Features

Shine On: Vince Clarke

by coldwarnightlife
written by coldwarnightlife

yazooBorn in the suburb of South Woodford and raised in Basildon, Vince Clarke could have ended up as a cab driver or worked at Ford’s Essex plant, but instead he founded three of the world’s most successful pop groups: Depeche Mode, Yazoo and Erasure.

It was his charismatic, blue-eyed friend, Robert Marlow, who was expected to make it big amongst their Basildon contemporaries, but Simon & Garfunkel fan Clarke proved to be more adept at writing sparkly pop songs. He turned underemployment to his advantage during the early days of Depeche Mode, programming future hits into a sequencer on the sofa or practicing keyboard riffs with headphones on (to avoid annoying his mum).

Today, he lives and works in New York, surrounded by one of the world’s greatest collections of vintage synthesizers, and is revered as the musical genius behind more than three decades of chart-bothering electronic pop hits – from Depeche Mode’s “Dreaming of Me” in 1981 to the latest Erasure album, The Violet Flame.

Along the way, Clarke’s interests have broadened into ambient soundscapes, soundtracks and remixing work. In 2012, he released Ssss, an album of techno-driven instrumentals, with his former Depeche Mode bandmate, Martin Gore. The same year saw a 10 CD box set, The House of Illustrious, compiling more instrumental works – many of them designed for art galleries and dance companies – with Heaven 17’s Martyn Ware.

vinceandericHaving settled into the Erasure groove thirty years ago, it is almost forgotten how the ambitious but impatient Clarke left Depeche Mode just as they were on the cusp of world domination, or that his working relationship with Alison Moyet was so difficult that Yazoo’s second album was recorded in separate studio sessions. Of the latter experience, Clarke told an interviewer from Songfacts, “It was sad, but I don’t think we could have continued working together without probably strangling each other.”

A natural collaborator who likes to work alone; a synthesizer master who composes on acoustic instruments (guitar or piano) – Clarke is a man of contradictions, and some of his best work arguably has been generated by the tension between his pop instincts and the contrasting styles of his musical partners.

10. West India Company – Ave Maria

Blancmange was a duo that came to prominence about the same time as Depeche Mode. They became friendly with Clarke through supporting Depeche on their Speak & Spell tour. In the summer of 1984, Blancmange’s Stephen Luscombe put together this East-meets-West fusion track under the name, West India Company, with vocals being provided by the popular Bollywood singer, Asha Bhosle (who was later name-checked in a popular song by Cornershop). It was recorded at Splendid Studios, set up with Eric Radcliffe on the site of Blackwing Studios, where he worked following the break-up of Yazoo. Clarke set to work with his Fairlight CMI synthesizer, getting credit on the sleeve for “pyrotechnics.”

For the technically-minded, it will be of interest that, in the same year, Clarke showed off the capabilities of his Fairlight CMI for Electronic Soundmaker and Computer Music magazine. His presentation included samples of tablas recorded with percussionist Pandit Dinesh, who had contributed to West India Company’s recording.

9. Billy Ray Martin – Sweet Suburban Disco (Vince Clarke Mix)

Former S-Express and Electribe 101 vocalist, Billy Ray Martin, pulled in Clarke for a remix of her 2011 solo single, “Sweet Suburban Disco.” With Erasure, Clarke has perfected the adaptation of the disco template to contemporary danceable pop, so he would have been an apparent candidate for remixing duties. Less obvious was his match-up with Happy Mondays, for whom he provided one of the remixes of “Wrote for Luck” (the other coming from Paul Oakenfold) that signaled the transformation of Manchester indie into the Madchester rave scene. Clarke has been selective about his remixing assignments, but he almost always finds the sweet spot that infuses a great song with dancefloor magic.

8. Dome – To Speak

Dome was the experimental project of Bruce Gilbert and Graham Lewis, on hiatus from their roles in Wire. Their output features little by way of melody or traditional song structure, but Clarke appeared on their fourth album, Will You Speak This Word, as the operator of his rare and expensive Fairlight CMI synthesizer. The story goes that Clarke didn’t feel comfortable turning over his Fairlight CMI to Gilbert and Lewis, fearing it could be messed up by inexperienced operators, so he found himself on the album as a manipulator of sounds. This track also features the voice of his then-girlfriend, Deb, who was one of the prime movers behind the Depeche Mode and Yazoo Information Services.

7. Absolute – T.V. Glare

After the break-up of Yazoo, Clarke set up his own record label, Reset Records, together with the owner of Blackwing Studios, Eric Radcliffe. The artists released on Reset included Robert Marlow, Peter Hewson, Hardware and Absolute. Robert Marlow was the best-known of the Reset stable, but his Clarke-produced album, The Peter Pan Effect, didn’t see commercial release until 1999. Absolute’s effort is in a similar vein, and is interesting for the recognisable sounds and accents that were extracted from Clarke’s equipment.

6. Vince Clarke & Paul Quinn – One Day

“One Day” veered from Clarke’s usual formula. It was sung by Paul Quinn, the singer from Bourgie Bourgie, and incorporated a synthetic string sound that is a rare reminder of Clarke’s childhood violin training. The Cold War-influenced video featured the unlikely image of Clarke holding a semi-automatic rifle and manning a border post. The single just dented the Top 100 on its release in 1985, but its moody, brooding feeling has made it an enduring favourite for fans of Clarke’s music.

5. The Clarke & Ware Experiment – House of Illustrious (Extract Three)

In 1999, Clarke released Pretentious with Martyn Ware. A second collaboration appeared in 2001, Spectrum Pursuit Vehicle. In 2012, a box set of their joint work appeared, gathering both albums and adding to them no less than eight CDs of material accumulated from commissioned works. Clarke has described the early Human League albums, before Ware left to start Heaven 17, as key influences on him, which showed how electronic music didn’t have to be emotionally cold.

4. Erasure – Stop!

The project with which Clarke has been most closely associated for three decades, Erasure, was not initially a great success. Andy Bell, a women’s shoe salesman, auditioned for Clarke, producer Flood and Mute Records boss, Daniel Miller, after dozens of other singers had been rejected. Their first album together, Wonderland, made it into the lower rungs of the Top 100 in the UK, but the band’s first three singles failed to achieve the commercial success or reap the critical praise that Yazoo had won. Touring and refinement of their sound built up Erasure’s profile, and a string of chart-topping releases firmly established them as a world-class act.

The Crackers International EP came out in time for Christmas in 1988, sporting a sleeve inspired by a Soviet propaganda poster and led by a high energy track that has become a crowd favourite. With its bright, synthetic brass and seasonal bells, pulsing synths and layered vocals, it’s iconic Erasure.

3. The Assembly – Never Never

Clarke’s original plan for The Assembly was to record an album of songs with different vocalists – a concept that doesn’t sound dissimilar to the British Electric Foundation project of future collaborator, Martyn Ware. Together with Eric Radcliffe, Clarke worked out a scheme for the album, but they were reportedly defeated by the complex licensing and exclusivity practices of the recording industry. The only material to make it to release was 1983’s “Never Never,” which featured The Undertones’ vocalist, Feargal Sharkey, and the instrumental B-side, “Start Stop.”

2. Depeche Mode – Puppets

Everyone has their own view on Clarke’s work with Depeche Mode, which makes it difficult to pick out just one song. While “Just Can’t Get Enough” has become a mainstream classic, more experimental works from Clarke’s time with the band, like “Shout” and “Any Second Now,” have their own appeal. There are some who would argue that “Ice Machine” should have been the A-side of their first single, instead of “Dreaming of Me,” while debate continues whether the version of “Photographic” that appeared on the Some Bizarre compilation was better than the one on Speak & Spell. We selected “Puppets” because it captures the essence of the sound that Clarke designed for the band: simple, repetitive phrases building into elegant, interlocking sections, allowing room for Dave Gahan’s vocals to breathe. They took a different direction when he left, leaving fans to dream of what might have happened if he had stayed.

1. Yazoo – Softly Over

Given the fractious relationship between Clarke and Alison Moyet during the recording of You and Me Both, one might think that there is a reference to their working arrangements behind the opening line: “It’s over, there’s nothing more to say.” Actually, this song is a sweet story of love passing beyond reach, in which the warmth of the electronics contrasts with Moyet’s pained, blues-tinged vocals – just the combination that made an ex-punk and a Simon & Garfunkel fan such a potent combination.

