Eight-X (05)

Hello, more vinyl rips today, those that followed the Eight-x posts might have guessed i'd arrive at 1984 this week, obviously i can't pass on the book that brought us Big Brother, Newspeak , Room 101 and government sanctioned torture things that these have become a reality though not as complete , i know we have the internet to thank for that. Well George Orwell saw thru the way governments create terror and the control they strive for..at the time he just changed 48 in 84 it wasn't a timed prediction yet here we are in 2007 and the outlook for 1984 in the coming 5 years shouldnt be taken lighthartedly.

Back to the real 1984 obviously people then felt that this grim tale hadn't come about and the music that year was upbeat and energetic, lots of hits that have carried over the years, most notably the topsellers that year, which are usually ballads of a kind..this time had just one in the top 5..i just called to say....Dance Hall Days, Dancing in the dark, Girls Just Want To Have Fun I , Like a Virgin, Won't Let The Sun Go Down On Me, People Are People, Let's Go Crazy, Shout, Radio Ga Ga, Relax, Skin Deep, The Reflex, Shout To The Top, Your Love Is King just to list some of that years hits.

There were a lot of good albums too, my first offering really broke thru with the Beatbox maxi single in 83 , a year later they released an album around it, it was unlike anything in the market then-hi production values and hard beats softened up by the that year inescapeble chillout moments in love. 84 was the year of ZTT, lots of productions became big hits and Trevor sure blew his Horn that year. Felt maybe a dark horse here, good in the press and recognised as a musical highlight of the eighties, commercially they never found footing . Here's their second(mini) album luscious, minimalist and hypnotic, unfortunately the guitarist, Maurice Deebank, dropped out after that. The remaining decade Felt released another 8 albums after which they pulled the plug on Felt.

Recordlabel trouble is a feature of my next offering, this time it was the band that was responsible, they switched from the independant Y-records to the major league, Arista. Recording of Jamscience had been well underway and Arista refused to buy out Y records this would turn out badly for Shriekback as they had a brilliant back catalogue there which would have made them and Arista plenty, now it got released to frustrate their official releases, lot's of bad blood at Y records. Anyway i present here the two versions that were released of Jam Science the screw you version by Y which contains the raw originals of six of the tracks that would turn up in the more produced and concise Arista version, plus two unreleased tracks. These troubles have caused Jam Science to be unavailable on CD thusfar, so here 's both in digitised format.

1984 obviously saw the release of a movie from the infamous book starring Richard Burton in his last great role. The choice for the providers of the soundtrack surely raised some eyebrows as The Eurythmics made quality popmusic and were at the height of their popularity. It may come as a surprise to you but i consider 1984 my favourite Eurythmics album , a little less Annie and just one hit kept the album fresh. Well not much made the final score, Orwell's book expresses a sense of loss the loss of human emotion and natural evolution, which are replaced by a mechanical world of machines, monotony and melancholy. As such the album does have a mechanical, cold quality to it. Its not very available on cd and hasnt been remastered like the rest, another mistake by those recordcompany heads that just don't get it .

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Art Of Noise - Who's Afraid Of The Art Of Noise  ( 84  flac 290mb)

The roots of Art Of Noise lie in Malcolm McLaren's 1982 single Buffalo Gals, and the Duck Rock album that followed it. McLaren foresaw the rise of hip-hop and recruited producer Trevor Horn to record his musical vision. At this point Horn was working with the aid of a close group of collaborators: Anne Dudley - pianist and orchestral arranger, JJ Jeczalik who was a dab hand with the emerging Fairlight technology, and engineer Gary Langan. The team produced for McLaren a high-tech pastiche of the most fashionable black music styles of the time(see Eight-X (03)). The experiments of Dudley, Jeczalik and Langan on this project led to the formation of Art Of Noise.

