On this day, 41 ago, John Foxx released his first solo project album Metamatic (Virgin, 18 January 1980), after leaving Ultravox the previous year. Opposite to Utravox' mix of rock and synth-pop, Metamatic became a pure electronic album. Although John Foxx performed ’Touch & Go’ and ’He’s a Liquid’ already with his former band Ultravox, the band was not credited on the Metametic album. Not surprisingly the remaining and continueing members of Ultravox didn’t credit Foxx when they adapted parts of ‘Touch and Go’ for their song ‘Mr.X’ (What’s in a name?) on their next album Vienna.

Foxx used a.o. a Minimoog, an ARP Odyssey synth, an Elka Rhapsody 610 “string machine” and a Roland CR-78 drum machine to produce the album. It was recorded on 8-track and engineered by Gareth Jones.

The album features one of John Foxx' greatest hits ‘Underpass’, which was previously released as the album’s announcing single.

'Metamatic' was named after a mechanical artwork (a painting machine) by Swiss sculptor and artist Jean Tinguely and became a must have album for (electronic) music lovers.

It spent seven weeks in the UK charts, peaking at #18. The album was generally well received by critics and is still cited as his most influential solo release.

The album was re-released on CD several times, amongst them some with bonus tracks (+ 6 in 1993 & + 7 in 2001) and even with a complete bonus CD featuring 15 extra tracks (2007).

In 2014 the original album finally got a vinyl re-released on Record Store Day with a gatefold sleeve featuring some new and rare artwork.

Metamatic (1980 - Original 12" tracklist)

1. Plaza 3:52
2. He's a Liquid 2:59
3. Underpass 3:53
4. Metal Beat 2:59
5. No-One Driving 3:45
6. A New Kind of Man 3:38
7. Blurred Girl 4:16
8. 030 3:15
9. Tidal Wave 4:14
10. Touch and Go 5:33

DISCOGS

Today, 36 years ago, Alien Sex Fiend recorded their live album and VHS video Liquid Head in Tokyo (17/01/1985). Liquid Head In Tokyo was recorded at Tsubaki House, at the end of a sell-out Japanese tour. It consists of selected recordings of both shows the band played that same day.

The VHS video and LP have a different tracklist

A 1997 CD re-issue features 4 bonus tracks, though these are not live recordings but normal and 12" studio versions.

Liquid Head In Tokyo (VHS 1985)

1 RIP
2 Dead & Buried
3 Back To The Egg
4 E.S.T.
5 Crazy
6 Hee Haw
7 Ignore The Machine
8 In God We Trust

Liquid Head In Tokyo (LP 1985)

A1 R.I.P. (Blue Crumb Truck) 3:45
A2 E.S.T. (Trip To The Moon) 5:33
A3 Dead And Burried 5:00
A4 In God We Trust (In Cars You Rust?) 4:27
B1 Back To The Egg 4:47
B2 Attack!!!!!! # 2 5:22
B3 Lips Can't Go 5:19
B4 Wild Women 4:56

DISCOGS

Today, 26 years ago Siouxsie and the Banshees released their eleventh and final studio album in the majestically divine “The Rapture”. This is a erotic-beast created over a year and a half with the Velvet Underground’s John Cale producing and mixing all but three tracks.

This however was not the dark-gothic masterpiece which people thought would close the career of those who forged that very path, instead it contains some of the more lighter elements in The Banshees work.
A natural progression is heard from their acclaimed 1991 offering “Superstition”.
It continues with the same flowing themes, Siouxsie Sioux as the confident, scorned femme-fatale, a chanteuse and not just a punk revolutionary, Sioux moved forward along with the sound built behind her.

From the start and throughout the twelve-track song cycle there is an experimentation, the title track itself is an eleven-minute journey that twists and turns through a haunting atmosphere like a wounded animal.
Along with “The Rapture” another gem to behold is the magnificent and melodic “Stargazer”, a very unnerving though accessible sound breaks through. The pleasures of “Sick Child” and the sublime “The Double Life” make up for any lack of dark joy an often criticism of “The Rapture”.

The last studio hurrah from Siouxsie And The Banshees is definitely worth a revisit, granted it is not cut from the same menacing cloth as “Juju” or “Peepshow”, nonetheless it is a staggeringly beautiful piece of work which shows great passion and depth, displaying Siouxsie Sioux as a singer and not just a screamer.

The Rapture, verse

“Wondering if I dare to say your name
Wondrous thoughts embalmed avow you came
By the crescent disc rising amethyst
How can love remain the same unchanged?
Moonlight plays upon this sunken brow
Midnight ink bleeds wet mercurial clouds
By the crescent disc rising amethyst
Somnambulist unharnessed storms the plow
By the crescent disc rising amethyst
How can love remain the same unchained?”.