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Shine On: Daniel Miller

by coldwarnightlife
written by coldwarnightlife

Daniel Miller is best known as the owner of Mute Artists (formerly Mute Records, but the original name didn’t come with the sale by EMI) and as The Normal, the artist name used for the release of “TVOD”/”Warm Leatherette.”

The son of Austrian refugees, Miller grew up in North London with a love of Kraftwerk, Can and Neu! and worked as a DJ before buying a Korg 700s and recording his first single. Modest and uncomfortable in the limelight, Miller performed as The Normal with Scottish electronics pioneer, Robert Rental, but found himself happier in the studio and working behind the scenes with his record label than standing on the stage himself.

He discovered and propelled the careers of Depeche Mode and others, but over the years has also been seen lending a technical hand to Thomas Dolby and Soft Cell or producing The House of Love. Miller still records as Sunroof! with his close friend and Mute producer, Gareth Jones.

To launch our new feature, Shine On, we’ve picked out a number of songs to reflect the breadth of Miller’s work as a producer, composer and performer. The constants are a well-developed sense of arrangement, an instinct for unique sounds that are often detuned or shaped in unexpected ways, and a feeling for driving rhythms. These reflect his Krautrock influences but also the effort that comes with closely reading the manuals to his collected synthesizers and then throwing them away.

10. Missing Scientists – Big City Bright Lights

The synthesizer credit on this 1980 release is granted to one “Jacki” and a co-production credit on the A-side goes to “Larry Least,” but both are pseudonyms for Miller. “Jacki” was one of the mythical players in Miller’s Silicon Teens fantasy pop group, while “Larry Least” was a name he adopted as a reference to the producer, Mickey Most.

The reggaetronica style is one that is not commonly associated with Miller, though he was later to contribute to On-U Sounds’ legendary Pay It All Back compilation a few years later.

9. Voice of Authority – Fuh Fuh

When On-U Sound released their first sampler album, Pay It All Back, in 1985, it cost the same as a single and was packed with the juiciest reggae/experimental tracks from Adrian Sherwood’s burgeoning stable of artists. It also contained this short and peculiar composition by Miller, featuring early sampling technology.

8. Thomas Dolby – Radio Silence

In the early 1980s, it was known that, if an artist needed help with some complicated synthesizer set-ups, or the use of a Synclavier, Miller was the go-to person. He did production work with Soft Cell, but less well known is his contribution to this 1982 Thomas Dolby song.

7. Alex Fergusson – Stay with Me Tonight

Another 1980 production effort credited to “Larry Least,” this single from Alex Fergusson (Alternative TV, Psychic TV) is clearly programmed/performed by Miller. At the time, Ferguson was experimenting with the move from punk to electro-pop, a path charted by Mute Records. This single appeared on the Red Records label.

6. Silicon Teens – Sun Flight

Miller’s Silicon Teens project was, for the most part, a series of covers of rock standards, like “Memphis, Tennessee” and “Just Like Eddie,” but it also yielded a couple of original Miller compositions. “Sun Flight” is the one that gets remembered best, as it combines themes of space travel and synths in a way that was not totally dissimilar to a later Mute release, “Fred vom Jupiter” by Die Doraus und Die Marinas.

5. Fad Gadget – Lady Shave

The strength of Miller’s songwriting and production work came out most strongly in his work with Frank Tovey (aka Fad Gadget). Miller took songs written by Tovey and turned them into brooding electronic classics with the menace of punk but a style of their own. The early Fad Gadget singles became an outlet for Miller’s creativity, where he could stretch his one-fingered compositional style to the limits.

“Lady Shave” is an exceptional song from a number of standpoints: the sequenced bassline that carries the song is electro-minimalism incarnate; the studio itself is played to generate tones based on an electric shaver; and the unconventional top line is distinctively Miller.

4. Duet Emmo – Or So It Seems

The most achingly beautiful pop song ever made, we’ve called “Or So It Seems” before, and this collaboration between Miller and Wire refugees, B.C. Gilbert and Graham Lewis, shows Miller at his one-fingered best. Lewis’ vocals are like threads of glass spun around the core of a grumbling bass-line and bells, but the build-up and release of tension in the song is 1982 shot-through.

3. Sunroof – Hero

Miller’s occasional project with Gareth Jones, Sunroof has largely been responsible for covers of Krautrock classics, like this legendary Neu! track. The vocals here are provided by the extraordinarily beautiful Alison Conway, who has appeared as A.C. Marias on Mute and made a number of videos for the label.

2. The Normal – TVOD

If you put out a record by yourself, while living in your mum’s house, the last thing you’d expect is for it to be covered by Grace Jones and adopted as the title for her album. Such was Miller’s luck with “Warm Leatherette,” which Jones’ producer probably heard played by DJ Rusty Egan at the Blitz club.

An attempt to make punk music with synthesizers, “TVOD”/”Warm Leatherette” came out in 1979, while the DIY spirit was still strong, and it is the springboard for everything that followed. We’ve picked “TVOD” for this list, because it gets less attention but shows off techniques like tape cut-up that link the single to the industrial scene that was taking shape at the time.

1. Depeche Mode – Shout

The influence of Miller on early Depeche Mode is very clear from their recordings. While a major label would have polished their sound and image beyond recognition, Mute and Miller brought out the experimental side of the band and gave them room to explore sounds and rhythms that were less obviously commercial. One of the best examples is on this B-side to 1981’s “New Life,” which is driven by sequenced drum-like sounds and the simplest synth line ever.

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The Twelve Songs of Synthmas

by coldwarnightlife
written by coldwarnightlife

At this time of year, the malls are full of carols, television ads feature jingling bells, and radio stations highlight the latest commercial Christmas singles. We decided to line up an alternative playlist, to give your ears a rest. Come cynics, come stoics, come industrial dancers – here’s a set from your own record collection.

12. The Fall – Hark the Herald Angels Sing

11. Röyksopp – Le Cantique de Noël

10. Galaxie 500 – Listen, the Snow Is Falling

9. Pet Shop Boys – It Doesn’t Often Snow at Christmas

8. S.P.O.C.K – White Christmas

7. Rational Youth – Merry Christmas Mary Anne

6. Cocteau Twins – Winter Wonderland

5. The Knife – Reindeer

4. Erasure – She Won’t Be Home (Lonely Christmas)

3. Parralox – Little Drum Machine Boy

2. Winston Tong – The Twelve Days of Christmas

1. Captain Sensible – One Christmas Catalogue

Bonus! Page – Little Drummer Boy

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CWNL Presents: The Top 10 Releases of 2014

by coldwarnightlife
written by coldwarnightlife

If 2013 was a bumper year for recorded music, then 2014 was the year of the live show. Besides carefully curated festivals, like Electronic Summer and TEC 003, there was an ambitious Nordic tour by Rational Youth, Psyche, Sista mannen på jorden and I Satellite, followed by a German-Polish outing for Rational Youth and Psyche. Cold War Night Life sponsored “An Evening with the Swedish Synth” in Brick Lane, showcasing leading poptronica Vikings, Page, Machinista and Train to Spain. Karin Park and Parralox stormed the London stage this year, as well. The high water mark for UK artists was set by Vile Electrodes, however, who warmed up for their show at TEC 003 by winning awards in Germany. Sure, Avicii can fill hockey arenas with EDM DJ sets, but does he hand-make CD sleeves from faux fur, wear hats made from washing-up gloves and sing like a young Debbie Harry? No, and until he does, the Vile ones will have the creative edge.

With that, we are pleased to present Cold War Night Life’s Top 10 Releases of 2014.

 

ALBUM OF THE YEAR

1. Rational Youth – Cold War Night Life / Recordings 1981-84

IMG_9621Pole position in 2014 was easily taken by a set of recordings that were all made by 1984. Rational Youth’s first album, Cold War Night Life, came out in 1982 and quickly took a place in the synth pantheon next to the classic releases from that time, such as Depeche Mode’s Speak and Spell and John Foxx’s Metamatic. Over the years, it has become a cult favourite outside of Canada, with Swedish and German synthers fanning the embers into occasional flames. This year, the leading European artisan label, Vinyl on Demand, lovingly collated it with live recordings, demos, singles and EPs for one of their ultra-high quality box sets. Stunning sound from heavy-duty 180gm vinyl and amazing design mean that this is a package that only comes around once every thirty years.

