OMD - Classic or Dud? S&D?

http://www.freakytrigger.co.uk/nylpm/2005_05_01_nylpm_archive.html#111576540197656225

kind of

ILM IS THREE MONTHS BEHIND AJA/DANTE!!!

... fuck. rats' cocks.

[1] did you get my triptych e-mail? if not, let me know and i'll re-send.

Anyway, this is all good news, no matter the timeliness.

[comment deleted on legal advice]

The album, which featured the singles Genetic Engineering and Telegraph, will be digitally remastered and will feature bonus tracks, including the full-length version of 66 & Fading. The reissue will also feature some previously unreleased material in the shape of Swiss Radio International - a track that was dropped from the original release - and also a version of Telegraph recorded at The Manor during the Architecture & Morality sessions in 1981.

Meanwhile, OMD will be back in the studio on August 7th for 1 week of rehearsals for the 2007 tour.

Andy McCluskey is also to be interviewed for a forthcoming issue of magazine The Word.

this is insanely good news. i cannot wait.

sadly, the A&M gigs planned for the autumn have been put back to next year too. oh well. gives me more time to anticipate. and maybe see OMD twice in one year. the joy!

― grimly fiendish (grimlord), Thursday, 13 July 2006 08:44 (seventeen years ago) link

that's better.

the DVD re-release of A&M sounds good too. but i still want me that remastered "dazzle ships", yo.

here endeth the newsflash.

"Organisation" and "Architecture And Morality" were ace though, and the more straight pop oriented stuff they did later in the 80s is better than its reputation.

That's for damn sure.

now, geir. we've done this. at length. you're wrong and i'm right, remember?

and the more straight pop oriented stuff they did later in the 80s is better than its reputation

yes, absolutely. in fact, at some point i might even go back and re-investigate "junk culture".

then again ...

Has this already been covered?

"Work on the forthcoming OMD album The History Of Modern continues and a provisional release date is under consideration.

Paul Humphreys has been working on the new OMD album recently and mixing work is also on the schedule. Meanwhile, Andy McCluskey is meeting with Peter Saville this week to discuss sleeve design concepts. The band are also receiving a lot of requests for licensing offers from around the world and it looks likely that a lot of deals are going to be made over the next few months.

The record label that will be issuing the album is 100% Records, who have previously worked with Moby, Placebo and The Temper Trap.

The provisional release date for The History Of Modern is scheduled for late August/early September."

Heard a track on some podcast recently and it sounded a little like Souvenir. Looking forward to this.

Souvenir = my favorite OMD track, no contest. Cautiously optimistic...

The Peter Saville thing is interesting, because it sounds like they might do something that sounds like their earlier stuff again. Also, good to hear Humphreys being back again, he didn't participate on those mostly below par 90s albums McCluskey made all alone.

New album forthcoming, new interview in the Quietus, GREAT quote from McCluskey that Tom Ewing flagged on Tumblr:

We looked at how we had constructed some of our more unusual songs, and a lot of them were made from concrete music, found sounds, and we looked at what we had explored in the past and we were trying not to repeat ourselves, and, well, we’ve done trains; we’ve done machinery. And then I actually said to myself “I realise now that everything that we’ve sampled from the real world – trains, machines, computers, guns, typewriters – they were actually accidental”. The audio that we had sampled was a waste product from the specific design function of whatever it was that we had recorded. Let me clarify that: a typewriter is designed to type things onto a page, not make a clicking noise when you hit the key. A steam engine is not designed to go ‘chuff chuff’. That’s an audio waste product of the inefficiency of its engine. And as the world has modernised, the accidental audio by-products, waste products, of the things that have become concrete music are going to be less and less because the designers have designed out the waste so that the machinery of the modern world has actually become more silent.

Read this earlier on this morning... having heard two (and a half!) snippets from the album now, I'm getting very very excited for this one!

This is closer to the "Dazzle Ships" end of town, right?

I think we should start another OMD S&D thread.

BLimey, it's all happening in music-world, innit?

mbv,
OMD,
ILX do Bowie...

This is closer to the "Dazzle Ships" end of town, right?

― Mark G, Tuesday, February 5, 2013 4:38 PM (4 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

The two and a half tracks they've previewed so far would suggest so, yeah.