The Rapture (Original 1995 Track List)

01. “O Baby”
02. “Tearing Apart”
03. “Stargazer”
04. “Fall from Grace”
05. “Not Forgotten”
06. “Sick Child”
07. “The Lonely One”
08. “Falling Down”
09. “Forever*”
10. “The Rapture”
11. “The Double Life”
12. “Love Out Me”

Peek-a-Boo review

[Kevin Burke]

The Canadian industrial outfit Front Line Assembly have been fearlessly pushing the boundaries of that musical description for more than three decades, exploring all manner of styles and influences since forming as a purely electronic based concern in the mid-80s. Helmed by founder Bill Leeb with long-time cohort Rhys Fulber, the legendary Vancouver based act have just announced the release of a brand new album entitled 'Mechanical Soul' in January 2021. A masterful work from one of the greats of the genre, it can be seen as the zenith of the duo's artistic endeavours together. The album also includes guest appearances by Jean-Luc De Meyer of Front 242 (on 'Barbarians') and Dino Cazares of Fear Factory (on 'Stifle').

MECHANICAL SOUL
1 Purge
2 Glass and Leather
3 Unknown
4 New World
5 Rubber Tube Gag
6 Stifle
7 Alone
8 Barbarians
9 Komm, Stirbt Mit Mir
10 Time Lapse
11 Hatevol (Black Asteroid Mix)

FEATURED INSTRUMENTS (by track)
1 Elektron Analog Rytm mk2
2 Studio Electronics Omega 8
3 Roland Alpha Juno 2
4 Mutable Instruments Shruthi
5 Waldorf Pulse+
6 Noise Engineering Basimilus Iteritas, Ormsby DC7
7 Moog Model 15 reissue
8 Mutable Instruments Clouds
9 Waldorf Q+
10 Doepfer A100
Produced by Bill Leeb and Rhys Fulber
Mastered by Greg Reely
Design and Illustration by Dave McKean

In the last number of years music fans have suffered loss after loss, idols who it seemed would outlive time itself passed into the ether. The rapture of legends was unforgiving to our heroes, the immortal figures such Prince, David Bowie, Chris Cornell, George Michael along with a greater parade of souls left us with their legacy in music.

Only a year ago today it home that another shining talent had succumbed and slipped away unexpectedly.
The soaring passion of Dolores O'Riordan is measured with the uneasy and ripped emotions which heralded her passing. An obvious and true talent such as hers can sometimes bring fourth turmoil as if you knew them personally. When you question why, you may feel this way, the answer is simply through a relatable appreciation of the personal words Dolores sang. Those lines of song let you Inch into her world, creating a connection, for a time it felt that as Dolores would sing the world stopped to listen.

The Cranberries as a band had become a soundtrack to the nineties, singing along to their songs became easy very quickly, even if you were not their biggest fan or even knew who they were. Looking at the impact of their career early on, a picture builds of both the bands importance and the inspired vision of O’Riordan.
The Cranberries debut album in 1993; 'Everybody Else Is Doing It, So Why Can't We', is a phenomenal work of cleverly constructed songs with harmonious-crescendos and of course O'Riordans athletic vocal, rich and perfectly delivered with an effortless dramatic tension. The two single releases 'Linger' and 'Dreams' are still radio staples twenty-six-years after their release.

A realization quickly followed of the importance of Dolores and The Cranberries especially here in Ireland, a band which had released lush, lovelorn songs in the past were about to turn the critics inside out with their follow up album, the expectation of more of the same was blissfully torn apart with the 1994 release 'No Need To Argue'.
This album had a darker theme, an almost 'night' to the previous albums 'day', preceded by the radio unfriendly but steady grunge explosion that is 'Zombie'.
Heavily distorted guitars with which O'Riordan could sing over, at times turning into the sound of pure, emotional pain.

To those expecting another tune such as 'linger’ were more surprised than disappointed, which shows the character strength within O'Riordan and the band to follow their heart as a musical compass and not what is wished of them by fans, record companies and the FM-radio of the day.
This highlights perfectly the importance of the band, to survive such a change in direction, in saying that the album 'No Need To Argue' went on to sell in excess of seventeen-million copies, going number one in five countries. The case in point was increasing the volume increased the sales and popularity, what may have been viewed at the time as being commercial suicide led to wider acceptance.
Risks such as this are rarely taken in music, and voices such as that of Dolores O'Riordan are few and far between,and sadly missed.

“Suddenly something has happened to me
As I was having my cup of tea
Suddenly I was feeling depressed
I was utterly and totally stressed
Do you know you made me cry? Whoa oh oh
Do you know you made me die?
And the thing that gets to me
Is you'll never really see
And the thing that freaks me out
Is I'll always be in doubt”

Animal Instinct - The Cranberries

[Kevin Burke]