Tag Archives: 1983

432. everglades

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“The Blackouts didn’t last very long before breaking up and getting more or less absorbed by Ministry – the rhythm section anyway, Paul Barker and Bill Rieflin, and just in time to propel that outfit to world pummeling fame and/or notoriety. And it’s all there in Everglades, the twelve minute plus A-side of their Lost Souls Club EP, the only record of theirs I ever heard. And honestly, I don’t think I ever made it to the B-side more than once. Because once the prolonged and haunted grooving of Everglades hooked me, there was no going anywhere else. Just so much to explore.” (Philip Random)

443. this is the day

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“It’s all there in the first couple of lines of This is the Day, the story of my life, summer 1983: Well you didn’t wake up this morning ’cause you didn’t go to bed – You were watching the whites of your eyes turn red. Maybe 5AM, looking myself in the mirror after way too many mixed up hours of mixed up partying, imbibing, whatever. The song spoke directly to me, Matt Johnson and his burning blue soul joining me in my young adult mixed up pain and ecstasy, telling me I wasn’t alone, wherever the hell I was. Melody was pretty much perfect, too. The whole album really.” (Philip Random)

466. the back of love

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“As the story goes, ECHO was a drum machine and the Bunnymen were a few guys from Liverpool that hung around with it, made weird, angular, dark, psychedelic music. Eventually they got a real drummer, but they stuck with the weird, angular, dark, psychedelic stuff, even as they edged into the popular realm (in Britain anyway). Not unlike early U2, except there was no Jesus in sight. As for The Back of Love, well it just rocks in a particularly sharp sort of way. No idea what it’s about, but something tells me it’s more about confusion and tearing apart than sweetness.” (Philip Random)

EchoBunnymen-1983-live

528. kiss off

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If you were halfway cool in 1983, you were hip to the Violent Femmes first album. None of the commercial radio stations were playing it, but you’d long ago given up on them anyway — cesspools of bad sound, populated by liars. Unlike the Femmes who couldn’t not be fresh, horny, mad, honest – sometimes annoyingly so. But not with Kiss Off. Kiss Off hit it all just right, particularly the part where he counts them all down, his ten points of rage, frustration, spite, EVERYTHING. A punk that required no amplifiers, that could be delivered from a street corner, which is how the band got discovered in the first place.

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534. never never

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“When power pop (to the point of punk) heroes the Undertones broke up in 1983, their absolute one of a kind singer Feargal Sharkey next showed up doing something pretty much completely different with the Assembly. Which we assumed was a new band, but it was really just him and Vince Clarke, recently ex of Yaz (or perhaps Yazoo). In fact, the only thing I ever heard from them was the one song, which makes Never Never (and the Assembly in general) more or less pop perfect. Talk about not overstaying your welcome.” (Philip Random)

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536. the need

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Mysterious live performance from somewhere in Europe, 1983. Chris + Cosey (late of Throbbing Gristle) exploring strange sonic regions via the nebulously labelled CTI – European Rendezvous album. This was the kind of thing you’d record off the radio back in the day, late night weirdness, the DJ never telling you who it was. Maybe a decade later, you’d finally figure it out.

Chris+Cosey-1983