Leeds based singer / songwriter IMI has made a fine impression in 2019 as one of the most promising new synth acts of the year.
Blessed with a glorious soprano in the vein of striking vocalists like Alison Goldfrapp and Tara Busch, what has also stood out is the widescreen aesthetic of her music with sharp electronic melodies and inventive arrangements.
Having previously been a member of a Goth band, classically trained IMI’s ears were drawn to her parents’ record collection; her father, a veteran of the New Romantic campaign had naturally been a fan of VISAGE so it was fitting when Rusty Egan started playing her music on his radio show.
IMI made a rare live appearance in London at The Finsbury to showcase her intelligent avant pop. Opening with ‘The Fence’ from her recent ‘Lines’ EP, a programmed warbling drop of vintage bass synth and a metronomic rhythm construction was the backdrop for an almost folky vocal before a percussive build to usher in the clouds and the darkness with a beautiful crescendo.
Two still-to-be-released songs ‘Monolith’ and ‘Pin Me Down’ demonstrated IMI’s previous flirtation with the gothique while encapsulating the filmic ambition of GOLDFRAPP circa ‘Felt Mountain’ and its delightful oddness.
On stage, IMI took up different personas in the live presentation of her songs, from serious synth girl to serene pop princess, but the rousing melodic call of ‘I Feel Alright’ saw her enter I SPEAK MACHINE mode.
With the dramatic combination of her magnificent live vocals and sampled ethereal voices while sternly facing her Moog Sub Phatty, proceedings became more sinister but strangely captivating as her delivery emotively conveyed the parradox of the song’s title in a barrage of squelch and rigid beats.
Closing the short set with the mighty triplet infused operatic statement of ‘Margins’, IMI’s musicality allowed her to cross trip hop and Synth Britannia without anyone noticing the join, before a piercing cry on the caesura.
A largely mesmerising solo performance, IMI did well to get round some minor technical difficulties. As she increases in confidence and maturity, she will only get better.
For the moment, she is a highly promising songstress with lashes of talent and a focussed esoteric mindset that will hopefully lead to more artful adventures for all to savour. IMI is undoubtedly one of the keys to a sustainable synthy future.
Alison Goldfrapp and Tara Busch need to watch out… there’s a new synth girl in town, she’s got a Moog Sub Phatty and she’s going to use it!
Leeds based singer / songwriter IMI is gifted with a most glorious soprano but not only that, she applies that and her love of analogue synths to an intelligent avant pop aesthetic.
Having opened for LET’S EAT GRANDMA, she has certainly made it clear which playground she prefers to be in. IMI’s recently released EP ‘Lines’ contains three dramatically layered electronic mood pieces that encapsulate the early cinematic ambition of GOLDFRAPP and the more recent esoteric adventures of I SPEAK MACHINE. But crucially like both of them, she does this within a song-based format.
Originally released as a single in 2018, ‘Margins’ synthetically rumbles while side-chained to a cascading train ride, cerebrally meshing brooding atmospherics with IMI’s hauntingly assured smoky high vocal, like an oddball amalgam of opera, trip hop and Synth Britannia.
‘Lines’ opener ‘The Fence’ drops incessant warbling vintage synth textures over a steadfast metronomic back beat as IMI offers a traditional folk laden topline not far off Susanne Sundfør. Building to a ritualistic percussive fervour that chillingly darkens the Northern sky, there however remains a stark beauty, marking a clear demarcation line in keeping with the EP’s theme.
Meanwhile, ‘I Feel Alright’ with its sharp melodic call and ethereal voices heads into something more threatening, with pulsing rumbles and squelches facing off against swirls and sweeps, although in this song about acceptance, it all rewardingly comes over with a strong sense of musicality. IMI’s artistic promise was there from the off with her debut single ‘Born For What?’ in 2017, but what the ‘Lines’ EP showcases is an increased confidence and maturity. With her Instagram indicating further experimentation with the Korg Mono/Poly, EDP Wasp and Moog Modular, there are certainly more artful adventures to come.
As long as there has been a music business, artists and producers have been tinkering with their work.
