The earliest of the four tracks I have by them, 1983's Childbride + Chegança, is actually tracks two and three of their 1983 EP Hatikva. Childbride is a short piece of found sound, while Chegança seems a fairly straight take on the Walter Wanderley Trio's version of a Brazilian jazz classic.
A band playing some latin easy listening is, of course, not odd in itself. Hearing some rather lovely lo-fi electronica released by the same band the following year decidedly is, however. Although its sound is perhaps a little retro by its 1984 release date, Words Never Said, the opening track from the album Jedda By The Sea, is a smashing song. What really makes the song for me is the live drums - how much better live drums make synths sound is something that I don't think enough electronic acts appreciate. Here's the song:
Suit Of Nails, the opener from 1985's Captured In Ice is stylistically very similar to Words Never Said, although I don't think it's nearly so good a song. That similarity makes the, once again, huge stylistic jump to 1988's Drunkard a bit of a surprise. Drunkard is a guitar driven, shambling, stacatto waltz, and another fine song by a band I'd like to hear more of. Whether music from 1988 can truly be considered post-punk is maybe a question for another time, but I have plenty of post-punk-posting coming up where I will no doubt ponder just exactly what post-punk actually is.
Hatikva, Jedda By The Sea and Captured In Ice are available, it seems, together on CD, so that's definitely one for the To-Buy list. Nice.
Very kind of you to remember us. -Jackson
ReplyDeleteNot at all, Jackson, although credit has to go to the Scavenged Luxury guys at http://lapostpunk.blogspot.co.uk/ (and to Boing Boing for pointing me there) for opening my eyes and ears to a lot of great stuff.
ReplyDeleteI've got the Jedda By The Sea/Captured In Ice re-release on order - looking forward to it!