My Mine was an Italian synth band with quite a few hits in the mid 80s.
Band Members:
Stefano Micheli
Carlo Malatesta
Darren T. Hatch
Zip
"...I agreed that what really matters is what you like, not what you are like... Books, records, films -- these things matter. Call me shallow, but it's the fuckin' truth."
www.facebook.com/officialhomework
Bookings: jo@jackmode.de Homework
www.facebook.com/officialhomework
Bookings: jo@jackmode.de Homework
“Producer Stephen Wilkinson is a self-taught musician from an area in central England often referred to as the Black Country. His love for sound and noise led him to the University of London and the study of Sonic Arts where he discovered experimental electronic acts such as Aphex Twin, Autechre, and most importantly Boards Of Canada. His own musical identity was christened Bibio, in honor of a fly his father had insisted on using during the fishing trips to Wales that were so influential in establishing his love of the sounds of nature. Where his Mush ouvre focused on location recording using cassettes, a half-broken sampler, dictaphones, and experimental ways of affecting sounds, his recent release on Warp stands apart in its more electronic, beat-savvy production. In both arenas Bibio has crafted a unequalled style that is as subtle as it is powerful.”
Waist.
“French film composer Georges Delerue studied his craft under prestigious movie musician Darius Milhaud. More interested in establishing mood than churning out hit theme songs, Delerue contributed the scores to over 150 motion pictures. In his native France, Delerue wrote music for such highly regarded New Wave films as Hiroshima Mon Amour (1959), Shoot the Piano Player (1960) and Jules et Jim (1961). Equally busy in England and the U.S., Delerue worked on A Man for All Seasons (1966), Anne of a Thousand Days (1969), Day of the Dolphin (1973), A Little Romance (1979), Platoon (1986) and Steel Magnolias (1989). He also penned music for stage and TV productions during his long career. Delerue’s final score was for the strange American romantic comedy Joe Versus the Volcano (1990).”
Waist.
“Some seemingly outlandish claims from interviews have been verified. James does own a tank (actually a 1950s armoured scout car, the Daimler Ferret Mark 3) and a submarine bought from Russia.
Additional unverified claims include the following: He composed ambient techno at age 13; he has “over 100 hours” of unreleased music; he experiences synaesthesia; and he is able to incorporate lucid dreaming into the process of making music.”
Waist.
“Jimmy Edgar’s music is like the aural equivalent of those mid-’80s “sexy robot” airbrushed pop art posters by Hajime Sorayama — the sound of a sleek digital future when machines have the same erotic desires as human beings. A postmodern polymath who also built a successful career as a graphic artist, photographer, and fashion designer, Edgar was born on August 10, 1983 in Detroit and manifested a love for music at an early age, learning to play saxophone and drums, gigging in local bands, and experimenting with making electronic music. His elder brother was a music promoter, and at the tender age of 15 he found himself DJing in strip clubs and “whorehouses” alongside techno legends Juan Atkins, Kevin Saunderson, and Derrick May. His first track was released by the respected German label Poker Flat in 2002, when he was just 19 years old.
The same year, after hearing just that one track, the Florida label Merck signed him and put out his debut album, My Mines I, which was attributed to his “dual alter ego,” Kristuit Salu vs. Morris Nightingale. The next year, the Dutch label audio.nl released his second album, %20, this time under the alias Michaux. These two works, which were fairly experimental and can be classified with the glitch or clicks + cuts genre that was prevalent at the time, received favorable reviews and attracted the attention of powerhouse electronica label Warp, which signed him to a worldwide deal. His debut release for the label, in 2004, was the four-track Access Rhythm EP, which had more of a hip-hop sound and featured, in a nod to his former alter ego, the “Morris Nightingale Theme.” Later the same year, he followed up with the Bounce Make Model mini-album, which first crystallized the erotic electro-funk sound for which he would become well known.
Edgar spent the next two years working on his debut Warp full-length. The result was Color Strip, a breathtakingly original album on which Edgar attempted to “capture the essence of Detroit.” Inspired by sex and drugs, made using a selection of software custom-built by Edgar himself, and recorded to analog tape, it had a sleazy urban feel that combined techno, electro, R&B, glitch, and hip-hop influences and was an immediate success, invoking a slew of critical acclaim.
In the four-year gap following the release of Color Strip, Edgar was involved in several other projects including Black Affair, Her Bad Habit, and X District, and was rumored to be part of the mysterious electronica outfits Plus Device and Creepy Autograph. In 2008 he moved from Detroit to New York City, which had an influence on the music he was to start making next. When his follow-up album, XXX, was allegedly rejected by Warp, he signed with the German jazz-house label K7, which released it in July 2010. While in a similar vein to Color Strip, it had a somewhat more straightforward and “live” sound, with Edgar playing bass guitar on a number of tracks, and collaborating with female guest vocalists.”
