RhoDeo 1325 Aetix

Hello, as mr Snowden is still hold up in a Moscow transit hotel, which is defacto accessable to anyone in transit I'm beginning to wonder if mr Putin is luring in the cat (US) to go after the mouse (mr Snowden) so he can snare the cat and he can score some big global points, obviously he doesn't care much if the mouse lives or dies, but embarrasing the US will lift his status at home and abroad.

Todays artists are all easy on the ears yet no Sundaze material two of the bands presented here were shortlived not because of lack of attention or quality but internal strive drained the will to go on together. The third solo artist had already split from the group that had carried her name she only needed to add her christian name to carry on a solocareer, which started with todays post.  ...N'Joy

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Based in Shepherds Bush, West London, The Passions' music was grounded mainly in Barbara Gogan's voice, and Clive Timperley's delicate echoplex guitar work. Before forming in 1978, most of the members had spent time in other groups. Timperley was an ex-101ers, whilst drummer Richard Williams and singer/guitarist Barbara Gogan were in the punk rock outfit, The Derelicts. The Passions' first single, issued in March 1979, was "Needles and Pills", which helped them gain a recording contract with Fiction Records, home of The Cure.

A year passed between the release of the "Needles and Pills" single, and Michael and Miranda, the band's first album. Singles "Hunted", and "Swimmer" followed, and then their major charting song, "I'm in Love with a German Film Star". Before "The Swimmer" Bidwell and Barker left the band, the former to join The Wall. David Agar took over on bass guitar. The band's second album, 30,000 Feet Over China, was released in August 1981. It included previously released A-sides and several brand new recordings. Clive Timperley left the band in Verona in December 1981, during the Italian leg of their prophetically named "Tour Till We Crack" tour, as a result of "serious political differences".

The follow-up single release "Africa Mine" was recorded with a new line-up. Kevin Armstrong (a contributor to a Thomas Dolby album), who had previously been with Local Heroes joined, and the group added a keyboard player, Jeff Smith, perhaps best known for his past work with Lene Lovich. Armstrong and Smith took part in the recording of the band's third and final album, Sanctuary. It appeared in the autumn of 1982, Stephen Wright joined replacing Armstrong. The band toured Europe and the U.S., but dissolved for good in the summer of 1983, after playing their last ever live show at London's Marquee Club on 12 August that year. Gogan popped up again in 1998 when she released Made on Earth, a record made with experimentalist Hector Zazou.

The members of the Passions had done time in various punk and post-punk outfits, and their edgy debut album, Michael & Miranda, reflected that influence. The 1981 follow-up, Thirty Thousand Feet Over China, was a much more melodic, atmospheric outing, with a fuller production and a moody, shimmering quality. The mix of evocative new wave stylings, Barbara Gogan's hypnotic vocals, and a left-of-center lyrical outlook on songs like “I'm In Love With a German Film Star” make the album a winning proposition.

The Passions - Thirty Thousand Feet Over China  (flac 335mb)

01 I'm In Love With A German Film Star 4:01
02 Someone Special 4:07
03 The Swimmer 3:32
04 Strange Affair 3:29
05 Small Stones 5:37
06 Runaway 3:04
07 The Square 3:30
08 Alice's Song 3:12
09 Bachelor Girls 2:21
10 Skin Deep 4:19
Bonus Tracks
11 I Radiate (7" Version) 2:56
12 Some Fun (7" Version) 3:42
13 War Song (7" Version) 3:28
14 Don't Talk To Me (I'm Shy) (7" Version) 2:18
15 The Square (Live) 3:26

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Before Tracey Thorn established herself with Everything but the Girl, she produced mellow, spare indie pop with the all-female act the Marine Girls. Inspired by the Raincoats and the Young Marble Giants, Thorn formed the Marine Girls with her schoolmate Gina and Jane Fox in Hatfield, Hertfordshire, England, in 1980. At first, Thorn played guitar with Gina on vocals and Fox on bass. Since they knew no drummers, the group decided to focus on a minimalist approach to music. After Gina kept missing rehearsals, she was replaced by Jane Fox's younger sister, Alice Fox, on vocals; Thorn would eventually sing as well. The trio recorded a tape called A Day by the Sea and sold it to their acquaintances. The Marine Girls eventually released two albums in the U.K., 1982's Beach Party and 1983's Lazy Ways. Lazy Ways was produced by one of the band's influences, Stuart Moxham of the Young Marble Giants. While attending Hull University, Thorn began writing songs for herself; she was only able to gig with the Marine Girls during holidays. The Marine Girls broke up after Thorn and Alice Fox had an argument following a concert in Glasgow, Scotland, in 1983. Thorn then recorded her solo album A Distant Shore before joining Ben Watt in Everything but the Girl. In 1997, Cherry Red Records combined both of the Marine Girls' albums onto one CD; spinART reissued the albums in the US four years later.

