heroes’, ‘New Romantic Classics’, ‘It’s Electric’ and ‘Our Friends Electric’ despite being brass dominated.
But the nadir came with ‘Synth Pop’, a 3CD collection by Sony Music in 2015 which totally missed the point by featuring AZTEC CAMERA and HAIRCUT 100!??! Now while the inclusion of IMAGINATION’s ‘Body Talk’ with its iconic Moog bassline could be justified, the set highlighted just how much the modern day definition of “synth pop” had become particularly blurred…
Although some listeners just want endless hits on various artists compilations, others want to be informed and introduced to some lesser-known or rare songs. However, this latter approach can meet with mixed results.
For example, Cherry Red’s ‘Close To The Noise Floor’ and the Trevor Jackson’s ‘Metal Dance’ series were historically fascinating, but not always easy collections to listen to in one sitting. With some of the music close to being unlistenable, it could be akin to studying a hefty text book… highly educational but not always entirely fun!
So ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK takes a personal look at the electronic legacy of various artists via 20 notable compilation albums, each with valid reasons for their inclusion, presented in yearly and then alphabetical order within. Yes, several songs reoccur over a number of these releases, but perhaps that is more an indication of their timeless nature. These were tunes that were dismissed by the press and wider public back in the day, but are now considered classic and part of the cultural heritage.
MACHINES (1980)
Having seen the future and signed THE HUMAN LEAGUE as well as OMD through their Dindisc subsidiary, Virgin Records issued a long playing showcase of acts that used synthesizers as their primary instrumentation. Among the outsiders were TUBEWAY ARMY, FAD GADGET, SILICON TEENS and DALEK I LOVE YOU. XTC’s B-side ‘The Somnambulist’ appeared to be incongruous, but was from their synth experimentation period.
This compilation been the idea of David Sylvian, hence why it was named after the JAPAN song although their contribution would be ‘The Art Of Parties’. Virgin presented their embarrassment of riches including BEF, DEVO, DAF, SIMPLE MINDS and MAGAZINE while the primary selling point was a special dub edit of THE HUMAN LEAGUE’s ‘Do Or Die’ as a trailer to ‘Love & Dancing’. The cassette had more tracks including John Foxx and the actual undanceable ‘Methods Of Dance’ song!
1981 was when the sound of electronic pop was virtually everywhere, so ‘Modern Dance’ was perfect synthchronicity. Featuring the stellar cast of OMD, THE HUMAN LEAGUE, HEAVEN 17, JAPAN, DEPECHE MODE, SIMPLE MINDS, VISAGE, LANDSCAPE, FASHION and THE CURE as well as John Foxx and Gary Numan, an indicator of how supreme this compilation was came with the fact that its most obscure track ‘A World Without Love’ by THE NEWS was rather good!
Stevo Pearce’s compendium of new Futurist acts has gone into folklore, having launched the careers of DEPECHE MODE, SOFT CELL, BLANCMANGE, THE THE and B-MOVIE. Several of acts who didn’t make it were also superb. THE FAST SET’s cover of Marc Bolan’s ‘King Of The Rumbling Spires’ was enjoyable electro-macabre while the rousing ‘Tidal Flow’ by ILLUSTRATION is one of the great lost songs of the era.
It took a few years to realise just how good the music from the New Romantic era was. This compilation was named after one of Steve Strange and Rusty Egan’s club nights. Featuring DURAN DURAN, SPANDAU BALLET, ULTRAVOX, VISAGE, SOFT CELL and JAPAN, others who also got into the party were YAZOO, ABC, TALK TALK and CLASSIX NOUVEAUX while most welcome were ICEHOUSE with their eponymous single.
Gathering “Classic Hits From An Electric Era” including the full length ‘Blue Monday’ from NEW ORDER, ‘It’s Electric’ was largely, a more purist synth collection than ‘Club For Heroes’. Alongside the usual suspects were A FLOCK OF SEAGULLS, TEARS FOR FEARS, BRONSKI BEAT, KRAFTWERK, EURYTHMICS, BRONSKI BEAT and ERASURE. However, this collection featured the album version of ‘Tainted Love’ instead of the single, a mistake that would be repeated again and again.
Celebrating “a music synonymous with futurism”, ‘Dawn Of Electronica’ included the album version of ‘From Here To Eternity’ by Giorgio Moroder and the Some Bizzare version of ‘Remembrance Day’ by B-MOVIE. With the likes of DAF, SUICIDE, ASSOCIATES, CABARET VOLTAIRE, PROPAGANDA, THE ART OF NOISE and YELLO alongside TUBEWAY ARMY, ULTRAVOX, JAPAN and SOFT CELL, this compilation was something a bit different to what had come before.
Like ‘Teenage Kicks’ for punk and new wave, there are far too many compilations named ‘Electric Dreams’. This 2CD affair from Virgin Records comprised of 38 “synth pop classics”. This was a compilation combining trailblazing analogue electro and the advent of digital sampling that actually worked. From ‘The Model’ and ‘Electricity’ to ‘Relax’ and ‘19’, with ‘We Are Glass’, ‘Yellow Pearl’, ‘Say Hello Wave Goodbye’ and ‘Absolute’ in between, this was one of the best releases of its type.
God Made Me Hardcore was a label set-up by Andy Chatterley and Richard Norris for electroclash tracks they had involvement in. ‘This Is Hardcore’ included some striking covers; THE DROYDS and MOON UNIT contributed SQUEEZE’s ‘Take Me I’m Yours’ and DEVO’s ‘Whip It’ respectively, while there was also a brilliant posh boy mash-up ‘Assault On The West End Girls’ by MUGATU. Siobhan Fahey of SHAKESPEAR’S SISTER and Irish combo RIVIERA also featured.
