Transvolta - Disco Computer 12"

Rare electronic cosmic disco from 1979 produced by one third of Telex. Transvolta's Disco Computer features a funny and very cool combination of synthesized bass and high-concept vocoder vocals.

This is a recent bootleg facsimile re-release. The original is currently changing hands for around £50.

Vinyl rip at 320 Kbps.

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Visage - The Anvil

As promised, here's the original full length second album from Visage, circa 1982. This is the original vinyl edition with textured cover and poster, photographs of which have been included in the archive.

From Wikipedia:

This album sparked a brief controversy at the time of its release for being named after New York's infamous gay club.

The only musician of the first album line-up that didn't participate in this album's recording was John McGeoch. McGeoch commented in an interview: "One time I was in Spain [touring with Siouxsie and the Banshees] at the same time as Visage were recording the second album in London. Rusty wanted me to put a guitar solo on something or other but I only had one day off and there was no way that I could fly home on my one day off. Rusty is not a man to be put off by such things and he was actually trying to put together a satellite linkup from Madrid to London for this one guitar part. Not surprisingly it didn't come off but I was sorry not to have been as involved on The Anvil as I had been on the first album".

The Anvil was also the last Visage project to feature Ultravox frontman Midge Ure who left the band after its release.

The original vinyl release of The Anvil came in an embossed/textured sleeve (considered as deluxe packaging for the time), and a limited number of copies came with a free poster of Steve Strange posing in front of a hotel with a number of models (the same models can be seen on the cover of the single The Damned Don't Cry).

The album saw a re-release on the CD format in 1997 with bonus tracks, though they are tracks from the 1980/1 Visage era and not that of The Anvil. For a long time, this was the only official CD version and was extremely rare.

'The Anvil' was re-released on CD again on 17 March 2008, containing more bonus tracks and detailed liner notes.

I'ts a bit patchy, but there are some great tracks on here. "The Horseman", in particular is sounding great to this pair of ears, although it's a more guitar-y sound than that which was their signature. Midge's presence can be felt heavily on that one. Can it really be time to reappraise "Vienna" as well?

A couple of tracks are sequenced together on side one, so I haven't split them in the edit. As (super)nature intended.

Vinyl rip at 320 Kbps.

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Nelson - I Say You Can't Stop/Dammerung 7"

Excellent double A side 7" from 2008 from French art rockers, Nelson, who claim to sound like a mixture of Joy Division, The Rapture, and Animal Collective. Dunno about that, but there's a couple of great songs right here.

The tracks featured on the AA sided single are "I Say You Can't Stop" and "Dammerung", the latter of which was inspired by a German love poem written in the Battlefield trenches of the First World War.

Vinyl rip at 320 Kbps.

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Say What You Want Promo 12"

The name of the band whose single this actually is, is hidden from sight on this promo club 12" like a dirty little secret. So, accepting for the fact that you wouldn't normally find anything by that band up on here, let's consider the work of the remixers.

Rae & Christian give it some smoooooth downtempo beatment and while taking a lot of the track away to make much more space, they don't really add much to the original except for some super cliched (at this distance) scratching and cutting.

Much, much better, and the sole reason why I'm posting this is the fucking brilliant Andy Votel mix which is a totally deconstructed dust 'n' crackle take on the track. Vocals are submerged under water, a distant car alarm is triggered, some acoustic riffing is obliterated by a pitched-up air raid siren as the beat reemerges and then drops out. Everything stops then starts again as things proceed cautiously to a wonderful oscilloscope fade out. And then silence.

Vinyl rip at 320 Kbps.

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Burning Sensations - Belly Of The Whale 7"

Burning Sensations came out of Los Angeles in the early 80's and were a brief success (mainly for this single) on the fledgeling MTV in the USA.

According to Wikipedia, the group is best known for "Belly of the Whale", and for covering the Jonathan Richman song "Pablo Picasso", which was used in Alex Cox's cult classic, "Repo Man".

This is a great track in the Eighties stylee, which might spark some happy memories for a few of you. It's that kind of song.

Vinyl rip at 320 Kbps.

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Music For When The Clocks Have Gone Back.

These Cotton Goods albums are as much limited edition art projects as they are actual music releases, but for those who are lucky enough to get hold of them, the quality of the work reveals itself as being truly beautiful and special.

Variable Resistance is the work of Miles Whittaker, also of recent deep, deep, dub techno project "Demdike Stare" among several other dark and delicious electronic outfits shrouded in a doomy Northern fug of rolling mist and wasted dreams.

This amazingly packaged 3x3" CD set is housed in bespoke handmade sleeves inside customised microfilm boxes that have been individually numbered. 175 copies for the world. Sold out.

320 Kbps with full artwork.

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Beyond The Wizards Sleeve - George

I've just done a fresh rip of this fantastic third album from the wonderful Beyond The Wizards Sleeve.

I'm hanging out for some fresh material from the band and find myself returning to these early records time and again. They always go down well here on the blog so I thought I'd stick it up here as I think it was Spinster's Rock days when I last posted this.

There's a couple of tracks on here which didn't appear on the Ark 1 CD I posted a while ago.

Vinyl rip at 320 Kbps.

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