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The Blow Monkeys biography (part four - continued)
In the late summer of 1989 they released the wonderful Choice?. This song in 3 minutes 26 seconds managed to say about Thatcherism what numerous people have needed a book to say - and you can dance to it. Choice? was one of the Tories favorite words in the 1980's (adorning their awful deep blue conference stages), Robert managed to turn it round complete with clever use of Tebbit's Get on your bike phrase. It has been viewed that dance music is vacuous and that meaningful lyrics need to be accompanied by a dirge but Robert proved them wrong. The single featured Sylvia Tella, a reggae vocalist, to stunning effect. There were numerous remixes of the song all with their merits however the long version found on Choices was particularly impressive as it was often played at clubs yet actually maintained all the lyrics as well. The chart success of Choice? gave the group much more publicity than in recent years with numerous TV appearances and magazine articles. In Smash Hits Robert was asked to review the new singles and cheekily gave single of the week to Slam Slam's Move which he co-wrote himself! The success of Wait and Choice? enabled a singles collection to be released to similar success. Choices was a good buy for both people who hardly knew the group but liked a couple of their songs and for existing fans as it did have some unique aspects. Firstly a totally new track Slaves No More, secondly a reworked version of Celebrate The Day After You and thirdly the great long version of Choice? was available on CD for the first time. Also for long term Blow Monkeys fans, a great treat was the video collection featuring all the singles up to Choice? although it did not include the superbly arty Slaves No More video and the Springtime for the World video. A review by Kevin Murphy in Record Mirror said the Blow Monkeys had "littered the past few years with some sumptuous pop" but claims wider success was prevented by political idealism and "the Dr.s' smugness", but then again they wouldn't have been the same group without them. Choices was followed by Slaves No More which also featured Sylvia Tella. A new single version was produced along with a number of mixes (one of which is nearly all Sylvia). Robert still sings this song at his gigs now and its certainly worth it. Unfortunately Slaves No More did not hit the Top 40, as there wasn't a great deal of airplay, and it would be nearly six months before another record release. In 1990 the Blow Monkeys returned with the EP Springtime for the World which did get a fair bit of airplay and many people had picked up on the interesting track La Passionara. The EP sums up the diversity of the Blow Monkeys as each track is in a different style. Many reviews of Springtime highlighted that Robert had now discarded house and was concentrating on his forte - pop. However another track on the EP was a house version of If You Love Somebody with the 12"s featured various remixes of the track by Musto & Bones. The album itself was widely praised for its adventurousness and it showed yet again that Robert would not stand in the same place for long. The album opens with In Too Deep which shows Robert atoning his political lyrics at the micro level. The song features Sylvia Tella quite extensively and has a great rhyming couplets ending. An instrumental track follows the Springtime For The World single before joining into a track which features samples from political leaders talking largely about international and European affairs. Some of the most interesting tracks follows which features the vocals of Rai singer, Cheb Khaled which has a deep range of influences and excellent brass elements. The track is exciting and dynamic. Another version If You Love Somebody follows . After La Passionara comes a dance track which is lacking somehow despite some fine lyrics. Fruits of the Earth is a pure house track featuring largely Brian Powell's vocals. As The Dust Settles has Robert back in his lyricist mode. La Passionara gained rave reviews, although it received very little airplay. The record was radically altered with loads more instruments, vocals and two rappers and no promotional video was made. Unfortunately La Passionara was to be the last Blow Monkeys' single as later on in 1990 the band announced they were calling it a day. Press coverage of the break-up was not very extensive. NME said the group had decided to split due to "increasing public indifference to their recent output". The Channel 4 (in Britain) teletext music pages however did express deep regret about the loss of such an original group. The Blow Monkeys called it a day just months before Thatcher was thrown out of office. More... |
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