The debut album by the Marine Girls is one of the most willfully amateurish releases of its era, which is not necessarily a bad thing. When it was first released on Daniel Treacy's Whaam! label in 1981, it undoubtedly sounded impossibly shoddy and nearly inept, filled with deliberately out-of-tune vocals, extremely minimal guitar and bass, and almost no percussion. However, its place as one of the pillars of the twee pop scene, along with the Young Marble Giants' Colossal Youth, is now incontestable, and what once might have seemed haphazard instead sounds refreshingly artless and slyly provocative. Tracey Thorn, whose vocals would gain much more technical polish during her years in Everything But the Girl, sings with a sort of offhand grace, while Alice Fox' more tuneless yelp sounds like a precursor to Kathleen Hanna or Sleater-Kinney. The songs are monochromatic, though a few, particularly the opening "In Love," manage to marry memorable tunes to the group's deliberate minimalism.

The Marine Girls' second and final album -- the group had already split by the time of its release, with Tracey Thorn pursuing a solo career before forming Everything But the Girl and the Fox sisters forming the even more minimalist Grab Grab the Haddock -- is far more polished than their 1981 debut, at times almost approaching professionalism. The clangorous clatter of the debut is largely absent here. Instead, producer Stuart Moxham (formerly of Young Marble Giants, whose sole album, Colossal Youth, is perhaps the pinnacle of this type of minimal indie pop) gives the album a soft, intimate sound. Singer Alice Fox has a much more tuneful voice this time out, and songwriter and secondary singer Thorn is clearly inching toward the jazz-influenced prettiness of early Everything But the Girl, especially on the downright lovely "Love to Know." Her guitar playing and Jane Fox' bass work are also considerably more refined. Purists might miss the noisiness of Beach Party, but Lazy Ways is in every way a far better record, and one of the best U.K. indie albums of 1983.

Marine Girls - Lazy Ways,Beach Party  (flac 275mb)

Lazy Ways
01 A Place In The Sun 2:31
02 Leave Me With The Boy 1:50
03 Falling Away 1:46
04 Love To Know 2:52
05 A Different Light 2:22
06 Sunshine Blue 2:05
07 Second Sight 2:58
08 Don't Come Back 2:01
09 That Fink.Jazz-Me-Blues Boy 1:32
10 Fever 2:14
11 Shell Island 2:27
12 Lazy Ways 2:42
13 Such A Thing.. 2:22
14 You Must Be Mad 2:02
Beach Party
15 In Love 1:53
16 Fridays 2:03
17 Tonight? 1:19
18 Times We Used To Spend 1:41
19 Flying Over Russia 2:05
20 Tutti Lo Sanno 2:21
21 All Dressed Up 1:46
22 Honey 2:02
23 Holiday Song 2:12
24 He Got The Girl 1:24
25 Day/Night Dreams 1:10
26 Promises 1:29
27 Silent Red 1:33
28 Dishonesty 2:16
29 20,000 Leagues 2:23
30 Marine Girls 1:39

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The first solo release by Isabella Antena but essentially a continuation of her work from the days of the Antena trio (then duo), En Cavalle, produced excellently by Martin Hayles and a crack studio band under his direction, is an immediate, enjoyable release. That Antena didn't make a bigger splash at the time (especially after Sade had popularized bossa nova grooves as modern pop) is downright remarkable -- she's in excellent voice throughout and her backing players, including earlier bandmate Sylvain Fasy on guitar, both perform and are recorded brilliantly. But such are the vagaries of the market, though at least those who listen in now will be well rewarded. Starting with the sassy-yet-cool kick of "Play Back," a great showcase for flautist Philip Todd, En Cavalle is also a showcase for Antena's songwriting ability, with six out of nine songs written solely by her. Her singing is confident, sly and straightforward throughout -- there's no being lost in the mix here, more a perfect sympathy with the musicians, from the rollicking punch of "How Can They Tell" to the more modern shock of "Life Is Too Short," an almost industrial-pop brawler at the start. "Seaside Weekend" in particular is a winner, the busy tropical beats set against soft, reflective piano work, then topped off by Antena's sweet singing and gentle scat work. There's also an inspired cover of the Sister Sledge's "Easy Street," interpolating hints of Antena's other musical obsessions into the steady disco punch of the original to create a winning tribute.

Isabelle Antena - En Cavale (flac 469mb)

01 Playback 3:48
02 Easy Street 4:48
03 Seaside Weekend 3:53
04 Ten Minutes 5:42
05 How Can They Tell 3:17
06 Be Pop 3:58
07 Magic Words 4:30
08 Booby Trap 3:28
09 Life Is Too Short 5:33
10 Don't Think About It 4:32
11 Time To Work 5:00
12 Blow The World Away 3:30
13 Mummy's Not At Home 6:41
14 Be Pop (12") 6:25
15 Life Is Too Short (12") 5:10
16 Behind The Door 5:05

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