Waist.
“The System was an American synth pop duo consisting of vocalist/guitarist Mic Murphy and seasoned session keyboardist David Frank. The band was founded in 1982 in New York and backed up by Paul Pesco on electric guitar and Kris Khellow - keyboards, synthesizers.
Sometimes the group is referred to as an “emotio-electro” band because of their hi-tech, synthesizer-driven sound mated to passionate vocals and sensitive lyrics.
The resulting 1983 album Sweat launched the club hits “Sweat,” “I Can’t Let Go” and the iconic “You Are In My System”, which became a number ten R&B smash. Robert Palmer’s cover of the song became a mainstream rock hit.
In 1984 they released their second album, X-periment. Frank’s expertise in recording studio technology gave the material a sound that many felt was ahead of its time. Indeed, the heavy use of synths and electricpercussion was a step beyond the dance-influenced flavour of the previous album, and Murphy’s soulful vocals gave the songs a definite R&B flavour. Besides the upbeat electronics-laden tracks, the album also introduced a more mature and pop-friendly quality, evident in tracks such as “Promises Can Break”, “I Wanna Make You Feel Good” and “I Can’t Take Losing You.” The System also appeared in the 1984 breakdancing film Beat Street and the soundtrack performing Baptize The Beat.
The title track from their 1985 album The Pleasure Seekers was featured in the season two premiere episode of the hit NBC series Miami Vice. Other tracks on the album include “It Takes 2”, as well as “Love Won’t Wait For Lovin’” and “This Is For You”. In 1985, David Frank and Mic Murphy teamed up with Jeff Lorber to collaborate on Lorber’s album Step by Step.
Their version of the Marc Benno song “Rock N’ Roll Me Again” became famous in the 1984 action comedy Beverly Hills Cop with Eddie Murphy. The soundtrack album would go on to win a Grammy. They would also reach #23 on Billboard’s R&B chart with the title track from the 1988 Eddie Murphy film Coming to America. All of this success occurred while they were contributing their talents to projects such as the Scritti Politti album Cupid & Psyche 85, Phil Collins’ “Sussudio,” Chaka Khan’s “I Feel for You,” and “This Is My Night,” and Mtume’s “Juicy Fruit,” among many others.
The System’s greatest success came in 1987 with the release of the single “Don’t Disturb This Groove,” from the album of the same name. The duo hired Steven Machat and Rick Smith to be their managers. Machat and Smith took control of the promotion and marketing of the duo on behalf of Atlantic and helped the duo achieve their biggest US Pop hit, “Don’t Disturb This Groove”. The single reached #1 on the Billboard R&B chart and #4 on the Hot 100. The follow-up single, “Nighttime Lover,” was also a top 10 R&B hit, peaking at #7.
Murphy and Frank parted ways professionally after releasing their Rhythm & Romance album in 1989.
In 2000, the duo reunited for the album ESP, which also featured a reworked version of “You Are In My System”, originally found on 1983’s Sweat.
Late 2009 saw the release of Unreleased Unleashed, a collection of prototype and unreleased songs recorded at various points over the span of The System’s recording career. Although two tracks, “Hole In My Love” and “You Are In My System (Redux)”, the previously-mentioned remake of their earlier single, were taken directly from the ESP album. Also, the track “Sonic Fire” was previously released as the B-Side for some 7” singles of “I Wanna Make You Feel Good” in 1984.
Murphy recorded the solo album Touch and charted in 1991 with a single from that project. Frank has found more recent success as a songwriter and producer, most notably for hit singles such as Christina Aguilera’s “Genie in a Bottle” in 1999, and teen girl-group Dream’s “He Loves U Not” in 2000.”
Zip
“Junior Giscombe (born Norman Washington Giscombe, 6 June 1957,) is a singer-songwriter (frequently known simply by the mononym, Junior) who was one of the first British R&B artists to be successful in the United States.
Giscombe was born in Wandsworth, London, and was a backing vocalist with Linx between 1980 and 1982.
When turning towards a solo career, he was first billed simply as Junior and he scored a #7 hit in the UK Singles Chart in 1982, with “Mama Used to Say”. His follow-up single, “Too Late” also made the Top 20 in the UK. ”Mama Used to Say” was also a Top 40 Pop hit and Top 5 R&B in the United States, earning him a “Best Newcomer” award from Billboard magazine.
