Psychic TV – WZBC Interview – 1984 / Interview with Genesis P-Orridge discussing William Burroughs – 1981 / Current 93 – LAYLAH Records – 1984 / Coil – LAYLAH Records -1984 – Street Level EP – Fuck Off Records – 1980 – Blue Midnight – 100 Things To Do Records -1982 / Rubella Ballet – Xntrix – 1982

Interview Part 1

Interview Part 2

Sandie Charron hosting Genesis P-Orridge Decadant and John Doe Gosling Joan Ov Arc on Boston College Radio WZBC station on the 21st April 1984. Genesis hitting the humour straight off of the bat with the introductions.

This interview shows a more playful and mischievous side of Genesis P-Orridge with Sandie Charron playing along graciously, although seemingly a little confused with of the discussion at some points.

This audio on this old C90’s seems to have been duplicated from the source recording but recorded far into the red (rather than being recorded in more audio friendly green or yellow) This means that the audio has a fair bit of distortion present, very noticeable on the Psychic T.V musical interludes. The songs ‘Orchids’ and ‘Roman P’ are pretty badly affected but the talking audio is OK, as the participants do not particularly sound like screeching aliens..

An interesting interview nonetheless Genesis P-Orridge and Sandie chatting about several subjects. At the end a recording of Genesis P-Orridge daughter Caresse crying and a wailing seemingly ends the interview…

I added some visuals to this YouTube post to compliment the conversation. The visuals are:

The Psychic T.V skull test card.

All pages from the ‘Personal Message From The T.O.P.Y’ handout.

A rare Tatler magazine article on Psychic T.V / T.O.P.Y (including a picture of Min with Lurch from Yeovil).

Artwork of a weird Hitler-Lucifer-Horn type affair.

I am placing a few Psychic T.V audio posts up at the moment as there is a documentary being considered and I wanted to get some of this rare material out in case Sacred Bones from New York City are interested in including some of the material for inclusion on the film.

Sacred Bones have already contacted me for material that I was happy to supply.

Interview

Twenty odd minutes of Genesis P-Orridge (who in 1981 was still a member of Throbbing Gristle) discussing the history of his relationship with William Burroughs as well as discussing the ‘Nothing Here But The Recordings’ album released Industrial Records.

There are some snippets of the recording plus Burroughs explaining a little about Hasan-i Sabbah, the ‘Old Man of the Hills’, drinker and sharer of hashish, founder and leader of ‘Ashishin’, the ‘Holy Killers of Islam’.

I do not know any more about this recording that has laid dormant on an old cassette tape that I just unearthed.

I do not know who the interviewer was who was speaking to Genesis P-Orridge, or the reason for the interview, and whether the interview might have ended up in print, visual or audio media.

Perhaps someone will step up and fill those gaps.

The visuals which accompany this post are just scanned from the book, Re-Search 4/5 which was first published in 1982.

Included within the pages are William Burroughs, Brion Gysin and Throbbing Gristle discussing advanced ideas involving the social control process, creativity and the future.

Also within the book are interviews, scarce fiction and essays.

This book is a manual of prophetic ideas and insights.

If you see a copy you should grab it double quick.

Side 1

Side 2

Uploaded tonight the debut 12″ single release by Current 93 recorded in 1983 but released in 1984.

Appearing with David Tibet are Coil’s John Balance and 23 Skidoo’s Fritz Haaman.

The inclusion of Fritz Haaman on these recordings make me think that the tracks appearing on this Current 93 12″ single would have fitted quite nicely onto 23 Skidoos’s ‘The Culling Is Coming’ album!

The first two Current 93 album’s ‘Nature Unveiled’ and ‘Dogs Blood Rising’, both released on L.A.Y.L.A.H records are classics of the industrial/goth/deathrock genre and are well worth trying to get hold of if you have the £££ to spare for a secondhand copy of the original pressings. They have both been repressed on Durtro Records so there might be versions that will set you back a little less £££.

Although I apprieciate the early releases released on L.A.Y.L.A.H Records, I personally feel that the work Current 93 has completed in the last twenty years or so is the absolute pinnacle in their long career.

‘Pretty Little Horses’, ‘Halo’, ‘Black Ships Ate The Sky’, ‘The Inmost Light (Pretty Little Horses trilogy)’ and ‘Aleph At Hallucinatory Mountain’ (all released on Tibets’ Dutro record label) are among my favorite albums of the last twenty years.

The text below ripped off of Wiki Pear Dear.

Current 93 are an eclectic British experimental music group, working since the early 1980s in folk-based musical forms. The band was founded in 1982 by David Tibet (né David Michael Bunting, renamed ‘Tibet’ by Genesis P-Orridge sometime prior to forming the group).