While often, it’s the single version made for mass consumption through radio play that remains superior and best loved, there are occasions when the album take reigns supreme due to the freedom to work on a larger easel without commericial considerations or radio play constrictions.
Often there’s a track that is the obvious standout on the long player, but sometimes it can be of a structure that is considered too long for peak time radio where instant gratification is the key. On other occasions, the vision of the track for album consumption is reconsidered following an earlier short form release produced on a more limited budget.
So as a companion list to the earlier 25 Single Versions That Are Better Than The Album Versions listings feature and restricted to one track per artist, here are 25 Album Versions That Are Better Than The Single Versions presented in chronological and then alphabetical order…
GIORGIO From Here To Eternity (1977)
Despite being a hit single, ‘From Here To Eternity’ was actually something of a disjointed disco medley, throwing in a section of the album track ‘Utopia – Me Giorgio’ halfway through. The full six minute ‘From Here To Eternity’ from the long player of the same name was a futuristic slice of electronic dance perfection, with Giorgio Moroder steadily building on his throbbing synth backbone and layers of vocoder punctuated by the steady beats of drummer Keith Forsey.
The original Fast Product single version of ‘Being Boiled’ from 1978 had its own charm, recorded as mono demo which was subsequently released. However, having signed to Virgin Records and with a budget behind them, Messrs Marsh, Oakey and Ware took the opportunity to update their calling card with producer John Leckie for the ‘Travelogue’ album to more fully realise its funky overtones inspired by FUNKADELIC. The end result was fuller and more dynamic.
Available on THE HUMAN LEAGUE album ‘Travelogue’ via Virgin Records
‘Ghosts’ had been an unexpected singles success for JAPAN in 1982 and Virgin Records wanted more of the same with ‘Nightporter’, despite it being already two years old and with the previously unreleased song ‘Some Kind Of Fool’ in the vaults. Trimming the solemn seven minute ivory laden Satie homage was always going to be difficult and the horrific radio edit butchered out the lengthy if vital instrumental climax of melancholic Oberheim OBX strings. Less really does mean less…
The album version of ‘I Travel’ was only four minutes in the first place, yet original label Arista Records felt the need to chop the track on both single edits it released and neuter its impact. SIMPLE MINDS never fully realised their potential until they signed to Virgin Records and ‘I Travel’ heralded a futuristic art rock phase where the band’s Germanic influences, coupled to synthesized disco aesthetics of Giorgio Moroder, found favour at clubs like The Blitz.
Available on the SIMPLE MINDS album ‘Empires & Dance’ via Virgin Records
Whether ‘Autobahn’, ‘Radio-Activity’, ‘Showroom Dummies’, ‘Trans-Europe Express’, ‘Neon Lights’ or ‘The Robots’, the sheer average length of a KRAFTWERK track made them difficult to apply to the single format and ‘Computer Love’ was no different. A beautifully melodic piece that predicted internet dating and stretched to just under seven minutes with its glorious second half synth solo in its album version, it was like the reel of the film was missing in its edited form.
Available on the KRAFTWERK album ‘Computer World’ via EMI Records
A UK Top 20 single for BLANCMANGE in 1983, ‘Waves’ was remixed and given an orchestral treatment arranged by Linton Naiff, but it strangely detracted from the bare emotion of the song. Sounding like Scott Walker fronting OMD, with a more basic synthesized construction and a sombre detuned brass line allowed to breathe at the song’s conclusion, the album version sans orchestra was much better. However, the original cut has yet to be reinstated on reissues of the parent long player ‘Happy Families’.
Available on the BLANCMANGE album ‘The Very Best Of’ via Music Club Deluxe
Originally recorded for a 1980 single on Mute Records in more of a band format featuring guitar and hand-played synths, ‘Kebab Träume’ was subsequently reworked by DAF in a more superior fashion under the production supervision of the legendary Conny Plank for their third and final Virgin-era long player ‘Für Immer’. Transforming into something much heavier, the memorable if controversial line “Deutschland, Deutschland, alles ist vorbei!” had more bite on this album version also issued as a single.
