Description
I always find it odd that people call us post-punk. I know that punk and New Wave started at the same time because I was there. (Ganesh Seshadri aka Bid, singer, guitarist and main songwriter)
Emerging at the end of punk era, The Monochrome Sets estrangement from society came from a more arty angle. This boxset is the full account of their frantically productive early period, the perfect document of an under-appreciated chapter of British pop history.
Though widely unknown, they are one of the most influential British bands of the last 40 years, with the early Morrissey and Marr, Blurs Graham Coxon and Franz Ferdinands Alex Kapranos among their admirers. Though Bid never went to college, The Monochrome Set are often seen as an archetypal art school band. Their name alludes to Yves Kleins monochrome paintings while song titles like Alphaville and Eine Symphonie des Grauens nodded to Godard and F.W. Murnau. In 1979 they released a string of snappy, now highly collectible singles on Rough Trade, followed by early masterpieces Strange Boutique and Love Zombies. In 1982 they moved to Cherry Red Records with their third LP Eligible Bachelors whose lead single The Jet Set Junta was banned for its non-existent connection to the Falklands War. Their major label effort The Lost Weekend (1985) contained their biggest airplay hit Jacobs Ladder.
I read a bit of Restoration poetry and listen to Leadbelly, and it comes out like that (Bid, The Monochrome Set)
The casual prose of pop history is full of backhanded compliments, and The Monochrome Set have received a few, ranging from should have been massive to influential, numbering the likes of Morrissey and Marr, Blurs Graham Coxon and Franz Ferdinands Alex Kapranos among their celebrity admirers.
All of which seems irrelevant when faced with the rich treasures assembled here from a previously scattered back catalogue. Heres the early work of a band that always eschewed world domination in favour of twisting chord sequences, turning phrases and plotting perfect collisions of guitar and vocal lines. In literature there are recognised different fields with different cows in them. But in pop everyone who has a guitar is put in the same field, says Ganesh Seshadri aka Bid, the bands unashamedly bookish singer, guitarist, main songwriter. When The Monochrome Set emerged towards the end of the punk era, they didnt fit the voguish stereotypes of the day. Im not pretending to be working class, says Bid, Im half American, half Indian, but Im also quintessentially British, apparently. As it was, the early Monochrome Set sound betrayed a fondness of Lou Reed and American psychedelia, and though they shared their generations sense of estrangement, they certainly werent part of the punk revolution. I always find it odd that people call us post-punk, says Bid, I know that punk and New Wave started at the same time because I was there. The genre was to be not a genre. We didnt talk about it, we were just different.
Though Bid never even went to college, The Monochrome Set are often regarded as an archetypal art school band, not least thanks to the arty references peppering their work, from their name alluding to Yves Kleins monochrome paintings to song titles like Alphaville and Eine Symphonie des Grauens nodding to masterpieces by Jean-Luc Godard and F.W. Murnau. Admittedly, the Hornsey School of Art played a part in the bands genesis. This was where lead guitarist Tom Hardy, later to be known as Lester Square, studied with a certain Stuart Goddard aka Adam Ant, which is also why The Monochrome Sets family tree shares its roots with the latters first band the B-sides and the early Ants. The Monochrome Sets lack of breakthrough success is usually attributed to their inability to churn out the hits, but in hindsight their now highly collectible first four seven inches for the Rough Trade label, united here on one disc with all the singles from the early eighties period, prove that they started out as bona fide masters of pops ultimate format. Released in February 1980, their first album Strange Boutique, featuring the bands percussion-heavy theme song (predating Adam & The Antss Kings of the Wild Frontier by months) and the Johnny Marr-anticipating Love Goes Down The Drain, caught the Monochrome Set in full flight, quickly followed by the equally taut, funny and adventurously dynamic Love Zombies. 1982 saw them move to Cherry Red Records (via sub label él) on their third LP Eligible Bachelors, with the catchy lead single The Jet Set Junta promptly banned because of its non-existent connection to the Falklands War. Yeah, it was banned, says Bid, but it was funny that it was banned. The modern version of British indie started with Cherry Red, and Jet Set was a proper indie pop record. After a financially disastrous American tour, the band were resigned to taking the major label shilling with The Lost Weekend (1985), scoring their biggest airplay hit with Jacobs Ladder but failing to dent the charts enough to sustain their new masters Warners interest, as the eighties went off into full-on hyper pop overdrive. Today, the Monochrome Set are very much a going concern, with a new album due for release in the coming year. But while you wait here is the full account of their frantically productive early period, and as such the perfect document of a widely under-appreciated, essential part of British pop history. Robert Rotifer, Canterbury 2017
6-LP boxset (limited to 700 copies) includes 6 cds in slipcases.
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