Minimal Compact - Deadly Weapons / Next One Is Real CD

Despite the Colin Newman ties, Minimal Compact made long-limbed post-punk from a bleaker, less-spastic perspective. Deadly Weapons emphasized the situational decay of a lot of what had become standard in early-'80s anti-pop. Minimal Compact's world was stiff and artificial, made to underscore the bizarro funk of the brass and the woefully droning and distorted vocals. Everything, in fact, was swollen with a phobic sense of performance, as if the band was afraid to touch their instruments.
"There's Always Now," an exaggerated shadow play of the Cure's Pornography, is still fantastically depressing; the title track is almost synth pop in spirit; and "The Howling Hole" is a mangled interpretation of a repetitive, barely decipherable, tribal-drum Middle Eastern snarl. Underappreciated, if nothing else.

Label: Crammed Discs

Country: Belgium

Media Condition: Near Mint (NM or M-)
Sleeve Condition: Near Mint (NM or M-)