Tag: Sudden Creation

Carry On Synthpop: ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK Reacts to DEPECHE MODE’s News Conference October 4th 2022

Unlike the 2013 Paris press event when the band didn’t even know the name of their new album, DEPECHE MODE’s recent news conference at Berliner Ensemble at least revealed that the as-yet-unfinished long player due out in Spring 2023 is to be called ‘Memento Mori’, a Latin phrase meaning “Remember That You Must Die!”

As with the lamentable ‘Spirit’ from 2017, it has been produced by James Ford, best known for his work with poshboy folkies and Dave Gahan’s favourite band MUMFORD & SONS.

In front of an invited audience, Martin Gore and Dave Gahan spoke to their UK publicist Barbara Charone about “boring boring” Arsenal and possibly paying tribute to their late departed bandmate Andy Fletcher by playing an old song that he liked on the upcoming concert tour; how The Drumhead Christian Eigner and The Noodler Peter Gordeno will ruin it has yet to be confirmed.

There then came a few inaudible questions from those present and replying to that almost insanely predictable question about performing “unplugged”, even the now-ungratefully synthpop-phobic Dave Gahan responded to confirm that DEPECHE MODE are “an electronic band”!

The news of fresh DEPECHE MODE activity with new sketched on a fag packet artwork by Anton Corbijn has polarised the electronic music community again; while some have been getting rather over-excited, others have taken to Photoshop to portray Gahan and Gore as successors to Laurel & Hardy.

Using a key bunker scene from the acclaimed film ‘Downfall’, Chris Mines has assembled this highly amusing and entertaining send-up of ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK – best known as the synthpop satirist SUDDEN CREATION who has never met Vince Clarke, his video focusses on numerous well-documented rants about DEPECHE MODE and Devotees over the years as a kind of greatest hits… please note, this video will probably be meaningless if your first language is German unless you turn the sound down!

The phrase “underwhelming arena show plonked into a stadium” of course makes an appearance and while ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK frequently likes to highlight Dave Gahan’s criminal past, it was during DEPECHE MODE’s acceptance speech into that dinosaur institution The Rock & Roll Hall Of Fame in 2020 when Dave Gahan remarked to his bandmates that “I dunno what the hell I would have been doing if I didn’t find music to be quite honest…”, that Fletch retorted “YOU’D HAVE BEEN STILL STEALING CARS DAVE!”

The ‘Memento Mori’ world tour comes to London Twickenham Stadium on Saturday 17th June 2023 and among the many ticket options are a Gold Circle Early Entry Package at £275. While this has been the only UK date confirmed so far, many observers predict that further dates where DEPECHE MODE will be able to downscale and plonk an underwhelming theatre show into several arenas will be announced; although many Devotees pride themselves in following a band can play in stadiums and in the rain, it is so much better indoors…

Many London-based electronic music fans will be relieved that they will have already purchased tickets on that date for PET SHOP BOYS at Wembley Arena where Messrs Tennant and Lowe will perform the songs that made them famous and that their audience actually want to hear.

However, ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK predicts utter travel chaos in the capital as next door in Wembley Stadium, as occasional synthpop exponent Harry Styles will be presenting the fourth night of his ‘Love On Tour’ residency at the iconic Middlesex complex.

Unlike their beloved Arsenal, DEPECHE MODE have actually yet to play at Wembley Stadium…


ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK gives its warmest thanks to Chris Mines aka SUDDEN CREATION

Cold War Night Life’s more comprehensive review of Dave & Martin’s Laugh-In at Berliner Ensemble can be read at https://www.coldwarnightlife.com/2022/10/04/depeche-mode-announce-tour-album/

Official news and updates on the new DEPECHE MODE album ‘Memento Mori’ and the 2023 tour of underwhelming arena shows plonked into stadiums can be found at http://www.depechemode.com

The SUDDEN CREATION albums ‘One Man Party’ + ‘Synth Boys Don’t Smile’ are available as CDs or downloads from https://suddencreation1.bandcamp.com/


Text by Chi Ming Lai
Photo by Anton Corbijn
8th October 2022

SUDDEN CREATION Synth Boys Don’t Smile

SynthBoysDon'tSmile coverOne man synth operation SUDDEN CREATION aka Chris Mines deserves an award or a straitjacket or something!