 

SINGLE OF THE YEAR

2. Sista mannen på jorden – ”Stadens alla ljus”

10171757_625556007514876_1542272301361497548_nEddie Bengtsson nearly didn’t record “Stadens alla ljus” [EN: “City Lights”] himself. He first offered it to his former band, S.P.O.C.K. It was only after they turned it down that he took the plunge with his legendary project, Sista mannen på jorden [EN: The Last Man on Earth]. That proved to be a good move, as SMPJ fans have come to expect world-class poptronica with themes of space and longing from Sweden’s own Vince Clarke. “Stadens alla ljus” is the story of an astronaut looking down on the Earth and commenting on urban illumination as his air supply runs out. With sweeps that cover the cosmos and sequences set to Warp 4, it’s an evocative song made more poignant by Bengtsson’s emotive vocals. Once you’ve been transported by the chorus, there’s no way back.

The 12” version came with another SMPJ original, “Vem gör det då?” [EN: “Who does it, then?”], as well as two covers: an exquisite version of OMD’s “Stanlow” with Swedish lyrics and a faithful Devo tribute, “Going Under”. The combination was unbeatable in 2014.

 

3. Hannah Peel – Fabricstate

IMG_9361One of the highlights of the year was receiving a copy of Hannah Peel’s Fabricstate EP on a Saturday when the Sun was shining. We said:

“It’s not just that the record is pressed in red vinyl, mirroring the colour of her hair; nor that it contains Chloe, the award-winning song already heard in a British television production – the thing that sets Fabricstate apart is that it is infused with distillates of folk music but is a thoroughly modern musical cocktail. Take the title track, which begins with a piano accompaniment, but quickly develops a martial rhythm underpinned by Test Dept-esque metal, before razor-sharp sawtooth waveforms come in. Peel’s voice has a delicate quality, which sits against the more dangerous sounds of the instrumental track, setting them off by highlighting just the slightest hint of menace. Folk music for urban living, let’s call it.”

Peel’s talent and technique are solidly in evidence throughout. We couldn’t pick just one song, so the whole EP takes third place in this year’s list.

 

4. Machinista – Xenoglossy

machinista_xenoglossyMachinista’s infectious poptronica travelled well in 2014, reaching London for “An Evening with the Swedish Synth.” Their live show is a razor-sharp combination of up-tempo pop and experimental rock (think Bowie meets Suicide at Nico’s house with lots of Italo records scattered around). Xenoglossy is their first proper album, and it comes filled with the same superb, original poptronica; sometimes pointing at the skies and sometimes in our hearts for signs of life, but always moving feet and hips in tandem. On disc, John Lindqwister’s vocals let rip while Richard Flow runs the machines, and the two Swedish veterans conjur up a sound that is both fresh and electrifying.

 

5. I Satellite – Zephyr EP

artworks-000076614130-12nl15-originalRod MacQuarrie’s collection of machines is impressive by any standards: he owns equipment formerly housed by Bill Zorn of Rational Youth and Phil Collins, and his studio is crammed with Oberheims, Rolands, Logans and ARPs that can be used to recreate the sounds of classic tracks by everyone from Alphaville to ABBA. With the release of Zephyr, the Kalamazoo-based musician showed off his old-school influences, as well as his ability to construct distinctive original material. Covers of New Order’s “Your Silent Face” and ABBA’s “I Am the City” are polished and respectful; but, by moving more in the direction of Gary Numan and John Foxx, we’d argue that the latter is arguably better than the original version. Tracks like “This Time” and “City Streets” are instant classics, while “Bubbleboy” channels alienation and pain to a mid-tempo beat. It’s pure magic.

 

6. Karin Park – “Shine”

karin-park-shineKarin Park ran a remix competition on Beatport for her 2014 single, “Shine,” but none of the contributions came close to the original. With pained lyrics yielding a glimpse of hope in the chorus, the track sounded best with the attack side of the envelope set high on the keyboards and the beats restrained. Park’s voice is distinctive and sometimes compared to Karin Dreijer Andersson’s, but it’s got a texture of its very own. It provides the emotional overlay that lifts “Shine” to the next level, gliding frictionless over the instrumental track.

 

7. William Orbit – Strange Cargo 5

avatars-000082801444-daft9x-t500x500It’s perhaps easy for an album given away for free on social media to be overlooked, but the latest instalment of William Orbit’s Strange Cargo series wasn’t exactly a vanity project. The musician and producer, best known in popular music circles for his work with Madonna, Britney and (once, but we doubt ever again) Blur, had the material up his sleeve but just wasn’t looking to cash in on it. He could have charged the market rate for Strange Cargo 5, because it is the type of exemplary poptronica that record companies write him large cheques to use as a platform for their major stars, but he just put it on Soundcloud with the download feature enabled. Pure class – in more ways than one.

 

8. Parralox – “Crying on the Dancefloor”

a1184752648_10We interviewed Parralox just before they appeared in London as support for Polly Scattergood. John von Ahlen’s sophisticated pop sense had consistently impressed us, but we were still blown away by the unveiling of “Crying on the Dancefloor.”  With the addition of vocalists Francine and Johanna, Parralox ramped up its capabilities and glammed up its image even further. The accompanying video, in which the band play the role of a talent show jury, revealed them to have a sense of humour, as well as style. Parralox are back on the London stage to warm up for Erasure before the end of the year, and this is certain to be a crowd favourite. We’ve featured a techno mix here by Your Silent Face.

 

9. Vile Electrodes – “Empire of Wolves”

a4154517545_10Drawing enough power to keep National Grid engineers on their toes during live performances, Vile Electrodes are the UK’s leading electro duo. Anais Neon has stunning vocal control, while keyboardist Martin Swan just about keeps the machinery under his spell in their synthetic Fantasia. This high-voltage track came in an exclusive package of remixes, embedded in a faux fur envelope, and it’s coiled to spring out of your speakers with fangs bared.

 

10. Colouroïd – Long Play

275638_largeColouroïd are the Icelandic/Swedish duo of Jòn and Ella Moe. Besides making excellent lower-case M and W minimal wave music, they also run the FlexiWave label from their Stockholm base (which we hear will be relocating to Berlin soon). Their first album is a masterful slab of vinyl, pressed with grooves cooler than the surface of Neptune. From the run-in groove until the stylish inner-label, each side is an icy, voltage-controlled mindscape. With titles like “Pillow Fort” and “Eye Shadow,” we’d say their songs are playful and dark – fifty shades of black, if you will.

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And You Thought You Were Normal: Nash the Slash (RIP)

by coldwarnightlife
written by coldwarnightlife

We hardly knew Jeff Plewman, the man behind the bandages. Nash the Slash, on the other hand, had a global following. In his top hat and suit, Nash was a silent film star in an age of noise; widely appreciated for his misuse of electrified violins and mandolins. Fed through effects pedals and played over drum machines and keyboards, Nash’s instruments yielded shrieks and drones that could mute a banshee or echo Prokofiev.

Gary Numan stumbled across Nash in a Toronto nightclub and immediately dropped his scheduled support act. Nash accompanied him on tour, gaining exposure, a UK record deal and even a place on a Smash Hit flexidisc (alongside OMD); however, unlike Canadian label-mates, Martha & The Muffins, Nash failed to achieve commercial success in the UK. Dindisc, the Branson-funded label run by Carol Wilson, promoted Nash as a post-punk novelty act, playing on his horror-film imagery and clever covers of songs by The Rolling Stones and Jan & Dean. Frustrated by the lack of appreciation for his inventive original material, Nash returned to Canada.

From his base in Toronto, Nash released records on the Cut-throat imprint. The label’s distinctive logo included a skull, and one of the eye sockets was positioned over the spindle hole on Cut-throat releases. Listening to a Nash album therefore required listeners to impale the skull and rotate it around the violated socket. That dark sense of humour and his attention to detail were constant features of Nash’s work, whether in songs like “Vincent’s Crows” or in the production of a Nash the Slash comic book.

