Youth & Ben Watkins - The Empty Quarter

As referenced in my previous post, here is the first collaborative album by Martin "Youth" Glover and Ben "Juno Reactor" Watkins, The Empty Quarter. Released in 1983, it is an all-instrumental affair, and a more abstract album than their next one, Delirium, as befits its status as a soundtrack (for the play Street Captives by Jonathan Moore). It does have some of the more "foreground" musical elements that would play a greater part on Delirium, though. "Incompressible Megalasaurians" highlight's Youth's funk bass playing (which was also a staple of Brilliant's sound at the time), and "Repulsion" sounds more than a little like a Goblin soundtrack piece. Playing cello on the album is Adam Peters, who would subsequently team up with Watkins as The Flowerpot Men (later Sunsonic); "Three Go Down To Brighton" sounds like an early draft of the Flowerpots' B-side track "UG". Full performance credits are:

Youth: bass, percussion, keyboard
Ben Watkins: keyboards, drums, guitars
Adam Peters: cello
Kate St. John: oboe
Steve Irwin: percussion

Get it here or here.

The Empty Quarter - Delirium

This was almost a "someone beat me to it" post; Rho-Xs did indeed post it last June, but his download link has expired, so I can offer up my own rip, inferior though it probably is. Youth (ex-Killing Joke, represented on this blog so far by his recordings with Brilliant) and Ben Watkins (Juno Reactor) first teamed up to record an album called The Empty Quarter (soon here) in 1983 as the official soundtrack from the play Street Captives by Jonathan Moore. For their second collaboration, 1986's Delirium, they adopted The Empty Quarter as their band name. Like their first album it's all instrumental, but with a greater focus on rhythms. The beats run from tribal to industrial to gothic funk a la Brilliant (unsurprisingly) with several guest musicians filling out the sound. The full performing credits are:

Ben Watkins: keyboards, guitars, programming
Youth: keyboards, bass programming
Dave Heath: flute
Kate St. John: oboe, sax
Jake Le Mesurier: percussion, drums
Chris Bell: drums
'Mainframe'-John and Murray: Greengate programming
'Ranking Seymour': voice
Guy 'Thumb' Pratt: bass

This is one of several "techno-worldbeat" albums that came out in the late 80s/early 90s that in my opinion are classics. More albums in that category that other bloggers have posted are:

Anne Dudley and Jaz Coleman: Songs from the Victorious City
Eric Random and the Bedlamites: Ishmael
Saqqara Dogs: Thirst and World Crunch

But the point of this post is The Empty Quarter's Delirium: get it here or here.

Sunsonic - Melting Down On Motor Angel

As The Flowerpot Men, Ben Watkins and Adam Peters brought a dark edge to 80s synthpop. Upon signing to Polydor they changed their name to Sunsonic (presumably because there had already been a band called the Flowerpot Men in the 60s) and released a single album, Melting Down On Motor Angel (a Flowerpot Men track that did not appear on the album, oddly enough) in 1990, before they split up and Ben Watkins went on to become Juno Reactor. Melting Down marks the middle ground between the rock-influenced synthpop of the 80s and the full-fledged techno of the 90s. Here is that album, the first of several projected Ben Watkins Before Juno Reactor posts. (Or here.)

Various Artists - The Invisible Frame

This 1983 mini-LP from Future Records contains two postpunk classics, "Lifes Illusion" by Ice the Falling Rain and "Telecommunication" by Blitz (actually a Blitz splinter band led by original Blitz singer Carl Fisher). Here's the full track listing:

A1 Blitz Telecommunication
A2 Ice The Falling Rain Lifes Illusion
A3 Two Regime
B1 And Also The Trees Wallpaper Dying
B2 Rhythm & Faith Young Too Young Girl
B3 The Visit All The Walls

Get it here or here.