New album soon! First track from same:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9PO_RkGju6M

Meantime they're playing LA and SF at the end of July -- and nowhere else (at least, so far). But that's lucky for me! Already got my ticket for SF. This'll be the first time I've ever seen them, so I'm quite glad.

Predictably, I really love this... sounds like they're moving even further in the direction they went with English Electric, which of course I wholeheartedly welcome.

Heard a clip from another track on BBC radio, it sounded pretty good to me!

So Malcolm Holmes ultimately retired?

Word has it is he is still making contributions to the new record, but Stuart Kershaw has taken over the drum stool for live performances.

looking forward to this, I've never seen them and I really like the last two records

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KUDQeREbJgc

Not really feeling this as much as "Metroland". All of this modern OMD stuff feels a bit cynical to me even if I still enjoy some of it. "You guys like 'Dazzle Ships'? HERE YOU GO!"

maybe but I'm perfectly happy a band is aping itself at it's best work.

Yeah this song is pretty fantastic, if Wire can revisit earlier albums why shouldn't OMD? If the results are this good.

I don't think this track sounds anything like Dazzle Ships, to me it sounds very much a continuation of the last couple of LP's rather than OMD circa 1983. I think the recent stuff (History of Modern onwards) has a sonic quality which distinguishes it from the earlier albums. Sure, there's a Kraftwerk influence there but that shouldn't be very surprising.

As for the track - I like it, but it sounds to me like it'll work best in the context of the album.

The themes, instrumentation, emphasis on isolated samples and vocoders - this is all the pure spirit of Dazzle Ships even if the production is updated for 2017. At best the last couple of albums are a genuine return to the spirit of early 80's OMD vs. say, "If You Leave".

The first half of that track is really just straight-up Kraftwerk, circa Autobahn/Radioactivity. If you stripped down the production a bit, it could practically pass for an outtake from one of those albums.

I don't hear any detuned guitars, toy pianos, shortwave radios or acoustic instruments treated in unusual ways on this. Dazzle Ships is a record that couldn't possibly be made again. Thematically, it just strikes me as being business-as-usual OMD. 'If You Leave' was never one of their defining tracks.

Isotope is great, sounds like OMD. The military one ... that sounded like something from Dazzle Ships.

Military themes have been part of OMD's music since 'Bunker Soldiers', the first track off the first LP.

probably an unpopular opinion but "Save Me" (bonus track on History of Modern) is amazing. probably my whole track on the entire disc. idk man I'm just a sucker for a great intro

oh, and they've got a new album out today

And it's good!

Incredibly, I haven't had the opportunity to hear it yet but from what I've heard it's going to be as good as the last one, which was great.

New Numan in a fortnight too!

So yeah, I'm on my third listen to The Punishment of Luxury now, and my general feeling is like it's essentially a sort of English Electric part II but with a few surprises thrown in there ('As We Open, So We Close' in particular... fuck!) ... however, it's also a much less immediate record than English Electric. Still, I don't get any feeling that they sleepwalked their way through the making of this record - I can hear a band very much still trying to do something different (for them, at least) and a couple of the tracks here suggest that there's still new territory for them to mine and new directions for them to follow should they want to follow them.

One thing is for sure, they're not going to be able to get away with releasing another album in this mould for their next one - that's if there is a next one. If they continue, though, I'd personally like to see them make a different kind of record - start incorporating more acoustic percussion back into their sound or instruments not commonly heard on an OMD record.

Oh, and 'Robot Man' really has no place on this LP.

Maybe in list form, but listened to? I bet it's just right!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hDDxpKJv8Qc

This is an odd beast, but kinda interesting - https://store.omd.uk.com/products/architecture-morality-singles-40th-anniversary-cd

I wonder why nothing from it ended up on the box set?

There's a very weird, faster, almost disco-y version of Souvenier and the demo of Georgia is really sweet, missing the radio clips and the sample from 'I Wish You Love' but really poppy and simple.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O5NDXBf1zGY

New album out today?

listening to it now and I'm surprised there's been no discussion of it on ILX so far. it's really good! reminds me of Electric by the Pet Shop Boys - sounds surprisingly youthful (has McClusky's voice changed at all the last 40+ years?) and modern, in fact most of these probably could be modern PSB tunes