Throbbing Gristle: Three chords? You Can Start A Band With No Chords!
Throbbing Gristle in 1978.
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The pioneers of industrial (non-)music, Throbbing Gristle were formed in 1975 from two members of the Hull based confrontational art collective COUM Transmissions (Genesis P-orridge and Cosey Fanni Tutti), graphic designer Peter "Sleazy" Christopherson who joined COUM in 1975, and early synthesist Chris Carter. They played their first official gig at COUM Transmissions infamous Prostitution exhibition in October 1976. Literally exploding in a cacophony of noise into a scene that had never before existed, and what would become known as industrial music. The exhibition and Throbbing Gristle's performance was so earth-shattering that it caused Member of Parliament Nicholas Fairbairn to describe them as "the wreckers of civilisation". A reputation that the band tried to live up to, with provocative live shows, with darkly abrasive and uncomfortably jarring compositions, that spoke of the dark obsessions of human nature. They were true pioneers of techniques many musicians now take for granted. Using found tape samples and loops, early synthesisers and electronic gadgetry, and a good dollop of distortion for Genesis's monotone often spoken or screamed, surreal, dark and perverse lyrics to cut through.
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Throbbing Gristle originally disbanded in 1981, as they had completed their mission. In true mail-art style they sent a postcard to fans simply stating that "The Mission is Terminated". However Cosey is said to have claimed that, "TG broke up because me and Gen broke up". Whatever the reason, the members went on to form and front bands that would continue to push the boundaries of music, and pioneer in emerging genres and sub-genres of music. Genesis and Sleazy formed Psychic TV in 1981, Sleazy would later in 1982 form the band Coil, and Cosey and Chris continued to work together under different names to this day. Throbbing Gristle reformed in 2004, but were over again by October 2010, when Genesis left the band mid-tour, and claimed that the band would continue the tour as X-TG. He stated he hadn't left the band, just the tour, but with the death of Sleazy in November 2010, Throbbing Gristle were over again.
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The postcard that Throbbing Gristle sent out to inform fans of their demise in 1981.
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20 Jazz Funk Greats (1979)
The bands first full studio album, and often cited as their best album and one of the best albums of the 1970s. The innocuous looking front cover and name was done to purposely wrong-foot people coming across it "in a Woolworth's bargain bin". The image is of the band stood on the infamous English suicide spot, Beachy Head. In a 2012 interview Cosey Fanni Tutti said, "We had this idea in mind that someone quite innocently would come along to a record store and see [the record] and think they would be getting 20 really good jazz/funk greats, and then they would put it on at home and they would just get decimated." As dark and foreboding as the album is, and it seems contrary to say this, but in ways it's Throbbing Gristle lite. More accessible than much of their previous out-put. |
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Track Listing
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The Wreckers Of Western Civilisation: COUM Transmissions - The subversive avant-garde art collective, founded in Hull, that became Throbbing Gristle the industrial music pioneers.
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Nothing Here But The Recordings - Cult spoken word album by William S. Burroughs, produced by the guys from COUM Transmissions / Throbbing Gristle from his tape experiments in 1981.
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