SOCK TO THE SOLAR PLEXUS

LETTER FROM BRITAIN

SOCK TO THE SOLAR PLEXUS

by

Cynthia Rose

Time for a few home truths: your “British Invasion” may not exactly constitute a Brain Drain for us, but the U.K. is certainly not Where It’s All Happening. To give you facts (rather than sales gimmicks), this is actually Where It’s All NOT Happening. This week the nurses, teachers, postmen and auxiliary staff at various large municipal spots up and down the isles are on strike. And last night’s news showed barely-believable footage of 5,000 mounted police charging 7,000 of the miners—whose strike is in its 13th week. Two days ago, our own publisher even suspended printing the New Musical Express “for the foreseeable future.”

This afternoon in London at least 25,000 folks plodded seven miles in the sunshine to protest Maggie Thatcher’s meeting with Pieter Botha, Prime Minister of South Africa’s apartheid state. The many martyrs to its entrenched racism include, of course, Nelson Mandela—and strains of the Special AKA’s “Free Nelson Mandela” could be heard the length and breadth of the march*, .both blaring from trannies and sung by the crowd.

Botha’s visit has been allowed at a moment when British racism enjoys an alarmingly frank public profile: on May 23, the Race Relations advisor to the Police Federation referred to “our colored brethren, the nig-nogs” while answering questions from the floor at the Federation’s Annual Conference.

There was a modest outcry, but the Inspector responsible was not asked to resign from the police. He did “retire early,” which means that instead of earning 15,000 pounds over the next eight years he will now recieve 8,000 pounds pension per annum.

The truly frightening thing about this incident, though, was the response it provoked. You simply couldn’t turn on a radio callin without being deluged with waves of pity from callers for the unfortunate cop in question. I asked one venerable journalist (himself a member of Robertson’s family, whose marmalade labels are notorious for the caricature darkie—the “golliwog”— which traditionally adorns them) about the public reaction. “I knew racism existed here as a strong undercurrent,” he replied. “And of course anyone with eyes and ears knows it’s overt in many areas. But even so, I was totally and utterly shocked by the fact that almost every person who’s spoken out about this has been not just happy, but eager to broadcast their racial hatred in THE most obvious ways.”

“You were the one they’d talk about/Around town as they put you down. ” That’s a snatch of lyric from a current hit lamenting U.K. prejudice against something else: homosexuality. It’s a bit of the debut single by Bronski Beat, released on their own label, Forbidden Fruit. FF is distributed by London Records; probably a wiser choice than Trevor Horn’s ZTT, who initially chased the Bronskis but ended up with Frankie Goes To Hollywood to sell like meat on a slab.

Two of the Bronski boys-Steve Forrest and Jimmy Somerville-did leave Glasgow for reasons similar to those expressed in the single ("Smalltown Boy"). "It's a damn small town if you're not straight," says one. Down in London, they discovered gay discos, council-flat life, and ham home-electro whizzkid Larry Steinbeck, who shared their love of Sylvester and Donna Summer. The thing which distinguishes the music their resulting combo makes is Jimmy's high and keening falsetto (of course they've covered "I Feel Love"), but so far its best use is still audible on “Smalltown Boys. A majority of their other stuff so far sounds like Eurythmics outtakes, but there’s little doubt these lads mean to press on.

For one thing, they are frankly nononsense about their preferences (“not that we’re political queens!”), and it must be remembered that their first performance was merely a get-together of goodwill for London’s September in Pink gay rights fest last fall. “It’s our lives,” says one Bronski. “It’s to do with what one is and isn’t allowed to do by the law and by those in power. It isn’t just some gimmick, like old Pete Burns. Nor are we gonna limit it to looking harmless and ‘eccentric,’ like Boy George.”

For all their lack of expertise, one has to give thanks for the level-headedness of the Bronskis in the face of a persistent, neverending media deluge of bland blondes. Duran Duran, Howie Jones, Kajagoogoo, Limahl, and “Wake Me Before You Go-Go” fashion-plate Wham! are with us constantly. Almost impossible to believe, but the latter twosome’s kiddie-TV anthem “Before You etc.” is No. 1 even as I write. And George and Andy appeared on this week’s Top Of The Pops appropriately clad in Miami tans (the Miami vid cost 47,000 pounds) and cheerleader whites. Not that the “competition” scored many points for raffishness: the best it could offer was Morrisey flailing his arms and detailing his misery, while wearing a large leafy bush (in his back pocket), an expensive shirt, and a cheap brooch.

