I’m ashamed to admit I found This Heat too experimental, too avant-garde, too noodly and (dare I say it) too proggy to appreciate them at the time. And for that I feel foolish.

(more…)

The Jolt were the first punk band to play a gig in Glasgow, and the first to sign with a major label when they inked a deal with Polydor. But they seem to have been forgotten, even in their native Scotland.

(more…)

This stark, minimalist single is a landmark release in the birth of electronica and its commercial cousin synthpop. It’s the entire recorded output of The Normal, alter-ego of Daniel Miller – and the first release on his label Mute Records. (more…)

I’ve heard it said that Gloria Mundi were the spark that lit the flame of goth icons Bauhaus. Apparently it was after gigging with them that Bauhaus completely changed their music and presentation.

(more…)

Graph are another of those barely remembered bands from Fast Product’s first release in their ‘earcom’ EP series in 1979.

(more…)

The Prats embodied the spirit of punk as much as any band. They looked like schoolkids, they sounded like schoolkids. Because they were.

(more…)

While some bands tried to pose as punks and failed miserably, others carried it off with aplomb – like Cardiff’s one-hit wonders The Table with their minor classic Do The Standing Still.

(more…)

Before they made perfectly crafted pop-soul records, Scritti Politti were what was then called an “agitprop” band – though you would not immediately mark them down as left-wing firebrands from their music.

(more…)

I suppose you’d have to call Vic Godard another of the oddballs of punk, alongside the likes of Wreckless Eric, Johnny Moped, Kevin Rowland and Spizz.

(more…)

Looking back from more than half a century later, it’s astonishing how rapidly the primitive pounding of punk evolved into the questing experimentalism of postpunk. PragVEC were one of the first to embrace the avant-garde.

(more…)