Subtitled “A Nu-Wave Electro Compilation”, this brought out the electro in Electroclash with gloriously klanky drum machines in abundance. The undoubted star was Miss Kittin with four tracks including the mighty scene anthem ‘You & Us’ with Michael Amato aka THE HACKER; meanwhile the man himself and Anthony Rother each had three contributions. FPU, DOPPLEREFFEKT and ADULT. were among those bringing the sound of electronic pop into the 21st Century.
Compiled by Ministry Of Sound, ‘This Is Tech-Pop’ was a representative snapshot of the start of the 21st Century, although the “Tech-Pop or Electroclash or Synth-Core or Neu-Electro” legend highlighted dance music’s daft obsession with categorisation. The music from LADYTRON, FISCHERSPOONER, TIGA & ZYNTHERIUS, FC KAHUNA, WALDORF, SOVIET, FELIX DA HOUSECAT and GREEN VELVET was excellent but DJ mixing the tracks together clouded the listening experience.
‘Electricity 2’ came at a time when the only platform for UK and Irish synth acts seemed to be Ninthwave Records in the USA. It featured HEAVEN 17’s first new song for six years in ‘Hands Up To Heaven’ as well as material by WHITE TOWN, SPRAY and EMPIRE STATE HUMAN. Highlights included ‘The Machines’ by MASQ which sounded like a bizarre Gaelic synthpop take on Gary Numan and the comical ‘Alan Cumming’ by TURD FERGUSON which sent up MISS KITTIN & THE HACKER.
Compiled by Wayne Clements of Essex duo MACONDO, ‘Robopop’ was possibly the closest thing to the ‘Some Bizzare Album’ in the 21st Century. Heading the line-up were CLIENT and MY ROBOT FRIEND while Mute stalwarts KOMPUTER contributed ‘My Private Train’. The stand-outs though were machine funksters ALPINE STARS, irreverent retro-poppers BAXENDALE and VIC TWENTY featuring Piney Gir with a delicious synth cover of Lynsey de Paul’s ‘Sugar Me’.
Compiled by Alex Hush, now of U2 and ERASURE remixers DAYBREAKERS, ‘Retro:Active 5’ gathered 12 classic 12 inch extended versions into a listenable programme. A-HA and THE PSYCHEDLIC FURS led the way with BLANCMANGE and DEAD OR ALIVE in support, but the biggest selling points were the ultra-rare ‘Love Cascade’ from LEISURE PROCESS and ‘More To Lose’ by SEONA DANCING, the duo fronted by Ricky Gervais.
For ‘Robopop The Return’, Wayne Clements was joined by production duo MANHATTAN CLIQUE. Described as “Essential Electro Pop”, it was a much higher profile release than its predecessor with GOLDFRAPP, THE KNIFE, TIGA and DRAGONETTE all on board. Also present were THE MODERN relaunching as MATINEE CLUB while HUSKI, FORMATIC, LORRAINE and SOHO DOLLS were among the worthy lesser-known inclusions.
A downtempo compilation by BLANK & JONES, the most exquisite tracks featured female vocalists with Sarah Nixey just pipping the highlight honours on her cover of JAPAN’s ‘Ghosts’ with INFANTJOY over Claudia Brücken on the hosting DJ duo’s ‘Don’t Stop’. Meanwhile, ‘Ghost Trains’ by Erlend Øye was a livelier number that worked alongside chilled out tracks by THE GRID, BLISS, MARCONI UNION, SPOOKY and DEPECHE MODE.
ELECTRI_CITY 1_2 Elektronische Musik Aus Düsseldorf (2016)
Tying in with the book about Düsseldorf’s music heritage, ‘ELECTRI_CITY 1_2’ gathered the more accessible elements of Deutsche Elektronische Musik, Kosmische and Neue Deutsche Welle. With RIECHMANN, DER PLAN, DIE KRUPPS, RHEINGOLD, DAF, LIAISONS DANGEREUSES, LA DÜSSELDORF, NEU! and pre-PROPAGANDA girl group TOPLINOS, this two volume collection was like a journey of discovery with the benefit of a local tour guide.
Be Music was the moniker which NEW ORDER used to cover studio production work by all four members of the band. This boxed set gathered these varied recordings which involved them, with notable solo tracks from Marcel King, Paul Haig and Winston Tong alongside those of 52ND STREET, SECTION 25, THE BEAT CLUB, SHARK VEGAS and AD INFINITUM’s cover of ‘Telstar’ which many believed was NEW ORDER in disguise but actually only featured Peter Hook.
ELECTRICAL LANGUAGE Independent British Synth Pop 78-84 (2019)
The 4CD ‘Electrical Language – Independent British Synth Pop 78-84’ did as it said on the tin and with a far more accessible template, was all the better for it. With THE HUMAN LEAGUE, OMD, THE NORMAL and FAD GADGET included to draw in the more cautious consumer, purchasers were treated to a plethora of wonderful lesser known acts like FIAT LUX, BOX OF TOYS, LORI & THE CHAMELEONS, PASSION POLKA, TESTCARD F, EDDIE & SUNSHINE and JUPITER RED. Meanwhile, the best novelty item was a Schaffel driven cover of Alvin Stardust’s ‘My Coo Ca Choo’ by BEASTS IN CAGES; half of the band went on to form HARD CORPS!
Compiled by Pete Wiggs and Bob Stanley of SAINT ETIENNE, ‘The Tears Of Technology’ gathered a heartfelt suite of music. OMD’s ‘Sealand’ sat alongside synthy diversions by THE TEARDROP EXPLODES and THE PALE FOUNTAINS, with the Merseyside connection extended to CARE and CHINA CRISIS. Scotland got also got a look in with Paul Haig and Thomas Leer. The rare ‘Direct Lines’ by Chris Payne’s ELECTRONIC CIRCUS found itself a place too.
Celebrating their career with a lavish 10 disc boxed set, ‘Keychains & Snowstorms: The SOFT CELL Story’ features material from both periods of the duo including their imperial phase when they had a continuous run of hit singles between 1981-1984 and the 2001-2003 reunion.
