The Monochrome Set

The Monochrome Set: Strange Boutique (1980) Love Zombies (1980) Eligible Bachelors (1982) The Lost Weekend (1985) Fin (1985)

Anybody who has read my previous posts on The Monochrome Set will know the high esteem in which I hold them. Close to perfection in my book. Here is a repost of The Monochrome Set LPs that have previously appeared on Burning Aquarium.

 Strange Boutique (1980)

http://d01.megashares.com/dl/GIPg442/The Strange Boutique.rar

Love Zombies (1980) 

http://d01.megashares.com/dl/6Q2UW64/Love Zombies.rar

Eligible Bachelors (1982)

http://d01.megashares.com/dl/IA6p1TQ/The Monochrome Set-Eligible Bachelors.rar

 The Lost Weekend(1985)

http://d01.megashares.com/dl/GyPhGLN/The Monochrome Set The Lost Weekend.rar

Fin (Live-1985) - later rereleased as The Good Life
 http://d01.megashares.com/dl/F5x0jsS/The Monochrome Set- Fin.rar

The Monochrome Set- Colour Transmission

The Monochrome Set's first two LP's  (Strange Boutique & Love Zombies, both from 1980) combined onto one CD.
Released in this format in 1993.

Would-be-goods- The Camera Loves Me (1988)

Twee. Imagine the most twee record that you can remember from the golden age of twee in the late eighties and then times the twee by twenty. Named from a story by Edwardian children's author E.Nesbitt- says it all really.
However- I've included it here on account of my devotion to The Monochrome Set, who provide the backing tracks.

The Monochrome Set- The Lost Weekend (1985)

I'll never understand it, not if I live to be 100.
When The Monochrome Set, after 6 years, finally did a deal with a major (Warner's), they produced a suitably mainstream LP. The two infectiously poppy singles , Jacob's Ladder and Wallflower should have been massive, but reached numbers 81 and 97 in the charts.
Mismanagement by the label (Blanco y Negro, a WB subsidiary) failed to capitalise on the airplay that Jacob's Ladder was accorded. The video was delayed, the opportunity missed. Hurrah!

The Monochrome Set- Eligible Bachelors (1982)

Bid- vocals , guitar
Lester Square- guitar, keyboards, vocals
Andrew Warren- bass, vocals
Lexington Crane- drums, vocals

The Monochrome Set- The Strange Boutique (1980)

I fascinate, infatuate emphatically...

When I was first seized by the desire to share my music collection with you this band were high on my list of priorities. I played them to death in drunken parties in the nineties, aghast at the fact that so few people remembered them. I still can't figure out why they received so little attention in the mainstream media. Perhaps they were just too stylish, just too cool? Or was it that they didn't fit easily into any pigeonhole?

In the field of quantum mechanics Dr David Deutsch of Oxford University is producing some excellent work that shows that Professor Hugh Everett's theory of parallel universes is not as far fetched as it initially appeared, I can only hope that somewhere in the multiverse The Monochrome Set are enjoying the reverence that The Beatles enjoy in this particular little branch of the everything...


Bid - vocals, guitar
Lester Square - guitar, vocals
Andy Warren - bass , vocals
J.D. Haney - drums, percussion, vocals
Bob Sargeant- keyboards, vocals

The Monochrome Set- He's Frank

Show me a cooler frontman. Not vintage TMS in sound or look, but still excellent. More from these chaps later in the week...

The Monochrome Set- Fin (1985)

I must have been sleeping! My next post was going to be The Lost Weekend by The Monochrome Set- a classic from truly the most remarkable of the post punk art school type bands of the eighties. (I already regret that half arsed attempt to categorise them, but in my defence I plagiarized it from Cherry Red Records!) But when I was doing my homework I found out that this delightful LP had been rereleased on CD in February – so go out and buy it you lucky people.
In the meantime here’s Fin. This LP comprises live recordings from 1979-1985, including two tracks from a TV appearance on Eastern Eye. I had this on cassette and played it until it was little more than a distorted sub-aqua squeal.
The Monochrome Set were cool, they were clever, they were sexy, they were witty and I’ve never understood why they weren’t absolutely massive.