The Bridge - Love Dance

Before founding UK alternarock band Zerra One, Paul Bell released an electro single called "Love Dance" as The Bridge on the Second Vision label in 1984. It is about as close a copy of New Order's "The Beach" as you can get without being sued. The over-8-minute "Love Mix" (vocal) is on the A-side, with the almost-8-minute "Industrial Mix" (instrumental) on the B-side. The "Industrial Mix" should really have been called the "Dub Mix" or "Instrumental Mix" as there's nothing particularly industrial about it. Apparently there is another version of the 12" that adds a 7" mix and is titled "Industrial Love Dance"; I suppose that was the one for UK release, while this one is labelled "Export Only" on the sleeve (because people outside the UK didn't deserve a shorter version of the song?). You can probably recreate the 7" mix by stopping the Love Mix after about four minutes. All that aside, this really is a great dance record, and if you like "The Beach" but don't necessarily want to hear it again, "Love Dance" should do quite nicely. Get the vinyl rip here or here.

Savant - Stationary Dance

One of the most respected independent electronic music labels of the 80s was Kerry Leimer's Palace Of Lights, on which he released several of his own recordings (as K. Leimer) as well as albums by Roy Finch, Marc Barreca, and Michael William Gilbert. Leimer's music was mostly in the ambient vein; he used the moniker "Savant" for his more rhythm-based works, the "Stationary Dance"/"Sensible Music" single (1981) and the LP The Neo-Realist (At Risk) (1983). Palace Of Lights went dormant after 1983 and Leimer disappeared from the music scene, concentrating on his and his wife's design business, Leimer Cross. After nearly two decades of inactivity, Leimer revived Palace Of Lights in 2002, reissuing his 80s albums on CD and releasing new work by himself and others. I would have expected "Stationary Dance"/"Sensible Music" to be included on The Neo-Realist CD, but it wasn't; the initial vinyl release is all there is. "Stationary Dance" is a classic piece of postpunk art-funk, with an infectious rhythm track (looped?) featuring prominent bass guitar, overlaid with atmospheric synth lines and cut-up spoken vocals. "Sensible Music" is instrumental only, with a slow but insistent rhythm and an overall sound that recalls Jon Hassell's work with Brian Eno. Musical contributors on the record are:

• K. LEIMER: SYNTHESIZERS, TAPES, VOICE, GUITAR.
• DAVID KELLER: FRETLESS BASS, GUITARS, PERCUSSION.
• JAMES KELLER DRUMKIT, GUITARS, PERCUSSION.
• MARC BARRECA: SYNTHESIZERS, TAPES.
• ROBERT CARLBERG: PERCUSSION, ENGINEERING.

Get the vinyl rip here or here.

Various Artists - For Your Ears Only

As mentioned previously, here is the massive 1987 Third Mind compilation album For Your Ears Only: 25 songs over two LPs, some tracks previously unreleased, some rerecorded, and some taken straight from already-issued albums. It is the most comprehensive overview of the Third Mind label in existence. In fact it's so much music I wasn't able to fit a complete 192kbps rip into a single archive file, so each LP is a separate download. The track list is:

LP 1

01 Bushido - Introduction (previously unreleased)
02 Bill Pritchard - Pas De Plaisanterie (previously unreleased)
03 Beautiful Pea Green Boat - And She Laughed Too (previously unreleased)
04 Attrition - Fusillade III (Both Barrels) (rerecorded version)
05 All Singing All Dancing - The Rising Tide (previously unreleased)
06 Bushido - Recalled To Life (rerecorded version)
07 CRedit - Almost Virgin (previously unreleased)
08 Beautiful Pea Green Boat - Paper House (from Future Tense)
09 Bushido - Time And Time Again (from "Voices"/"Time And Time Again" EP)
10 Attrition - Into The Waves (from In the Realm of the Hungry Ghosts)
11 Bill Pritchard - Greek Street (previously unreleased)
12 All Singing All Dancing - The Grains Of Time (previously unreleased)

Get it here or here.

LP 2

01 Badland - Til the Stars Fall (previously unreleased)
02 Intimate Obsessions - Why Can't I (rerecorded version)
03 Tragic Venus - Paintbox (previously unreleased)
04 Frontline Assembly - Aggression (previously unreleased)
05 Konstruktivits - Nostalgia (from Black December)
06 Bill Pritchard - Déjeuner Sur L'Herbe (previously unreleased)
07 Bushido - Question Of Time (from Deliverance)
08 Simon Fisher Turner - I Love Your Suit (previously unreleased)
09 Jung Analysts - Entrails (previously unreleased)
10 Edward Ka-Spel - And The Lord Said RISE (previously unreleased)
11 CRedit - What Are These Words (previously unreleased)
12 Attrition - Day I Was Born (from The Attrition of Reason)
13 Intimate Obsessions - Erebus To Hades (from Erebus to Hades)

Get it here or here.

