AK-47 – Stop! Dance! (Output Records single, 1981)

Posted on January 17, 2015 by 429harrowroad

output records | opr202 | 1981

AK-47 was the work of Simon Leonard; ‘Stop! Dance!’ was released a year before Leonard met David Baker, his future musical accomplice in I Start Counting, Fortran 5 and Komputer, at Middlesex University, and two years after his solitary 7″ with File Under Pop on Rough Trade.

Unlike the industrial noise claustrophobia of FUP’s ‘Heathrow’, ‘Stop! Dance!’ is a bouncy little synthpop track which is very 1981 (in a good way), albeit with a dark edge thanks to the vocodered vocals which seem to be lots of references to AK-47, which, in case a whole generation of computer games and action movies has passed you by, is a gun. Naming your musical alias after a weapon and then delivering fey pop music is just about as contradictory as anything else Leonard has done in his musical career I guess. ‘Stop! Dance!’ is all simple, persistent drum patterns, stalking single-key basslines and bubbling sounds and sweeps blended in over the top, while a chord change brings in a brief, wobbly and quite pleasant melody.

‘Autobiography’, the first of two tracks on the B-side, is a short instrumental featuring a sawing synth sound, tick-tock beat, some Kraftwerk-esque vocal loops, reedy melodies and Leonard intoning a brief couplet about waking up and getting on a freight train, as if the autobiographical element was some deep southern porch blues number. ‘Hilversum AO’, another instrumental, has a euphoric quality, even if there are a few dud notes in among its elegiac melodies.

There’s nothing exceptionally polished about these three tracks, unlike the comparatively gleaming work Daniel Miller and Depeche Mode would put out the same year on Speak & Spell; like ‘Heathrow’ it retains a firmly experimental dimension, only here that edge is delivered through synths rather than grainy field recordings. Quite aside from its collector status among I Start Counting / Fortran 5 / Komputer fans, this is an example of an alternative electropop and bagging a copy on 7″ would have set you back near enough GBP50.00 at the time this was first uploaded.

First published 2011; re-edited 2015.

Barry Adamson, Anita Lane & The Thought System Of Love – These Boots Were Made For Walking (Mute Records single, 1991)

Posted on January 10, 2015 by 429harrowroad

mute records | mute119 | 1991

This version of Lee Hazlewood’s hit – made famous by Nancy Sinatra – is an absolute stone cold classic, as they may have said in the 1970s. On Terry Donovan’s 7″ mix, those immediately-recognisable descending bass notes that herald the original are here complimented by piano and a deep dub-inflected hip hop beat. Barry Adamson adds a string section and a funk guitar where the Sinatra version quickened the pace with a rather cheesy horn section. Anita Lane‘s vocal is typically excellent, archly naïve and seductive all at once, somehow colouring the sparse arrangement perfectly.

On the other remix front, Renegade Soundwave departee Karl Bonnie‘s ‘Bonnie Floats On Airwair’ mix – aided superbly by Holger Hiller with additional noises from then-Orb member and onetime Fortran 5 accomplice Kris ‘Thrash’ Weston – ratchets up the bass levels and adds some pulsating electro percussion, pushing this into heavy digital dub territory, with all the aplomb expected from the assembled trio. The mix also makes full use of some sterling slide guitar work from ex-Birthday Party man Rowland S. Howard. John Waddell adds all manner of new elements – a fragile synth melody and soulful sax – and in so doing turns the track into a blissed out groove somewhat reminiscent of The Beloved, recalling the chilled-out Balearic vibe of the time.

Adamson’s own ‘Go Johnny’ blends two strands of his distinctive style – spiralling orchestration and jazzy bop laced through with samples and abrasive noises. The track kicks off with some meditative organ lines before diving headlong into a Bernard Herrmann-esque chase theme with a beat that doesn’t know if it’s bop or rockers reggae. Both ‘Go Johnny’ and the original cover of ‘These Boots…’ feature on the celebrated Fine Line soundtrack to Delusion.

First published 2004; re-edited 2015.

Barry Adamson – Black Amour (Mute Records single, 2002)

Posted on December 29, 2014 by 429harrowroad

mute records | mute223 | 19/08/2002

If Marvin Gaye was still alive and collaborating with Massive Attack, this dark and sensual track could well be the outcome. ‘The deeper you go, the funkier it gets’ intones a honey-throated Barry Adamson, over a fantastically dark soul backdrop which deploys some extremely stirring strings and a bunch of What’s Going On-style female vocal harmonies.