"Telecommunication" appears on the Blitz album Second Empire Justice. I thought I would rip that and post it, but someone else has already done it: see Hangover Heart Attack. Here are a few more records that fall into that same category (i.e. I was gonna post it, but someone else already did):

• The Danse Society - Say It Again double 12": New Romantic Rules
• Float Up CP - Kill Me in the Morning (Neneh Cherry, post-Rip Rig + Panic, pre-solo): To Live And Shave In L.A.
• Don Cherry - Hear and Now: Music For My People

Workforce

We go back to 1980s Sheffield today for the entire catalog of industrial funk band Workforce, who put out just two 12-inch singles, but they're among the best of that time and place. The first was "Skin Scraped Back" in 1985, released on Cabaret Voltaire's Doublevision label (and that stamp of approval should carry more weight than anything I could write). The record contains two mixes of the title track plus "Heap the Blame." The lineup:

Paul Wheatcroft: Vocals Guitar Violin Keyboards
Alan Fisch: Drums Percussion Tapes/Treatments
Rod Leigh: Guitar Keyboards Tapes Voice
Tim Owen: Wind Instruments Percussion Keyboards
Special thanks to Adi Hardy Bass Guitar

The throbbing bassline really makes the song tick; Workforce comes across as a harder-edged Chakk. I found an interesting post on the Sheffield forum from Tim Owen about Amrik Rai, the NME music writer who co-founded FON Records:

He always seemed to have some project or other up his sleeve when I briefly knew him. I played in Chakk rivals, Workforce for a while [sax, percussion, keys, tapes]. Rai interviewed us for NME after our first Peel Session and single, but the NME interview mysteriously never saw the light. I put it down to the fact that he was also the manager of Chakk, and didn't want similar [although more experimental] bands such as Workforce and Hula to steal Chakk's thunder.

In 1986 Workforce released their second and last record, the "Back in the Good Books" 12-inch on Rorschach Testing.





Again, there are two mixes of the title track (which cranks the tempo up a couple notches from "Skin"), and one more song, "This Is the One," which sounds uncannily like Chakk. The lineup is the same but now three members have "programming" in their credits, and special thanks go to Terry Todd (of The Box) who I presume played bass. And that's all there is from Workforce, except for another remix of "Skin Scraped Back" from Abstract Magazine 6 (Audio/Visual), which I have included for completeness' sake. Get it here or here.

Pinski Zoo - The Dizzy Dance Record

In the same vein as The Box, Rip Rig & Panic, etc. (which is to say, no-wave free-jazz skronk, but without the vocals) was reedman Jan Kopinski's Pinski Zoo, from Nottingham. Or that should be is, since amazingly, the band is still active. Here is the info on this 1982 record, Pinski Zoo's second, from Kopinski's own website:

JAN KOPINSKI tenor / soprano saxophones / voice
STEVE ILIFFE electric grand piano / harmonium
TIM BULLOCK drums
TIM NOLAN bass
MICK NOLAN percussion

1. It’s a Monster Steve
2. Spasm and Split
3. Dizzy Dance
4. Erase My Memory

For this 12” mini LP, Jan collaborated with famous Dub producer, Adrian Sherwood, who produced it at Berry street Studios. Dizzy Dance is about trying to hear many harmonies and rhythms as if they were crossing the street at once and picking your way through it. Steve Iliffe’s use of the harmonium is an interesting clue to his later masterful use of sounds with keys and samplers in the 90’s.

It came in a plain white open-centered sleeve--at least mine did--so there's no cover art. That's okay, because the music is great! Get it here or here.

Update: a helpful chap has found a cover image for me, I've placed it below. I will eventually incorporate it into the archive file, re-upload, and re-link; in the meantime, right-click below as Save Image As...

Chain - Banging on the House/Chains 12"

Here's another of singer Peter Hope's post-Box collaborations from 1985 (I think; there's no date on the record or the sleeve), this one with Mark Estdale as Chain. Estdale was an audio engineer who worked on several great Sheffield records, many by Hula (who are really my favorites from that scene, but will not be included here since they have reissued their records for paid digital download); in Chain he contributes "drums and programming." Chain only released this 12" single (Native Records NTV 2): "Banging on the House" (with Robin Markin on piano, Simon DC Markham on bass, and Elaine Mcleod on backing vocals) backed with "Chains" (with Alan Russell on guitar, a press hammer sample from Dexian Ilust, a high tom sample from Hula's drummer Nort, and bass from someone uncredited, I would guess it's Markham again). "Chains" has the edge here, working into a killer funk groove a few minutes in, another Lost Classic, but the A-side is perfectly good industrial funk as well. Links removed: track reissued on Peter Hope's Exploding Mind - Hoodoo Dance.