I always liked the Jung Analysts song, but I never found any records by them. I've just found their (or his, Terry Burrows) 1985 album Sprockendidootch over on Mutant Sounds, and it's great! I love how the Internet has given me a chance to hear the records I missed the first time around.

Solar Enemy - Dirty vs Universe

Here's another album from Gary Levermore's Third Mind label, which you may have already realized is a Fantod Favorite. Portion Control, longtime purveyors of "hard, rhythmic electronics", greatly expanded their pallette on their 1987 album Psycho-Bod Saves the World (even recording a ballad, "H.O.T. Matter"), and then disappeared. They regrouped in 1990 as Solar Enemy, a "side project" that just happened to contain only members of Portion Control and sound just like Portion Control. Solar Enemy released an EP in 1990 (Techno Divinity), an album in 1991 (Dirty vs Universe), and one more in 1993 (Proceed to Beyond--Rape of Europa). Offered here is Dirty vs Universe, unfortunately just the 10-track US version and not the German version with several extra tracks. Still, if you like the danceable Portion Control of "The Great Divide" (let's hear it for punchy sequencers!), then these ten tracks will be sure to please you. They are:

1. Universe
2. Welcome To Hell
3. Inca Pisco
4. Burm-Up
5. Dark Angel
6. Massive Radiation
7. Carcajou
8. Trojan
9. Rotator
10. Sundown

Get the CD rip here or here. Portion Control reactivated and began releasing new material, and new packages of old material, in 2004. Their latest album, Slug, was released earlier this year; you can sample it (and buy it!) here.

Various Artists - Future Tense

Like Four from the Madding Crowd, Future Tense is a four-artist compilation released by Gary Levermore's Third Mind label in 1986. Future Tense (TMLP15) was actually released first, with Four having the next catalog number (TMLP16). In fact, they released three compilation albums in a row, the third being the massive two-album set For Your Ears Only (TMLP 17/18, coming here someday) (and I definitely have it!). The Future Tense track list is:

The Beautiful Pea Green Boat (Obsessions LP posted here)

• Paper House
• The Vase

Bill Pritchard

• Grey Parade
• Cecile
• The Invisible State
• Springtime in Prague

Attrition

• Questions
• Which Hand?
• A Forgotten Dream
• A'dam & Eva

The Legendary Pink Dots

• Premonition 5 (previously released on the Rising From The Red Sand cassette on Third Mind)

Get the vinyl rip here or here.

David Harrow - The Succession

Before coming up with his James Hardway and Technova aliases in the mid-90s, David Harrow had already been recording under his given name for about 15 years. According to obscure.co.nz:

His first recordings were created in Berlin in 1981/1982 when he was working with a woman called Anne Clark. The sound they created was soon termed new beat or industrial and along with DAF they kick started the European electronic dance scene. When Harrow visits Germany today, he is still hailed "The Godfather Of Techno".

Later in the 80s and into the 90s, Harrow would collaborate heavily with Genesis P-Orridge, Jah Wobble, and Adrian Sherwood. He also recorded an EP with singer Peter Hope of Sheffield band The Box in 1985, posted here. Often overlooked, though, is the solo album he recorded in 1983 for release on Red Flame/10 Records , The Succession. Harrow assembled quite a band for the occasion: John White, a.k.a. U.V. Pop (!), on guitar and saxophone, Roger Quail (of The Box and the original ClockDVA lineup) on drums and percussion, Gary Malkin on bass (who? can't find any more info on him), and Janice Chaplin (?) on backing vocals. Harrow is credited with vocals, keyboards, guitar, and percussion. He is obviously not very comfortable as a singer: he tries out several different singing styles throughout the course of the album, but none quite fit. His compositional and instrumental skills, on the other hand, are already fully developed even on this early record. The track listing is:

• A1 Introduction
• A2 Without Sin
• A3 Driving Force
• A4 Our Little Girl
• A5 Here
• B1 Kick
• B2 Still Optimistic
• B3 Civilised
• B4 Belief

Get the vinyl rip here or here. (Links removed at artist's request: look for reissues!)

Beautiful Pea Green Boat - Obsessions

Here's some pretty music for a change of pace. Beautiful Pea Green Boat took their name from Edward Lear's poem "The Owl and the Pussycat" and recorded for Gary Levermore's Third Mind label, where they fit in perfectly. If I had to categorize their music I would call it "electronic shoegaze"; their sound occupies the middle ground somewhere between Cocteau Twins and Curve, I think. They had a female vocalist, of course: Heather Wright on these recordings. The instrumental backing was the work of Ian Williams. If you look at a discography of Beautiful Pea Green Boat it looks like they released four albums; while that is true, they are all just permutations of the first album, Obsessions (1987), and accretions of a few additional tracks recorded in the subsequent years. Presented here are all eight songs from Obsessions plus the two tracks from the Third Mind sampler LP Future Tense ("The Vase" and a longer version of "Paper House") (all vinyl rips). Or here.