Available on the DAF album ‘Für Immer’ via Grönland Records
Sweden’s LUSTANS LAKEJER came to international attention when their third long player ‘En Plats I Solen’ was produced by Richard Barbieri of JAPAN. With its synthesized atmospheres and art funk aspirations not that far off DURAN DURAN, ‘Läppar Tiger, Ögon Talar’ was one of the album’s highlights. But for the later single version produced by Kai Erixon, the band opted for a more laid back swing arrangement punctuated by a brass section, which frankly was not as good as the original.
Available on the LUSTANS LAKEJER album ‘En Plats I Solen’ via Universal Music
The single version of ‘We Take Mystery’ which was Gary Numan’s last UK Top 10 hit was too short and the extended 12 inch version was too long, which left the album version from ‘I, Assassin’ as the best take of the song. With its crashing Linn Drum snap and fretless bass with live percussion syncopating on top, this was a dancefloor friendly excursion which concluded with a marvellous additional rhythm guitar breakdown from fretless bassist Pino Palladino.
Available on the GARY NUMAN album ‘I, Assassin’ via Beggars Banquet
Remixed by John Luongo for single release, ‘The Anvil’ ended up as a B-side but while the sound of metal-on-metal was added, it somehow had less presence than the original album version. Possessing far Teutonic tension with some superb guitar work from Midge Ure, metronomic drumming courtesy of Rusty Egan minus his hi-hats, Dave Formula’s superb screaming ARP Odyssey complimented Steve Strange’s tale of debauchery for one of the best ever VISAGE tracks.
Available on the VISAGE album ‘The Anvil’ via Cherry Pop
By 1982, John Foxx has rediscovered his love of early PINK FLOYD, THE BEATLES and psychedelia which manifested itself in ‘Endlessy’. Based around a tom heavy Linn Drum programme, deep cello samples and sitars, it was an interesting if messy experimental romp. Come his third album ‘The Golden Section’ recorded under the helm of producer Zeus B Held, the new version, also released as a revisionist single, was much more focussed with an accessible uptempo electronic euphoria.
A sub-ten minute progressive epic was never going to work as an edited single and with ‘And That’s No Lie’, that’s exactly what happened. The original album version was HEAVEN 17’s ambitious adventure in sound and fusion that threw in everything from abstract sonic experiments, jazz piano, Fairlight samples, the gospel voices of ARFRODIZIAK and an orchestra, plus some excellent live bass and guitar work from John Wilson and Ray Russell respectively.
Available on the HEAVEN 17 album ‘How Men Are’ via Virgin Records
ARCADIA was Simon Le Bon, Nick Rhodes and Roger Taylor’s attempt to be JAPAN during the DURAN DURAN artistic hiatus, but many of the songs from the short-lived side project were smothered in a pond of self-indulgence. One of the highlights though was ‘The Flame’, basically ‘A View To A Kill Part 2’. However for its single release, a neo-acapella intro was applied rather than the frantic percussive beginning of the album version which robbed the song of its tension and impact.
Having got DIVINE into the UK charts, Stock Aitken & Waterman gave the same treatment to DEAD OR ALIVE, scoring a No1 with ‘You Spin Me Round’. The resultant album ‘Youthquake’ had a number of excellent tracks including ‘My Heart Goes Bang’ which was ripe single material. But the single remix by regular PWL associate Phil Harding was horrible, throwing in the kitchen sink with voice cut-ups and an overdriven rhythm section which drowned out any merits the song originally had.
Available on the DEAD OR ALIVE album ‘Youthquake’ via Sony Music
Inspired by a News Of The World headline, ‘Bizarre Love Triangle’ is one of the best loved NEW ORDER tunes. The rugged self-produced original version that appeared on the ‘Brotherhood’ album was a glorious electronic number with a slight mechanical offbeat and space for Hooky’s distinctive bass. But the version released for 45 RPM consumption was a frustrating, four-to-the-floor remix by Shep Pettibone which took all the character out of the song with a barrage of overdriven percussive samples.
Available on the NEW ORDER album ‘Brotherhood’ via Warner Music
Although ‘Living In Another World’ was the best song on ‘The Colour Of Spring’, it was always going to be a tall order to successfully cut its seven minutes in half for single consumption! A fine progressive combination of synthetic strings, piano, Hammond organ, hypnotic bass, acoustic and electric guitars, percolating percussion and harmonica, the TALK TALK sound would have been nothing however without the anguished vocals of Mark Hollis and the production skills of Tim Friese-Greene.