No chance of flashing pearlies, however, from the other end of what remains a stubbornly polarized spectrum (gutless wonderboys versus gothic goblin-puppeteers). At this moment I’d have to say that the latter’s star ascendant is still Nick Cave, Aussie refugee from the Birthday Party, the Lydia Lunch club, and personal friend to most of the press folk who so endorse his every effort. Cave’s been sold to me as a Man Of Charisma, a Man Of Ideas and—always a trifle suspect—a deft “self-parodist.” But all the real go on his new LP From Her To Eternity seems to come from Ex-Berlin bartender Blixa Bargeld of Einsturzende Neubauten.

Along with cutie/vocalist Anita Lane, former BP drummer Nick Harvey, exMagazine bass man Barry Adamson and guitarist Hugo Race (“introduced” from a group called Play With Marionettes), Bargeld has banded together behind Cave as one of the Bad Seeds. At best, the assertive sound on From Her To Eternity manages to drown the overloaded junkiegenre self-pity of Cave’s love-leads-to-deathbut-so-does-everything-else philosophizing. Someone present at the recording promised me Cave had “claimed” “Avalanche” for his own, but spinning it simply convinces me even Leonard Cohen wasn’t quite as corny as I’d thought. All in all, the only two tracks where vocal meets beat to yield real meat are both co-written with Blixa: “Cabin Fever!” (a heave-ho me hearties doomwatch that would make Jack Hawkins writhe in his grave) and the title track, which I will probably like if I play it enough.

Gotta see ’em onstage tomorrow night, too, but the waxings of Cave and his notso-merry men strike me as not substantially different from Robert Smith’s maunderings on The Cure’s The Top...Whether it’s the noisy virulence of “Shake Dog Shake” or the popular viewpoint of the title track’s “I don’t care,” lyrics, where the accompanying rhythm section actually sounds like sickly raindrops dripping down.

TURN TO PAGE 68

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 22

It should be said by someone that the life is but corrupt putrefaction corps and their increasing, enthusiastic constituency is not unconnected to Britain’s very rapid rise in heroin addiction—just as our market glut of vacuous blonde boys and men in skirts bears a definite relation to the large percentage of male homosexuals in these isles. Possibly the most refreshing thing about three lads like Bronski Beat is their complete lack of interest in beating about the bush. “Christ,” says Jimmy Somerville, “all our old mates in Glasgow are hairdressers now—what a cliche! And here we are tryin’ to break down these stupid stereotypes.”

Since late ’82, fellow Scots So You Think You’re A Cowboy have tried to do the same to the British view of C&W. A market Research and Opinion International Poll recently proved (much to the delight of London’s branch of the Country Music Association) that 49 percent of the British public actually preferred country to any other genre of music but pop. Yes: strange as it may seem, Crystal Gayle, Johnny Cash and Dolly the P are as familiar to the majority of the U.K. listening public as Boy George, David the B or Eurythmics. So You Think You’re A Cowboy, however, are only one of a number of young bands using the form—many inspired by ’82’s Costello tour when The Imposter was supported by Rank & File.

Unlike the Boothill Foot-Tappers or the Skiff Skats (both London-based), Edinburgh’s So You Think bunch can handle a full live set. Vocalist Annie Foy—formerly a dancer with the Revillos—comes on strong as the working-class wife who sets out for Wynette-style independence on new 45 “Don’t Need You.” And a doughty bass-line from former Flowers player Frazer Sutherland plus a light-headed fiddle from Kenny Brady add a spot of spring to this band’s dosie-do. But country pop in Britain still seems dogged by the spectre of the pub; it can’t quite shake the same leaden touch which has always weighed on U.K. rockabilly.

Cyndi Lauper made ’em pay in her one-off gig at the Lyceum. By turns ragged, touching, exhilarating, startling, irritating and surprisingly subversive, her set was above all always under control. Few times in my life have I seen ah audience made to squirm quite so much for the sins they inflict on female performers in general.

Every ounce of it—the Betty Boop-fromBrooklyn tones, the tiresome monologues, the unbearably un-funny jokes—was intended, too. Intended to jolt to an abrupt end every time this Lynda Barry cartoon of a modern Miss opened her mouth to SING.. .And soared so high and so wildly that she vaulted her own showbiz shtick by a mile, catapulting her listeners into a zone of sincerity so serious it was almost scary. All through “All Through The Night,” Lauper clutched the hand of a fan who had grabbed her as if it belonged to some drowning relative. And anyone thick enough to have been suckered in by the cartoon she adroitly fleshes out probably picked their ears right up when Lauper announced (in a perfectly “normal” voice) to her front-row hecklers: “So you want a dirty song? Alright, here’s a really dirty song. ‘MONEY CHANGES EVERYTHING’!”

And so it does—not just here or there but everywhere. Bear that in mind when the next deluge of paid-for pap comes your way, supposedly straight from US CENTRAL. My colleague who sighed when he put down his latest report on the “British Invasion” and opined “Sometimes it seems like the whole world has turned into one big Day-glo sock” had your interests as well as his own at heart. ^