Marc Almond and Dave Ball met at Leeds Polytechnic and at the time of their wider breakthrough on the ‘Some Bizarre Album’ and their subsequent debut long player ‘Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret’ in 1981, SOFT CELL were perhaps rated higher than DEPECHE MODE.
Their cover of ‘Tainted Love’ was one of the biggest UK singles of 1981, selling over one million copies and was on the US Billboard Hot 100 for a then-record of 43 weeks. But despite all the success, the pair ultimately imploded but their template was taken to the worldwide audience it deserved via PET SHOP BOYS.
While Almond continues a fruitful solo career and Ball found success with THE GRID, they are both best remembered for SOFT CELL. On their singular history alone, SOFT CELL are up there with THE HUMAN LEAGUE and DURAN DURAN, and like their contemporaries, they exploited the then-new format of the 12 inch single.
All the singles from ‘Tainted Love’ to ‘Down In The Subway’ via ‘Say Hello, Wave Goodbye’ and ‘Where The Heart Is’ are included in their extended versions, but the longer variations of ‘Bedsitter’ and ‘Torch’ are masterpieces in their own right, seamless productions where you literally cannot hear the join, mainly because they were recorded as developing stories outside of the expected three minute radio edit.
And then there were the B-sides which SOFT CELL also excelled at, again all presented in their extended versions. From the reflective solitude of living away from home in ‘Facility Girls’ to the hilarious tail of teenage rebellion in ‘It’s A Mug’s Game’ where Almond confessed that he actually hated ‘Deep Purple In Rock’ along with ‘Led Zeppelin II’ and couldn’t “wait until I’m 21 and I can tell them all to sod off!”, the music connected with young outsiders.
And Almond wasn’t afraid to express how anxiety was playing with his mind, as reflected in the superb chemical fuelled ‘Insecure Me’ which featured a rap from the appropriately named Cindy Ecstasy.
‘Keychains & Snowstorms – The SOFT CELL Story’ features a disc of new extended and reworked mixes supervised by Ball which he said was “just tightening a few things up as a lot of the original stuff was all played manually”. These naturally achieve mixed results; on the Lateral Mix of ‘Say Hello, Wave Goodbye’ for example, some of Dave Tofani’s clarinet sections from the original 12 inch have been dropped in and although it is an improvement on the bland 1991 re-recording, nothing can touch the emotive tearful resonance of the definitive 1981 version.
Another case in point is the new ERASURE remix of ‘Bedsitter’ which offers a chunky bass and fat beat, but the melody is replaced by a heavy guitar swirl; despite including the 12 inch rap, it’s a little disappointing. However, the ‘Hallowe’en Mix’ of Martin is leaner and works well while the ‘Wasted On The Young Mix’ of ‘Youth’ stretches out the drama and will please Cellmates who have always longed for an extended mix.
Indeed, from the rarities and curios collection, the previously unreleased extended version of ‘Forever The Same’ (which was intended as a single before the intervention of the duo themselves) will be welcomed. Pleasingly, ‘The Girl With The Patent Leather Face’ which secured SOFT CELL their earlier acclaim still freaks and creeps as the undoubted standout from the ‘Some Bizzare Album’ along with DEPECHE MODE’s ‘Photographic’.
The Daniel Miller produced ‘A Man Can Get Lost’ remains a great lost single, overshadowed by the proto-house of ‘Memorabilia’ which appears in both its original Daniel Miller mix and the remixed ‘Non-Stop Ecstatic Dancing’ version with Cindy Ecstasy and the horns of John Gatchell. The anti-consumerist electronic art piece ‘Persuasion’ from the same recording session at Stage One is still (if not more) relevant today, while the sub-two minute Daniel Miller take of ‘Metro MRX’ for ‘Flexipop’ borrows the same synthetic rhythm track as DEPECHE MODE’s ‘New Life’ to accompany Almond’s snarls of “he’s a mutant!”
Of course, the original ‘Metro MRX’ came from SOFT CELL’s debut ‘Mutant Moments’ EP released in October 1980 and it’s featured here in full. From it, the wonderful ‘L.O.V.E Feelings’ is a touching gem, a sign of things to come with basic but beautiful synth sounds and an air of John Barry’s ‘Midnight Cowboy’ while ‘Potential’ is something of a metronomic buzzfest.
A number of interesting demos find their way onto the box; ‘Tainted Love’ is more rigid but has appeal and potential, coming over a bit like FAD GADGET while ‘Bedsitter’ is still lively, the klanky Korg Rhythm KR55 adding some home recording charm. There’s also the bonus of the previously unreleased ‘Red Tape, Sticky Tape’ and Cellmate favourite ‘Martin’ in its 1980 demo incarnation.
Previously from ‘The Bedsit Tapes’ and not in a dissimilar tone to ‘The Girl With The Patent Leather Face’, the synth bass heavy cover of BLACK SABBATH’s ‘Paranoid’ presents out of tune electronics and Almond screaming like he’s trapped in the gutter, while the solid triple bassline of Ball’s Korg SB100 Synthe-Bass emerges in ‘Science Fiction Stories’. The raw ‘Bleak Is My Favourite Cliché’ does what it says on the tin, embroiled in winter of discontent dystopia but with hidden melody and an edgy gothique. The 6/8 rhythmic template of ‘Mix’ sees a development into pop like THE HUMAN LEAGUE’s ‘Empire State Human’ although Almond is suitably wayward.
As usual with these boxed sets, a number of live recordings are included and from the Leeds Polytechnic Fine Art Christmas party in December 1979, ‘Walking Make Up Counter’ captures the electro-punk aspect that showed they had more in common with SUICIDE, rather than the clean KRAFTWERK inspired lines of OMD.
And speaking of Messrs Vega and Rev, fast forward to a Los Angeles show in 1983 and there’s a frenzied cover of ‘Ghost Rider’ with Gary Barnacle on sax which provides an interesting curio. Probably the best known SUICIDE song, Almond smirks that “I love a bit of Nihilism”; what’s also noticeable is that his live vocals lave improved considerably from earlier live tapes without losing his energetics and passion.