German trio CAMOUFLAGE had a hit with ‘The Great Commandment’ all over the world including the US, with only Britain remaining ambivalent to their industrial flavoured synthpop. As with many singles of the period, it clocked in at just over three minutes but sounded rushed. Come the debut album ’Voices & Images’ and ‘The Great Commandment’ was more fully realised, allowing space to prevail in the one of the best DEPECHE MODE tracks that the Basildon boys never recorded.
Available on the CAMOUFLAGE album ‘Voices & Images’ via Metronome Music
Enigmatic Glaswegian trio THE BLUE NILE were never an easy sell to the wider marketplace and the Bob Clearmountain single remix of ‘Headlights On The Parade’ was hopeless, with over a third of the emotively atmospheric number absent for the sake of radio play. The centrepiece of the brilliant ‘Hats’ album, its haunting piano, swaths of synths and a collage of modulated sequences needed a full six minutes to truly convey its solemn drive and rainy cinematic melodrama.
Available on THE BLUE NILE album ‘Hats’ via Epstein Records
Subsonically remixed by Andrew Weatherall with a distinct chilled-out flavour and an additional vocal from Sacha Souter for single release, the brilliant album version of ‘Floatation’ had a more rigid KRAFTWERK feel echoing elements of ‘Tour De France’. And as the track drew towards the home straight, Julian Stringle’s clarinet brought to mind the aesthetics of Dave Ball’s previous residency in SOFT CELL. But while those woodwind textures were present in the single, they were less effective overall.
Available on THE GRID album ‘Electric Head’ via Cherry Red Records
Partly inspired by a quote about Zelda Fitzgerald, novelist and wife of author F Scott Fitzgerald which stated “she refused to be bored chiefly because she wasn’t boring”, ‘Being Boring’ is one of PET SHOP BOYS’ best songs, reflecting on Neil Tennant’s youth and the loss of a friend who died of AIDS. While the single itself was almost five minutes long, the superior album version featured a fabulous intro that steadily built with a lilting synth bassline and wah-wah guitar that made the most of the song’s elegiac aura.
Available on the PET SHOP BOYS album ‘Behaviour’ via EMI Records
A tedious rockist statement by DEPECHE MODE when reworked by Butch Vig for single release, the lengthy original album version of ‘In Your Room’ was widescreen magnificence with a tense percussive drive courtesy of Alan Wilder who only played what was needed, adding a second simplistic drum passage in the final half for extra weight. A fine example of how feel is more important technique, current DM drumhead Christian Eigner managed to mess up his opportunity to shine on this during the ‘Global Spirit’ tour.
The second LADYTRON album ‘Light & Magic’ is probably best known for its lead single ‘Seventeen’, but opening its second half was the brilliantly propulsive ‘Evil’. An obvious single, when remixed by noted dance producer Ewan Pearson, it was filled out with extra string synths and made more contemporary. The track lost its appealing spatial dynamics and grunt while the way in which the vocals of Helen Marnie were mixed more than muted her charm.
Available on the LADYTRON album ‘Light & Magic’ via Nettwerk productions
ARTHUR & MARTHA were Adam Cresswell and Alice Hubley; their debut single ‘Autovia’ was the first release on Happy Robots Records in 2008 but when it came to recording the album ‘Navigation’, the incessant Doctor Rhythm drum machine was given a more hypnotic Motorik makeover which ironically gave the track more drive. Meanwhile, there was an extended end section which allowed for some cosmic Theremin and synth wig-outs between the pair not unlike STEREOLAB meeting NEU!
Available on the ARTHUR & MARTHA album ‘Navigation’ via Happy Robots Records
From MESH’s best album ‘Automation Baby’, the wonderfully metronomic ‘Adjust Your Set’ with its personal relationship commentary in a technology dominated world was one of its many highlights. Given a more orchestrated remix by Nico Wieditz for the MaBose Radio-Edit with a much busier electronic bassline along the lines of ‘Enjoy The Silence’, while this single version had more obvious presence, it lacked the eerie cinematic Morricone-esque air of the album original.