Sometime (most likely) around 1984 and 1985, Junior Giscombe recorded (and very possibly co-wrote) an unknown number of songs with Phil Lynott, the former leader, vocalist and bass-player of hard rock bandThin Lizzy. Lynott died in January 1986 and the songs were never officially released. Most remain as demos, but one of the songs, “Lady Loves to Dance”, was mastered and nearly released before being pulled by the record company. Some of the songs are available on YouTube, including “What’s the Matter Baby” (Giscombe provides backing vocals) and “Time (and Again)” (Giscombe shares vocals with Lynott).
After a period outside the charts, he made a brief return to the Top 10 in 1987 when he sang a duet with Kim Wilde on “Another Step (Closer to You)”. He also became involved with the formation of Red Wedge in 1986 with Billy Bragg, Jimmy Somerville and Paul Weller, and had been a part of The Council Collective with The Style Council, Jimmy Ruffin and others for the 1984 fundraising single, “Soul Deep”. Later he became better known as a songwriter for various artists, including ] Sheena Easton. He is currently a DJ with internet radio station, Solarradio.com.”
Zip
“Loose Ends was a successful British R&B band that had several urban contemporary hits. The trio was formed in London in 1980, initially comprising vocalist andguitarist Carl McIntosh, vocalist Jane Eugene, and keyboard player, writer and founder Steve Nichol. The latter two left the group in 1989, bringing an end to the band’s most successful phase.
The group was originally called Loose End, and signed with Virgin Records in 1981. Their debut material was written for them by Chris Amoo and Eddie Amoo, who had achieved UK Singles Chart success of their own in the 1970s, with their group The Real Thing. The trio changed its name to Loose Ends in 1983 and continued to record for Virgin. They were distributed in the United States by MCA Records.
The group was founded by Steve Nichol after he left the London Guildhall School of Music and Drama where he received extensive classical training. Nichol received ‘The Young Musician Of The Year Award’ at the age of just 16 which lead him into great success. Nichol went on to tour with The Jam in 1982 as a Trumpet, Trombone and Keyboard player. He was also a composer for: Rakim, Carl Cox, Phyllis Hyman and other various artists. Most of the band’s material was also written and supplied by Nichol. Nichol auditioned McIntosh at a bar in Central London and found Eugene through a college fashion show.
They achieved their first success with “Hangin’ on a String (Contemplating)” in 1985, which reached #13 in the UK chart. ”Hangin’ on a String” also reached #1 on the U.S. Billboard R&B chart, making Loose Ends the first British band ever to top that chart. They reached #16 with the single “Magic Touch” in the same year. The disc was produced in the U.S., as was their 1986 hit “Slow Down” (later used as thetheme music for MuchMusic’s Soul in The City program). Later that year, a track they had written and produced for Five Star, “Let Me Be The One,” reached number two in the same listings. Subsequent falling sales saw the threesome notch up their final transatlantic hit in 1988 with “Watching You (Watching Me).”
The group’s lineup changed in 1990 due to differences in its proposed musical direction, with Eugene and Nichol wanting to maintain the group’s sound and McIntosh wanting to be more experimental. Eugene and Nichol decided to leave, and were replaced by Linda Carriere and Sunay Suleyman. Look How Long turned out to be the final studio album released under the Loose Ends name, and featured their final hit single, “Don’t Be A Fool” (1990). McIntosh himself went on to work behind the recording desk following the group’s peak popularity, but the new trio soon disbanded. He has since produced several artists’ work, most notably that of Caron Wheeler and Ruth Joy.
In 1998, the group reunited to appear on a single by Pete Rock called “Take Your Time.” They also appeared in the music video for the track.”
Zip
“European-American collaborations were not uncommon during the disco and post-disco eras. Donna Summer’s work with Giorgio Moroder and Pete Bellotte was most prominent and groundbreaking, while Change was among the most noteworthy — yet somewhat overlooked — international acts to spring up during the early ‘80s. Driven by Guadeloupian producer Jacques Fred Petrus and Italian partner Mario Malavasi, Change is most commonly associated with “The Glow of Love,” a 1980 single featuring Luther Vandross over a wistful Chic-like production. Through a series of minor transformations — a shifting array of vocalists and behind-the-scenes associates — the group released 11 other charting singles from 1980 through 1985, as well as six charting albums, two of which peaked in the Top Ten of Billboard’s R&B Albums chart.