Nash played to packed arenas and small clubs. He warmed up for The Who but also for The Spoons. He toured with Iggy Pop and played along to silent films in local cinemas. He composed albums that could be played at any speed and practically invented the sound of The Orb and System 7 with “Blind Windows” in 1978.

He retired from music in 2012, leaving a note charting his accomplishments and lamenting the consequences of file-sharing:

A journalist once asked me to describe a typical Nash the Slash fan. I replied, ‘They just get it’. They get my references to Ray Bradbury, Boris Karloff, and even my opening quote from Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. It was my intention to shock, but not offend.

Nash had a full stage name – Nashville Thebodiah Slasher – but his family and friends knew him as Jeff. His passing last weekend leaves a hole in the heart of alternative music.

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Rational Youth, SMPJ, Psyche and I Satellite: The Nordic Tour for the New Cold War

by coldwarnightlife
written by coldwarnightlife

At the end of April 2014, a series of mini-festivals were organised in Norway and Sweden, showcasing some of the most exciting electronic music acts from the 1980s and today. Cold War Night Life took in the Swedish shows and came back with bags of salt licorice and memories of unmissable performances.

RATIONAL YOUTH
Malmö, 30 April 2014
Gothenburg, 2 May 2014
Stockholm, 3 May 2014

Caught between two superpowers, Canada was the right place for an album called Cold War Night Life in 1982. Though recorded in Montreal, the atmosphere of Rational Youth’s debut was distinctly European: basslines and leads echoed the sounds coming from Dusseldorf, Liverpool and London, while the lyrics evoked the shadows and fog of divided Berlin and Gdansk. As troops stared at each from opposite sides of no-man’s land, Tracy Howe and Bill Vorn absorbed the tension and cynicism of the times, filtered it through a construction kit of analogue synthesizers and sequencers, and produced a world-class collection of songs on themes of love, alienation, glamour and paranoia.

Cold War Night Life became one of the defining electronic albums of the early 1980s, comfortably sitting alongside John Foxx’s Metamatic, Kraftwerk’s Computer World and Fad Gadget’s Under the Flag. Released on an independent Canadian label, its commercial reach was limited, but over the years the record became a cult favourite among the synthescenti. A copy found its way to neutral Sweden and C90 duplicates began to circulate throughout the country’s burgeoning electronic music scene. In this case, home taping didn’t kill music; it built a base of fans for whom Rational Youth issued distant signals on wavelengths tuned to the alternative dancefloor.

It was only at the turn of the last century that Rational Youth finally bridged the physical distance between them and their Swedish fans, playing selected dates with local synthpop heroes like Elegant Machinery and contemporaries like Robert Marlow. The warmth of their reception on these occasions stayed with singer Tracy Howe, and a return to the Nordics was organised to coincide with the release of a box set on the German artisan label, Vinyl-on-Demand, and new vinyl editions of the last studio album, To the Goddess Electricity.

The original plan was to transport a six-piece pop combo from Canada for a mini-tour of Sweden and Norway, but logistical considerations trimmed the act down to the essential duo of Howe and original keyboardist Kevin Komoda. Not a problem: fans were more than happy to receive them for a purely electronic show. Armed with a Moog Little Phatty and Roland JX-8P, Komoda was able to recreate classic sounds while confidently adding runs and fills that lifted the atmosphere higher than the International Space Station.

For Rational Youth, the shows were about revisiting familiar songs and old friends. In Malmö, Howe sported a personalised version of the jersey of Sweden’s national hockey team – a gift from S.P.O.C.K’s singer on a previous tour – while diplomatically avoiding mention of the Olympic games final. At the same show, Howe paid tribute to the Swedish scene’s finest songwriter, Eddie Bengtsson, performing an English-language version of “Luft” by Sista mannen på jorden. Joined on-stage by Bengtsson, Howe was visibly moved by the beauty of the music and their reunion.

Rational Youth’s sets on each date were dominated by tracks from Cold War Night Life, such as “Ring the Bells” and “Beware the Fly”. The songs have lost none of their vitality in the three decades since they were recorded, and the tug-of-war over Ukraine by empire-builders provided them with a familiar geopolitical back-drop. Tracks from later releases, including “The Man in Grey” from their eponymous EP on a major label and “Pink Pills, Orange Pills” from To the Goddess Electricity, were warmly received. The loudest cheers were reserved for “Saturdays in Silesia” and “City of Night” – both up-tempo, sequenced singles fondly remembered from the days when superpower submarines prowled Sweden’s archipelago.

A surprise show-closer in Malmö and Stockholm was a cover of AC/DC’s “Thunderstruck,” including Angus-like hopping. Firmly tongue-in-cheek, it was a playful riposte to the scene’s purists. Like many of the electronic pioneers, Howe was a punk who found his way to synthesizers (he still plays drums with his old band, The Normals), and he clearly couldn’t resist breaking down walls. It was also a coded signal that he hasn’t given up on adding drums and guitars to Rational Youth’s live act. A return to Europe is a real prospect, as is an expanded line-up with a new take on the band’s classic songs. The purists will secretly love it.

PSYCHE
Malmö, 30 April 2014
Gothenburg, 2 May 2014
Stockholm, 3 May 2014

Legendary Canadian exports, Psyche, have been pioneers on the dark electro scene for almost three decades. Informed by the hard electronics of early Fad Gadget and the Gothic imagery of post-punk artists like Joy Division and Bauhaus, Psyche launched in 1982 but first came to wider attention with 1985’s Insomnia Theatre, an album of horror-inspired classics with titles like “The Brain Collapses” and “Mr. Eyeball Ooze.” In due course, Europe called and Psyche were transplanted to Germany, from where they have continued to release edgy music born in the depths of the night and build their reputation as an outstanding live act.

Psyche’s Swedish shows opened with the hard-edged stomp of “The Saint Became a Lush” from 1986’s Unveiling the Secret. There were hints of “Tubular Bells” in the sequencer pattern; but, instead of Max von Sydow in a dog-collar, the fog gave way to singer Darrin Huss, occupying the stage with a vigorous dance routine, and keyboardist Stefan Rabura. What followed was a selection of hits from Psyche’s extensive back-catalogue, covering a range of styles while maintaining the dialectic between the morbid and uplifting. Songs like “15 Minutes”, “Sanctuary” and “The Crawler” easily got the appreciative crowd making noise: in Gothenburg, Huss told the boisterous audience, “I’m singing to the rhythm of your screams!”

Huss’ vocal range is impressive, and he is capable of bluesy belters as well as more delicate interpretations. On “Goodbye Horses,” one of Psyche’s signature covers, Huss successfully conveyed the song’s careful balance of pain and splendour, while Rabura’s accompaniment underlined its emotional ambiguity. The full power of Huss’ voice really came out on “Unveiling the Secret,” their 1986 hit, showing exactly how Psyche became a lasting presence on the dark electro scene.

A treat for Gothenburg fans was the appearance of Gothic personality, Adora BatBrat – who was on DJ duties for the event – for a cover of Soft Cell’s “Sex Dwarf.” The Swedish singer and model brought her entertaining brands of glamour and humour to the song – a main-stay of Psyche’s live shows – while acting as a foil for Huss’ own improvisation. Like the public service announcements used to say, “Sometimes the after-effects never wear off.”

SISTA MANNEN PÅ JORDEN
Malmö, 30 April 2014
Gothenburg, 2 May 2014
Stockholm, 3 May 2014

Eddie Bengtsson nearly gave away one of his best songs to his old band, S.P.O.C.K. When they turned down “Stadens alla ljus” (EN: “City Lights”), he recorded it for his own project, Sista mannen på jorden (EN: The Last Man on Earth). Released in time for Swedish shows alongside Rational Youth, it is a fusion of space disco, with a pulsating, filtered bass and classic sweeps, together with a melody line that Jean-Michel Jarre would die for. S.P.O.C.K probably knew their limitations: given a live outing, “Stadens alla ljus” fits smoothly into the SMPJ canon, sending hips and feet into motion with a sleek style more Studio 54 than old-time S.P.O.C.K-and-roll.

