The Good Missionary / Graves Of Delux Green / Smile In The Day
Uploaded today is Alternative TV’s moody and atmospheric second LP, which I think is rather wonderful and is dedicated to Mark Wilson, late of The Mob whose birthday it is today. Happy birthday to him.
Photo above showing Mark Wilson in his favoured ‘Vibing Up The Senile Man’ shirt performing with The Mob at Meanwhile Gardens in 1983. Photo from Mark Palmer collection.
Mark and Claire Wilson – Photo from Claire Wilson collection
In a strange twist of fate, not only does the Alternative TV ‘Vibing Up The Senile Man’ artwork share similarities with the artwork on The Mob’s ‘Let The Tribe Increase’ LP, but the official remastered re-release CD of ‘Let The Tribe Increase’ is available in stores (and via Overground Records) from today. A day which, as I have just mentioned, just happens to be the writer, guitarist and vocalist birthday. This release date was certainly not planned by the record label to coincide with Mark’s birthday. The label had no idea! The release date for this excellent CD is a very nice coincidence…Great stuff.
press release
THE MOB
‘Let The Tribe Increase’
14 track CD: 49 minutes:
Label: Overground
Cat. No. OVER 122VP CD
Barcode: 604388719020
Release Date: 6th April 2009
In many ways The Mob were the archetypal anarcho punk band. Formed in Yeovil, Somerset in 1979 the band soon spent their time permanently on the road in a convoy of trucks before squatting in Brougham Road, Hackney – a street of houses that accommodated many punk and counter-culture types. Until their demise in 1983 they remained an integral part and a huge influence on the anarcho, traveller and free festival scenes.
Their first release was the 1979 ‘Crying Again’ single on their own All The Madmen label. 1980 saw another single the hugely popular and haunting ‘Witch Hunt’, followed later in 1981 by the ‘Ching’ cassette, soon followed by their now legendary Crass single ‘No Doves Fly Here’, both taking anarcho punk into new musically unchartered waters.
1983 saw the release of their now legendary album ‘Let The Tribe Increase’, an album that saw them moving away from the constraints of the punk sound as they continued to push the musical boundaries. This trend continued in their epic single ‘The Mirror Breaks’.
The Mob’s involvement with the counterculture saw them playing gigs with archetypal hippies Here & Now and Androids of Mu as well as being actively involved in the Persons Unknown and Centro Iberico anarchist centres and the Black Sheep Housing Co-operative.
Eventually The Mob dissolved with Joseph Porter and Curtis founding Blyth Power.
‘Let The Tribe Increase’ includes the full album, both tracks from the ‘Mirror Breaks’ 7” and a previously unheard demo version of ‘Stay’, all professionally remastered. Packaged in a 12-page booklet it contains a band history and the events that surrounded the recording of the album by Kill Your Pet Puppy fanzine editor Alistair Livingston.
Track Listing:
Another Day, Another Death/ Cry Of A Morning/ Dance On (You Fool)/ Prison/ Slayed/ Our Life Our World/ Gates Of Hell/ I Wish/ Never Understood/ Roger/ Witch Hunt/ Stay (demo)/ The Mirror Breaks/ Stay
Even more news for this great day.
This day is not only a day where the new tax year begins, The Mob CD is finally released, and Mark Wilson from that very band has his umpteenth birthday to celebrate.
This day is also the day that my little boy Aaron celebrates his very first birthday!
Happy Birthday (and much hugging) to my special little man for this day also…
John No Last Name
April 6, 2009 at 1:18 amHappy Birthday Mark and Aaron, and for the record you are at least two or three years away from being classified as senile.
D.F.
April 6, 2009 at 6:03 amVibing Up the Senile Man is a fucking classic! I heard this album through being a fan of the Mob oddly enough (I’m only 22, working backwards I guess.) so I only discovered this gem last year but wow, this and Throbbing Gristle (who I also checked out due to credit from again, Mob/Apostles) totally blew the doors off my perception of the way music could be played.