In terms of capturing the rawer aspects of first phase SOFT CELL, the 1981 BBC Radio 1 session for Richard Skinner does that best. While unpolished, ‘Entertain Me’ was good fun complete with fluffed cues while the brilliant ‘Seedy Films’ was much faster than the final album version and possibly better for it.
When SOFT CELL unexpectedly got back together for the start of the 21st Century, it was like unfinished business and two brand new songs for 2002’s ‘Very Best of’ collection along with the ‘Cruelty Without Beauty’ album were duly delivered.
The romp of ‘Divided Soul’ still comes over like a dirty version of ‘Sailing On The Seven Seas’ by OMD and a reinterpretation of ‘The Night’ generates thoughts of how things might have panned out had that Northern Soul staple made famous by FRANKIE VALLI & THE FOUR SEASONS been chosen to be recorded as a single in 1981 instead of ‘Tainted Love’.
But the brilliant brass assisted swipe at the X-Factor generation of ‘Desperate’ was perhaps the reunion’s best fruit of labours, although the enjoyable comeback single ‘Monoculture’ aimed at the same target while ‘Last Chance’ provided a fitting epilogue to ‘Say Hello Wave Goodbye’.
The new special ‘Non-Stop Euphoric Dubbing’ continuous mix begins with a variation on the haunting ‘Barriers’ which works well as a lead into ‘Numbers’. Working like an imaginary horror film soundtrack as opposed to a dance megamix, it is heavy and cinematic in sound. ‘Youth’ and ‘Where The Heart Is’ are particularly effective with the dub elements of Almond’s voice echoing in and out, seguing into the Richard X Dub of ‘Seedy Films’ which maintains its sleazy edge without sounding too contemporary.
The inclusion of ‘L’Esqualita’ provides some fabulous gothic menace while ‘Loving You, Hating Me’ and ‘Baby Doll’ prolong the claustrophobic tension. A rework of ‘Facility Girls’ offers respite into ‘Little Rough Rhinestone’ before concluding with Dave Ball’s Lateral Dub treatment of ‘Say Hello, Wave Goodbye’.
As well as 9 discs of music, ‘Keychains & Snowstorms – The SOFT CELL Story’ includes a DVD collecting together TV appearances, promo videos, archive 1981 concert footage and the notorious ‘Non-Stop Exotic Video Show’ which ironically saw the unmissed ‘News Of The World’ tabloid accuse SOFT CELL of attempting to corrupt their teenage audience.
Everyone from FRANKIE GOES TO HOLLYWOOD, BRONSKI BEAT, ERASURE and PET SHOP BOYS to NINE INCH NAILS, PSYCHE, FISCHERSPOONER, TIGA and HERCULES & LOVE AFFAIR have much to thank Marc Almond and Dave Ball for.
It’s amazing to think how much of an impact SOFT CELL had in popular culture. Rather fittingly, Dave Ball said to ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK of ‘Keychains & Snowstorms: The SOFT CELL Story’: “It’s got a lot of stuff, there’s a great book that comes with it which has got quotes from people like Neil Tennant and Trent Reznor, so it’s interesting … if anybody is a serious fan, I think it’s a must!“
One-time Leeds Polytechnic art students SOFT CELL set the blueprint for acts such as PET SHOP BOYS and ERASURE with their stark but danceable synthesizer driven pop and were undoubtedly ahead of their time.
Managed by Stevo Pearce of Some Bizzare Records who secured them a deal with Phonogram Records, Marc Almond and Dave Ball had an amazing run of Top 40 hit singles between 1981-1984.
Having entered into cultural folklore with their catalogue of classics such as ‘Memorabilia’, ‘Tainted Love’, ‘Bedsitter’, ‘Say Hello Wave Goodbye’, ‘Torch’, ‘What!’, ‘Where The Heart Is’ and ‘Soul Inside’, Almond and Ball will say hello and wave goodbye with a final concert at London’s O2 Arena on Sunday 30th September 2018 and a soon-to-be-released celebratory 10 disc boxed set entitled ‘Keychains & Snowstorms: The SOFT CELL Story’. Every recorded track from the duo’s Phonogram-era is represented on ‘Keychains & Snowstorms: The SOFT CELL Story’ in some form or another, with all of the singles presented in their extended 12 inch format.
Photo by Peter Ashworth
Meanwhile, there will also be tracks like ‘Divided Soul, ‘Somebody, Somewhere, Sometime’, ‘The Night’, ‘Monoculture’, ‘Desperate’ and ‘Darker Times’ released in 2002 following Almond and Ball’s unexpected reunion as SOFT CELL. Among the rarities included will be the debut SOFT CELL EP ‘Mutant Moments’, ‘The Girl With The Patent Leather Face’ from the iconic ‘Some Bizzare Album’, tracks recorded under production auspices of Daniel Miller, rarities, demos, BBC radio sessions, new remixes and live recordings.
On a sunny August day, Dave Ball took time out from preparations for the final concert and kindly chatted about the return of SOFT CELL and their past life of vice…
What concept did you follow for ‘Keychains & Snowstorms’ with regards the budget and restrictions you had?
It wasn’t really so much how much budget we had, but how much material we had; things came out of the woodwork. We’ve got stuff from the very first ever show which we did in 1979 at Leeds Polytechnic for the Fine Art Department party right up to the present day really. There’s rare mixes of quite well-known tracks and a performance from Los Angeles in which Michael Jackson was in the audience! So there’s lots of rarities and oddities.
There’s also a DVD which is most of our British TV performances on ‘Top Of The Pops’ plus ‘Old Grey Whistle Test’, ‘Oxford Road Show’ and even a programme called ‘Supersonic’; ‘Non Stop Erotic Video Show’ is on there too. It’s got a lot of stuff, there’s a great book that comes with it which has got quotes from people like Neil Tennant and Trent Reznor, so it’s interesting … if anybody is a serious fan, I think it’s a must! It looks beautiful, it was Chris Smith’s idea to have the neon Revox, it’s such as iconic image in its own right, Dave Chambers took the pictures. It’s such a simple design but looks nice as a piece of art, you could have it on your mantelpiece.