When Petrus and Malavasi conceptualized Change, they had several projects under their belts, including Macho, Midnight Band, Revanche, and Peter Jacques Band. They brought in guitarist Paolo Gianolio and bassist Davide Romani, composed instrumentals, then looked to the U.S. for an impressive crop of lyricists and vocalists — Wayne Garfield (Roy Ayers, Candi Staton), Tanyayette Willoughby (Twennynine), Jocelyn Brown (Musique, Inner Life), and Luther Vandross (Chic, Gregg Diamond Bionic Boogie). The result, Glow of Love, reached number ten on the R&B chart, driven by “Glow of Love” and “Searching” (with Vandross as lead vocalist, just prior to his solo breakthrough), “Angel in My Pocket” (a fusion of electronic Italo disco and Chic-style elegance led by Brown), and “A Lover’s Holiday” (boasting the type of snappy, upbeat group vocal that became a Petrus trademark through productions for High Fashion, the B.B. & Q. Band, and the Ritchie Family).
Some of the material for the group’s second album was written with Vandross in mind, but the singer and Petrus could not agree on contract issues, allowing James “Crab” Robinson — who had recorded with Lonnie Liston Smith, Norman Connors, and Michal Urbaniak — to enter the fold as a lead vocalist. While Vandross was still present in the background, Robinson was showcased, as was an assortment of females that included Brown (then credited as Jocelyn Shaw), Diva Gray, and Ullanda McCullough. That album, Miracles, was released in 1981 and repeated Glow of Love’s feat, managing to top out at number nine with a relatively unique sound — remarkably sleek, yet rhythmically robust — highlighted by the number one club-chart triad “Paradise,” “Hold Tight,” and “Heaven of My Life.”
Compared to the group’s first two albums, Sharing Your Love (1982) and This Is Your Time (1983) were holding-pattern releases without a great deal of progression, though minor hits were spun off from both sets. Malavasi, Romani, and Robinson departed. Petrus responded in a shrewd way by hiring ex-Time members Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis, who were just starting to hit their stride with the S.O.S. Band and Cheryl Lynn, to produce 1984’s Change of Heart. The title song, featuring Deborah Cooper, reached number seven on the R&B chart, while newer fellow member Rick Brennan was used to best effect on “You Are My Melody,” a midtempo song that didn’t chart in the U.S. but stands among the group’s best output.
Timmy Allen, who also had a hand in the writing and production of Change of Heart, wrote three-fourths of 1985’s Turn on Your Radio and co-produced the album with Petrus. Its singles did not perform well, though there was some solid material, such as “Mutual Attraction” — a song that could have held its own beside some of the year’s most advanced R&B, from Maze’s “Twilight” to Loose Ends’ “Magic Touch.” Other songs, like the ballad “You’ll Always Be Part of Me,” resembled Jam and Lewis/S.O.S. Band outtakes. It would be the group’s last recording under the guidance of Petrus; the producer was murdered in 1987 at his Guadeloupe villa by a disgruntled tourist who, earlier that evening, had been denied entrance into Petrus’ night club. A few years later, Romani and a handful of fellow producers and musicians made another Change album — a set of adequate, sophisticated, turn-of-the-‘90s R&B with some club grooves — but it was shelved and didn’t see release until 2009 as Change Your Mind. The group’s 1980-1985 releases were reissued in a number of forms throughout the ‘90s and 2000s via labels like Rhino, Wounded Bird, and BBR.”
Waist.
“Spawned from the urge to do something apart from his post-rock band Fridge, Kieran Hebden’s Four Tet project balances organic and programmed sounds. Hebden formed Fridge with Sam Jeffers and Adem Ilhan while still in high school. When Fridge went on temporary hiatus for Jeffers and Ilhan to attend college, Hebden spent time playing with ideas gained from hip-hop and electronica that he hadn’t had time for while concentrating on the band. Eager to experiment, Hebden bought a computer and began collecting drum and sound samples. Though his tracks sounded contrary, Hebden produced them all in his flat using only his computer to loop, slice, and paste downloaded samples and rhythms. His first full-length was 1999’s Dialogue, which was noticed by experimental dub pioneer Pole (Stefan Betke). The two eventually collaborated on a 12”, Four Tet vs. Pole, which included an original song by each and a remix of the track done by the other artist. Around the same time, Fridge were signed to the label Go! Beat, owned by Polydor. Hebden retained Four Tet as a side project, however, and released subsequent records Pause (2001) and Rounds (2003) through Domino. The No More Mosquitoes EP and the “My Angel Rocks Back and Forth” single preceded the 2005 release of Everything Ecstatic. In 2006, Hebden put together two compilations of some of his favorite tracks, LateNightTales and DJ-Kicks, as well as Everything Ecstatic Films & Part 2. The two-disc Remixes was also compiled and released that year, as were two volumes of his Exchange Session project with jazz drummer Steve Reid. These two volumes found Hebden working under his proper name for a change. This trend continued when their third collaboration, Tongues, arrived in 2007. The four-track Ringer, issued the following year, was the first Four Tet release in over four years, and it was trailed by the critically adored full-length There Is Love in You in early 2010.”
Waist.