Bengtsson has an informal rapport with fans, who push to the front of the stage to sing along to “Sekunder” (EN: “Seconds”), “Allt är klart” (EN: “Everything is Ready”) and other SMPJ classics. Flanked by Christer Hermodsson, he knocks out energetic poptronica gems with an ease that belies their sophistication. For sheer elegance, songs like “Luft” (EN: “Breath”) and “Det där är grönt” (EN: “That is Green”) are without peers in modern electronic music. The crowds in Malmö, Gothenburg and Stockholm know this, and the bartenders at the venues are left in relative peace for the duration of SMPJ’s sets.

A SMPJ live show is an interactive affair; and, as the lyrics are all in Swedish, the audience easily sings along at Bengtsson’s prompting. You don’t need to speak a word of the language, however, to enjoy the throbbing basslines and clever melodic poptronica: a pair of dancing shoes will do the job perfectly.

I SATELLITE
Malmö, 30 April 2014
Gothenburg, 2 May 2014
Stockholm, 3 May 2014

The first single Rod MacQuarrie ever bought was Gary Numan’s classic, “Cars.” On the B-side of the US release was “Metal,” one of the cover songs that is a highlight of I Satellite’s Nordic shows. MacQuarrie, who grew up in a remote part of Canada but now lives in Kalamazoo, Michigan, clearly absorbed Numan’s futurist vibe deeply, as I Satellite travels with a vintage Korg System 700 synthesizer and an analogue sequencer the size of a small house. Turning out catchy songs that deconstruct city living and the love lives of replicants, I Satellite was a popular discovery for Nordic audiences who grew up with The Pleasure Principle and Telekon on their built-in IKEA record shelves.

MacQuarrie’s show isn’t all robotic longing: audience favourite, “Bubbleboy,” taken from 2003’s Auto:Matic album, explains the fate of a boy “alone in a bubble world,” superimposed over a sonic palette lifted from 1979. The I Satellite originals on display are both quirky and catchy, and after the shows groups of young men press forward to ask questions and seek signatures. Who knew in Södermalm that Kalamazoo was hiding such an interesting act?

ROBERT MARLOW
Stockholm, 3 May 2014

Robert Marlow could have been a contender. While his Basildon contemporaries saw their careers take off with Depeche Mode and Yazoo, Marlow narrowly missed out on stardom. On paper, a label deal and production help from Vince Clarke should have been the ideal platform; instead, he was Andrew Ridgeley in the shadow of the talent he stood closest to. Sales of his singles were slow, and an album recorded with Clarke and Eric Radcliffe was shelved until the end of the 1990s.

Never mind – the crowd at Stockholm’s Nalen venue knows all of the words to the 1980s singles: Claudette, The Face of Dorian Grey and Calling All Destroyers. They sing along contentedly, while Robert Enforsen, the former Elegent Machinery vocalist, handles iPad and keyboard duties and adds harmonies. Marlow’s voice holds up, but the years have clearly weathered the lad from Essex.

“Touch me!” cries a heavily made-up Marlow, extending his free hand from the stage. A sea of friendly Swedish hands reach back; and, at least until the music stops, Marlow is the Smash Hits cover star he always wanted to be.

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Scratched in Wax: The Secret World of Matrix Etchings (Part I)

by coldwarnightlife
written by coldwarnightlife

The process of manufacturing vinyl records affords a final opportunity for creativity to artists, labels and engineers, before the final product is packaged and distributed. When the master is cut, prior to stamping of the records, it is common for identification marks to be added, such as catalogue numbers, references to the mastering house and notes about the tape being used by the engineer. A practice also emerged of engineers adding their names, nicknames or logos, and inscribing messages of their own, such as references to lyrics or notes meaningful to themselves or to the artists. Scrawled into the inner run-off grooves of the record, nearest the label, such matrix etchings are important for record collectors to help identify different editions, but they also provide a source of coded communication to fans keen to discover every detail about their favourite recordings. Holding records at an angle to the light reveals the messages, which are otherwise overlooked by the listener.

One of the best-known practitioners of the subtle art of matrix etching was the engineer, George Peckham, who signed off many masters as “Porky” or added his mark, “A Porky Prime Cut”. The hand-drawn face of a pig can also be traced back to Peckham. Here’s an example of Peckham’s sign-off, taken from Fad Gadget’s “Fireside Favourites/Insecticide” single:

matrix-fadgadget1

Peckham’s sense of humour is evident, as next to his motto he has drawn a picture of a fly buzzing (in reference to the lyrics of “Insecticide”):

matrix-fadgadget2

Sometimes, the messages look like they could be personal statements about the engineer’s own musical tastes. Take, for example, this message cut into the A-side of Depeche Mode’s “Enjoy the Silence” (BONG18):

matrix-depeche1

Other times, they look like paying tribute to the songs being worked with. This is the etching on New Order’s first single, “Ceremony”:

matrix-neworder

We’ll post some more of these shortly, but feel free to send your favourites to post@coldwarnightlife.com.

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CWNL Presents: The Top 10 Songs of 2013

by coldwarnightlife
written by coldwarnightlife

The last weeks of 2013 are ticking by, and it can already be declared a vintage year for fans of electronic music and culture. Not only was there a steady stream of high-quality releases from established artists; there were encouraging signs of new artists taking the field, armed with sequencers and bags of groovy waveforms. The cassette format started to make a come-back, encouraged by artisan labels like Flexiwave and Nachos!, while vinyl, special edition CDs and box sets all made headway against the tidal forces of subscription-based streaming. Even promoters got into the act, by putting on festivals that were properly curated, instead of being kitchen-sink events.

Against this backdrop, Cold War Night Life paused to pick out some of the best songs of 2013. From an unusually strong field, we managed to select ten stand-out tracks to make our playlist for the year. If we had a crush on you, this is the mix-tape we would give you for Christmas.

1. Page: Som ett skal

hemma - cover3After 2010’s Nu (EN: Now) revived the musical partnership of Eddie Bengtsson and Marina Schiptjenko, the profile and creative output of Page have been reaching new heights. Sweden’s original synthpop act, Page went through several transitions before bowing out at a performance in 2000. The reunion of Bengtsson and Schiptjenko, a decade later, surprised many by reinvigorating their music with mature themes and catchy melodies. Nu came across as a reboot, rather than a simple refresh, of Page’s sound.

The release of Hemma (EN: At Home) in 2013 went even further, showcasing the growing strength and sophistication of Bengtsson’s songwriting while fusing modern and vintage influences. His signature “glamtronica” sound draws upon the best punk, disco and glam rock influences and runs them through a bank of Moog synths. Underpinned by dancefloor-friendly rhythms, the songs on Hemma all come across as having come from a place five minutes into the future.

The most accessible of these is Som ett skal (EN: Like a Shell), which was released by Wonderland Records as a series of limited edition 3″ CD-singles with additional remixes. In a bumper year for electronic music, Page’s effort was peerless.

Listen/buy on Amazon

 

2. Rational Youth: Ring the Bells (Live in Ottawa)

AOF151__62507.1377502632.300.400Sitting for thirty years in the attic of Kevin Komoda, a box of memorabilia collected from his days in Rational Youth yielded some expected treasures when opened earlier this year. Besides pictures from Kraftwerk’s 1981 show in Montreal, Komoda found recordings from Rational Youth’s 1983 cross-Canada tour. Tapes from shows in Ottawa and Winnipeg were promptly digitised and released as cassettes and CDs, including bundles with rare and unreleased tracks from the RY archives.

The stand-out song from the live recordings is the version of Ring the Bells played in the Ottawa show. One of the best tracks from the classic Cold War Night Life album, singer Tracy Howe’s vocals and the synthetic strings played by Komoda combine to spine-tingling effect. With live Rational Youth shows being organised for Canada and Sweden in 2014, this is a taster of the magic to come.

Listen/buy on Amazon

 

3. Hannah Peel: Harbour

packshotIrish-born and Barnsley-raised, multi-instrumentalist Hannah Peel is best known in the electronic music community for her work with John Foxx & The Maths. With her amplified violin and keyboard work, Peel has brought an iridescent quality to Foxx’s stage shows, complementing the contributions of drummer and modular-synth master, Benjamin “Benje” Edwards. Peel’s solo material occupies a different place from Foxx’s, ranging from music-box versions of classic synthpop to ethereal, sweeping pop tracks that are more obviously inspired by a mixture of the Cocteau Twins and Irish folk traditions.