With a glut of industrial-pop hybrids on the market in the 1980s, several bands stayed true to the experimental nature of early industrial music. The Psychic TV axis alone spawned many creative artists, including Current 93’s David Tibet, who blends Gothic chanting and haunting atmospherics with industrial noisescapes courtesy of tape loops and synthesizers.

Tibet has been the only constant in the group, though Steven Stapleton (of Nurse with Wound) has appeared on nearly every Current 93 release. A favor which David Tibet returns by working with Stapleton on most projects by Nurse with Wound.

Michael Cashmore has also been a constant contributor since Thunder Perfect Mind. Douglas Pearce of Death In June has played on well over a dozen Current 93 releases, and Steve Ignorant of Crass (using the name Stephen Intelligent), ex-Psychic TV compatriot John Balance (more famous for his work with Peter Christopherson in Coil), Boyd Rice, runeologist Freya Aswynn, Nick Cave, Fritz Haaman, formerly of 23 Skidoo, Björk, Andrew W.K., Will Oldham, Ben Chasny, Rose McDowall, Tiny Tim, Tony Wakeford of Sol Invictus, Marc Almond and Ian Read of Fire and Ice have also lent their talents over the years. Tibet is also fond of the works of American writer Thomas Ligotti, and invited him to collaborate with Current 93.

The trio of Tibet, Balance, and Haaman debuted in 1983 by recording the 12″ single ‘Lashtah’ for L.A.Y.L.A.H Records. Until the end of the ’80s, Tibet — utilizing the various lineups — recorded at a frenetic pace, issuing more than two albums per year for both L.A.Y.L.A.H and the Maldoror label.

Current 93 have released some twenty albums, and many singles, as well as having been a guest on many of the above listed artists’ records, and others’ such as Nature and Organisation and The Hafler Trio.

Much of Current 93’s early work was similar to late 1970s and early 1980s industrial music: abrasive tape loops, droning synthesizer noises and Tibet’s distorted, excoriating vocals. This early work became influential with the goth scene. Later works found Tibet mostly casting off such trappings in favor of a more organic sound, labeled by some as “apocalyptic folk” music, occasionally featuring his sinister nursery rhyme-influenced singing and primarily acoustic folk-styled music.

Tibet’s lyrics have been fairly consistent, regardless of delivery: The earlier recordings reflect his preoccupation with death, Christ, mysticism, Aleister Crowley (Tibet borrowed the term “93 Current” from Crowley – the 93 Current being the current of Thelema or Agape), Tibetan Buddhism, Gnosticism, runes, swastikas, Noddy, The Wicker Man, and a variety of occult notions.

The later to present-day period of Current 93’s recordings increasingly reflect Tibet’s interest in Christian mysticism. Tibet has stated that he now identifies as a Christian.

Side 1

Side 2

The debut 12″ record by ex-Psychic TV members, Peter Christopherson and John Balance released on the wonderful L.A.Y.L.A.H record label from Belgium.

‘How To Destroy Angels’ subtitled ‘Ritual Music For The Accumulation Of Male Sexual Energy’ is a haunting soundscape lasting around seventeen minutes.

Most of the audio is quiet but some louder parts come into the recording so do not turn your volume up too much…

The B-side of this record has not got a Coil track on it as such, although the labels on the record do give this side a title, ‘Absolute Elsewhere’.

This ‘track’ is a continuous looped ‘bleep’ that runs for around fifteen minutes.

I recording only twenty seconds out of the fifteen minutes playing length for obvious reasons.

This track is not meant to be played. It was just a gimmick for this pressing of the 12″ single. There are other versions of this 12″ single with other styles of B-side.

Coil was conceived by John Balance in 1982 as a concurrent project with Psychic TV, with whom he was working, playing bass guitar, vibes and various Tibetan instruments.

In 1984 he began concentrating full time on Coil together with the co-founder of Psychic TV, Peter ‘Sleazy’ Christopherson.

In addition to his role in TG and Psychic TV, Christopherson was also a member of the Hipgnosis design group who executed covers for many ‘supergroups’ of the seventies, including Led Zeppelin, Yes and Pink Floyd.

John Balance has previously worked with David Tibet and Fritz Haaman in Current 93 and Zos Kia.

On the Coil album Scatology, they are variously joined by Clint Ruin and Gavin Friday of Virgin Prunes.

Coil have also written the soundtrack to the feature film The Angelic Conversation, directed by Derek Jarman, while the video for their version of Tainted Love is on permanent display at The Museum Of Modern Art in New York.

What is Coil?