‘Ocean’ was already dramatic perfection as the best track on the seventh GOLDFRAPP album ‘Silver Eye’, but for the single version, it was felt a contribution from a former member of the Mute family was needed. While Devotees were wetting themselves over Dave Gahan appearing on a more obviously electronic sounding track again, his faux bluesy drawl was something of a mismatch next to the breathy angelic tones of Alison Goldfrapp. Gahan may be from Essex but he is certainly no Alison Moyet.
Available on the GOLDFRAPP album ‘Silver Eye’ via Mute Artists
Producer and remixer Richard Philips, better known as Richard X, began his musical career creating bootlegs or mash-ups.
This was an illegal creative practice of combining two existing and often incongruous records to make an entirely new track. The fusion of disparate elements, where often the vocals of one recording from a particular genre were placed over the instrumental backing from another.
This became a fashionable practice in clubs; Belgium’s 2 Many DJs were among one of the more notable exponents alongside Richard X. Influenced by THE HUMAN LEAGUE and KRAFTWERK in particular, Richard X’s first notable mash-up under the name GIRLS ON TOP was ‘I Wanna Dance With Numbers’ in 2001; it dropped Whitney Houston over KRAFTWERK and inspired by the apparent elitism of the electronica scene at the start of the 21st Century.
But it was when he placed ‘Freak Like Me’ by R ‘n’ B artist Adina Howard over TUBEWAY ARMY’s ‘Are Friends Electric?’ for a bootleg entitled ‘We Don’t Give A Damn About Our Friends’ that figures within the music business realised Richard X’s Frankenstein vision might have commercial potential. Ironically, one person who didn’t was Adina Howard herself who refused permission for her vocal to be used on an officially sanctioned release. Instead, the British female pop trio SUGABABES recorded a cover version of the mash-up produced by Richard X and the rest is history.
Since then, Richard X has been approached to work with many artists, but remains selective, declining most of what he is offered and often only working on individual tracks, thanks to his own artistic assertion that “I’ve always been about singles…”
Richard X created his own production umbrella Black Melody to oversee his work and even released a collection of demos by THE HUMAN LEAGUE as ‘The Golden Hour Of The Future’ which had been shelved by Virgin Records back in 1981. Meanwhile as well as ERASURE, NINE INCH NAILS, GOLDFRAPP, MIRRORS, SAY LOU LOU and NEW ORDER, his productions and remixes have encompassed artists such varied as Will Young, Roísín Murphy, Rachel Stevens, Sam Sparro, Tiga, Jarvis Cocker and Lana Del Rey.
As a result of often working on just singular tracks with artists, Richard X has a large and diverse portfolio; ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK lists eighteen of his most notable tracks, with a limit of one track per artist and presented in chronological and then alphabetical order…
SUGABABES Freak Like Me (2002)
When Richard X dropped ‘Freak Like Me’ over ‘Are Friends Electric?’, a crossover hit was just waiting to be unleashed… enter SUGABABES, modern pop’s equivalent of ‘Charlie’s Angels’. This was a period when Gary Numan was being sampled left, right and centre by the likes of BASEMENT JAXX and DJ Armand Van Helden, so this Diabolus In Musica urban hybrid helped bring him to a curious new audience.
A huge fan of THE HUMAN LEAGUE, Richard X continued his mash-up magic, albeit in a more reproductive manner. When the appropriately monikered LIBERTY X came knocking, he took inspiration from the various versions of ‘Being Boiled’ and put RUFUS & CHAKA KHAN’s funk classic ‘Ain’t Nobody’ over the top, helped by the fact that both tunes ran at a very similar BPM of 103/104.
Available on the LIBERTY X album ‘Being Somebody’ via V2 Records
RICHARD X in collaboration with DEBORAH STRICKLAND-EVANS Lemon / Lime (2003)
Deborah Evans-Strickland was best known for her deadpan vocal on THE FLYING LIZARDS’ very unusual cover of ‘Money’. Richard X dragged her out of retirement for a bizarre reinterpretation of ‘Walk On By’ as well as the Trans-Commuter Express job spec art piece ‘Lemon / Lime’. Stern but strangely alluring in her posh Essex accent, she came over like the scary HR Manager who everyone is secretly attracted to.