Are you including Peter Ashworth’s many photos of SOFT CELL?
The thing is, it’s been such a productive time for us that Richard Franklin who did Marc’s coffee table book, we’ve been working with him on one. I had a meeting over at Peter Ashworth’s flat a few months back, he found a load of stuff from the early 80s, lots of test shots and polaroids, a bin bag full of them! So we sat there one afternoon by the river sipping champagne looking through these test sheets of amazing stuff that people have never seen. Now this is not tied in with the boxed set, this is like a separate project. The audio is the boxed set and the visuals will come out next year as a proper hard backed book.
Is there going to be a souvenir programme for the final concert?
Of course there will be a programme, that’s going to be interesting… there’s lots happening, Universal are going to be re-reissuing all the albums on vinyl while the final one ‘Cruelty Without Beauty’ which we did with Cooking Vinyl, that will be released for the first time on vinyl, which is ironic considering the name of the label *laughs*
Your debut EP ‘Mutant Moments’ had a very art school vibe while the next single ‘Memorabilia’ b/w ‘A Man Can Get Lost’ was more clubby…
‘Mutant Moments’ was very homemade, very lo-fi and made on no money, done at art college. But we thought we needed a producer and we had the chance when Daniel Miller came along. We gravitated towards him because we loved ‘Warm Leatherette’ plus we knew Frank Tovey who was FAD GADGET, he did MUTE 002 which was ‘Back To Nature’. We passed a cassette to Frank and asked him to play it to Daniel but at first, he didn’t really get it.
Eventually we managed to persuade him to do a single in a 16 track studio in East London called Stage One where we recorded ‘Memorabilia’ and ‘A Man Can Get Lost’ … it was a bit confusing that because the 7 inch came out as ‘A Man Can Get Lost’ while the 12 inch came out as ‘Memorabilia’! And ‘Memorabilia’ became this big club hit, it even got in the American dance charts! I think that’s why we got a chance at doing another single with Photogram because they were quite astonished and probably thinking “how are these two art school guys getting a record into the American dance chart?”.
But we were very self-motivating… even with ‘Mutant Moments’, I managed to get three plays on Radio1 with no record label, management or plugger! We did the Futurama2 festival at Leeds Queens Hall in 1980, I had a test pressing with me just in case and lo-and-behold, I saw John Peel! So I made a beeline for him and went “Excuse me sir” while doffing my cap, “may I give you this?”… he was like “oh thanks” and put it in his filing cabinet*laughs*
I thought nothing more of it but he played ‘Metro MRX’ three times on his Radio1 show, all this on a chance meeting. So you never know your luck 😉
You did a re-recording of ‘Metro MRX’ that ended up being issued by ‘Flexipop’ magazine which uses the same electronic rhythm track as ‘New Life’ by DEPECHE MODE?
That was done with Daniel Miller, his bass drum at that time was an ARP 2600, which was a semi-modular system which apparently he bought second-hand from Elton John which was used on tour! It’s a fantastic synth, I’d loved to have had one! Talking of ARP, I’ve just got an ARP Odyssey reissue which has an absolutely beautiful sound because we’ve got a bit of a deal with Korg so that’s quite handy *laughs*
After ‘Mutant Moments’ and ‘Memorabilia’, did you notice that SOFT CELL were morphing into something much more synthpop, because the songs on the demos that are in the boxed set and which formed ‘The Bedsit Tapes’ did not end up on ‘Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret’…
Yeah, ‘The Bedsit Tapes’ were all just little sketches and a lot were written by me at art college, they were just doodles really. When I met Marc, he was a performance artist and I was just doing weird synth music for him. But he asked if he could sing some of my songs, and I was like “great” because I’m not a singer and he looked fantastic, when I first met him I thought “that’s a front man!”.
So we started to think about how to get a sound; Marc had been working at Leeds Warehouse in the cloakroom and they were playing a lot of New York disco, so he was bringing these records home that he’d borrowed. So we were getting more and more into music with a heavy dance beat and heavy basslines.
That’s how ‘Memorabilia’ came about, it was directly influenced by all that and us deliberately doing something a bit more clubby. I give Marc full credit for steering it there and suggesting we do something with more of a James Brown bassline. So I started noodling repetitively, it wasn’t sequenced but it started sounding like those Techno records which came later. We inadvertently came across that sound and with Daniel’s help obviously, we created something amazing.
You’ve talked about the rhythmic and art school side, but where did the tunes spring from?
Marc’s always been the very big pop fan as have I, plus I’m a big fan of a lot of film music like John Barry. So we’ve always been strong on our melodies. I’d play a little tune and Marc would do something that counters it. KRAFTWERK, YELLOW MAGIC ORCHESTRA and DEPECHE MODE are very melodic.
The most successful electronic bands are all extremely melodic and fantastic. It’s all very good listening to drones, I mean I love Brian Eno and even some of that has amazing melodies, but it’s like being washed over in water colour. I do like a powerful theme and I like the subject matter of a song to be powerful and to have some kind of a thematic quality with it, like a James Bond song such as ‘Goldfinger’, a very powerful musical element and a powerful vocal element.
Even on ‘Mutant Moments’, there’s a track called ‘L.O.V.E Feelings’ which had a John Barry vibe, so it seemed to be there even back then?
There was this pub Marc and I used to frequent. On a Sunday evening, they had a singalong-with-the-organist night and there would be this old bloke with a Hammond organ and this drummer who had this round tom and he’d have his newspaper on that, doing the crossword with his pint and a fag in his mouth, playing the hi-hat and bass drum!
