Medical Records returns to celebrate Record Store Day this year with a brand new installment from their Electroconvulsive Therapy series! Once again teaming up with the blog Crispy Nuggets, to bring listeners an expertly curated collection of rare and out-of-print tracks, these fine folks have taken great care to make the oddities here once again available on high-quality vinyl. While last year’s ECT Vol 2 – Fuzz Dance collected hard to find classics from the Italo Disco scene, ECT Vol 3 – Obscure Singles Circa 83-86 focuses on several short-lived but intriguing European synth-pop bands whose original vinyl recordings from the ’80’s would now cost you, in some cases, well over $100. Most of the bands in this collection would only be around long enough to record the few tracks found on ECT Vol 3, with the notable exception being the moody Scottish group Secession, who would go on after releasing their debut 7″ Betrayal in 1983, to eventually put out material on Beggars Banquet and Siren Records–before parting ways in 1987 (with members Charlie D. Kelly and J.L. Seenan going on to join The Vaselines). Otherwise, for bands like Tipical Me, Black Fantasy, Almost Alone, Leidenschaft, and V.U.D., this was basically it–these quirky and singular tracks represent the pinnacle of their short lived musical careers.
What really distinguishes the selections on ECT Vol 3, though, is their off-beat compositional sense, combined with an attuned ear for what was new in pop music at the time. Not off-beat in a rhythmic sense, but idiosyncratic, and often emotionally or stylistically pitched in such a way as to slightly miss the mark. And yet, therein lies the awesomeness of cuts like Tipical Me‘s “Claustrofobian” and “Pope No Hope“, both found on ECT Vol 3. While Lieven Nicasy would eventually play synthesizer with The Wave, on the Sometimes (You Enter My World) 12″, his other Colour Records release was this obscure 7″ as Tipical Me. On “Claustrofobian”, we meet a strange little fellow who tells us he’s “scared and alone/waiting on a friend night and day”. Later he let’s us in on the fact that he’s also plagued by ghosts who want his blood, and when he has a bad dream that his wife is dead, the doctor explains, “be calm and stay in bed/you were almost dead”, before finishing with the awkward aside, “…and I like your wife”. Sung in a sometimes “broken” English, and complete with Belgian accent, sure, we can’t help but giggle a bit, even as Nicasy backs up his weird tale with the kind of sound and style that would come to define synth-pop and new wave in the early 80’s.
I think it’s fair to say that most of the “obscure singles” found on ECT Vol 3 share the “Claustrofobian””s qualities of being both off-beat, yet stylistically of-the-moment. Leidenschaft‘s “Who Cares?” and “The Cities Of The Red Night” first appeared on a 3-song cassette for the French label GMG in 1986, and both are animated by itchy, hyper-active drum programming, as well as minimal dark wave melodies. “The Cities Of The Red Night” seems to borrow a page from William Burrough’s novel of similar name, while on “Who Cares?”, Leidenschaft’s vocalist Thierry croons, “everything’s all dead/everything’s all ghost”, with his accent making the dramatically delivered lines that much more…ah, dramatic? But then, who doesn’t love a Parisian nihilist?
For “odd” in a slightly different flavor, ECT Vol 3 includes the UK duo Black Fantasy, whose 1984 7″, Evil Places/Fade Away From Me, was originally pressed to 1000 copies. With only 400 ever sold, and the rest destroyed in 2004, the existing vinyl versions can fetch as much as $200. Having only the two songs to go on, it’s hard to put my finger on what’s so weird about these guys, exactly, but something smells a little off. “Evil Places”, for instance, has the very strange odor of Ayn Rand and residual Catholic guilt, as it tells the tale of “two young people living in sin”, their lives passing through “places the devil’s been”–and if that sounds “judgy”, I think it’s because it probably is. “Fade Away From Me” is also a bit “off”, with it’s passionate vocal appeal to a spurning lover telling you everything you need to know about why said lover would chose to leave!
To round out it’s excellent collection of oddities, ECT Vol 3 includes the UK duo Almost Alone, as well as the ultra obscure group V.U.D.. That band’s futurist punk meets acid track “Look!” seems only to have been included on a 1983 Italian comp from Mask Productions, while Almost Alone‘s “Blue City” was recorded with producer John Fryer, at the famed Blackwing Studios–also home to Yazoo, Depeche Mode, Erasure, and others. Originally appearing on a 1984 7″ for Family Records, bold production and programming shine throughout “Blue City”–which also happens to reach new levels of deep with intriguing insights like “only darkness is forever”, or “forever is only endlessness/an open door that’s clear”.
Glad to see, then, that another Record Store Day will include a brand new installment from the Medical Records/Crispy Nuggets‘ Electroconvulsive Therapy series. Obscure and odd for sure, but curated with special care for that modern weirdo, and collector of hard-to-find synth-pop! ECT Vol 3 features additional mastering by Martin Bowes, at the Cage in the UK, and it will come out April 18th on high-quality 180 gram blue and magenta “half and half” colored vinyl…Sure wonder what these cats got cookin’ up for next year!