Adamson’s own ‘Trojan Extended Pleasure’ remix (credited to The Pimp Floyd just to increase the Carry On vibe) kicks out the soul groove in favour of a dub-style makeover, seeing elements faded in and out sharply, echoes and all manner of King Tubby homages riding over a thick and filthy reggae beat. CD B-side ‘First Light’ is a fast-paced rock meets jazz surprise – fuzzy guitars, saxophone and horns that wouldn’t have been out of place on a Bruce Forsyth Saturday evening show theme. It’s a joyous, uplifting track featuring a spoken word sample from The Foundation For Inner Peace and Foundation for a Course in Miracles.

First published 2003 / re-edited 2014.

Barry Adamson – Whispering Streets (Mute Records single, 2002)

Posted on December 29, 2014 by 429harrowroad

mute records | mute283 | 04/11/2002

Oddly enough, this was the first thing I ever bought from eBay. What’s more, just like I always used to at record fairs, I paid well over the odds. Still, despite feeling out of pocket, I have to say it was well worth it.

Isolated from their position within an album, Barry Adamson‘s early singles felt a bit lost. Not so with this track, which works well on its own despite being an integral part of The King Of Nothing Hill‘s narrative. It’s sleazy, funky in a maudlin seventies soundtrack stylee, features a stunning Cypress Hill sample and guitars which could have been culled from Portishead’s Dummy. Here Adamson is a unwilling assassin driven to kill by love, deploying some decent word-play on the chorus – ‘five bullets, five names / and a contract worth five hundred grand‘. With some soaring strings and chilling organ lines from Adamson collaborator stalwart Nick Plytas, this is among Adamson’s most atmospheric work, while his vocal was his most assured to date.

Mixes come from AIM, who strip out some of the soul and atmosphere to create a spindly groove, and Funkstörung. The latter is a electronic cut-up, deploying small vocal snippets over a quirky beat; it also teatures an organ groove reminiscent of Stevie Wonder’s ‘Superstition’.

First published 2003; re-edited 2014.

Barry Adamson – What It Means (Mute Records single, 1998)

Posted on December 20, 2014 by 429harrowroad

mute records | mute219 | 10/08/1998

‘What It Means’ is a perfect Barry Adamson track, and certainly one of the most complete of his tracks to have been released in the single format. It’s quite a thrilling ride, a suite of electronically-enhanced high-speed verses over which Adamson delivers a harsh and harmonious vocal, backed by springy synth noises and a bold, stalking bassline. The vibe is cast in a jazz mould, and on the chorus the track opens out into a horn and organ groove blessed by a great drum section from Andrew Crisp, with some ebulliant, Andy Williams crooning by Barry.

Skylab exploit the jazzy vibe and create a loose arrangement across their two mixes. They break the track apart to create what could pass as a live improv jam, introducing Adamson’s vocal on their second, amusingly-titled ‘Skylab A Smokin’ Japanese We’re Chicken in Moss Side’ mix. Renegade Soundwave survivor Danny Briottet returns to the fold to team up with stalwart Mute producer Paul ‘PK’ Kendall on his ‘Subsonic Legacy Master’ mix. A jazzy two-step variant, Briottet adds some dub echoes and a killer sub-bassline to create a superb electro-dub counterweight to the bebop sounds elsewhere on the disc.

First published 2004; re-edited 2014

Olivia Louvel – Bats (If You Cross The Line SFT Remix) (CatWerk single, 2014)

Posted on September 11, 2014 by 429harrowroad

Beauty Sleep is the new album from Olivia Louvel, representing a beguiling set of song-based tracks that showcase the distinctive soundworld she resides in.

One of the most fragile tracks on the album is ‘Bats’ which is here given a very different reading by Simon Fisher Turner. Listen to SFT’s remix at Soundcloud.

‘Beauty asleep’ is available from Olivia’s Bandcamp page and is released in a special DVD-sized case. The album also features ‘In My Shed’ which takes a sample from Recoil’s ‘Stone’ as its source. The album was mixed by Paul ‘PK’ Kendall.

My review of Beauty Sleep will appear in the next issue of Electronic Sound.

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Documentary Evidence

a mute records blog by Mat Smith

Category Archives: Single reviews

Barry Adamson, Anita Lane & The Thought System Of Love – These Boots Were Made For Walking (Mute Records single, 1991)

Barry Adamson – Black Amour (Mute Records single, 2002)

Barry Adamson – Whispering Streets (Mute Records single, 2002)

Barry Adamson – What It Means (Mute Records single, 1998)

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