At the end of 2013, Peel won an award for another track, Chloe, which was used in a British television programme, but the song we chose for our mix-tape was Harbour, which comes from Peel’s Nailhouse EP – one of the independent stand-outs in 2013.

 

4. Cryo: The Portal

1377785521_august28012013The release of Cryo material is always special, but the first single from the forthcoming Retropia album, In Your Eyes, came with an outstanding bonus track. While the A-side single is a definite alternative dancefloor-filler, The Portal is solid evidence that Martin Rudefelt has a deep well of compelling songs to draw upon. Although released in the position of a B-side, The Portal could easily have been a single in its own right. Dark, brooding and uplifting at the same time, it shows why Cryo continue to set the benchmark for EBM.

Listen/buy on Amazon

 

5. Julian & Marina: Count the Stars

julian-marinaOne of the surprises of 2013 was the low-key release by the electro-crooner duo, Julian & Marina, of their Distance EP, which included this exceptional track. Count the Stars is a wonderful pop song: elegant and charming in equal amounts. It goes a long way to preserve the feeling of early Pet Shop Boys songs, at a time when the PSB are borrowing ideas from Michael Nyman while singing Fabien Society pamphlets, and deserves wider exposure.

Listen/buy on Amazon

 

6. Candide: Lustfyllda nätter

R-4990737-1381527070-9673They’ve been around since 1984, but Candide aren’t stuck in an old-school groove. They released two singles in 2013, both of which were excellent; but, if pressed, we preferred this tribute to influential Swedish new wave act, Lustans Lakejer.

 

7. Train to Spain: Passion

After a line-up change, which saw a new vocalist come into the fold, Train to Spain started to write and release uptempo, energetic pop songs with renewed vigour. Live dates across Sweden gave audiences a chance to experience their developing brand of synthpop; a combination of classic electronic sounds and driving sequences that sits somewhere on the spectrum between Yazoo and Front 242. This was one of our favourite songs of 2013, and the combination of Jonas Rasmusson’s music with Helena Wigeborg’s vocals holds out great promise for future releases.

 

8. Acute Onset: Nosology

Hanna Kihlander and Johan Söderling revealed their musical project with a bang, a bleep, clicks and pulses. Nosology showed that their eclectic combination of keyboards and modular components could be deployed to make infectious dance music infused with influences from DAF to A Guy Called Gerald. The DIY spirit behind this project is exactly right for the time.

 

9. Vive la fête: La Vision

138804_origBelgium’s number one party band, Vive la fête went all Vicious Pink for this sultry but rhythm-infused remix. We made it a Track of the Day, but in truth it is one of the top songs for the year. A bouncy synth line, laid in by remixer Pantser Fabriek, gives it a minimal wave feel, but the vocals of model Els Pynoo take it over the top. More of this for 2014, please.

 

 

 

10. Machinista: Pushing the Angels Astray

machinista_picture3The duo of Richard Flow (ex-Vision Talk) and John Lindqwister (ex-Cat Rapes Dog) have conjured up a number of high-quality songs in their short time together, and with Pushing the Angels Astray they have established their place among the most exciting new acts of 2013. Their performance at Electronic Summer was one of the highlights of the festival, and with their signing to Juggernaut in the UK, we’ll be seeing a lot more of them next year.

 

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Prepared to Energise: William Orbit

by coldwarnightlife
written by coldwarnightlife

William Orbit
LEAF 2013, London
10 November 2013

In his next life, William Orbit is going to be a university professor. A particularly English kind of genius, he appears on stage with course notes that he doesn’t read and muses about the relationship between notation and music at the end of the universe. Along the way, he shows off a drum machine that is actually a machine that plays drums, explains the formal structure of pop hits, tells the history of his work with Malcolm McLaren and Madonna, and shares videos of Soviet trains crashing. An engaging and charmingly self-deprecating speaker, students will love him. A tweed blazer with elbow patches is all that stands between him and tenure at a top college.

Well, that and Britney Spears. As one of the UK’s leading producers, Orbit is in demand among the upper tiers of commercial pop music as a songwriter, studio fixer and remixer. He wouldn’t say this himself, but there is a strong argument that he rescued Madonna’s career with her Ray of Light album. Britney’s comeback needed some oomph, as well, so he recently found himself Stateside working on her next single, Alien. The regularity of such assignments will make it difficult to teach normal classes, and he’s given up drinking, so the quadrangle of an appropriately prestigious university will have to wait for another day.

Orbit’s appearance at the London Electronic Arts Festival was billed as a show, rather than a seminar, but it moved between both ends of that spectrum like the needle on a VU meter. Orbit came to the stage with Torch Song and Bassomatic songs, reaching back more than two decades to his early club hits. In the course of the evening, he shared a remix of Falling Free made for Madonna (revealed as one of his favourite tracks), Purdy from his My Oracle Lives Uptown album and snippets from the next Strange Cargo effort (expected in the New Year). They are all distinctively Orbit-treated tracks, impressed with sublime style. Although he makes a living sharing his creativity with household-name artists, Orbit’s output is often on the alternative or experimental side – like Brian Eno without his oblique strategy cards.

Eno certainly would have appreciated Orbit’s demonstration of a new toy, the Gogobot: a robotic machine that played rhythm on a traditional drum set with added percussion. While Torch Song collaborator Rico Conning supervised the machinery [Editor’s note: Conning is also its inventor], Orbit used it to accompany sounds issuing from his laptop. As Orbit confessed to a love for steam power, as part of a diversion into the influence of digits (fingers) on counting systems, it is perhaps a matter of time before he develops a steam-punk version.rico

Orbit’s manner is entertaining and informative. Perhaps there is a market for spoken-word shows with audience questions for record producers – as Kevin Smith has done on the back of his successful films and podcasts. If so, then it would be easier for Professor Orbit to schedule lectures between pop hits and Youtube experiments than to squeeze the music into end of term breaks.

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At Home with Page, Sweden’s Original Synthers

by coldwarnightlife
written by coldwarnightlife

To viewers of Nordic Noir detective stories, the south of Sweden is a place occupied by disillusioned and lonely policemen, living in houses filled with wooden furniture, surrounded by endless fields of yellow rapeseed. To listeners of Swedish alternative music, it is a region brimming with creative artists, carrying forward the spirit of early European synthesizer bands like Kraftwerk, The Human League and Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark; a place where the flow of electricity from the country’s power-stations keeps analogue keyboards and drum machines humming. Now that a British audience has embraced Wallander on television, through the original Swedish films, surely the time has also come to discover that Skåne’s finest songwriters and musicians don’t just live in the collective shadow of Agnetha, Benny, Björn and Anni-Frid.

page - back in the dayTake Page, the original Swedish synthpop act. Founded in the suburbs of Malmö in 1980, Page were inspired to take up keyboards by Silicon Teens, the alter-ego of Mute Records’ founder, Daniel Miller. The back-story is that, before he discovered Depeche Mode, Miller had dreamed of a teenaged pop group based entirely around the synthesizers that were starting to become more compact and affordable at the end of the 1970s. He set out his vision through a series of singles and an album of rock standards re-conceived using analogue synths, which were attributed to a fictitious quartet of youthful musicians. When these records reached Sweden, Miller’s idea was turned into reality by 18-year old skateboarder Eddie Bengtsson, who was inspired to sell his drum set and buy two Korg synthesizers: one for himself and one for 15-year old Marina Schiptjenko, a classically-trained pianist who had fallen in love with electronic music when she saw Gary Numan playing on Swedish television. Together, Bengtsson and Schiptjenko created a new template for electronic pop, and Page became the house band for a growing audience of dedicated syntare (synthers).

