London Triad, 1987: Sigue Sigue Sputnik, The The, Fuzzbox

The The, Infected

I first heard about The The from a compilation album that my brother gave me the year before, If You Can’t Please Yourself You Can’t Please Your Soul, and the track “Flesh And Bones”, which I enjoyed. Infected had just been released in November 1986, so it was easy to find. I bought it on cassette so I could listen to it on the trip, and it colored my brain that English winter. Some color that used to be bright and primary, but was now stained and sooty.

It’s a well-produced album, but it’s the sentiment that’s damaged. It sounds like a cabaret jazz combo playing as the world ends. There’s a lot of melancholy and cynical emotion here, all delivered by Matt Johnson’s growly voice. And yet it’s pretty dancy. Songs of sex, despair, and politics, and they all got into my head. Infected did a lot to help temper my near-boundless optimism, adding a dash of bitterness to my naïve emotional palette. And a lot of the bitterness on this album is directed toward America and her foreign policy. Johnson provides foreshadowing to our current association with the UK when he sings this is the 51st state of the U.S.A. in “Heartland,” or I can’t see for the tear gas or the dollars signs in my eyes in “Angels of Deception.” The Reagan years were responsible for a lot of distress and a lot of good music.

I played this tape a lot in the evenings or on rainy days. Normally I don’t go for depressing or melancholy music, but the ideas in the songs are perfectly balanced by the up-tempo music and backing vocals. It’s an apocalypse you can dance to—I give it an 86.

Click to read about. . .

Sigue Sigue Sputnik, Flaunt It
The The, Infected
We’ve Got A Fuzzbox And We’re Gonna Use It, Bostin’ Steve Austin

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