Co-written with Hannah Robinson and based on real-life music industry anecdotes, Richard X’s GOLDFRAPP-styled production on ‘Some Girls’ saw Rachel Stevens playing a wannabe on pop’s casting couch. Driven by having his GOLDFRAPP remixes rejected, it was ‘Some Girls’ that first put the icy glam electro sound into the mainstream consciousness before GOLDFRAPP themselves.
Available on the RACHEL STEVENS album ‘Come & Get It’ via Polydor Records
“There is no you, there is only ME!” exclaimed an angry and provocative Trent Reznor on ‘Only’, but Richard X brought forward the chorus and took it down the discotheque, albeit a dark gothic one! With a frantic marimba line added and an increased dance tempo, this was one of Richard X’s best crossover reworkings that still retained the original’s heavy spirit of Reznor’s battle with alcoholism and substance abuse.
LUKE HAINES Off My Rocker At The Art School Bop – Richard X Mix (2006)
Once referred to as the Adolf Hitler of Britpop, Luke Haines’ memoir ‘Bad Vibes: Britpop & My Part In Its Downfall’ declared that Damon Alban deserved that title! An installation of danceable pop terrorism by THE AUTEURS and BLACK BOX RECORDER leader with a full fat electro mix by Richard X, this gleefully satirised the Shoreditch club scene with a bitter attack on its array of poseurs.
PET SHOP BOYS Fugitive – Richard X Extended Mix (2006)
Although the ‘Fundamental’ album was produced by Trevor Horn, Richard X powerfully extended ‘Fugitive’ as a limited edition exclusive for the fittingly titled ‘Fundamentalism’ bonus album. PET SHOP BOYS’ own post-9/11 song, Neil Tennant recently revealed in the reissued booklet notes:“It’s about a terrorist, a terrorist whose ideology is that he believes that by killing the enemy he’s going to go to heaven”.
Richard X has worked on-and off with Anne Lilia Berge Strand since 2004; ‘Songs Remind Me Of You’ was another fabulous tune from the X / Hannah Robinson songbook. Filled with high octane electronic dance flavours, “How does it feel…to hear your songs on the radio?” asked the Norwegian songstress wispily with an exquisite devenir a gris lilt over a classic chord structure inside a spiky synthesized mix.
Available on the ANNIE album ‘Don’t Stop’ via Smalltown Supersound
As a jokey publicity stunt for the Italo disco flavoured ANNIE single ‘Anthonio’, Richard X used its backing track and a new lyric by Hannah Robinson to create a brilliant tongue-in-cheek response to her tale of broken holiday romance. As a modern exponent of Italo, HEARTBREAK’s charismatic vocalist Sebastian Muravchik amiably played the role of the disimpassioned Latin lover.
Available on the ANTHONIO single ‘Annie’ via Pleasure Masters
With some slight structural similarities to Kylie Minogue’s ‘The One’, ‘Method Of Modern Love’ was again written by Richard X with Hannah Robinson alongside Matt Prime. A long-time fan of the SAINT ETIENNE, it had only been intended for Richard X to remix the track ‘This Is Tomorrow’, but he ended up producing them as they opted for ‘Method Of Modern Love’ as a new single after hearing the demo.
‘Overpowered’ was the second solo album from one-time MOLOKO frontwoman Roísín Murphy and a superb collection of soulful 21st century electronic disco. The Richard X helmed ‘Parallel Lives’ penetrated with some deep sub-bass, providing a nice bonus to an album where Murphy had gloriously sounded not unlike Lisa Stansfield fronting PET SHOP BOYS on songs such as ‘Primitive’ and Cry Baby’.
Available on the ROÍSÍN MURPHY album ‘Overpowered’ via EMI Records
DRAGONETTE Pick Up The Phone – Richard X Remix (2010)
While ‘Pick Up The Phone’ from Canadian popsters DRAGONETTE was a summery upbeat tune, their usual Euro-leaning sound took a breather with electric guitars subbing for the usual synths. But this made things perfect for a superior Richard X remix to stick back in all the electronic dance elements that the band were actually best known for.
