Throbbing Gristle: RFI

This would seem to be the main thing a book about T.G. should struggle to avoid. Oh well.

c'mon jess...persuasion and hamburger lady get there too!

there's one way though, that you'll never convince people
and that's when you try to be someone who's not telling
and who's trying to compel, who is trying to tell you of what to be convinced of

I can't stop listening to 20 Jazz Funk Greats. I haven't heard anything else by Throbbing Gristle. DoA is next on the list, but what else should I check out by other groups? Did anyone else ever come close to sounding this good?

start with SPK's leichenschrei. there's lots of good industrial from that time period. early cab voltaire, test dept, einsturzende. there's gotta be a thread, no?

also, you need TG's very friendly.

all ILMers are courteously invited to attend:

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2093/2416070319_f47d621bf8.jpg

this will be a Very Friendly DJ set and book reading.

Looks like a good gig, I wish I could attend.

I bought the DVD box :)

Ok, so everyone knows not to expect Front Line Assembly when they pick up TG. Still, inevitably in a discussion about TG, one gets the impression that they were just some proto-power electronics ugly pig-fucking noisefest. Even people who listen to them, or at least are familiar with the music, seem to carry this impression. I was glad to see the new(est) record destroy that legend- because even in the older material, there's as much Kraftwerk and Martin Denny influence as there is pipe-welding guitar and klangklang tape loops. My favorite record is probably DOA: The Third and Final Report. The solo tracks grew on me where they didn't catch me right away (especially "Weeping" - Gen's pathetic suicidal solo), there's the infamous weirdness of "Hamburger Lady," the solid pop of "United," the ceaselessly hilarious "Death Threats," along with the painful "Walls of Sound" and "Blood on The Floor." I mean, you just can't go wrong when you shutup and listen.

buddha gristle machine

http://cdn.pitchfork.com/media/gristleism215__.jpg

2010 dates!!

23rd OCTOBER LONDON VILLAGE UNDERGROUND, UK

30th OCTOBER PRAGUE ARCHA THEATRE, Czech Republic

2nd NOVEMBER BOLOGNA THEATRE ARENA DEL SOLE, Italy

6th NOVEMBER PORTO CASA MUSICA, Portugal

TG WILL PERFORM AN ALL NEW SET USING NEW EXPERIMENTAL ELECTRONIC EQUIPMENT,
SPICED WITH A COUPLE OF OLD FAVOURITE TRACKS.

THESE SHOWS ARE THE ONLY LIVE PERFORMANCES TG ANTICIPATE PLAYING THIS YEAR.

did anyone go to the london show?

Looks like it may have been their last, they have split up again

from twitter :

@chris_carter_ Chris Carter
⚡ ⚡ ⚡ we are about to make a SIGNIFICANT ANNOUNCEMENT REGARDING THROBBING GRISTLE ⚡ ⚡ ⚡

NOOOO they're supposed to be playing gy!be ATP in December :(

Throbbing Gristle official statement:

In the evening 27th October T.G. members and their associated managements received two emails from Genesis P-Orridge stating s/he was no longer willing to perform in Throbbing Gristle.

Cosey, Peter & Chris are therefore forced to understand that currently Throbbing Gristle has now ceased activities again as a live entity.

Therefore, and with deepest apologies, T.G. must cancel their scheduled performance at Archa Theatre, in Prague, Czech Republic on 30th October, it being too short notice to offer an alternative set.

In order not to further disappoint fans of the old quartet, and with the kind support of the associated event producers, Cosey, Peter & Chris will perform live under the name "X-TG" at the currently sold out show at Arena Del Sole, Bologna, Italy on 2nd November, & at Casa Musica, Porto, Portugal on 5th November.

We hope fans will appreciate and enjoy this new project and the trio is looking forward to performing exciting new and radical electronic musics together.

Full refunds are available at the point of purchase if required.

X-TG hope to be able to come to play in Prague very soon .

END

this has been online at the prague venue website for 2 hours now, so the word is already out...

So they're playing sans-gen at the next couple of shows, but i'm pissed off as i already have my hotel booked and travel arrangements for prague tomorrow....

doubt the atp thing will happen tho..

Curiouser and curiouser - here's a statement from Gen:

GENESIS BREYER P-ORRIDGE – HAS NOT QUIT TG !

Dear Friends,

We have seen and heard various inaccurate, erroneous, even sometimes libelous speculations about why we felt compelled to drop out of the current Throbbing Gristle tour. As a result we intend to address these matters in full as soon as possible. We hope that what we state now, and later, will be clear, will not fan the flames of destructive gossip, will not seem negative and will reduce an somewhat dramatic situation into a simpler story. We want to make it clear right now that we did not, and have no wish to quit TG. Obviously there is more involved than just that simple statement. Personally, at this point of my life, my position is that the inner workings and dynamics of any band, but especially of TG, are as intimate, unique and most of all complex as they are within any family. Unfortunately, even at the level TG occupy in popular culture, band business becomes potentially everyone’s business. We all know the internet has amplified the speed of distribution of “information” almost as fast as it has accelerated the decline of accuracy worldwide. We have no interest in pointing fingers (or is it claws?) at various people or sites and accusing them of letting the cat out of the bag. Bickering is never attractive, not one on one nor within the realms of an ever expanding media fueled by smart phone technologies and laptops. As soon as we have composed a written version of what series of events we believe led to my feeling unable to remain part of THIS short tour by the re-grouped TG that feels acceptable we will post it here.

smoke screen

http://www.factmag.com/2010/11/25/throbbing-gristles-peter-sleazy-christopherson-dies-aged-55/

:(

Aww RIP Sleazy.