And then there was this mad old lady who had drunk too much sherry trying to sing Shirley Bassey! I think Peter Kay captured all that with ‘Phoenix Nights’, so it was kind of like a p*ss take of that! You can hear Marc giggling at the end! He did that a few times when we were recording, we were doing something recently going through some of our old tracks and I found a multi-track of a take of ‘Tainted Love’ and when Marc gets to the first chorus, he’s in fits of giggles, I don’t know why!
Despite being art school boys, did a new discipline have to emerge with ‘Mutant Moments’, just by the nature of having to choose four songs to record for an EP?
At that point, we went through what we’d got and thought those were the best four songs we had at the time, so that’s why those ended up on it. It was never done as a commercial enterprise. It was more like a promotional thing and it did work because it got us on Radio1 and we started getting more and more gigs. It built very gradually over a two year period…
So this is where Stevo picked up on you?
Yes, that was after Futurama2, he wasn’t there but asked if there were any interesting unsigned electronic bands there and people kept saying our name. So he got involved… he was very lucky, he was an opportunist really, but he had good ears and was putting together a compilation which became the ‘Some Bizzare Album’ which helped us immensely.
Us and DEPECHE MODE were singled out as the ones to watch. But unfortunately, we did this gig at Crocs in Rayleigh, Essex… DEPECHE MODE were the house band and SOFT CELL were the main act, we were absolutely appalling and they were fantastic! There were all these people from London like VISAGE and SPANDAU BALLET there to check us out and they were chucking pennies at us, we were dreadful.
But that’s when Daniel Miller got involved because we knew we had to get the sound better, and as he’d signed DEPECHE MODE, we thought he might know what to do with us and luckily he said yes. We didn’t want to create any rivalry but DEPECHE MODE were cool because their take on electronic music was different. We always got on fine with DEPECHE MODE.
Was this the night where legend has it, Tony Mayo from NAKED LUNCH took a dig at Marc?
I think he said “You’re a load of sh*t”, but then Rusty Egan said to Stevo to drop us because he thought we were rubbish! *laughs*
I’ve known Rusty for years and in fairness to him, when ‘Memorabilia’ came out, he changed his mind. He used to have two copies of it and keep it going for like half an hour, mixing into each other because he loved it so much. That really was the key track that changed the momentum upwards and obviously, what happened next is history as they say…
Do you remember much about the recording of ‘The Girl With The Patent Leather Face’ for the ‘Some Bizarre Album’?
That again was done at art school with a couple of Revoxes, a toy Chinese instrument that I put a pick up on for that clanging sound, a Korg synth and a Rhythm Master drum machine. It was a little black box that had the usual bossa nova / jazz / disco / pop presets, but only 1 or 2 of those were useable *laughs*
The guy who ran the sound studio in Leeds Poly was a guy called John Darling who’s sadly no longer with us, he had a nice home studio in the Yorkshire Dales and a proper mixing desk, so we tried to polish it up as much as possible on zero budget. It came out as it was, so we were surprised when people like journalist Betty Page aka Beverley Gillick gave it a really good review!
Your drum machine journey has been quite interesting…
I bought a Boss Doctor Rhythm DR55 which was used on those BBC Radio sessions and the first time I used anything to do with Roland, because Boss was part of the same company. When we did ‘Tainted Love’, we used a CR78 Compurhythm which had a monophonic output which our engineer Paul Hardiman cleverly managed to split the bass and the snare by gating one off the other so that they were isolated, it probably helped that it was quite a simple rhythm.
The rest of the percussion came from Marc’s Pearl Syncussion unit, a Synare which looked like a flying saucer and an Electro-Harmonix Crash Pad which had a trigger made out of cork! So all that zapping and sounds that are like smashing pottery on the segue of ‘Tainted Love’ with ‘Where Did Our Love Go?’ were done with those, alongside the live finger snaps. Simple but effective!
Photo by Poalo Di Paolo
Then you moved onto a Roland TR808?
I think SOFT CELL were the first band to use a TR808 in the British charts with ‘Bedsitter’. As soon as ‘Tainted Love’ went massive, the record company said we had to do an album and our producer Mike Thorne was an Englishman who lived in New York, so he suggested recording it there… we weren’t going to say no! So off we went to Manhattan for a few months. I took my little Korg SB100 Synthe-Bass which was the SOFT CELL bass sound on the first album.
When I got to the studio, I thought “what’s that?”… Mike had bought one of the first 808s in America and I thought “bloody hell, that’s amazing”! I immediately took to it and developed my own style. I loved it, it was instant, I had a feel for it. Then we had the Synclavier which was the first time I’d seen a polyphonic digital synth… so I’ve got this dirty little bass thing with this amazing very early techno drum machine that no-one had really used before and we did ‘Bedsitter’, everyone was asking me “how did you get that sound?”.
That drum machine, the bass synth and the Synclavier were seriously important to our sound and the whole first album. We also put on things like a Mellotron, a celeste, a bit of real piano and some real percussion, woodwind and brass. We found our sound very quickly when we worked with Mike in New York and we knew how to do it.
We had the songs, we never stopped writing and it was great to be able to hear them recorded properly. A lot of those songs we wrote at art school and been playing them for years so we knew what people liked, things like ‘Bedsitter’.
After the 808, you moved onto the Oberheim DMX on ‘The Art Of Falling Apart’?
Yes, I bought a DMX; we used a mix of that with the Linn Drum Mk1 and Mk2. But when I listen to those albums, I prefer the sound of the 808. I wished we’d carried on using it, but everyone was gravitating towards that more ‘realistic’ sound and the 808 was out of favour. Everyone wanted real snare and bass drum samples, Martin Rushent was using the Linn Drum with THE HUMAN LEAGUE. So it was the fickle world of pop y’know, so you tend to go with the flow on that… it was a bit stupid in that way I think.
SOFT CELL did some glorious 12 inch versions, in particular ‘Bedsitter’, ‘Facility Girls’, ‘Torch’ and ‘Insecure Me’, which are long songs with song parts rather than just extended versions…
We always wrote songs to be long versions… people would normally do a radio version and then re-edit that, we just did a really long version and then take the best bits to compress them into a radio version which I think worked quite well for us. We always seemed to get good results and everyone comments on how our 12 inchers seem to flow, but that’s because they’re written as long pieces and not an assemblage.