After several years of video previews and gigs showcasing his satirical but very musical songs, the Cambridgeshire based singer/songwriter has finally delivered his debut album, ‘Synth Boys Don’t Smile’. Long standing synthpop fans will also have fun listening out for geeky reference points and in-jokes. And while Mines might not be the greatest singer in the world, his delivery is sharp and honest while his lyrics make great stories, even without the music.

The actual ‘Synth Boys Don’t Smile’ title track is a joy, sending up the likes of Vince Clarke, Dave Ball, Stephen Luscombe, Chris Lowe and Ron Mael. Those with man buns and a preference for hipster hosiery need not apply… and that could be the title of a SUDDEN CREATION song in itself!

Of course, the stoney faced ERASURE and YAZOO synth maestro was the subject of one of the first SUDDEN CREATION songs to have been previewed back in 2013. ‘I Never Met Vince Clarke’ is an amusing tale of managing to meet all your heroes, except that elusive one. “Every time I’ve tried to meet Vince I have missed him…” says Mines, “And to clarify, yes I have met everyone else mentioned in the song, but no, I still haven’t met Vince …”

Lazy journalists, bloggers and ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK are the target on the highly amusing ‘Shouldn’t I Be A Girl?’ while remaining with the fairer gender, ‘The Girl Rocks’ is those rarest of things, a synthpop number using the blues scale!

Inspired respectively by MORRISSEY and MANIC STREET PREACHERS, ‘Repellent Me’ and ‘Electric Light’ explore some conventional musical avenues despite the use of synths, while also sending up the forthright miserablist overtures of the two.

Of the former, Mines says: “When someone like Morrissey makes a comment like ‘There’s nothing more repellent than a synthesizer’, it’s a bit like a red rag to a bull to me… the lyric is definitely taking comments he has made in several interviews and turning them around and firing them back at him …”

The amusing mid-life crisis referencing ‘Fat Forty & Fashion-Free’ explores the plight of older musicians in a music industry obsessed with the young, the thin and the trendy… with most artists performing synthpop being enclosed in this mature category, this most frustrating but real scenario will strike home. But it’s not all tomfoolery and high jinks on this diverse observational collection of synthpop, as the closing numbers ‘Goodnight God Bless Goodbye’ and ‘It Is What It Is’ both testify. Inspired by loss and grief, despite the mournfulness, they are melodic and hopeful. Funny, technostalgic, deadpan and tragic, all within a space of 45 minutes… yes, ‘Synth Boys Don’t Smile’ but you possibly will!


‘Synth Boys Don’t Smile’ is available on CD or download from
http://suddencreation.bigcartel.com/

http://www.suddencreation.co.uk/

https://www.facebook.com/SuddenCreationOfficial

https://twitter.com/SuddenCreation

https://www.instagram.com/suddencreation/


Text by Chi Ming Lai
27th November 2015

SUDDEN CREATION Shouldn’t I Be A Girl?

SUDDEN CREATION is the one-man synth vehicle for long time electronic music enthusiast Chris Mines.

Possibly the UK’s answer to MAISON VAGUE, Mines has described his sound as “Love, Death and middle-aged angst in three and a half minutes of synthpop…”; Certainly song titles such as ‘I’ve Never Met Vince Clarke’ and ‘Machine Man’ indicate a wry tongue-in-cheek demeanour gleefully gained by observing the electronic music scene from its fledgling Synth Britannia stages.

And none more so than with a track which Mines says was inspired by ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK! Entitled ‘Shouldn’t I Be A Girl?’, it gives an ironic commentary of the synthpop renaissance over the last five years… on paper, it seems perfect for many aspiring electronic musicians until the realisation dawns that most of the press coverage has been centred on female acts…

Using a 2009 quote that was made by this writer following the publication of Caroline Sullivan’s now prophetic article in The Guardian entitled ‘Slaves To Synth’, while ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK can neither confirm or deny any gender bias, the self-produced promo video ‘Shouldn’t I Be A Girl?’ amusingly captures that moment in time when synth girls ruled the world! However, with new albums by LITTLE BOOTS and LA ROUX seemingly rumoured to be less than synthy, maybe it’s now time for the boys to extract their revenge?


‘The Video EP’ is available as a CD now from www.suddencreation.co.uk

https://www.facebook.com/SuddenCreationOfficial

https://twitter.com/SuddenCreation

https://www.instagram.com/suddencreation/


Text by Chi Ming Lai
8th April 2013