Did "X-TG" make it to Italy? That story seems to suggest not.

RIP

if he died in the midst of beefing w/ Gen then that is sad upon sad

started a new thread for this... He deserves it...

RIP dude

whoa they're doing double-CD versions of the first four albums with extras on the 2nd discs... would love to get more detailed tracklisting if anybody knows.

Yesssssssss. I was just thinking they needed badly to do something like this. As long as the second disc isn't just modern live stuff.

Each release in this 'Time Capsule' series, comes with an additional disc of selected TG live performances culled from our TG24 archive recordings. They are selected to represent TG live performances specific to the original release year of each album.

I'd be surprised if there was any original-era live stuff left in the archives that hasn't already seen an official release, but let's see.

it'll be from the 24 Hours of collection i assume from that press release. it's the internet age, it wouldn't kill somebody to make that whole set commercially available again surely?

that's pretty cool. i've listened to some of that 24 hours set and there is some incredible stuff.

YES!

The new reissues sound ~sublime~

Just listening to DOA 3rd & Final now, it sounds fucking great. I'm not sure whether this unmasks the original as a horribly bad pressing, or that it actually improved this much, but this reissue sounds so much wider in scope, so much deeper. There's bass-y sounds on here I never even noticed before on the originals!

I am gonna buy the hell out of all these reissues.

Really? Shit. I passed on DOA because I got a nice second hand vinyl copy recently. Hoping to get my Heathen Earth and 20 Jazz Funk Greats soon though. Sooooo looking forward to getting the latter on vinyl now you write this though.

Well I don't know what to tell you (and congrats on your vinyl copy regardless!), but this just sounds... amazing. There's a depth I haven't heard on the original vinyl pressings, it sounds so much more spacious. Apologies if that sounds vague, don't know how else to describe it, but it sounds so much 'richer'. At long last.

Hey are you talkin' vinyl reissue or the CD?

Yeah, I recall that the vinyl reissues had appeared (and went, apparently) some months ago.

2nd Annual Report CD and vinyl were listed in the Forced Exposure update I got this morning...

The vinyl reissues came out last week. I know because I bought the lot.

I meant the cd's btw

oh. I thought you were speaking vinyl.

found

oh yeah, i have that re/search book. it's the one with burroughs on the cover, split in thirds between burroughs, gysin and TG (really mostly about genesis)

snapped a pic of the relevant page w/ my phone, can scan the article if you like but assume this is prob enough for you

https://i.ibb.co/qxr7qWG/2-FF6847-F-11-F4-4-D37-9-B53-B1195-D0744-CF.jpg

Ta, I did know that the wee girl was a daughter of a Polish friend and that TG put them in to raise questions about context and interpretation and all that stuff. Just surprised nobody tried to ban the artwork or made more of a fuss about it

well, it was quite a small initiasl pressing - 3000 copies and 1000 of those were sold by TG directly, and only those 1000 contained the calendar image.

i must have bought this circa 1984 (second hand without calendar image, as previously mentioned) and it never crossed my mind at all that there was anything about it that was shocking. maybe that says something about my teenage naievety but i also think that was probably the general concensus at the time and also that the audience who would ever have even seen a copy would not be the types to go about trying to have it banned.

however, i do remember a friend showing me the og sleeve to the scorpions virgin killer album around this same time and being very shocked by it.

i think i may have devloped middle age dyslexia.

As confrontational as TG wanted to be they were never as shocking as Loverboy.

similar to stirmonster I had the DOA album in the 80s and never gave a second thought to it, lending it out to friends etc. maybe they were less naïve and thought I was a creep with my creepy albums!
the Hatsunekaidan album (a collab between Hatsune Miku and Hijokaidan) has a cover which parodies the Scorpions one
https://www.discogs.com/release/8171232-Hatsunekaidan-Noisy-Killer

Not seen that Scorpions cover before, fuck me

Amazing that weirdos will try to trick people into paying £7 for an AI-written essay, check the cover out though.

https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/61GNTsue6YL._SL1499_.jpg

gahhhhhh

Gen looking like an extremely ugly version of Mick Tucker from Sweet there.

... or Andy Scott, one of the two.

a film student from Austin Texas made horror film in 1980 and asked Throbbing Gristle to record the soundtrack

"But how does a film student in Texas get a radical and enigmatic British band to score his debut film? He sent them a letter via their UK label, Industrial Records. Not really expecting anything, he was shocked when a month later he got a reply. “I got a letter from [founder and singer] Genesis P-Orridge and it said, ‘Sure, send us $50.’ So I sent them a $50 bill in an envelope, and a month later the reel came in the mail. Just like that. It was like, what the fuck?”

Years later, he would find out via an interview with the British music press that they’d actually recorded it on Pink Floyd’s studio equipment. What they sent him was what he called “the most coherent piece of music they ever wrote. … It’s got this boom-boom-boom-boom and when I first heard it I went, ‘That’s pretty good music.’ It was spectacular, and the theme was perfect for a horror movie.”"

https://www.austinchronicle.com/screens/new-version-of-seminal-austin-horror-brings-a-lost-throbbing-gristle-soundtrack-to-light/

!!!

Damn!

wow!

What a combination of factors!

Awesome. Would love to hear it.

This is wild!

The original short is available on the director's yt channel:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9cK-Nlp3vyg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8xICQbdbruM

It's got boom boom boom alright

So GP-O sent him a copy of "See You Are" from the Factory gig in Manchester in May 1979 and pocketed the $50?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ee8tyPvro-c

Seems a fair price tbf

ha, nice find! xpost

It's got boom boom boom alright

― willem, Thursday, 6 November 2025 bookmarkflaglink

It sure does!