Sleazy: Loosely, it’s what we do musically. We do other things apart from music but it is the term for our musical experiments. Although it’s basically me and John, we do get other people to help as well. In that way, I suppose it’s like Psychic TV regarding the set-up and collaborative aspects. Coil is also a code. A hidden universal. A key for which the whole does not exist, a spell, a spiral. A serpents SHt around a female cycle. A whirlwind in a double helix. Electricity and elementals, atonal noise and brutal poetry. A vehicle for obsessions. Kabbulah and Khaus. Thanatos and Thelema. Archangels and Antichrists. Truth and Deliberation. Traps and disorientation. Infantile, inbuilt disobedience.

Where is the term Coil derived from?

J Balance: I chose it on instinct and since then I’ve found that it actually means a noise. And there are things like the spiral, the electrical coil and contraception. The spiral is a repeating micro/macrocosmic form. From DNA to spiral galaxies. A primal symbol. lt’s a nice little word. The Black Sun that we use is a surrealist symbol from Maldoror by Isadore Ducasse. It has ten rays (2×5). Coil are essentially a duo and five is the number of the aeon of Horus – the present time. We have a private mythology completely in tune with symbols and signs of the present aeon. We don’t believe that it should become an important part of our public image – as misinterpretation, and unnecessary and incorrect replication would possibly occur. Silence and secrecy. After all, the image of Horus most appropriate to the new aeon is of a ‘conquering child’ with his finger to his lips – the sign of silence.

Were the angels symbolic of a larger concept on ‘How to Destroy Angels’?

Sleazy: All of what we do is symbolic on several different levels at once, so you can interpret angels as being a number of things, whether it’s the controlling influence of the church, or whether it’s an unnecessary desire to retain virginity.

J Balance: When I thought of the title, all these things went through me. It was a record to accumulate enough power to destroy theoretical angels – Christian gossamer angels don’t seem hard to destroy. It was a curious matter of fact title, almost like a manual a handbook you’d come across which could be the key to immense power and change.

7″ single side 1

7″ single side 2

A Blue Midnight 7″ single side 1

A Blue Midnight 7″ single side 2

JB was a former NME journalist, who had dropped out of that organs employment to become a roadie for Here & Now. I had met him a few times at Woodstock Grove and liked him for his enthusiasm for bizarre projects, and dedication to the art of not conforming.

JB was the only person I’d ever met who could smoke forty a day of other people’s cigarettes without them minding.

Tragically his jewels of inspiration, and the energy with which he was able to expound them, were pitted against an almost overwhelming lack of personal organisation, and a breathtaking command of leisure that caused him even to put off procrastination until tomorrow. While the rest of us were merely idle, JB idled for England – or would have if he could have gotten round to it.

The advent of The Entire Cosmos provided us both with a tenuous foothold on the second Weird Tales tour.

The first rehearsal of The Entire Cosmos took place at Here & Now’s farmhouse in Buckinghamshire, where isolation from near neighbours allowed them to use a large outhouse as a permanent rehearsal space. The original line-up of the band was JB, vocals and most of the songwriting, Gregor, my fellow vagrant, bass, Gary ‘from Newcastle’, guitar, myself on drums and Gavin Da Blitz on synthesiser and keyboards.

After a few rehearsals we had a handful of JB’s eccentric songs prepared, which we augmented with a couple of Gregor’s, and an infinite repertoire of cosmic jams, over which JB would recite strange science-fantasy stories.

We soon felt that we were ready to unleash ourselves on the public, and with Weird Tales Two in the offing, we badgered the hierarchy for support slots. This time they had their own bus, a huge green piece of vintage army-surplus, with an unquenchable thirst. Once again there were no spare berths, but it was agreed that we could make our own way to some of the gigs and do a short set if there was time. We were accorded a low priority, however, and warned that our set would be the first to be cut if things were running late.

Joining The Entire Cosmos was not in any way a trip to the stars, but it did get me out of the obscurity and into the wider realms offered by Weird Tales, which was taking its bands to all kinds of exotic places like Manchester, and Scunthorpe, and even Bishops Stortford.

After the tour – while being driven home from High Wycombe in someone’s car – Gary and Gregor fell out massively, to our intense discomfiture, over a point of ego. While Gary threatened to punch Gregor’s lights out and Gregor vowed he would break Gary’s fingers, JB endeavoured vainly to mediate and I pretended to be asleep. Gary won the toss. Gregor left the band.

Grant Showbiz replaced him. Grant was formerly the sound engineer on Here & Now’s free tours, and had latterly put the experience and the contacts to more profitable use mixing The Fall. We did a few dates, with him playing, around West London, notably at The Raindrop Club, which was the silly name superimposed onto a squatted pub called The Trafalgar, that has provided the backdrop to more photo sessions than even The Clash could pose for, and in a park near Portobello called Meanwhile Gardens, which was the venue for miniature music festivals on a few Saturdays throughout the summer.