Art Of Noise were unleashed on an unsuspecting public in 1983, with the debut EP Into Battle With Art Of Noise. The groups' identities would have remained a complete mystery if the record hadn't credited Dudley, Horn, Jeczalik, Langan and Morley as their composers. Paul Morley contributed ideas and delivered the bands non-image to the press and media: their early appearances on TV were dominated by anonymous figures in masks, their videos featured pianos being bisected with chainsaws, their publicity photos were lovingly shot pictures of spanners

In 1984, the Close (To The Edit) single crashed into the UK top forty. 1985s The air of mystery surrounding the band meant that they could, in a famous mixup, receive an American magazine's award for best black act of the year - not bad going for five middle-aged, middle-class, white English people... 1985 saw Dudley, Langan and Jeczalik depart for China Records, taking the name with them. It was the beginning of the Art Of Noise as a band. The 'new' Art Of Noise had many pop hits – mostly as collaborators, with the likes of Duane Eddy (Peter Gunn, 1986); fictional TV presenter Max Headroom (Paranoimia, also 1986); Tom Jones (a cover of Prince’s Kiss, 1988) . Disbanding in 1990, the trio went their separate ways, with Dudley in particular achieving success. A Brit award for her work on the Phil Collins vehicle, Buster was followed by an Academy Award for her score for The Full Monty. Jeczalik made the studio his home, mixing and remixing artists as diverse as Stephen Duffy and Shakin’ Stevens, and Langan (who had left the group after In Visible Silence) produced the likes of ABC, Spandau Ballet and Ronan Keating.

In 1999 Horn, Dudley and Morley reformed Art Of Noise with the addition of Lol Crème. The result of this collaboration was The Seduction Of Claude Debussy, an album created around the work of the titular French modernist classical composer, built on hip-hop beats and drum and bass, with vocal contributions from actor John Hurt and rap pioneer Rakim. It owed nothing to anything the Art Of Noise had ever done before.



01 - A Time for Fear (Who's Afraid) – 4:41
02 - Beat Box (Diversion One) – 8:28
03 - Snapshot – 1:00
04 - Close (to the Edit) – 5:41
05 - Who's Afraid (of the Art of Noise?) – 4:19
06 - Moments in Love – 10:11
07 - Momento – 2:11
08 - How to Kill – 2:41
09 - Realization – 1:41

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Felt - The Splendour Of Fear ( 84 flac 156mb)

Formed 1979 by Lawrence Hayward who recorded the first single 'Index' on his own and soon dropped his surname in fear of getting associated with another popular Hayward who isn't fully named here out of respect.

The first string of releases through Cherry Red Records featured soundscapes dominated by the playing of classically trained guitarist Maurice Deebank and audible influences by Television and the Velvet Underground. For some reason despite critical acclaim and a #1 indie single ('Primitive Painters') they never made it big but even were denied major support from Wea Records (through Blanco Y Negro). In March of 1982, Cherry Red released Felt's debut full-length album Crumbling The Antiseptic Beauty. While the album received little notice commercially, it received high marks from the independent music press. Despite the critical success, the band underwent personnel changes. Tony Race, who had joined the group after it signed with Cherry Red, left Felt and was replaced by Gary Ainge.

The Splendour Of Four sound is mellow, melodic, understated, lovely . . . it's the instrumental passages that work best, not to detract from Lawrence 'Lawrence' Hayward's breathy, (Lou) Reedy vocals and beautifully imagistic lyrics. In March of 1982, Cherry Red released Felt's debut full-length album Crumbling The Antiseptic Beauty.In 1984, Maurice Deebank released a full-length solo album titled Inner Thought Zone also released on the Cherry Red label. Deebank, like Gilbert, did not like to be directed by Hayward. Their relationship as Felt group members had always been difficult because of their musical differences. Deebank decided to produce the solo effort to allow an outlet for some of the music he was forced to hold back while with Felt

Ignite the Seven Cannons was the follow-up LP to "Primitive Painters." The full-length LP was released in September of 1985. Guthrie produced the album with the 4AD formula, and The Cocteau Twins were at the controls. Afterwards, Deebank left the group, but Hayward found another skilled musician to replace him. Martin Duffy had filled in on keyboards for the album and joined Felt full time in 1985. While Felt played a few shows in support of Ignite the Seven Cannons, Cherry Red was busy releasing a compilation album. Felt's next album, Let the Snakes Crinkle Their Heads to Death, was issued in September of 1986 on the Creation label. Duffy's organ added a '60s sound that worked well with Hayward's songs.