Available on the DRAGONETTE album ‘Mixin To Thrill’ via Dragonette Inc
From ‘Head First’, the poppiest album in the GOLDFRAPP catalogue, the Richard X assisted ‘Alive’ allowed Alison Goldfrapp to explore her Olivia Newton-John fixation with a tune that recalled ‘I’m Alive’, the latter’s collaboration with ELECTRIC LIGHT ORCHESTRA for the film ‘Xanadu’. The synth solo was big and fat with power chords plus a great middle eight to boot.
Available on the GOLDFRAPP album ‘Head First’ via Mute Records
THE HUNDRED IN THE HANDS Young Aren’t Young (2010)
Hailing from Brooklyn, THE HUNDRED IN THE HANDS possessed a sultry new wave fusion with occasional gothic overtones. Despite having aspirations to be more like Warp Records label mates BROADCAST, Richard X produced a number of key songs on their self-titled debut. ‘Young Aren’t Young’ was a dreamy NEW ORDER influenced number layered with Bernard Sumner styled frenetic guitar playing.
Sophie Ellis-Bextor once fronted an indie rock band called THEAUDIENCE. Yet another Richard X and Hannah Robinson co-composition, the glitterball sparkle of ‘Starlight’ utilised a Linn Drum led rhythm section and sweeping synth strings for a dreamy electronic pop concoction. Alluringly finding “heaven in the dark”, it was one of those catchy Kylie-esque summer holiday disco anthems.
Available on SOPHIE ELLIS-BEXTOR album ‘Make A Scene’ via EBGB’s
MIRRORS Into The Heart – Richard X Radio Mix (2011)
With a determined art for art’s sake concept for their ‘Lights & Offerings’ long player, the original sessions with Richard X were abandoned when MIRRORS chose to produce themselves, although he did contribute a Radio Mix for the reissued single ‘Into The Heart’; less claustrophobic than the album version, the majestic singalong proved that Synth Britannia influences were nothing to be scared of.
Available on the MIRRORS single ‘Into the Heart’ via Skint Records
THE SOUND OF ARROWS are Stefan Storm and Oskar Gullstrand, a Swedish duo described by one observer as “Disney meets Brokeback Mountain”. Like PET SHOP BOYS fed with Fox’s Glacier Mints, the Richard X produced widescreen instrumental ‘Lost City’ was fittingly dramatic, although its main melodic theme may have been a bit too ‘Top Gun’ with synths for some listeners…
Available on THE SOUND OF ARROWS album ‘Voyage’ via Skies Above
Produced by Richard X, ‘The Violet Flame’ saw ERASURE return to form with their fourteenth album and express an infectious zest for the future with songs seeded via Vince Clarke’s pre-recorded dance grooves. With ‘Sacred’, this was another classic ERASURE pop tune, although the bizarre phrasal spectre of ‘Sweet Child O Mine’ by GUNS N ROSES could be found in the verse of Andy Bell’s vocal topline!
For the Mancunians’ first album of new material without estranged founder member Peter Hook, Bernard Sumner promised a return to electronic music. ‘Plastic’ was a full-on throbbing Moroder-esque electro number, solidly mixed by Richard X with blippy echoes of NEW ORDER’s own ‘Mr Disco’. Dealing with the issue of superficiality in relationships, it declared “you’re like plastic, you’re artificial…”
Available on the NEW ORDER album ‘Music Complete’ via Mute Artists
Produced by Richard X and Sunglasses Kid, a nocturnal warmth exuded from ‘Beyond Memory’, demonstrating how German songstress NINA’s pulsating electronic pop acted as a bridge between the sub-genres of synthwave and synthpop. With her vocals deliciously slicing the moonlit atmosphere with a superbly breathy chorus, ‘Beyond Memory’ reflected on the lifelong impact of past relationships.
Available on the NINA album ‘Sleepwalking’ via Aztec Records
Having started as a group of performers, the enterprise that is now FISCHERSPOONER consists of core members Warren Fischer and Casey Spooner, who are joined by a troupe of dancers and singers.
Fischer is a classically trained musician, while Spooner has his fingers in many pies, including performing in experimental theatre, fashion and producing various types of art.
