maxflinn:the_lhc:maxflinn:? u mean the _lhc ?? i wouldnt have thought he would be a pwei fan myself , maybe im wrong ..
Who me? A PWEI fan? Oh, only about the biggest in the world
What makes you think I wouldn't be a fan?
hmmm , ive never heard of them myself , after a quick google , i seen that "pop" was in the name , i thought they were a pop band , i didnt think you would be into pop music , i honestly dont know why (please note appropriate use of the word know
) i thought that , but i did , so are they a pop band ?? do you have posters of them on your bedroom wall
No, not a pop band, the name comes from a book from the early 80s called Will Pop Eat Itself? I believe the premise was that pop music was starting to become repetitive and retrospective and would ultimately disappear up it's own ar^H^H^H, you get the idea.
Pop Will Eat Itself was the perfect name for the band really, following their initially unreleased first album, a not hugely successful stab at early guitar indie music, they discovered drum machines and sampling and coupled with a clear love of early Hip-Hop, they somehow cobbled together their first "real" album, Box Frenzy, a raw, almost hollow sounding collection of sampled TV, music and cinema which reached back as far as the 50's, right up to present day (1987) influences (if you could call Mel and Kim an influence), like a scavenging cyborg whatever they needed to complete a track, they lifted from popular culture and created a completely different beast from it.
Box Frenzy wasn't perfect, far from it, with its demo-feeling sound, heavily accented pseudo-rapping and light, jokey feel, it was still enough of an underground success to see the boys signed by a big label, RCA (unbelievably!), a move which allowed them to bring in a proper producer, Flood. The album that followed, "This is The Day, This is The Hour, This is This." was a quantum leap forward, tracks had depth, proper instrumentation (stun guitar!), the sampling became both heavier and yet subtler, years later I'm still discovering that parts of tracks I believed were original are actually sampled from somewhere else, the twin vocals of Clint Mansell (you may know him) and Graham Crabb became more serious, better executed, the humour still remained in some tracks (Can U Dig It? and Def Con 1, notably) but there was now a darker, more political edge, nothing really overt about the politics, that came later but the combination of (very) metal guitars, samples, biting lyrics and just damn fine tunes attracted a much larger audience than previously, including myself, I was 15 and hooked instantly and it's no exaggeration to say that I didn't listen to anyone else for over 4 years, how could I, This is the Day was the first album I ever bought and it blew my head off, all music should be like this, I thought, so nothing else could possibly measure up.
It also saw the introduction of The Designer's Republic on sleeve art duty, a collaboration that continued right up until the band split in 1996 and beyond, this gave a coherent yet evolving look to the band, encompassing dozen of t-shirts, skater short, coats, etc, all without them having to appear in person at all, I can't think of another group that's elevated (gah, bad word, need another one!) their art work to the same level of success, except possibly the Pet Shop Boys.
When the 3rd album, Cure for Sanity, was announced, fans expected more of the same. They nearly got it but in a move seemingly almost designed to annoy the metal fans that had been attracted by the heavy guitars, the band dropped them completely. The sampling and the rapping, increasingly political now, was still there but the guitars were replaced almost exclusively by synthesizers and overall a more ambient tone. Not as instantly accessible as This, and without the instant recognition of tracks like Can U Dig It? and Def Con 1, Cure for Sanity did however give the band their biggest hit to date, X, Y and Zee, which reached number 13 (I think, probably due to the three beautiful remixes on the 12"), along with their first and only appearance on Top of the Pops (they also had a video featured in a Beavis and Butthead episode. The boys weren't impressed).
If success now seemed just around the corner, it wasn't. RCA funded one more more album, The Looks or the Lifestyle, which saw a return of the guitars, albeit not as heavy as before and also saw the band recruit a live drummer for the first time since their very earliest incarnation (Fuzz Townsend, now a journo with Practical Classics magazine!). The samples remained, for now, but the album didn't really break any new ground and RCA eventually pulled the plug (although they'd continue to try to squeeze whatever they could from the Poppies, with a live album, and a compilation that really wasn't going to attract anyone at all, fans already had everything on there, non-fans had no idea who they were).
This wasn't the end, as the band quickly signed with Infectious (and Trent Reznor's Nothing label in the US) and released what, for some, is their best album, Dos Dedos Mi Amigos. The sampling was drastically cut back, no doubt due to ever increasing litigation from record companies requiring every sample to be registered and paid for, the guitars hit home with full force and the lyrics became bile-laden and venomously political, railing against football hooliganism, fascism, the government (this was still Thatcher's Britain remember) and even the Royal Family, the humour that marked out earlier works was largely gone but it was replaced by what is certainly the strongest album musically.
But it couldn't last, the differing influences within the band that had combined so successfully in the past had now diverged so far that it was impossible for things to hold together, Graham Crabb left, releasing an album of ambient techno under the moniker of Golden Claw musics, the band attempted to continue without him, with a track on the Gary Numan tribute album Random (Friends, horrible) and a demo on a Future Music cover CD but it wasn't to be. Richard formed Bentley Rhythm Ace, catching the wave of the Big Beat surge (which also saw the rise of one Fatboy Slim), briefly threatening to eclipse the success of PWEI, whilst Clint Mansell went west, to Hollywood, scoring a small indie film called Pi, this was well received and in seemingly no space of time at all, has now established himself as one of the most sought after soundtrack composers, having scored such varying fayre as Requiem for a Dream, Sahara, Doom, Smokin' Aces, The Wrestler and lately, Moon.
The band reformed for a series of gigs in 2005 and following that it seemed that further tracks would be forthcoming, but Mansell's Hollywood commitments ultimately prevented it. Crabb and fellow band member Adam Mole formed VileEvils from the ashes, releasing a couple of singles (including a double A-side with a 2010 remix of Axe of Men, from Cure for Sanity) and had announced an album, when, just this month, Crabb announced that he was winding things up so that he could re-start PWEI, albeit as the only original member, the rest of the band declining to take part. Crabb feels he has unfinished business with the Poppies legacy, we can only wait to see what comes of it. Mood: apprehensive.
And that's all I have to say on the subject...
Well, you did ask.