If only punk had continued growing and changing like these sorts of bands, maybe then we wouldn’t have some of the garbage that’s around today. Where’s my Alternative TV? Where’s my Mob? Shit!
Cheers to all the birthdays! Let the tribe increase!
luggy
April 6, 2009 at 10:35 amHappy birthdays to both of you!
chris
April 6, 2009 at 1:28 pmHAPPY BIRTHDAY MARK & AARON! (Micky, must meet up soon, i got the young penguin a wee prezzie in Tokyo)
Love this album! It’s funny, but back in the day it was absolutely hated by everyone I knew and was one of those albums you were always guaranteed to find a load of copies of in the bargain bin of any 2nd hand record shop you went into.Now it probaby goes for a pretty penny on Ebay.
By another twist of fate, I got my copy off a mate from school who tracked me down on facebook recently!
By the way, D.F. – may interest you to know but this LP was always one of Andy Martin’s favourites and i’d say, if such a thing could exist, was the greatest discernable influence on the early Apostles sound. In fact, I think The Apostles even recorded three of the tracks from this LP at various stages.
alistairliv
April 6, 2009 at 1:41 pmHappy birthdays Mark and Aaron.
I did not like ‘Vibing Up the Senile Man’ at the time, but it slowly grew on me.
I loved ‘The Image Has Cracked’ much more… but only just discovered the Frank Zappa influence. I just assumed “Why don’t you do me right” was an ATV song, but here is Zappa/ Mothers original
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tBHjuIYyCLM
edu
April 7, 2009 at 10:05 ammany thanks for this post.
atv and anything mark perry did is so inspiring…
—
by the way, could i make a request? “we know nonsense” LP by 49 americans.
i desperately need to have “it’s time” song on mp3 format.
happy music doesn’t have to be dumb 🙂
many thanks in advance.
best wishes,
edu
Nic
April 7, 2009 at 10:51 amHappy Birthday Aaron, and Happy Birthday Mark…
Great album…
I came to it backwards: I’d bought a couple of the ATV singles but never owned the albums…
Then (in 1980) I was sent a couple of tapes which featured some live recordings of the Good Missionaries which I absolutely loved, and found out that some of the songs were on this LP, so I went out and got a copy…
Fantastic pieces on it – ‘Facing Up to the Facts’, ‘The Radio Story’, ‘Release the Natives’…
Carol Chaos
April 7, 2009 at 11:42 amHappy Birthday Mark!
Loads of good wishes!
Carol Chaos
April 7, 2009 at 11:43 amHappy 1st Birthday Aaron!!
Have a brilliant birthday!! 🙂
Stewart
April 7, 2009 at 7:22 pmOh, I’m late! But HAPPY BIRTHDAY Penguin infant thingy! 🙂 x
D.F.
April 9, 2009 at 6:42 amChris: The Apostles versions of “How Much Longer” and “Release the Natives” were the first time I heard ATV songs actually! Until I got “Vibing…” I was under the impression that ATV were just another late 70s punk group and that the Apostles version of “Release the Natives” was just a cover done in their own style (ala their cover of TG’s “Subhuman”) How wrong I was, needless to say the insane instrumentation and endearing lyricism knocked my socks off. Found some other Mark Perry work on here and it’s just as fantastic. I wish I had heard some of this stuff sooner!
Out of curiosity, is the work ATV did post reformation any good? I’ve never heard anything about it but Mark Perry seems to have some artistic self-respect and I can’t imagine it being too bad, although a lot of reformations are…
It’s great reading the stories and being able to find all these records with backround information. Great archives for those interested in punk/music history!
Steve
April 10, 2009 at 10:39 amI think I mentioned this on another thread but ATV are playing a rare one-off (they’re basically retired now) on 16th May with the Fallen Leaves, Rob Simmons (ex-Subway Sect) great band. More details here:
http://music.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=music.showDetails&Band_Show_ID=38534033&friendid=44605025
chris
April 10, 2009 at 3:35 pmGlorious! I shall be there. ATV have seen more ‘retirements’ than the credit crunch.