Their first album came in 2001, named ‘1’, cleverly released on many labels, to be followed by ‘Odyssey’
With their third opus, ‘Entertainment’, the duo went to Jeff Saltzman to aid the production and the current offering ‘Sir’ is being produced by none other than Michael Stipe from REM.
‘Sir’ follows Spooner’s art exhibition of the same name, which centres around nudity, featuring himself and many of his former partners, friends and lovers in assorted sorts of nakedness. “We’re living through this sexual revolution. Everyone has a camera. People are redrawing their boundaries of what they share and what they don’t” claims Spooner, introducing his saucy enterprise, to which the newest album is a perfect accompaniment.
With the tone being “aggressively homosexual”, with love moans being used as part of the soundtrack, Spooner showcases the liberated states of today’s society.
‘Have Fun Tonight’ heralds the album as the first single, and what an entrance it is! Big, bold, full of defined synth but not devoid of good melody and sexually charged vocals by Spooner. Mantric drum rolls and arpeggiated electronic elements flow freely throughout this sublime dance track, leading into sweet oblivion.
‘Togetherness’ with CHAIRLIFT’s Caroline Polachek, sounds like vintage PET SHOP BOYS meets GOLDFRAPP, with love pains present. ‘Butterscotch Goddam’ describes the vocalist’s long standing relationship which ended, resulting in Spooner’s liberation and the discovery of endless sensual possibilities.
The apparent sleazy Brazilian trysts are being described in ear-ringing ‘Top Brazil’, which marries marvellous synth a la DEPECHE MODE with filthy lyrics, as one can never have enough of gay sex! ‘Stranger Strange’ with its offbeat tribal simplicity boils up to a hallucinating psychedelic plea to be “fixed up”, while ‘Everything Is Just Alright’ brings a heavier synth line into play.
Multiple vocals on ‘Discreet’ frolic within the realms of simple melody depicting the urgency of “now” in sexual relations, leading gently onto ‘Strut’ with its club feel euphoria and contributions from Juho Paalosmaa of VILLA NAH and SIN COS TAN. While Spooner admits: ‘I Need Love’, he also needs to ‘Get It On’.
Andy LeMaster joins in on ‘Try Again’; an arpeggiated gem full of sadness in the lyrical content, where the desperate cries for “everything I ever wanted, everything I ever needed” prevail.
‘Oh Rio’ with Holly Miranda closes the opus with an alternative twist to wrap up the record of sexual freedom, the power of choice and the beauty of partying and being able to do what one wishes, no strings attached.
Spooner muses: “When I started, the record was optimistic because I was in a happy, open, long-term relationship”, but it wasn’t to be; otherwise the eclectic, sex laden product would never surface. Fischer agrees with “The best thing that happened to this record is you getting dumped.”
‘Sir’ marks the time to play and explore and Spooner is grabbing the opportunities with both hands: “Everyone thinks I’m having a midlife crisis, and maybe I am”…
And if it wasn’t for his midlife crisis, we wouldn’t be listening to the marvel that ‘Sir’ is!
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Leeds based singer / songwriter IMI has made a fine impression in 2019 as one of the most promising new synth acts of the year.
Two still-to-be-released songs ‘Monolith’ and ‘Pin Me Down’ demonstrated IMI’s previous flirtation with the gothique while encapsulating the filmic ambition of GOLDFRAPP circa ‘Felt Mountain’ and its delightful oddness.
A largely mesmerising solo performance, IMI did well to get round some minor technical difficulties. As she increases in confidence and maturity, she will only get better.
contains three dramatically layered electronic mood pieces that encapsulate the early cinematic ambition of 
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which had been shelved by Virgin Records back in 1981. Meanwhile as well as ERASURE, NINE INCH NAILS, GOLDFRAPP, MIRRORS, SAY LOU LOU and NEW ORDER, his productions and remixes have encompassed artists such varied as Will Young, Roísín Murphy, Rachel Stevens, Sam Sparro, Tiga, Jarvis Cocker and Lana Del Rey.
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, cleverly released on many labels, to be followed by 
is being produced by none other than Michael Stipe from REM.
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