Page’s first recording was the single for which they are best known within Sweden. Dansande man (Dancing Man) was written by Bengtsson and Anders Eliasson, who had joined the band shortly after it was founded. Released on the band’s own label in 1983, the record featured a distinctive hook, which was impressed with the feeling of Slavic folk music. Up-tempo and catchy, Dansande Man caught the attention of the Swedish media as a home-grown version of the synthpop wave then being led by Depeche Mode and Yazoo. Sung entirely in Swedish and released in a limited edition with quaintly hand-painted artwork, the record didn’t reach a wide public outside of Scandinavia, initially, but it has become a synthpop classic for the Minimal Wave generation. If you can find a copy for sale, it won’t be cheap: rare Page records are held onto tightly by collectors.

page2010

The departure of Eliasson for other projects reduced Page to the original duo of Bengtsson and Schiptjenko. Page continued as a live act, frequently appearing on-stage at the Stadt Hamburg venue in Malmö, which was the regional ground-zero for synth music and culture. Because the club lacked a liquor licence, teens were able to attend Page shows, which meant that the growing and youthful base of Swedish synthpop fans had a band to call their own. Even if Page would find commercial success at the level of Depeche Mode or the Pet Shop Boys elusive, within Sweden they shared much of the same audience – and are as highly regarded by many.

After Dansande man, the band released three singles on the Accelerating Blue Fish label. These were collected and updated for their first album, the eponymous Page, together with new tracks and a previously unreleased demo. Put out by Energy Rekords in 1991, Page represents a decade’s work, showing off the rapid and skilful development of the band’s songwriting. Although Eliasson’s legacy is also present, through Dansande man and the delightful Hus av glas (House of Glass), the album is really a showcase for Bengtsson’s pop sensibility. With strong tracks like Mia och Tom (Mia and Tom) and En dag på zoo (A Day at the Zoo), Page were firmly established in the premier league of Scandinavian synthpop. However, by the time the album came out, a credible songbook was no guarantee of commercial success. Without radio support or video play on MTV, Page wasn’t going to be able to compete with U2 and Genesis in the charts. For the band’s syntare fan-base, however, the release of a full album, collecting their favourite songs, was a major event.

Critics greeted the album warmly. Backlash magazine gave it a 4/5 rating, noting:

The style of music is easily danceable synth pop which has its roots in the beginning of the 80s. It’s hard to find any comparators, because Page’s music is its own. Moreover, Eddie Bengtsson sings in Swedish, which is not very common among the Swedish synth bands. He doesn’t just sing well; he also writes great lyrics.

Writing in Zero Magazine, Alexander Elofsson later recalled seeing the release celebrated on home turf:

Stadt Hamburg was totally packed on the evening of the show, and the atmosphere was boiling when Page stood behind their synths and gave one of the most highly-acclaimed concerts in Stadt Hamburg’s history. […] Page were kings of the Skåne synth scene.

They might have been electronic royalty, but Page didn’t rest on their laurels. It took another three years to put the follow-up album together, but Hallå!  (Hey!) was a step change from Page in both the quality and consistency of production. With songs like Fredag för dig (Friday for You) and Nr:12 (Number 12), the band showed that it could keep ahead of the pack stylistically, while maintaining its integrity.

The lead track on the album, Bilmusik (Car Music), was released as a CD-single, and it quickly found a groove with Swedish radio. The single paired the album recording with a dub version, as well as a new dance track called Acid Skate. The latter married the bubbling basslines of acid house to samples from a documentary on skateboarding, which had enjoyed a revival in the 1990s. Bengtsson’s love for boarding is no secret: when he lifts his arms during concerts, he reveals a tattoo showing the evolution of man from ape into a free-style skater. However, he is less committed to making what in America is now known as “electronic dance music,” seeing it as “too easy” and too far removed from the pop aesthetic that interests him. Acid Skate therefore remains a lonely example of 1990s dance music’s influence on Bengtsson’s output.

That’s not to say that the dancefloor wasn’t in Page’s sights. The next proper album, Glad (Happy), followed quickly (by Page standards) in 1995. The opening, electrifying chords of Står i din väg (Stand in Your Way) signalled that, despite the title, the band wasn’t standing still – and neither would the feet of its listeners. Songs like Tiden går (Time Flies) and Jag väntar (I’m Waiting) were dazzling pop tracks, flecked with glam and space disco influences. A close listening to Jag väntar reveals phrasing that owes a debt to the Sex Pistols, put through a set of Korg and Yamaha filters. There just wasn’t (and, arguably, still isn’t) another band making pop music that is so sophisticated in its stylings.

A creative triumph but commercial disappointment, Glad marked a fork in the road for Page. Schiptjenko left to join the philosopher (and future Swedish Idol judge) Alexander Bard in his new band, Vacuum, while Bengtsson’s attention also turned to other projects.

Vacuum was born for radio play, and the group achieved rapid success. Their first single, I Breathe, was released at the end of 1996 and reached number 2 in the Swedish charts within weeks. The album that followed climbed into the Top 20, with Europe-wide airplay and tour dates, including several former Soviet republics. For Schiptjenko, a modest “syntare från Malmö” (“synther from Malmö”) whose relatives emigrated from Ukraine to Sweden after the Second World War, the experience must have been other-worldly. Bard was playing by different rules than the synthpop fans that she had grown up with musically: Schiptjenko describes his style of writing as collaborative but with “hyper-commercial” ambitions.

When Bard started a new band, Bodies Without Organs, in 2003, Schiptjenko was invited on-board. Backed by a major label from the beginning, BWO was wildly popular by Swedish and European standards, reaching pole position in the charts with the single, Temple of Love. The style was amped-up commercial pop, treading ground previously broken by other Scandinavian acts, like Aqua and Dr Alban, but with a knowing wink and a heavy dose of humour. The band achieved heady success, but its members kept their feet on the ground: while Bard had his day job as an academic, Schiptjenko was already established as a dealer of contemporary art through the gallery she owns in Stockholm with Ciléne Andréhn. At the peak of BWO’s popularity, when they narrowly missed out on representing Sweden at the Eurovision Song Contest, she recalls overwhelmed fans coming into the gallery to seek her autograph (“It was cute!” says Schiptjenko).

Meanwhile, back in Skåne, Bengtsson was continuing to build on his reputation as a first-rate songwriter, juggling music with his day job as a teacher. While still in Page, he had started a side project, called Sista Mannen på Jorden (The Last Man on Earth), initially with collaborator Mats Wiberg. The name was taken from the Swedish translation of I Am Legend, the post-apocalyptic novel from Richard Matheson, and its songs reflected Bengtsson’s interest in science-fiction themes. Between 1998 and 2007, SMPJ released four albums of advanced pop music, with futuristic sounds teased from Bengtsson’s collection of analogue synthesizers. While the influences of Giorgio Moroder and Space can be happily detected in many songs, the music of SMPJ is strikingly original and often moving. Bengtsson is creatively fearless: he comfortably sings in a higher register, enhancing the emotional vulnerability expressed in his lyrics, which touch on themes of love and longing; and there aren’t many pop artists who would set the first song of their first release in waltz time with a theremin backing, as he did for En blå planet (A Blue Planet) on Först i rymden (First in Space).

Another channel for Bengtsson’s output was S.P.O.C.K, a science-fiction themed party band that had been put together in 1988 for a friend’s birthday celebration. The original plan had been only to write some songs to be enjoyed by friends, but the concept was hugely popular in the local scene. Live dates and foreign tours followed, with Alexander Hoffman on voal duty. Bengtsson’s involvement was originally limited to writing songs for the band, but by 1993 he had joined the group as “Captain Eddie B. Kirk” and took part in live shows. S.P.O.C.K’s touring schedule became more demanding, and in 1997 Bengtsson gave up his place on stage in order to spend time with his young family and focus on both Page and SMPJ.

In 2004, Bengtsson launched another project, This Fish Needs a Bike. Musically, it was consistent with the SMPJ line of albums, with the difference that the lyrics were in English for an international audience. One popular SMPJ song, Luft (Air), was rewritten, and songs like Putting My Suit On were unmistakably in the SMPJ style. After one album, From A to B, This Fish Needs a Bike ceased trading, and in 2007 Bengtsson returned to SMPJ for Tredje våningen (Third Floor). With a number of different balls in the air at any one time, how did he know whether a new song belonged to one project or another? Bengtsson explains:

It was always hard to know what I was doing – is this a Page song or a Sista Mannen song? Is this a S.P.O.C.K song? But I really tried, every time I was going to do a song – like, with Sista Mannen, I was trying to get into a certain mood for that. When I was doing a Page song, I was trying to get into a certain mood for that. Just to try to make some order for what was what. Sometimes it was hard, but I think, when I look back, that I managed it. If it was Sista Mannen, I tried to do a more spacey sound and the lyrics were about space, but also the style of the sound of the music was more dreamy and space-ish. For Page, it was more pop with a bit of punk and rock influence. And with S.P.O.C.K, there were more Euro and more Star Trek influences.