Forever Breathes The Lonely Wordfound Hayward back at writing lyrics and crafting some of his best Felt songs. The album was released in fall 86 on the Creation label. The song "All the People I Like Are Those That Are Dead" became a favorite on college radio and is now considered a classic to Felt fans. Felt followed with two more LPs in 1988 on the Creation label: The Pictorial Jackson Review released in March, and Train Above The City in July. Felt's swan song was the full length LP Me and a Monkey on the Moon released in November of 1989 on the El label. Hayward had to move to Mike Always' El label because Creation was not able to release the album before Hayward's self-imposed deadline of ten years, ten albums.



01 - Red Indians (1:54)
02 - The World Is As Soft As Lace (4:15)
03 - The Optimist And The Poet (7:49)
04 - Mexican Bandits (3:44)
05 - The Stagnant Pool (8:23)
06 - A Preacher In New England (4:11)

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(new rip) Shriekback formed in the early 1980s , Barry Andrews, formerly of XTC and League of Gentlemen (keyboards/synthesizers/vocals), Carl Marsh (guitars/vocals), and Dave Allen, formerly of the Gang of Four (bass), were joined by Martyn Barker on drums in 1983. The first Shriekback release was the six-song EP Tench (82), followed in 1983 by the album Care, also on Y, which featured "Lined Up," the song that put Shriekback on the map for many people. Care was picked up and released in the U.S. by Warner Brothers, with an altered running order and two different tracks, including "My Spine (Is the Bass Line). Although Care was critically acclaimed and garnered a fair amount of airplay it was not enough for Warner Brothers, who dropped Shriekback and deleted Care shortly after its release. As a result, the follow-up, 1984's Jam Science, was released only in Europe. Toward the end of the Jam Science sessions, Shriekback became a quartet with the addition of drummer Martyn Barker; however, they quickly became a trio again when Carl Marsh departed midway through the recording of their third album. Oil and Gold sold well in its U.S. release on Island Records. So did the follow up 1986's Big Night Music, thanks to director M Mann's use of their music in his succesful films and the many background soundclips in Miami Vice. Shriekback seemed on the brink of unlikely stardom, Allen departed before the recording of Go Bang! (1988), which is what they did after what easily is their weakest release ever.

That appeared to be the end of Shriekback, who dropped out of sight in the late '80s and early '90s. But Allen, Andrews, and Barker reunited in 1992 to record the excellent Sacred City, which essentially picked up where Big Night Music left off. There was another long silence after that, but as of 2000 some form of Shriekback was apparently still in existence; an album called Naked Apes and Pond Life was released, In 2003 followed by Having a Moment , Cormorant (2005) and this year Glory Bumps latter two on Malicious Damage Records which does make it a little harder to get, add to that it's overpriced, i doubt the boys have learned their lesson here, the music industry maybe very unreliable but squeezing your fans is bad business.



Shriekback - Jam Science (flac ^ 255mb)

01 - Hand On My Heart( 3:50)
02 - Newhome (3:39)
03 - Achtung (4:19)
04 - Partyline (3:30)
05 - Midnight Maps (4:07)
06 - Mercy Dash (4:04)
07 - Under The Lights (3:16)
08 - My Careful Hands (3:51)
09 - Suck (5:28)
10 - Hubris (3:51)



Shriekback - Y Jam Science ( flac ^ 279mb)

01 - Under The Lights (4:01)
02 - Building Up A New Home (3:55)
03 - Hand On My Heart (4:38)
04 - International (3:28)
05 - Putting On The Pressure (4:25)
06 - Party Line (4:11)
07 - My Careful Hands (4:20)
08 - Midnight Maps (4:10)
bonus
09 - Mercy Dash (ready for this) Extended Mix (5:11)
10 - Gated Joy (3:39)
11 - Bricks And Whistles (4:47)

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Eurythmics - 1984 (For The Love Of Big Brother) (84 flac 209 mmb)

What to say about Annie And Dave , another time.. as i said in my intro i consider this my favourite Eurythmics album.



01 - I Did It Just The Same (3:28)
02 - Sexcrime (Nineteen Eighty Four) (3:56)
03 - For The Love Of Big Brother (5:02)
04 - Winston's Diary (1:21)
05 - Greetings From A Dead Man (6:06)
06 - Julia (6:32)
07 - Doubleplusgood (4:35)
08 - Ministry Of Love (3:44)
09 - Room 101 (3:45)


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All downloads are in * ogg-7 (224k) or ^ ogg-9(320k), artwork is included , if in need get the nifty ogg encoder/decoder here !