Before ‘Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret’, you did a BBC Radio session for Richard Skinner. ‘Seedy Films’ was on it and underwent the biggest transformation because it was quite fast at first and didn’t have the clarinet, what was it like doing those?
We were always very fast with Mike Thorne, he didn’t like to work long hours but with the BBC Radio sessions, you had to work ultrafast because you basically had a day to do four or five songs. Luckily, we were very well rehearsed, so it was down to me to get stuff done as quick as possible. A lot of the energy and pace we were going probably led to us speeding the track up subconsciously!
I always used to enjoy those sessions, they were recorded in Delaware Road in Maida Vale with Dale Griffin who was in MOTT THE HOOPLE and had moved on to be an in-house producer for the BBC. We were really good friends with Richard Skinner and David Jensen who we also did a session for. I got on well with those two guys, you could have a drink with them in the BBC bar after ‘Top Of the Pops’, they were very approachable, really nice.
Songs like ‘Chips On My Shoulder’, ‘Frustration’ and ‘Secret Life’ hit a zeitgeist with Marc’s lyrical observations?
There’s always been a more fantastical underworld side with SOFT CELL, but there was a track which never came out called ‘Bleak Is My Favourite Cliché’ and it’s still strangely relevant today. I look at Marc’s lyrics now and they have a very keen sharp wit, I think he’s an extremely excellent writer. I’ve always loved his lyrics and he just sees things from a very interesting point of view. It’s taken me a while to get what he’s saying .
The success led to SOFT CELL taking a darker path towards ‘The Art Of Falling Apart’ and then ‘This Last Night In Sodom’, how do you think you were getting into this grittier mindset that harked back to art school?
‘Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret’ became a pop album, but by the time of ‘The Art Of Falling Apart’, we wanted to make something a bit more grown-up because we were getting a bit sick of being on TV programmes like ‘Tiswas’ and being perceived as lightweight pop fluff which we obviously weren’t. When we did ‘Old Grey Whistle Test’ on the BBC in 1982, it was amazing the gravitas that programme had. People started treating us as more of an albums band because before that, we were seen as a singles act. So when we made ‘The Art Of Falling Apart’, it was a statement and much more heavyweight and mature, we were taken more seriously I think.
Was this why you chose ‘Numbers’ as a single?
I think we were just being contentious! *laughs*
We were deliberately just trying to p*ss off the record company, because they were p*ssing us off! That’s when Marc went mental after he discovered they were double packaging ‘Numbers’ with a free copy of ‘Tainted Love’ to try to boost sales. Marc went into the Phonogram office with Stevo and they went berserk, smashing up all the gold discs on the wall and chucking coffee at the A&R men… I wasn’t there I’m glad to say, but this story is quite legendary in Phonogram circles *laughs*
Wouldn’t it have been better to choose something more obvious like ‘Forever The Same’ or ‘Loving You, Hating Me’?
We did a lot of things just to be awkward, we refused to play ‘Tainted Love’ live in America which was the only thing they knew by us, which was f***ing stupid! *laughs*
And then putting out a single about homosexual rough trade and how many people you’ve f**ked that night is not going to appeal to the little girls who buy pop records is it? But we didn’t care at that point…
The final first phase SOFT CELL single was a cover of ‘Down In The Subway’, was that reflective of your state of mind at the time?
That was an early R’n’B track by Jack Hammer with some really clever heavy lyrics. It was one that Marc discovered and I thought it had a great rhythm to it, it was very SOFT CELL because it was in that netherworld and had that dark element to it. It was still a minor hit!
But what amazed me was the album ‘This Last Night In Sodom’ actually got in the Top10 despite being our least commercial album, it even has a track called ‘Mr Self Destruct’! It was wilfully self-destructive and we made a conscious decision that it was going to be the last album, we’d do a couple of final shows and call it a day, we’d just had enough!
So the 2001 reunion, how do you look back on that and the ‘Cruelty Without Beauty’ album now?
It was great because it was unplanned to reform SOFT CELL. I’d worked with Marc on a few of his solo things like ‘My Hand Over My Heart’, ‘Meet Me In My Dream’ and a remix of ‘Waifs & Strays’, but he called me up at my studio with Ingo Vauk in Kensal Road and asked if I’d fancy meeting up for a coffee to discuss writing some tunes for other people. After coffee, I suggested going to my studio so we did about three or four numbers and Marc did some vocals. When we listened to them played back, we looked at each other and went “it’s SOFT CELL isn’t it?”*laughs*
So we recorded an album ‘Cruelty Without Beauty’ and started shopping it around, eventually Cooking Vinyl bought it and we toured it, playing festivals in Europe. Then we went over to America but it was not exactly the most successful tour in the world, it was a bit of a disaster that one but you live and learn. Then we came back from a festival in Venice and there were plans to do more shows and another record, but the awful motorbike accident happened and Marc was in a very bad way. That was it almost, we sort of lost touch and didn’t speak for about 15 years…
‘Desperate’ was one of the highlights from that period, a swipe at the X-Factor generation and you got in some more John Barry references with that ‘Goldfinger’ thing going on in there…
That’s right, it’s always lurking around somewhere, any chance! Marc’s always had that social awareness and ‘Desperate’ was totally about celebrity culture. But my favourite was ‘Monoculture’, although it’s an agricultural term, Marc mentioned it in passing… I thought it was brilliant.