There is a reasonable case for comparing Bengtsson to Vince Clarke, who had launched Depeche Mode, made two albums with Yazoo and attempted a number of projects, before settling into a long-term relationship with Erasure. Like Clarke, Bengtsson has an instinctive ear for a pop song, as well as the technical skills to draw sounds from analogue circuits with emotional qualities of their own. Their careers in music began at approximately the same time, and they have each spent more than thirty years writing danceable pop without compromising to chase the trends of the day. Both are in demand as remixers – indeed, both have produced mixes for Robert Marlow’s forthcoming remix album – and are known for working alone in their studios to shape electricity into distinctive and catchy rhythms and melodies. Further comparison is perhaps unfair to both artists, because they have followed their own trajectories, but Sweden has not produced another songwriter or musician who comes as close to the influential role played by Clarke in British electronic music.

This much was recognised when, in 2010, designer Johan Wejedel released Tiden går – En hylnning till Page (Time Flies – A Tribute to Page). To the surprise of a humble Bengtsson, a cross-section of Swedish electronic artists recorded enough covers of their favourite Page songs to fill two CDs. Contributors included Candide, PA Tronic, Vision Talk, Norator, New Modern Angels and Diskodiktator. Bengtsson had previously made his own covers for tribute albums, but those were versions of songs by Depeche Mode and OMD – bands whose influence on the synthpop scene was universally acknowledged. With the tribute album, artists wanted to show their love and respect for Page’s music and the band’s place beside those internationally-known bands for the Swedish scene. Maybe Page wasn’t going to crash the file-sharing networks, but it continued to reach and touch music lovers and creators in disproportion to its performance in the charts.

The departure of Schiptjenko had not meant the end for Page. In 1996, Bengtsson made the first album without Schiptjenko, bringing in a drummer and another keyboard player to round out the band. Hur så? (How So? or How’s That?) came out only a year after Glad, but with a shift in its sonic structure that disoriented the public. While the integrity of his songs was firmly maintained, Bengtsson started to introduce fuzzy feedback sounds that replicated the tones of electric guitars. A follow-up, 1998’s Helt nära (So Close), moved even further along that path. Bengtsson explains that the listening public didn’t know what to make of the shift, even though mixing synths and guitars was by then a common pop practice:

I feel like, on those two albums without Marina, I was trying to do something different. I was trying to make more guitar-influenced music, but using only electronics. On the first of those albums, we used no guitars, but people thought it was guitar. So, for the album after that, I thought I might as well use guitars in the music, too. But, for that album, those who liked synthesizers said, “Too much guitar!” The other audience, which liked pop music, said, “Too much synthesizer!” We didn’t reach anyone, really, which was very, very sad because it was good music. It feels like everybody can mix guitars – look at Depeche Mode and other bands – but when we do it, it is very, very naughty, and that is a shame.

The situation was essentially the reverse of Neil Young’s experience with Trans. While the Canadian axe hero had bravely experimented with synthesizers, a large part of his existing fan base was implacably hostile, as they associated synths with sequenced disco music. On the other side, followers of Kraftwerk and Jarre didn’t know what to make of Young’s adoption of their favourite tools.

While there wasn’t a Dylanesque “Judas!” moment, Bengtsson had underestimated the wall separating the subcultures of syntare and hårdrockare (hard rockers). Though there was never any danger of Page turning into Rush or Cheap Trick, neither side was ready for Page to broaden its sonic palette so radically. In fact, both Hur så? and Helt nära contain exceptionally strong songs – like Trans, they are just waiting for their audience, and will in due course be recognised for their exceptional content.

The experience with those two albums convinced Bengtsson to focus on his other projects. Page went quiet, until a live performance at the Swedish Alternative Music Awards in 2000 reunited Bengtsson, Schiptjenko and Eliasson. Intended as a farewell wave to their fans, the show was recorded and issued as a limited-edition CD. With a final “Cha, cha, cha!” and the cheers of dedicated syntare filling their ears, Page had left the stage for good.

Or so the story would have ended, had Schiptjenko not looked at the calendar in 2010 and felt the pull of her roots. BWO was coming to an end. It had been fifteen years since she worked together with Bengtsson, and thirty since two teens in a suburb of Malmö plugged in a pair of Korgs and learned to make music using oscillators and keyboards. Wasn’t it time to make another album? Bengtsson happened to have one in him, and the result was a collection of grown-up pop, made without any pretences or pressure.

Nu (Now) was unashamedly electronic, and this time the album didn’t fall between two cultural stools. The synth scene paid attention again, and TV appearances and live dates followed. Radio, however, struggled to find a place for Nu between the latest Lady Gaga and Coldplay songs, despite the album climbing its way into the Top 40. Schiptjenko explains that this was not a new challenge:

We had a little peak in Sweden in the 90s with some radio hits, but it’s never been super-big. We had always been very popular on the alternative scene, and always among the fans, but we’ve never been a band played a lot on Swedish radio.

It doesn’t bother her a great deal:

I think the reason we are loved so much by the scene is that we were among the first, and we have stayed true to our roots, even if we have developed. We sing in Swedish, we have a certain sound. A big part of it is nostalgia. We created the scene, in a way. We were the first. The syntare and hårdrockare are really loyal to their bands. I also think that the fact that we are not played on Swedish radio is down to two things: it is a little bit prejudice – they don’t really listen – and I also think it is our age. I know for a fact, because I have been talking to those who decide what is going to be played, we are too old. We are not new. They want to find the young audience all the time.

hemma - cover

In September 2013, Page are releasing a new album, called Hemma (At Home). If anything, the sound is more mature than Nu, with songs achieving yet another level of development from the days of Glad. Teasers that have been released on the group’s Facebook page reveal pronounced glam-rock stomping – a trend that began with Page’s cover of Slade’s Coz I Love You for The Seventies Revisited, a charity compilation that came out last year, and continued with the “Glamtronica” remix prepared by Bengtsson of a new Robert Marlow song. New promotional pictures show the duo posed next to a classic synthesizer in an early-20th century drawing room – a synthesis of the modern and the vintage. Bengtsson describes Hemma in these terms:

I think it is even more mature [than Nu], because I am maturing as an individual and a person, so the music is doing that, too – especially the lyrics. The music is actually the kind of electronic music I like. I can’t really say that I like electronic music, because electronic music is such a big genre, and my interest in electronic music is so very, very small. That small piece, that small bit, that’s like what I am doing. I am doing what I like, really, so there is no need for me to take a different direction. I am doing just exactly what I like. Electronic pop music stuff – that is what I like.

Hemma doesn’t completely shy away from the sounds of previous albums, but the guitars have been put back in their cases. Bengtsson again:

This album is purely electronic – like Nu, which was purely electronic, too. I tried to make it even more electronic and some of the songs are very electronic-sounding. Some of the songs are more guitar feeling, because I like that punk attitude and trying to make synthesizers sound like guitars – the arrangement of it. Instead of using Popcorn-ish sounds, I tried to do more grungy electronic sounds that sound like guitars. The way you play a guitar – I try to do that on synthesizers. I think it is very, very funny to do that, really, and nice. There are songs that sound like that, and songs that sound more like Giorgio Moroder – sequencer-oriented songs. All the songs seem to fit together in a way. They really make a whole body.

Will this be the time that Swedish radio finally grasps that they are sitting on a rich vein of home-grown pop music, just waiting for them to mine? Schiptjenko is stoic:

You never know – with this material, perhaps it will come through on Swedish radio, but I don’t think so. We do it for the love of the music and the scene, and it is so much fun, but it is not our main career.

A full tour is not planned, but a video is in the works and live dates are being lined up, starting with a performance at Gothenburg’s Electronic Summer festival. Schiptjenko will also be there with her “pet project”, an “electro-crooner” act called Julian & Marina, which is planning to release its own album shortly. Bengtsson is busy preparing another compilation of cover songs – this time, with a focus on punk rock done in an electronic style – together with artists from the south of Sweden. Page might not be the main career of its members, but only because their creative work is so broad and takes so many forms. It is a wonder that they are ever hemma at all!

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