Reviews

Lantern

Glaxo Babies Dreams Interrupted: The Bewilderbeat Years 1978–1980 2xLP

Upstart Italian reissue label Lantern brings Cherry Red’s 2006 CD-only GLAXO BABIES compendium to vinyl for the first time, taking it from a dead format to a format that 2021 is trying very hard to kill. Almost all of the content touched upon here has been reissued elsewhere within the last decade and/or the OG pressings are still relatively inexpensive and easy to come by, so a straight vinyl redux of what was already an incomplete anthology is a little odd, but that said, GLAXO BABIES were responsible for some of the finest dub-conscious, acute-angled post-punk in a late ’70s/early ’80s UK scene that never lacked in that area, so however their legacy is upheld is fine with me. What you get: all of the tracks from 1979’s “Christine Keeler” single and This Is Your Life 12″ (both essential) as well as the mutant funk “Shake!” 7″ from 1980 (less so), cherry-picked (no pun intended) selections from 1980’s Put Me on the Guest List (viciously dry and minimal early demos to rival WIRE) and Nine Months to the Disco (the band’s descent into freeform avant jazz-funk) LPs, one comp offering, and a few orphaned tracks—Y Records’ 1980 Limited Entertainment EP is conspicuously absent. If it leads to even a handful of people being exposed to the scratchy, EX-like ranting repetition of “Police State” or the sax-skronked GANG OF FOUR-worthy groove of “Christine Keeler” for the first time, this collection will have more than justified its existence on wax.

Scream and Dance In Rhythm 12″ reissue

Originally released in 1982, In Rhythm was the lone record from this short-lived, dubbed-out post-punk group who came up in the same late ’70s/early ’80s Bristol scene as the POP GROUP and MAXIMUM JOY, but in contrast to the fiery scratch and howl of the former and the simmering funk of the latter, SCREAM AND DANCE mostly locked into beat-driven, spiraling rhythms with an aura of mystique that was closer in spirit to the RAINCOATS, if anything. The seven-minute title track builds up a laid-back, minimalist groove that’s almost all percussion (the credits reference bongos, sansa thumb piano, and a naal drum, among other things—definitely not the usual post-punk/funk sources), with doubled-up, sing-song incantations from Amanda Stewart and Ruth George-Jones heightening the trance-like effect, followed by “In Pink and Black,” where the spell of the A-side’s first half is only broken by some increasingly intense vocals that hit almost like impassioned anarcho-punk poetry over the droning instrumental rattle. Two versions of the hyper-kinetic and polyrhythmic “Giacometti” make up the B-side, where SCREAM AND DANCE really manifest that band name—the non-remixed take is up there with MAXIMUM JOY’s “Stretch,” PIGBAG’s “Papa’s Got a Brand New Pigbag,” and the collective works of 99 Records in the top heap of mutant disco dancefloor starters, total clatter and clang for reflexive body movement, and spectral, echoing chants that gradually break into uncontrolled primal shrieks. It’s truth in advertising!