My first appearance on record found me plodding through a lengthy instrumental passage at the end of JB’s epic dirge ‘Looking For You’. The song is great. The drumming was terrible. We had contributed one song to a four-track compilation EP, which featured several of West London’s finest from the squat scene around Latimer Road – also known as the free state of Frestonia.

Fortunately for me all known copies of this record were destroyed by government order in a bizarre freak purge in the mid-eighties, so no evidence remains to haunt me. Far less gruesome was the first demo we recorded out in Buckinghamshire, as it included a couple of JB’s best songs, and the drumming was slightly better, but the crowning moment in the band’s short history was the two night stand we did supporting Here & Now at the Fforde Green Hotel in Leeds.

Joseph Porter

‘By jingo what a top EP that is. The Crumbs track was recorded at Quest studio in Luton. We did a few numbers that day and contradicting my diktat of the day (no drinking as we were paying good folding money for this) we got lagged in the pub.
If I remember rightly Grant was having a good fiddle with the sliders as was Mick Sinclair. The Voletones were like our Jeykle and Hyde. Mac (Colonel Spanker) and Dick (Deadly Earnest) were 50 per cent Crumbs / 50 per cent Voles.

Vince Pie

Blue Midnight included in their ranks Grant Showbiz, live and studio engineer at Meanwhile Gardens, many free festivals and at Street Level recording studios. Mark Perry from Alternative TV and Anno from later line ups of Alternative TV / The Good Missonaries, Justin Adams, later of The Impossible Dreamers and Andy, several years later joining up with Joseph Porter in Blyth Power.

Side 1

Side 2

One of the bands I saw perform numerous times throughout the 1980’s. In fact I think the band from ‘those days’ that I saw perform the most through varying line up changes.

This cassette tape and the ‘Ballet Dance’ 7″ single were firm favorites some decades ago, and are still a decent listen today.

The booklet that accompanied the cassette tape is scanned and added to the audio for this YT post.

Rubella Ballet formed towards the end of 1979 by former Fatal Microbes members (without Honey Bane who by this time had a started concentrating on a solo career care of Jimmy Pursey). Pete Fender on guitar, Gem Stone and ‘It’ (Quentin North) both on bass. These ex Microbes were joined by the drummer Sid Ation who would shortly also be drumming with Flux Of Pink Indians for a short while, and vocalists Annie Anxiety and Womble.

The bands first performance was when they took to the stage for a short set at a Crass and Poison Girls concert at The Conway Hall in Red Lion Square, London. They had originally been called Rubella Babies for this event. Rubella Ballet soon ended up the preferred name for the band. The original line up of Rubella Ballet with Annie Anxiety performed just a few times in and around London carrying on with chaotic stage shows, swapping instruments and even letting members of the crowd perform on stage with them.

Annie, Womble and ‘It’ were involved only initially, left and were replaced by vocalist Zillah Minx, who had at that time of the first Rubella Ballets gigs recently started a relationship with Sid.

Pete Fender and Gem Stone are the son and daughter of Poison Girls singer Vi Subversa, so Rubella Ballet used Poison Girls equipment to jam and write songs and also had full use of the recording studio and practice area underneath the house the band and children shared in Leytonstone (along with Sid and Zillah). This is course was a major advantage in any young bands career, not having the need to save up for weeks to get a substandard guitar or sessions in the studio.

The first ‘proper’ gig with Zilla and Gem in the band was a fundraiser at the Theatre Royal in Stratford supporting the Poison Girls, which ended up in a riot, when West Ham affliated skinheads caused trouble fighting with the police.

Rubella Ballet performed frequently from this point on, many times supporting Poison Girls, Crass and Conflict. Many venues were visited including the Wapping Autonomy Centre and The Centro Iberico in Westbourne Park.

The band were best known for wearing homemade brightly coloured dayglo clothes on stage at these gigs, to differentiate themselves from the other anarcho-punk bands who tended to wear black, ‘army-surplus’ clothing. The colourful garb is a styling that has carried on throughout the whole of the band’s career.

The band released one album on cassette tape with the addition of Andy Smith on guitar, entitled ‘Ballet Bag’ and following that, a four track 7″ EP entitled ‘Ballet Dance’ both in 1982 and both for Poison Girls’ Xntrix Records.

The band had rejected the opportunity to put out a record on the Crass label a year or so before due to the packaging being genric Crass style black / grey / white which did not suit the band whatsoever. The session for the cassette was recorded at Forest Studios and engineered by Alex Foulcer and the session for the 7″ single was produced by Richard Famous of the Poison Girls and engineered by Pete Fender in the studio underneath the Poison Girls house in Leytonstone.

Adrian Thrills, reviewing the single in the NME stated “the Ballet have an appealing sharp edge to their claustrophobic punk thrash, a poppy surge and even a discernible funk readjustment…of course, they could always just be taking the piss”.

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