Those two songs sort of sum up that repetitive and boring blandness in pop culture, it’s so safe and there’s no real serious artists coming through. They’ve all got that really irritating electronic Country sound that’s autotuned so they all sound like the same person, it’s monoculture. They’re desperate to be there for the opening of a can of lager! *laughs*
‘Caligula Syndrome’ was quite menacing…
That’s about people like Saddam Hussain, it’s to do with modern tyrants, it could be relevant today to people like Putin or even Donald Trump, they think they’re emperors… I mean, Trump’s apartment has gold plated everything. I’ve got this book of tyrants’ home interiors, people like Hitler and Idi Amin, they all had these palatial places like Nero; ‘Caligula Syndrome’ is a reference to that and tyrannical behaviour.
How’s the setlist coming along for the final show at the O2 Arena?
Marc did a survey of what were the most popular tracks and we can’t please everybody all of the time, there’s so much material. I think the show is going to be about two and a half hours long, so it will be quite taxing.
We’ve got backing singers, live brass and percussion, live synths, me and Marc… there will be nine people on stage and an array of engineers plus a lot of computer power on the mixing desk. And there’s a visual show which should look amazing.
The SOFT CELL social media teased a photo of your old live rack with the Korg 800DV, is that going to be brought out of retirement?
We’re making a documentary for BBC4, we did a little performance to camera and they wanted me to use my original synths at the Leeds Warehouse where we did our first proper shows. So the photo was just a reference to that really. That will come out some time after the show, they’ve not said when yet because we’re still filming. It’s quite in-depth and for once, I get to talk quite a lot! *laughs*
The boxed set has two remix discs, one is new versions using only original parts…
It was just tightening a few things up as a lot of the original stuff was all played manually, I didn’t want them to sound too mechanical but it was to make them sound more punchy and modern without sounding completely rehashed.
There’s one remix which Hifi Sean did of ‘So’ which was a B-side I knocked together for ‘What’, he’d been playing the original in clubs and it goes down really well with people into this Nu-disco stuff. So he did a dub mix of that and it got its first play on Radio1… for SOFT CELL to still be played on Radio1 these days is pretty amazing, considering we have the combined age of 120! *laughs*
Photo by Dave Chambers
Then there’s this continuous dub mix entitled ‘Non-Stop Euphoric Dubbing’…
That was meant to be more of a chill out sort of thing, you can just put it on and leave it in the background to get stoned to…
…I thought it sounded more like a horror film soundtrack!
I guess some people chill out differently! *laughs*
I could imagine a gothic ballet or dance commission coming out of this…
…now that’s an idea! *laughs*
There’s been a few theatrical things, there’s a musical that’s going to happen in London called ‘Tainted’, I briefly met the guy who’s done it because he lives near me and he gave me his card. I’d forgotten all about it, but he said he’d spoken to Marc. I was talking to my manager about it yesterday and he said it was all in hand.
ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK gives its warmest thanks to Dave Ball
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series which at the last count had reached ‘Now 106’ and spawned numerous spin-offs and even cable TV channels. In 1984, Sony BMG and Warner Music joined in the action with the ‘Hits’ series, but such was the domination in the UK of these types of albums that in 1989, they were given their own chart and excluded from the main one!
sets over two volumes contained a wide range of freeform experimental works from Germany, but occasionally forgot about the Trade Descriptions Act implications of its title. Meanwhile, ‘Reward’ by post-punk trip-poppers THE TEARDROP EXPLODES had a regular place on collections such as ‘Club For Heroes’, ‘New Romantic Classics’, ‘It’s Electric’ and ‘Our Friends Electric’ despite being brass dominated.
, a 3CD collection by Sony Music in 2015 which totally missed the point by featuring AZTEC CAMERA and HAIRCUT 100!??! Now while the inclusion of IMAGINATION’s ‘Body Talk’ with its iconic Moog bassline could be justified, the set highlighted just how much the modern day definition of “synth pop” had become particularly blurred…
and the Trevor Jackson’s 
series were historically fascinating, but not always easy collections to listen to in one sitting. With some of the music close to being unlistenable, it could be akin to studying a hefty text book… highly educational but not always entirely fun!
was released by Virgin Records
was released by Some Bizzare
was released by Telstar Records
was released by Dino Entertainment
was released by Demon Music Group
was released by Virgin Records
was released by Incredible / Sony Music
was released by Ministry Of Sound
was released by Ninthwave Records
was released by Lucky Pierre Recordings
was released by Hi-Bias Records
was released by Planet Clique / Lucky Pierre
was released by Soundcolours
was released by Grönland Records
was released by Factory Benelux
was released by Cherry Red Records
was released by Ace Records
features a disc of new extended and reworked mixes supervised by Ball which he said was “just tightening a few things up as a lot of the original stuff was all played manually”. These naturally achieve mixed results; on the Lateral Mix of ‘Say Hello, Wave Goodbye’ for example, some of Dave Tofani’s clarinet sections from the original 12 inch have been dropped in and although it is an improvement on the bland 1991 re-recording, nothing can touch the emotive tearful resonance of the definitive 1981 version.
featuring two new songs 
and 
not included in the boxed set is released on 28th September 2018
became a pop album, but by the time of 
, we wanted to make something a bit more grown-up because we were getting a bit sick of being on TV programmes like ‘Tiswas’ and being perceived as lightweight pop fluff which we obviously weren’t. When we did ‘Old Grey Whistle Test’ on the BBC in 1982, it was amazing the gravitas that programme had. People started treating us as more of an albums band because before that, we were seen as a singles act. So when we made ‘The Art Of Falling Apart’, it was a statement and much more heavyweight and mature, we were taken more seriously I think.
actually got in the Top10 despite being our least commercial album, it even has a track called ‘Mr Self Destruct’! It was wilfully self-destructive and we made a conscious decision that it was going to be the last album, we’d do a couple of final shows and call it a day, we’d just had enough!
and started shopping it around, eventually Cooking Vinyl bought it and we toured it, playing festivals in Europe. Then we went over to America but it was not exactly the most successful tour in the world, it was a bit of a disaster that one but you live and learn. Then we came back from a festival in Venice and there were plans to do more shows and another record, but the awful motorbike accident happened and Marc was in a very bad way. That was it almost, we sort of lost touch and didn’t speak for about 15 years…
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